Be Seen As the Expert (And Make More Money for Your Expertise)

Many entrepreneurs feel like the thing they need most right now is more customers. They feel like more customers will solve their business needs. But before you seek more customers and more sales, you want to make sure you have a clear direction to take those customers on. You want to be sure that your business's offerings accurately reflect the true value that you have to offer through your expertise and your specialized knowledge or skills. This episode will show you an underutilized tool that will help you be seen as the expert in your industry and make a lot more money for that expertise. You're listening to the Universe has yous Business. It's the podcast for rising entrepreneurs, coaches, and change makers who are here to achieve more while letting the universe do the heavy lifting. And I'm your host, Andrew Donovan. Let's dive into this awesome, awesome topic. There is truly nothing that feels quite as good as feeling like you as the entrepreneur are valid. And the reason why I say that word is because when we're looking to be seen as the expert in our field, we want to feel like we're credible. We want to feel like we're being taken seriously. We want to feel like we have legitimate value to offer the people who are following us, who are engaging with us. And that's really what this episode is about. You know, as a marketer, I pay close attention to what other marketers are pitching on Instagram, Facebook, paid ads, all over the place, through people's video ads, all of it. So much advertising is catered toward making more money, making more sales, getting more customers, getting more clients. And I think that that is the reason why is because at the most surface level, that's one of the biggest things at the forefront of our minds, right? We want a bigger following, we want more customers, we want more people buying our products, subscribing to our services. And I say that that's at the surface because I really think that that's like the most surface way to look at your business. I think that there are much deeper reasons why those new customers, those new sales, and all those tactics and strategies that get you there, I think there's deeper things that we're really looking for, which is really what I wanted this episode to be about. So as I reflect on what I'm looking for as an entrepreneur, it's not just sales, it's not just customers. I think that we want to be seen as experts. I think that we want to be seen as legitimate. I think that we want to stand out from the crowd. I mean, it is highly unlikely that you are the only person who does what you do. The world is just too broad and. And there's just so much going on. And I think that it gets really easy and tempting sometimes to look at the people around you and feel diminished because you see other people with higher certifications, more years of experience, bigger followings on social media, lot bigger incomes, and you feel like you don't stand up from the crowd. In fact, sometimes maybe you feel like you're invisible in a sea of other marketers. Am I right? Other marketers who do similar things, if not the same things that you do. And I think that we want to feel unique. We want to stand out from the crowd. We don't want to feel the same as everybody else. And then the other thing that I think we're really looking for is not just to get customers and to make more money. I think that we want to make more money for our expertise and our specialization. Does that ring true to you? It's one thing to be able to say, oh, yeah, I sold a bunch of shit. It's another thing to be able to say, wow, I got paid for being me. I mean, that's a sacred moment when you realize that your income is coming in consistently and maybe even growing month after month just because you are being you and people want to pay you for that. That's cool, right? So I have a specific underutilized tool that I want to talk to you about in this episode, and I've mentioned it in previous episodes. In the last episode where I Talked about my $250,000 success with one digital course that I sold, I hinted at this tool, but I didn't really dive into it. And I wanted to spend a few minutes with you today talking about an Ascension model. And I don't care what industry you're in, I don't care what you do. And every massively profitable business has an Ascension model. And if you don't know what this is, an Ascension model is basically a way of organizing the offerings that your business has to offer potential customers. So you are some kind of expert. You're a marketer, a network marketer, a coach, an educator, a practitioner, some kind of specialist. You've got a specific kind of value that you offer people. And an Ascension model is your way of creatively packaging up that value so that you can deliver different levels of value to different people as they are ready for it. Does that make sense to you? When you have an Ascension model, the results, they are so tantalizing. I mean, you have a clear path for your customers to take. You have multiple places where people can access or enter your business ecosphere, and they're able to start at wherever they're ready. So imagine an Ascension model looking like a pyramid, and say there's like five levels in that pyramid. So at the top of the pyramid is where you'd have your dream offer. Your most intense, your most expensive offer, the offer that gives people the most intensive experience with you or your brand, and whatever transformation you're able to lead people toward, that's what goes at the top of your Ascension model. So for a lot of people, it's like private