202: Build Greater Business Success By Answering Three Key Questions, with Laura Khalil

Hello Kathy here and thank you so much for tuning into today's episode. One quick thing I'd love to share is about my new digital training course the Most Powerful youl, which is the companion to my book the Most Powerful seven Bravery Boosting Paths to Career Bliss. I'm so thrilled that recently a division of the largest intergovernmental agency in the world sponsored several memberships to the Most Powerful U course for members of their staff. And what a powerful move that is in terms of bringing real world effective training to both men and women to help them thrive in the workforce. Coaching so many people, as I do each year, I see that leadership and career growth training programs today are so.

Often not effective because they simply don't go deep enough to address what really holds us back from thriving.

Believing in ourselves, understanding our talents and.

Abilities, communicating effectively, asking for what we need and deserve, networking to build a.

Great support community, and making the impact we long to so I'd love to make an ask of you and that is to briefly take a look at what I'm teaching in the Most Powerful.

You course and you can find that@mostpowerful.

You.Com and if you feel that the content about the seven damaging power gaps and how to close those for good would be helpful for you and people at your organization, I hope you'll ask your supervisors, HR leaders, and diversity and inclusion managers to sponsor memberships of this course for you and other staff so.

That you can all thrive at the.

Highest level in your roles and organizations. Thank you so much. And here's to you becoming the most.

Powerful you Cash loves clarity and the clearer that you can be on who you serve, what you provide, how you help, the more referable you will become, the easier it becomes for people to talk about you, the easier it becomes for business to come into you. And that's how we transform businesses.

Hello everyone, this is Kathy Caprino and welcome to my podcast, Finding Brave. I've created this show for everyone who longs to create something bold and brave in their life, to rise up, speak up and stand up for who they are and to reach their highest and biggest visions. Each week I'll be speaking with inspiring guests from all walks of business, leadership, entertainment, the creative arts and the entrepreneurial world. And they'll be sharing their intimate stories of Finding Brave and offer their best strategies for building their most rewarding, joyful and meaningful life, business and career.

Hello everybody. Welcome to another episode of Finding Brave. I have recorded several in one day today and I just couldn't be happier. I'M pinching myself all over the place. What joy. And today, this minute is no exception. We have the beautiful Laura Khalil here with us today. Coming back, we. You were on, I think, well, our wonderful editor Matt Repeat will tell us what exact episode I think it was 119. I do sound like I was underwater in that episode. So I think let's hope that. Let's hope the audio is better. I'm so happy to have you, Laura. Thank you for your time.

Oh, thank you for having me back. It is, you know, what the audience never sees is the friendship that you and I have developed since recording these episodes. And I am so in awe of the person you are. I just want people to know the person they hear is the person you are. And there is so much integrity in the work that you do and there is so much kindness and empathy in the work that you do to empower and lift up women. I'm just a pleasure to be here with you again.

So kind. Thank you. And I know this is going to sound like a mutual, you know, love fest over here, but I wanted to tell you, first of all, people, Laura has now become a sponsor for finding Brave Laura and her business. I'm just so, you know, we were just this minute talking about surrounding yourself with people who make your heart sing and make you feel safe and understood and not, not that you can't get challenged, but, you know, really good people who are so committed to doing good work.

And that is Laura.

So I'm so thrilled.

Thank you, Laura. Thank you, Kathy.

And I wanted to tell you a little bit about, you know, give you Laura's bio. We also have to link to. I joined you on your LinkedIn Live recently. You did my first LinkedIn Live as.

A guest, talking all about the power gaps, which if people have not heard that yet, it is, it's, it was a talk that I don't think anyone wanted to end. I got so much positive feedback on that from people who were learning about the power gaps, learning about how to rise. It's a really great episode. I love that LinkedIn live. Everyone can go find it on my LinkedIn. We will put a link.

Thank you for having me. All right, everybody. We are talking about build better business success by answering three questions. I can't. I know I'm going to learn. Time to build more success over here. But let me tell you about Laura. Laura is the founder of Brave by Design. I mean, we just flipped when we realized how much bravery is the thing for us. You know, she is Focused on rebalancing the scales. I sit up straighter just saying this.

Rebalancing the scales of financial justice for women.

Laura helps consultants and creatives go from burnt out to building thriving businesses filled with dream clients in only 30 minutes.

A day, even if they hate sales and marketing.

All right, but, so let me just, let me just go dive right in and you know us that we can't even, we can't even fib here. We are just going to tell, tell it like it is. But Laura and I were chatting. I have a bugaboo about a lot of things, but this one is really on my top 10. And I really want to hear your opinion. There are so many people in your field, which means helping entrepreneurs and small businesses thrive, which includes making more money. But it's not just that who I feel are. I mean it sounds like an old.

Fashioned word, but charlatans get steak oil.

