Episode 104 - How to Build an Online Business & Grow Your Email List Without Burning Out

Let me ask you something. Does your business feel like it runs? Or does it feel like it runs you? Ooh, did you just kind of wince?

I know. Sometimes I feel that way too. Because if business only grows when you are working non-stop, running 150 miles an hour with your hair on fire, posting every day, and trying to be on every platform, that's not a visibility strategy. That's exhaustion.

Today I want to talk about how to build a business that grows without burning you out. Let's get started. Ready to grow your online business without losing your mind? You're in the right spot, my friend.

Welcome to Create Your Online Business Success. I'm your host, Tracy Beavers. And this show is all about practical strategies, creative ideas, and sanity-saving solutions that you can use right now. Let's crank up the dial on your business growth and make it fun.

Let's create your online business success. I want to have an honest discussion. You know I always want to have an honest discussion. But I really do.

I want to have an honest discussion about how we can truly build these online businesses without exhaustion. How can we do it with ease but in a way that's authentic to us? You know, because I see it the way I see it, the problem is no one talks about it enough, in my opinion. But hopefully I can change this and you can kind of help change this over time.

A lot of people think they have to build their business with this hustle energy. Now, listen, when I first started this business years ago, your girl was hustling because the mistake I made was I thought there was a finish line. You've probably heard me say before, our online businesses are never going to be fully built. But I didn't clue into that for probably about eight months of running at 150 miles an hour with my hair on fire, right?

And just thinking, if I go faster, if I go faster, if I go faster, if I do all the things, I'll get there faster. Well, where was there? And it was about eight months in, and I was like, oh, there's no finish line. This thing is never going to be fully built.

I'm not building a Chick-fil-A franchise where I can stand back and go, isn't she lovely? And then go build another one. Right? So we build with this hustle energy, and it works at first.

It does, but it's not sustainable. You can't run 150 miles an hour for very long. You just can't. And people say, Oh, just work less.

Okay, sure. Sure. Maybe once you are years in and you can hire a team, or you have kind of some systems and automations running where you could take off a week at a time, or you could, you know, work three or four days a week. So, but unless you're but until you get to that point, you can't do that either.

So the real goal, in my opinion, is not working less. It's being strategic and building systems that make the growth easier. Because if your business only grows when you are pushing nonstop, you don't have systems yet. Ask me how I know.

The entrepreneurs I work with inside Business Visibility Made Easy, which you know is my eight-week group coaching accelerator, they're not trying to work harder. They are with me to learn how to build visibility systems that grow their list and attract clients without exhausting them. I teach them the exact strategies that I've used to build this business that I that I now have today. I built it alongside my corporate job, those two busy kids, my family, everything.

And I know you're thinking, but Tracy, don't I have to be everywhere? Meaning everywhere on social media, every platform? No, my friend, that's a myth. A myth.

That is a big, fat liar, liar, pants on fire. You do not have to be everywhere. Now, common sense might suggest that growth requires us to be on every platform, in every inbox, in every DM, just on, on, on 247, 365. Common sense would tell you that.

But the truth is that you don't. Thank goodness. I am proof of that, and so are my students and my clients. Visibility does not require being everywhere.

It requires strategy and putting strategy behind the content that you do create. Because content without strategy, that's a waste of time. And content for content's sake, that's just noise. And you know we have too much of that already.

And it's also a recipe for exhaustion. So what do we do? Well, here's my philosophy, and this is what I teach in my program. I want you to choose one primary platform, and I want you to make it work for you first.

Do not try to be on all the platforms all at once, and do not think you have to post seven days a week. That is too much. Now, if you have a team and you want to go gangbusters and be on all the platforms and do all the stuff, that's fine, but make sure they help you so you're not doing it yourself. I built a very successful business and hit over six figures in my second full year by focusing on Facebook and posting a few days a week.

And this was years ago. So I am proof that you don't have to do that. I want you to master one platform before you multiply your platforms. Okay, that's a sticky note quote.

If I've ever heard one, I want you to go grab a sticky note, hit pause, write down, master one platform before you multiply your platforms. I may need to needlepoint that on a pillow. All right, so here's what you want to do. You want to decide the one platform you want to use, whether it's Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram.

Goodness sakes, how many are there now? There's a threads, there's something called a Substack. I'm not on there. Um, is Snapchat still a thing?