coaching, because your time is your most precious asset. Or it might be like an extensive live retreat, something that costs a lot more money but gives people a lot closer proximity to you, and so they get more value out of it. And in the middle of the Ascension model, you've got different things. Maybe a course, maybe a signature course where you're able to put people on autopilot for the most part, maybe group coaching. At the bottom of your Ascension model is where you would put the simplest, easiest experiences with you. That might be like free webinars or a free digital download, a PDF, lead magnets, things that give simple, quick results. And so the point of the Ascension model is that you've got different levels of value and. And each level has different levels of. Is a different kind of intensity, a different kind of financial commitment, and will, of course, yield different amounts of the result that your business is really good at delivering to people. And what I love about this is, if you listen to my last episode, you remember, I said I had one product. I didn't have an Ascension model. I had one piece of an Ascension model. It was just one digital course. And that one course made me a quarter of a million dollars in 18 months, which was awesome. But what could I have done if I had built out an entire Ascension model with that brand that has now been retired? And I do something else now, But I love understanding this now because now I do this with all the companies that I start. So I want to teach you about three just invaluable secrets that you can implement in your business right now that to get you ready to create an Ascension model for your business. The first secret is turn your journey of transformation into a path that others can follow. And what I mean by that is I hear people all the time. They say, andrew, I just don't feel like I'm an expert. I don't know if people will take me seriously. And I hear this all the time and what I remind people is you are where you are in your business because you personally have most likely undergone some kind of transformation. People become Reiki healers all the time after experiencing a profound moment with a Reiki practitioner. Or people get into fitness coaching after experiencing their own physical transformation. Or people become a financial coach after taking the reins and getting back in control of their own finances. You are most likely where you are with your business because you had your own journey or you're on your own journey. And you don't have to be at the end of that journey to be an expert. You just need to be a few steps ahead of the people that you're inviting to go on that journey with you. And automatically you are then the expert. And so if you can allow, if you can hold space for your journey of transformation to become a clear path that you can guide other people on as well. I mean, there's your expertise. Does that make sense to you? So that's secret number one. Secret number two is learning to package the value that you have to offer creatively. What I see a lot of people do is what I did with my very first brand where I had built that, I had created that one online course. And so I took the value that I had to offer. I knew network marketing really, really well and a specific network marketing company that I was very much enjoying working with. And I made one package of value, one course. I packaged it up one way and again, that was very profitable, but I didn't take the time to package it up in different ways. That one course was around the $200 price point. So some, I mean, many, many people liked me when they would meet me online, but they weren't ready to invest $200. But what if I had had a $29 or a $49 offering that they could have purchased instead to take a smaller step, have a more, a less intensive experience with me? I also had people who would go through that course and after they would be like, what's next? And I didn't have anything after that. That was the end for me. I didn't have any immersive group coaching experiences or live events. I didn't have like a higher level course that they could take something more serious, more intensive. And that really is the lesson about packaging your value creatively. You don't do it all at once. You start with one thing and then you add more on above and below the thing that you started with. Okay, so secret number two again is packaging the value creatively. People say to me all the time that they don't feel like they have any real value to offer. They don't want to be seen as a fraud. They're not sure if their value is really going to be perceived by the public. But you solve that when you package up your value in different formats in different levels of an ascension model. Because the only time people don't really see your value is if it's the wrong value for them based on where they are in their journey. Because we're all at different levels, right? We're all in different places in our journey. And so if me as the entrepreneur, if I only have one value offering like one digital course, that's it. I'm gonna miss all the people that are ready for something more intensive and the people who are ready for something less intensive. So when I learn to package my value creatively, I capture a lot more people and I capture a lot more revenue. That makes sense to you, right? Okay. Secret number three is letting your business meet people where they are, not where you think they should be. And what I mean by that is I hear all the time that people say, I'm afraid folks won't take me seriously online. And what I think is really happening is as an entrepreneur, we have our