Salesmen, snake oil salesman, if they don't have the goods. And even if they made a million doesn't mean they know how to teach you how to make millions. Because they're making millions from people like you or me that need help desperately. And that's not how. No, don't get me wrong. They need help desperately, but they're feeding on that. This is how I see it. They're feeding on that without the chops.

To move the person forward.

So you're really in this field. I'm not necessarily focused on, you know, financial success of female entrepreneurs. Can you tell me, is that an over exaggeration what I just said there or.

No, I don't think that is an over exaggeration. I think that there are a lot of people who have very, very slick advertising and marketing and that their businesses are more focused around spending tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars a month being in your face through very slick advertising and marketing. And they will leverage that to then create really expensive programs that they have to pay for. Right, because they've just spent a million dollars running ads. So now we have to put pay for a program or get people into a program to pay for that. And so we will sell them based primarily around what, Kathy? Fear. Fear of loss, fear of not having enough, fear of being left behind, fear of being poor, fear. I mean, this is triggering, right? I'm talking about all this.

It's triggering me. It's making me feel very agitated. And then listen, let me ask this. You know, when people come to me, they're in a state of fear too. I mean, they don't have what they want in their careers. But there's this other ingredient that I think that makes it really awful, which is I don't think the vast majority of them have the goods to help people out of their condition. What do you think? Am I wrong?

No. There. And I just want to say this. I'm going to talk today about building business success. But what I'm going to tell you about anyone who is trying to sell you a product or program. There are no secrets. There are no secrets, folks. All the information to build a business is online or at your library. And you can go find it and you can go download it and you can go get it for free. What a coach is meant to do is to help guide you through the process of taking that information and modifying it and using it in your business. And if you are going into a program, I just say this as a warning. If you are going into a program where you will not talk to a human being and you will not get actual real help, boots on the ground help, please find someone else. Find someone who will work directly with you because they are the ones who will help you implement that knowledge in your work and do it consistently.

Ah, let me unpack this in two ways and then we have to talk about, you know, how you help women and men. You said two things that I want to hit in.

Gosh.

When. When people speak a truth that is not spoken much, like literally, I feel something here.

Yeah.

What Laura is saying as I hear it is there are no secrets. Meaning no one is going to give you this magic bullet that you. That is actually in a second going to change your business. It isn't going to work like that now. I was just speaking with Michael Bungay.

Stan your.

Stan your.

Gosh, say it right, Kath.

And he said things that unlocked an understanding in me and that resonated in a deep way. But I wouldn't say it was a secret revealed. So when people say that they are, they're playing on your belief that you are not enough, that you don't know enough, that you need this secret. Am I right?

I. That I have a magic potion that if you take my magic potion, you will be out of pain. That is not true. As. Kathy, listen, you and I are entrepreneurs. We know that business is built on consistent daily action towards our goals. We know that this road is not always easy. We know there will be highs, there will be lows, there will be lulls. And that is the truth of business. Not, hey, you can suddenly make a million dollars in 30 days, that type of stuff, it preys on a very specific type of consumer. And frankly, those are not the people I work with because the people I work with understand that they're going to have to put in the work. But yeah, it's a dangerous game out there. And so I say to anyone who's seeing lots of ads for someone or is put in a very slick marketing funnel, and they realize that what that person is selling is a secret and what they're selling is not actually access to a real human being who will work directly with them in the business. I would advise you to find someone else because there are no secrets.

And one more thing about this and then we're going to talk about your work. The second piece that I don't hear said often enough. You can. A lot of people say to me, how come I've read 50 self help books and taken 42 master classes and why am I still stuck? Because it's not insight that actually gets you to change, it's action. Now a lot of people say, oh, that's just not true. Well, I'm sorry, but I've been a therapist, I've been a. You know, you can have an insight that makes you say, wow, but it's how you apply that insight. And it's action and it's brave. Action, brave by design here. And, and you need a person to help you with that.

Usually we all need help. And I don't care if you're listening to this folks, and you're saying, well, I don't need to start a business. Great. You have Kathy to help inspire you along your journey. We all need mentors, we all need advisors, we all need guides for the areas in our life where we are struggling and challenged. The worst thing to do is to block yourself off from it. But any good guide, any good mentor, any good advisor will be telling you to get out of your head and start getting into action. Because to Kathy's point, that is where everything changes.

And you know, you're right about mentors. They also can be a mirror to, here's what I'm seeing and we need that. It's getting out of your head. I adore it.

I love it.

All right, now let's start here. Thank you for that. That was so helpful.

You talk about rebalancing the scales, you know, of financial justice in favor of.

You know, I think you're talking equality here. I mean, I don't want people to go, oh, here we go, now we're flipping it. I mean, this is what People have said around feminism, what people say why they hate it is we don't want the women to wear the pants and run everything. We're not saying that, we're saying we want equality and we're not there at all.

