Feeling stuck in your business?

I don't know one person—no matter how successful they are—who has not experienced that feeling.

If you're in it right now, there is a simple exercise that never fails to pinpoint the area of your business that's causing the problem.

First, zoom out.

At a high level, business growth is not complicated. There are 3 core pieces:

  1. Attract: You need leads coming in the door
     
  2. Teach: You need to build trust with those leads by showing them your expertise (especially if you sell courses, coaching, or consulting services)
     
  3. Monetize: You need an offer that solves a problem for your leads

If your growth has stalled, you can bet 1 of those pieces has gotten wonky. Unfortunately, most biz owners totally whiff on identifying which piece is actually their problem.

See, there's a natural tendency to skip allllllll the way to #3 (monetization) as the culprit for any business woes.

We want to believe that the right product can solve all of our issues. That if we build the world's best course or service everything else will fall into place: the raving fan testimonials, word of mouth like wildfire, all the traffic and leads we can handle.

Plus, if you're an entrepreneur, building stuff is just fun. So there's comfort in grinding away the early and late hours of the day in product creation mode.

But here's the uncomfortable reality…

For course creators and coaches who are struggling, the issue almost always boils down to #1 (not enough leads) or #2 (ice cold leads that don't trust you).

Those 2 pieces of the puzzle are so important that, if you get them right, you can kiiiiinda screw up #3 (the product) and still get decent results. 

DISCLAIMER: I am NOT saying you should sell a crappy product. 

But I am saying that you can get a lot further with an imperfect product + high-quality leads than you can with a perfect product + little to no leads.

So...how do you fix a leads and/or a trust problem?

This is where my advice differs from most online marketing experts.

  • The common solution to a LEADS problem is to simply buy them. 

    After all, there's never been an easier time in the history of the universe to instantly put your business in front of eyeballs. 

    Just whip out your credit card, lay it at the feet of Facebook, and let ol' Zuck shove your business in people's faces while they're scrolling through baby pictures and political memes.

    It's as simple as turning on a faucet, right?

    Ehhh, not really. :(

    Unless you're an expert at interrupting people who don't know you, getting them to click, nurturing them with an expertly-crafted funnel, and converting them with a 100% dialed-in webinar, sales page, offer, etc. you can end up blowing through $10k (or more) in a flash.

 

  • The common solution to a TRUST problem is content marketing. 

    Blog every week. Jump on the social media content hamster wheel. Publish, publish, publish.

    This can work great! But it heavily depends on your ability as a writer/podcaster/vlogger (and your patience).

    You can spend years publishing your face off before people start to take notice or Google/YouTube starts throwing you traffic. 

Your key takeaways:

  • Buying ads can get you leads quickly—but it's very difficult to get them to trust you (which makes ROI a beast).
  • Content marketing is great for building trust—but it takes a ton of time and energy before it pays off.

So the question then becomes...

How can I generate leads who will trust me almost instantly?

You might not know the answer to that question right now. That's OK!

Noodle on it for the next 24 hours.

Tomorrow, I'm going to give you the answer. So keep an eye on your inbox!

- Bryan