ideal customer in our mind sometimes, hopefully. And we think think that we're clear about where that person is and what they need at that moment. But people are, like I said just now a moment ago, people are all over the place. Some people are at the start of their journey of transformation. Some people are a few years or several years into it. Some people are like pretty transformed and they just want something that's next level per their existing successful transformation. And so if you can let your businesses ascension model be a method of meeting people at different places based off of their journey, not where, not the journey you think they're on. Well, I mean, again, you're going to meet a lot more people, you will rendezvous with a lot more, you'll have more successful connections. So these three secrets, these are really the preparation for creating your business's Ascension model. And again, the value of the Ascension model is that you have a clear path to take customers on. If someone starts at the bottom of your model with the most simple of steps that they can take with your brand and business, then they only have up to go, which is amazing. But if somebody has already been on that journey of transformation for a little while, they don't want to start at the bottom, they want to start in the middle. You have something in the middle of your model to be able to meet them where they are and then take them to the next level. And, and what I love about this, I mean, there's obviously a lot of things that I love about an Ascension model, but I love that it allows me to connect with so many different kinds of people. And I like that I don't have to turn as many people away because I'm not trying to be the right thing for everybody. But I am able to meet more people based on where they are. And then if I'm doing this really well, I take people up and up and up, level after level, and that's just more ongoing revenue for my business. I maximize the lifetime value of each customer that comes into my business ecosphere because I have more places for them to go. I have more journey to lead them on, to go on with them. So that's pretty cool, right? And then that takes us into a whole different conversation and about how your business becomes the vehicle for your mission, your mission of guiding people on whatever journey of transformation you do as your brand. So we will get to that in future conversations. But I hope you're seeing the possibility here. For you now, there is definitely some strategy and some finesse that goes into creating a really great Ascension model. You need your Ascension model to be cohesive. I've seen some people piece together what they think is a good business model and it just doesn't make sense. They've got random stuff hodgepodged together. The customer comes onto the website and it's just confusing. You don't know what to click on, what to do first. They don't have their launches, their product launches or relaunches done in any kind of logical sequence. So there is definitely some strategy that goes into creating an Ascension model. And I just want to remind you it does not matter what industry you are in. It doesn't matter if you sell other people's products as an affiliate or a network marketer. It doesn't matter if you are a coach, a life coach. It doesn't matter if you are an in person practitioner like a chiropractor or a holistic dentist. If you want to be able to scale your business and maximize the value that you can deliver to as many people as possible, especially the paying customers in your business, business world, then the Ascension model must be a fundamental piece of how your business is structured. So I want to invite you to take advantage of my Monetize what? You know, freebie. It's a little PDF download that is just, I mean it just makes drafting your Ascension model much easier. I give you some base concepts that you want to be aware of and then it's a workbook. So you can fill in the blanks and drop an Ascension model yourself. You can find that@donovanrising.com plan because this is your profitable business plan. The Ascension model becomes your ultimate big vision business plan. So again, you can get my download at donovanrising. That's-o n o v a n rising.com plan and I hope that you enjoy that little freebie. So again, the Ascension model, once you've got it, then you start at one level. You're off to the races. But new massive growth, massive influence, massive impact now becomes possible for you. And at the end of the day, you get to be the entrepreneur who goes to bed and says, wow, I feel like I am maximizing what I'm good at. I feel like I'm getting paid handsomely, generously, adequately for what I'm good at, for my expertise. I feel like I'm being seen as the expert and I feel like I'm standing out in the crowd and that I'm lighting up and the right people are able to easily identify me and easily connect with me and my brand friend. That is what becomes possible with an Ascension model. I hope that you will take this opportunity, jump at it and hop in and create yours. Alright, so. So if you loved this episode, if you found something valuable, then please tell us about what you learned, what you valued in a review on Apple Podcasts and then be sure to hit the subscribe button so that you don't miss another episode. And if you have a friend or colleague who'd benefit from this message, well, hit the share button and send this episode to them via text or direct message. We count on shares and reviews in order to get the word out so that we can keep this POD podcast thriving for you again. I'm Andrew Donovan and I will see you next time.