Right. Would you agree?

Exactly. So for example, million dollar businesses. Only 2% of women can build a, or have built million dollar business.

2% of the million plus million dollar plus businesses are founded by women at this point.

That is correct.

2%.

In addition, men are 4 and a half times more likely to make more money to grow half million dollar businesses to grow million dollar businesses to excel and reach those points than women are. It's not about, and this isn't about putting men down. It actually has very little to do with men. It's about helping women know their worth, see bigger picture and be able to go after it confidently.

I have a question for you. Let me ask you something. Can I, I think that, you know, this is what people say about my work. There's the individual element which we focus on helping the individual do and be and feel and communicate and connect the way they need to. But I do have to ask what you think. I think that truthfully, the sad truth is we can do all that and we still have a societal problem. Well, we know this. I mean, funding goes, VC funding, you know, whatever goes towards 98%. I don't know, we'll get the number towards men. That's not all because women aren't doing the right things. It's because society skews towards believing men can do this better. Would you agree?

Yeah. And it's, it's no change, whether it be in our society or in us individually, happens overnight. Everything is taking steps towards that. So you know, the way I approach business, the way I work with clients is I say what can we control? I can't control all of society that's out of my control. But I can make a lot of change with one person.

That's how I feel.

We can affect our communities one person at a time and that has a ripple effect. And that's where I, that's where I like to hang out.

So beautiful.

And I always do say, you know, we believe what we see. When we have more women doing this work successfully, whatever work you want, the society begins to see it and believe it. So we can't wait for some amorphous cultural shift. We've got to make that shift happen. So you're on the same page. All right, now let me understand here. We're going to talk about these three questions you have to ask and you have to answer. Is there anything we have to do before that? You know, we have to. The secret. Answer these three questions.

You'll be rich. Here's the secret. The secret. You know, honestly, people have to know what they're selling, so. And that makes. Kathy, you look shocked that I'm saying that. I just love it because.

Because we don't. We think we do when we don't. But tell us, what do you mean?

I meet a lot of entrepreneurs. Typically, people will come to me when they are under 250,000 in annual revenue, and they'll say, I'm stuck. I'm trapped. I don't know what to do. They can be anywhere from 50,000 to 250, something like that.

I love that niche because it's a fun.

And you know what they'll say to me? I don't really know what I'm doing. I don't really understand the products that the client needs. I don't really understand what I'm selling. People are just maybe buying things you would not believe. Huh.

Well, wait, yeah, I understand. Like, they sold something. If they're in entrepreneurs, what they think, how did that happen?

So they'll say, well, someone just asked me to do some design for them, so I did some design. And then someone came in and they, you know, asked for a website. So I did that. And, you know, they've been around for a while. And so it's not an intentional business. I see. It's. It's sort of like whatever's blowing in the wind, they might sort of pick up. And it's sticks to them like, you know, like a piece of trash just sort of sticks to you. And then that's only in the New York subway that's happened to me, but.

Oh, I love New York.

Don't get me wrong.

All right, so if they've. They've kind of the app. What's it called? The Accidental Entrepreneur.

Right. What are you really selling? What are you actually offering to people? That is the question we ask before we get into the three questions. Do you understand what you're selling? You would be surprised how many people say, I don't really know. And that shocked me.

Can you give us an example of. I mean, you can even use my work or someone, a client, whatever. What's the before and after of that? So they might say, I don't know. You know, somehow I got into. And I'm sure they're. They think they're more intentional. But look, I Studied design in college. Then I was a marketing person. But then someone asked me to do a website.

And.

And then I realized I kind of like that. And then their friend asked me, and now I'm doing some website design.

Now I'm doing websites.

Is that the. And then after working with you, what might they say?

They will say, I'll give you. I mean, this is. You're actually. I feel like, Kathy, we're like psychically connected right now because you're. You're. We know that. Right. You're telling the story of one of my clients. So I actually had a client come into me and they said, well, you know, we've been doing website copy, We've been doing websites, we've been doing ads, we've been doing graphic design. We're burnt out, we're overwhelmed. We don't really know what we should be focusing on, what we really like to do. That's the before. So we take them through these questions we're going to go through. And the after of that came to this. Now, this is what lights them up. I say this to the audience because you may hear this and think, well, I don't want to do that. You don't have to. They said at the end of our discussion, we are really excited about working with specific franchises. Yes. In the metro Detroit area to build their websites. We had a plan for outsourcing the design. We had a plan for outsourcing the development. We had a plan for how they were going to find the clients within six weeks. Within six weeks. 25x the revenue. Okay, so that's what I'm talking about, is people just sort of take things and then when we get intentional and we move forward with the questions I'm going to present to the audience, things can shift, things can move. I have said this. I don't know if I've ever said this on your show, but I'm going to say it now to the audience. Cash loves clarity. Oh, that's a tweetable.

That's going to be the high highlight quote.

Cash loves clarity. And the clearer that you can be on the. Who you serve, what you provide, how you help, the more referable you will become. The easier it becomes for people to talk about you, the easier it becomes for business to come into you. And that's how we transform businesses.

I love it. I have one funny little flip to that that I want to bring up and hear what you think. It feels like the opposite of what you said, but it isn't. Can I. Can I share it and get your.

I can't wait.

I have noticed in 16 years of doing this work. So I'm listening not only what the listener needs to hear. What do I need to hear? And I am. I've followed you and completely agree with everything you've said and made all these mistakes. And what I noticed in my private coaching is that, you know, the first time I ever had to charge anything, I, you know, said maybe $75 an hour. And then 100, and then I thought maybe 200. Coughed up a hairball saying it, right? I mean, I think 200. Now it's more than that. But every single time I've had an exponential increase in the price of a package or here's what happens. I had clarity that it was the actually, I had clarity that it was time to raise prices. The actual number is hard to come by. It doesn't just appear. You know, when I made that jump, what happens is this. The universe goes dark. I want to explain what I mean, all of a sudden, there's a vacuum that goes. And for what I always experience is in the first few weeks to a month, inquiries stop. And I think, oh, I've overpriced it. I've screwed it up. And then when the price is right now, I've gone too much in one fell swoop. When the right increment has been hit, they come flowing back in with greater abundance. So what I want to say to people is cash loves clarity. When you get clear that this is what I should be charging, sometimes you're not quite ready for that clarity. But even if you are, that vacuum feeling is. Matt's going to edit out that sound, I'm sure is, I think, because you have surrounded yourself with people that were comfortable at that lower level price.

Yep. You're ascending.

You are ascending.

You're ascending.

Ascending.

You have ascending. You are creating. You're making space. That clearing out that void is literally creating space for new people to come in who meet you at your new level.

That's it.

So don't get afraid, people. It feels scary. You can almost actually tangibly feel it, that space being made. I love it. Thank you for explaining that.

Love it.

Hi, Kathy here.

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All right, now tell us the three questions. I'm going to take notes and answer them.

Okay.

To myself.

So we figured out what we do for a living. We figured out how we serve people first. That's the pre question. All right, you got to figure that out. Question number one. Do I have an extremely clear target market that I can easily reach?

Target market that I can easily reach.

Now let me break this down for you because I'm going to use some terms that are a little bit different than what you would hear from a typical marketer.

Fantastic.

I talk about three things with my clients when we start. The ideal client. Those are the traits, qualities and characteristics of the type of person I want to work with, with. So that could be. I love working with women who are in midlife. I love working with women who have a great sense of humor. I love working with people who are eager to pay their bill on time. I love working with women who are coachable. Okay. Those are traits of the ideal client. The second thing we look at is target market. That is, where do those ideal clients live and exist? What industry, what location? How do I find them? And I want to give you for this second part what I call the camp test. To test if you have found your target market.

Is it the camp like, oh, I'm going to camp.

Test. I'm going to camp. We're going to camp. Everyone camp. Okay, Exactly. These people get on the bus with you to go to camp. You have picked a target market that will help you get business, help you do that thing you want to do. If they have a conference, an association, a meetup or a publication camp, conference, association, meetup or publication. So if I have a target market, and let's say my target market is fintech, okay, I'm going to pick that. Fintech in New York City. I'm just going to pick that as an example for our audience. Do they have a conference? The fintech people and possibly New York? Yes. Do they have an association? Yes. Do they have meetup groups? Do they have things that I can go attend, where I can go speak, where I can go find people? Yes. And do they have a publication? Yes, they do. They have publications online, they have print publications. I can find places to go speak to, have my name put in writing to reach that audience. And if you can say yes to all four of those areas in the camp test, y', all, we're going to camp, we're going to make some s'. Mores. We're going to have everyone around the campfire with us, learning from us and saying, wow, that person seems like they're everywhere and that's what we want because we've picked a specific target market.

Oh, yeah, I got a question.

Go for it, Kathy.

Isn't that like everybody on the planet, like even now with social media, the tiniest niche, dog walkers with red hair that I'm not trying to be facetious, who live in blah, blah, blah, don't they? Maybe they don't have a conference.

Maybe that's it.

But let me put it. Do some people come to you and they that their target market doesn't have these things?

Kathy, 90% of the work I do with people is picking target market. People will fight me, fight me on picking a target market. And if there's an entrepreneur listening to this who is struggling to get clients, you may be saying to yourself, well, I help everyone. I don't want to turn people away. If I turn people away from my business, then I won't have enough business. And what I'm trying to explain to people is that the more we get specific about who we serve, the easier it is for them to find us, to search for us, to get referrals to us, to hear us speak to our name in writing, the easier it becomes when we niche down.

So true.

Get very, very specific. People do not. This is. Most finance problems in business are related to target market problems. Not always, but often.

I mean, I think I've shared this story, but when I was just starting out with my first website and I used a wonderful branding guy, Robert Friedman, Fearless Branding. He said, I think we should call you, you know, women's coach. I'm like, oh no.

Oh no.

And he said, why not? And I said, well, I'm afraid of losing half the population. He said, didn't you just tell me you love it when women are on your calendar? Yes. Didn't you just tell me you spent a year researching your book? Breakdown, Breakthrough. About women's. Yes. Didn't you just tell me that you move women forward so much faster and men, you know, a certain kind of men will move forward, but not the kind that don't want to be vulnerable. And that's many men. Yes. Why wouldn't you want to call yourself a women's coach? So what I know to be true, Laura, and I'm sure you do too. It's just fear, right? Fear that I will cut out 90% of the population. What they don't understand is you get so magnetic because you serve that niche so well that other people will come to you. But even if they don't, you're rocking it in your swim lane.

Yeah.

They will come and they will feel like you know them. They will feel like, oh my gosh, they're speaking my language. Because you are, you are speaking their language. But you can only do that when you get very specific about target market. And to your point, Kathy, often we already know our target market, but we're sometimes afraid to say it. We're afraid, but getting out of that lack mentality, that scarcity mentality, and saying, there is so much work here, even if I only served one city or one region, I could have worked for days.

Wow.

I could have worked for years. That, that, that's, that's a huge, huge game changer. I love it.

Can I ask you another dimension of that and tell me what you think. You said the target has to be and you broke it down into two things. I mean, yes, they have to have these things or they have to be easily reachable and definable. I gotta ask you one other thing, and maybe this comes later in the pipeline, but I find that I wrote somewhere, if you don't like the people you serve, they won't like you back.

That's the ideal client.

It's right. So would you say. I think I would say this to someone who's just beginning. In the world that I live in, coaching or training, sometimes we can't begin with the ideal. We know what it is. It's mid to high level professional women who are blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. In the beginning, I don't have the reach perhaps to have only that, but I certainly know what the ideal is. So what I also see is people cast. They're starting and they're desperate for money, so they cast the net too widely and they don't actually like or enjoy the work of helping that person that they chose to help for the money. What do you think about this?

Well, I want to say one of the philosophies that I believe and that I share with clients is that you and your business is one of the most important relationships you will ever have in your life because you will be in your business for eight hours a day, 10 hours a day, whatever it may be, till you're up and running. And so why not work with people we like? Why not choose people we like? So I talk about ideal clients. I talk about finding those people that have those traits, qualities and characteristics that we gravitate towards. And often they're kind of like us. You know, there's some similarities there. Now, we typically, and even I experience this where I am at my business. We will. I don't want to say often, once in a while we will have ideal client violations where we will get into business with someone and we'll say, oh, shoot, that was a mistake. Oh, man, I shouldn't have done that. And every time we do that, it makes us smarter to learn and refine and get better at that ideal client and who gets in. So, yes, it is normal in the beginning of starting a business that you may take on people who aren't ideal because you're trying to grow the business. But we want to always keep that in mind of saying, I want to say yes to more of the people that excite me. And I want to get to the point of saying no to people who do not excite me, who drain me, and who make me hate life. Because why would you want to work with them? So I will say this. Let me say one other thing, Kathy, because I don't want to, you know, crap on people who we don't like. I had everyone who we don't like. I guarantee you there's someone else who would love to work with them.

That's right.

So having it is having strong referral partnerships is so important. I had a call with a woman a year ago who I wanted to tear my eyeballs out because I could not. I was just like, I can't do this. This is going to kill me. And I had to turn her away. And a few months, but I didn't have someone to refer her to. And I have a big belief in my business that if you come and work with me or even if we have a conversation, I want to leave you better off for having met me. I will work hard to try to give you a referral if I don't feel I'm the right fit. And I couldn't think of anyone because I said Gosh, this woman is a nightmare. Who would want to work with her? Few months go by and I'm telling this story and I'm explaining what she needed, and this woman says to me, that's exactly who we love to work with. You've just described our ideal client. And I said, really? And they said, that's who that we love people at that level who are like that. We help them. We love the high touch. I said, great, I know who to refer people like that to in the future.

Yeah, I want to stop and amplify this. I can't describe how important this is because, number one, it helps you recognize a fact that you don't necessarily want to recognize. You are not perfect for everyone.

No.

And when. So I built a coaching team, some that serve high level CEO males, some who serve whatever in other countries. I am so overjoyed to send these dear team members, people who I can't and don't want to serve. It's such a win, win. But first you have to recognize you're really not perfect for everyone. And I think that that's just a hard thing for people to understand in the beginning, don't you?

Well, you know, the easier you understand that message, the faster, you know, faster.

You'Re going to grow and the faster.

You'Re going to grow. I don't know if it's the ego so of hanging on to needing to be liked. If so, maybe evaluate that. But one of the, one of the lessons that I learned very early on in business is someone said to me, Laura, about 30% of people are just never going to like you and just get used to about 30%. They're not going to be crazy about you. Don't focus on.

Great tip that you got. No one ever said that. I kind of had to learn it the hard way. Oh, she doesn't like me. Doesn't like my approach at all.

Okay. And we feel bad. We feel bad when someone doesn't like us. But when you realize that's just nature. Do you like everyone? I don't like everyone that's normal. It doesn't make them a bad person. It simply means they challenge our values in ways that are not compatible. It doesn't make them evil. It doesn't make them the worst. It just makes them not right for us. And that's okay.

So good. All right, are we on to question number two now?

Number two, so I want you to imagine before I, before I tell you the question, I'm driving down the street, I live in metro Detroit. Quote, unquote, Motor City. But we have absolutely horrific roads, tons of potholes in the winter. It's a nightmare. We have, we, we have, we like to call it, we have two seasons, winter and construction season. So I'm driving down the street, get a hit up smack into a pothole, get a flat tire, get to the final, you know, get to the garage. We're going to fix it. And the guy comes up to me and says, so I see I have a flat tire. You can't move the car forward. You need the tire fixed. But before we address that, I'd love to talk to you about getting an oil change and your repair policy. If you have a warranty on the car and you look at him and I'm thinking, what in the hell are you talking about? Fix the flat tire.

What a mistake.

Then we can talk about warranties or we can talk about oil changes. We can talk about anything else. But I have a flat tire right now, and I need to fix the flat tire. Question number two. Does my service offering pass the flat tire test?

So tell us more. Tell us more.

So a lot of people will think they know what someone wants to buy, but the fact is that people look for solutions when they're having a very acute problem, such as a flat tire. So as a business owner, it is very wise to be able to recognize when people start looking for solutions and then to offer something that may help solve that initial pain. Okay, that's. So for example, I work with accountants. When are people looking for solutions? Tax around tax season. Right. They're looking around tax season. So we're going to set them up in the business so that they're addressing tax season. They're talking about tax season coming up. They're talking about how they help clients during tax season. So that when that arises, people say, oh, my gosh, it's tax season. Who can help me Google for it? All this SEO is built around tax season. They've have. They are known as the tax person. Oh, that's exactly who I've got to talk to. You know, that's what we talk about. Fixing the flat tire rather than just fixing. Yeah, there might be other issues that they want to deal with, but they're not really immediate. They are not really pressing challenges. You know, one thing I see a lot now, which is taking off are career coaches. I see a lot of career coaches who are doing very well. Why? Because everyone is switching jobs. People are looking for new opportunities. This is a moment in time where your messaging and your product or Service offering can be targeted towards that and say, hey, are you part of the great resignation? Are you reshuffling? Are you figuring out what your next step is? This is what I do. I actually have a package exactly for that. Whoa, you do? That's my exact problem. You know, it's talking to people in terms of what they need again, it's removing that. We talked about the ego before. It's removing the ego of saying, well, here's what I think you need, and saying, how can I serve someone right now and help them get out of this pain that they're in and bring them to a place where they feel so much better about their life, about their business, about their emotional wellbeing. So, you know, that is the flat tire test. Does it pass the flat tire test if you're service off? Yeah. So there you go. That's number two.

I love that I have something to.

Ask you about with that. When, you know, obviously I am a career coach, people will come to me in acute pain and they will want one session. I don't do that anymore because one.

Session isn't going to help your acute pain.

So I am interested in, you know, later I'm going to see do I pass the test in terms of all the things you're saying. But what I will tell them is, you know, I have a three session and a six session. The three, you're going to need more than one hour. I mean, it took longer than an hour to create this problem. You need more than an hour. So there's a three session, a succession. But if you basically can invest in that or don't want to, I've got a ton of free resources. But it won't be my private time with you. So one thing I want to see how you would advise. I think you must know what their acute problem is. But what I try to avoid is the snake oil Salesman that in 60 minutes I will solve your acute problem. I won't solve your problem when it is a many layered issue. So with someone just starting out in a business, you know, if we apply this so I can understand it, yes, this person's coming with an acute problem and. And my little one hour package isn't going to help them. What would you suggest to help feel served but not lied to?

We have lots of great resources for people. We have books.

There you go.

We have YouTube, we have videos, we have podcasts, we have things that you can consume and you can learn and you can take that with you. And if that's enough, you Go on your way and you go do that now if you want help. One of the things that we have to do as good service providers is we have to help people understand before they come in the door, before they start even knocking, saying, kathy, I got to work with your girl, give me 60 minutes. They've got to understand before that ever happens why coaching is an investment over time and that that is on us to teach people that, to say, we cannot solve your problems overnight. Beware of people who will try to solve your problem in 60 minutes. Can you make. I do VIP days with my clients where we do 66, about six hours together, kind of sit down and we plan a bunch of things out for their quarter to be successful. And I tell every single one of them we have just taken the first step today. If you would like to be successful in implementing this step, implementing what we have done today and in learning how we were inevitably going to have to modify it. As we learn more about the market and we see what's coming up, that is where we work together in an ongoing way. But if I said to people, one and done, see you later, you're going to be fine, you never need to talk to me again, boy, I would be doing them a real disservice.

You would be.

Yeah, there you go. You've explained it so beautifully. Ah, people, I hope you're hearing what true help is. True help acknowledges the problem, has deep understanding because you've been in the niche a while. That's another thing that helps if you're used to helping blah blah, blah, blah, blah blah franchisees in mid Detroit, blah blah, blah, whatever. Yeah, you have so much knowledge, but you also have the knowledge of how people get tripped up and you're not going to lie to them that your one hour or your six hour VIP session is the answer to everything for 10 years.

No way. I want to say something else. I should have mentioned it earlier because I did talk a lot about the advertising that a lot of these snake oil people do. I'm not saying ads are totally bad, everyone does some advertising. But I will tell you I built a multi six figure consulting business with zero ads, zero email list, zero social media. I did that for years. And so what I will tell you, word of mouth referrals because I had a very specific target market, I had a very specific service offering that I offered to them and they knew me. And you don't have to do all that other stuff if you have, if you are that clear, people will find you through word of mouth. Okay, so to everyone who's thinking, oh, I got to set up the Facebook ads and I got to do this and then that. If you've got a very clear micro target market. No, you don't. No, you do not.

I love it, Laura. Fantastic.

All right, hit us with number three, then I gotta let you go.

What's question?

Okay, number three. We have been talking around this issue for this entire discussion. Number three is how do I consistently reach out to people? Oh. So here's the deal, Kim. And you know this. Trust is built through consistency, and people buy according to the amount of trust we have earned with them. Trust is built at different speeds with different people. Some people will hear you or I speak and say, sign me up for a year and you'll say, great, here you go. Other people will say, kathy, I've been on your email list for six years, I just bought your $12 ebook. And you'll say, okay, thank you very much. But that's a very different engagement. Right. It is built. Trust is built at different speeds with different people, and it is built through consistency. So how will you consistently reach out to people and what will you do? And I am. I just want to be really clear here. I am not talking about posting endlessly on social media. I am vehemently anti hustle. My entire brand is built on doing this stuff in 30 minutes a day. And what does that mean? It means direct outreach. It means having a little bit of communication with different people every single day and reaching out to them. It will change your business.

And, and so does that mean you have a mailing list that you're reaching out and giving?

You could have a mailing list. What other ways you could literally, you could have a mailing list. I also encourage my clients to create a list of people that are in and around and surrounding their area of expertise that they need to know who could help them become referable. So if I'm, if I'm a web designer, let's use that as an example. Well, who might I need to know in the world to become more referable? Well, I'm going to need to know some marketers. I'm going to need to know some accountants, I'm going to need to know some business owners. Oh, I probably want to know the chamber of commerce as well. That could actually be really helpful. If I'm doing a geolocation type target market, I want to know what associations. Oh, remember that whole camp test? I'm going to see where they hang out, what meetups these people go to. And I'm going to go just around the wheel and I'm going to write down names and I'm going to personally reach out to people who are in those associated fields in very non spammy, non sleazy, non gross ways and say, hey, bud, what's going on? Let's chat. Or, you know, we send messages to them. Just connect with human to human connection with people and you will be amazed how people come to know you, like you, trust you, and buy from you.

I love it.

And it's got this other component that way where you're finding people who refer to you. It's. It's reciprocal.

Exactly.

You're not reaching out, going, hey, buddy, can you just send things one direction? You know, you're going to have coffee, you're going to like them or not, but. And then you're going to find someone you feel comfortable because you should not refer to people that you don't know. What a disaster.

Exactly.

I love it.

This is very, very simple. I just want to point out to everyone, if you're listening, this is very simple. I'm giving away the secrets. Okay? These are the quote unquote secrets. The challenge for people is in customizing this to their business and doing, doing it consistently. And if you can do it consistently, if you can figure it out for your business, you will do, gang. You'll go gangbusters. It'll be amazing. Love it.

I want to offer one more tip to people because it's working. I'm on the receiving end of it. So I get pitches maybe six to, I'm not kidding, 600 to 700 times a month.

Oh my gosh.

On anything you can imagine. But a lot of web people, SEO people, but two people I've recently hired pretty much on the spot because they did this. They reached out usually via email. Not. And they didn't just say, dear sir, you know, or. And they said, for instance, I've looked at your content. It's amazing. Here's how I, you know some specifics, not just some, you know, you know, platitudes. But then they'll say, for instance, I've looked at your 1 sales page and I think it can do. We can do better. Would you get on a call? I never say, yes, I'm too busy. But I do say, I'd be interested. Can you give me your top 30 things you'd change on my sales page? And they walk me through it in a video.

Oh, my gosh.

On Loom Loom, you know, they take a picture of Their screen. Okay, here, this, this, I think should be a hero image. This is too dark. This shouldn't be moving so fast. I know what I'm going to buy when I hire them. And in the latest case, her proposal was so affordable, I did it that second, and now she's doing another sales page. So I am going to say this to you people. You have to do much more work than you think you do to get someone to see the value of what you offer. If you think, I'm not going to tell this woman, Kathy, what, what I would do, she could hire someone else. I could. But why would I hire someone else? You can do it, and you can do it very affordably. Why would I? But. But you have to prove your value. And I think, like, for someone like me, I'm proving value by the writing that I'm doing, the podcast. If, if someone wants to know what Kathy's about, I send them to YouTube. Watch me on the podcast. I mean, you're. You're going to see it. So I would say, for instance, new coaches, you better start that mailing list and you better be delivering free help so that you prove consistently your chops.

Absolutely.

And to your point, someone can be on your list six years, but when they're ready, they're ready, and you'll be the first person they'll come to. Would you agree with any of that or disagree?

I should say no, I completely agree. And that's why it is important that we continue to build the list, that we continue to grow and expand our network and do this type of outreach and get in front of people at those different conferences, associations, meetups, and publications. Remember, if you do that consistently, you're always going to be in front of your target market. They have built in places to go find you, and it'll make it a lot easier.

I love it. Laura.

Three questions. I mean, within those simple three questions was embedded a heck of a lot of not secrets, but fantastic knowledge that you all are ready to take advantage of. So where do we send people? Where do they find you? Where do they take your training? Where do they get your deliciousness?

So I want to send everyone over to bravebydesign.net I actually have a revenue calculator on there. So for people who. A lot of people come to me and say, I don't actually know if I can double revenue. That doesn't seem possible. That seems like I'd have to, like, do a lot more work. So the revenue calculator actually does all the heavy lifting for you, you can take it. You can see how to actually grow your revenue in very reasonable ways. That's at bravebydesign.net forward/calculator. I'm sure Kathy will put a link to it.

I will. And I, I downloaded it. Yes. Months ago. And I'm like, zip, zip, zip, zip, zip. It's so great. It's all done for you. The thinking is done. And ultimately it shows you how. I'm not going to say easy. That's not true. How accessible it is to expand your success.

Absolutely.

It isn't what you think.

Typically.

So good. Brave Byte is. Laura. Thank you, my dear. I feel so. I think we learned a lot, didn't we? We would love. Laura would love to hear from you. I know that if you have struggled with any one of the these three questions because they're not. It's not a simple thing. It's really teasing out who you are. And having the Brave by Design is the right name.

You do have to have the bravery.

To say, this is who I want. And, and I think this is what I deserve. So sometimes we need help with that. So you know where Laura is. I hope we'll hear from you. Question every anywhere you see this. And thank you again for being a sponsor of Finding Brave, Laura.

Oh, my pleasure. Thank you for having me, Kathy.

Come back again soon. All right, people, hope you're inspired. Have a wonderful double dose of Brave here this week. Have a wonderful week and we'll see you next time. Bye. Hello, Kathy here.

With the new year coming up, it's the perfect time to start taking steps towards your business's financial future. Future. If you'd like to grow your business as a coach or consultant, but the.

Thought of figuring out how to do.

That stresses you out, I want to share something that will give you real peace of mind. Brave by Design has created a digital calculator that shows you how you can double your revenue in 2022.

I've used it myself and I love.

How easy it is to plan out your year and see where the money will come in. It's free and available@bravebydesign.net.

Brave by Design.

Founder Laura Kahlil has been on Finding Brave twice, most recently discussing the three key questions you need to ask yourself if you want to grow your business now. And I know you'll find the revenue calculator helpful and a great complimentary resource to that episode. If you're ready to make 2022 the best year yet, grab your free Download today@bravebydesign.net Thanks so much for joining us today. And please don't forget to check out findingbrave.org for more programs, resources and tips. And tune in next time.