I don't even know. Decide the one platform you want to use that you can use to grow your list. And then I want you to learn what content attracts the right people, your people, and how to move them to your email list. And I want you to learn how to turn engagement into conversations in your and their inbox and also in the DMs, because that conversations, that's where the magic is going to happen.

So whatever platform you choose, I want you to be able to have the ability to do that. And honestly, one of the reasons why I love Facebook, one of the many reasons, there's so many nooks and crannies for list growth that most people just completely overlook. And that's what I teach. But also, there's communities on Facebook, Facebook groups.

LinkedIn has groups, but they don't function nearly the same way as a Facebook group, a well-run Facebook group, let me just say. Instagram doesn't have groups. Substack, I'm not even sure if that's got DMs. And I'm not even sure it grows your list.

I think it grows Substack's list. YouTube's great. You can have some comments and stuff like that, but you really need that list growth. So I want you to pick a platform where you can, you're, you can learn what you need to do to pull the right people to your list.

And then I want you to have fun ways to get them to reply back in the inbox. You can have conversations there and also conversations in the DMs. And then once that works, expansion to other platforms is going to become so much easier. And then you can take all the content that you've been using and totally repurpose it for those platforms.

So let me ask you this. I was thinking about this training and I thought, why do most content systems burn people out? I mean, that's that's a real thing. Um, I will meet my clients and students and they'll go, Tracy, I'm creating the content and I am exhausted.

And I'm thinking, what system are you using? And here's the thing it's because we believe we've got to post daily, seven days a week, 365 days a year, even Christmas. I mean, that's what we're thinking. And that's exhausting.

Your content should support your business, not dominate your calendar. Oh gosh, write that one down too. Your content, I'm full of it today. Your content should support your business, not dominate your calendar.

So here's a system I developed for creating my content week in, week out, when I was building alongside my full-time job. You may have already heard this strategy because I am known for it and I present on it a lot. It's the 90-30 content strategy. Create 90 days of content topics and only 30 minutes.

The first part of it is visualizing your ideal client. What do they want? What do they need? What can you give them?

What are the emotions they're feeling? What are the words they're saying? What is the transformation they want? And then brain dumping all of that stuff that came to mind.

And then you look at that brain dump list and you think about what are the topics that I could teach on, the work that you do that you know will give your client the result they want. And then I want you to start spitting out topics. Try to get to 12 because with my strategy, we take one topic per week for 12 weeks. That's 90 days.

12 weeks is 90 days. So that's where the 90 comes from. And the 30 part of it is 30 minutes. So the whole exercise should take you less than 30 minutes.

Then what we do, I want you to pick your regular piece of weekly content based on that topic. You get to this week and you look at that topic, that one topic you've got that you put down for this week. And then I want you to write your regular piece of weekly content. What is that?

You ask? Great question. I will tell you. So a regular piece of weekly content is a live training.

You, you know, you probably know I went live every Thursday at 11:30 for a million years before I had my podcast. So it's a live training on social, on the platform of your choice, or it is a podcast that you record. Um, it could be a blog, but I'm not thrilled with blogs anymore. I'm just gonna tell you, because of AI, people I don't even think are finding blogs on Google anymore because the Google answer at the top is AI generated, and Chat GPT can tell you anything you want to know.

So I'm just not sure what's gonna be happening with blogs in the coming days. So I would encourage you to do a live training or a podcast. So you write that out, right? Um, I have notes.

I'm looking at notes right now for this podcast episode because I will squirrel us off into a ditch and completely teach you a different topic before this is over with if I do not don't have notes. So I take all the notes I wrote on this particular podcast episode, then I can throw it into ChatGPT and say, hey, this is my podcast episode for the week, which by the way, ChatGPT helped me map this out based on all the ideas I had and the things I wanted to say. And I could say, Hey, I need two to three social media posts that pertain to this exact topic.

And then you've got a couple of posts. So you post your regular weekly content, which would be my podcast episode. I can post that on social media, or I could go live and talk about it. Then I post my new social post that AI just helped me write, add in one lead magnet post and one paid offer post, and you're done.

And all you did was write one piece of that whole thing. You don't need more content, you just need a repeatable content rhythm. And this is one of many strategies I teach my students with. And we dive deep into this in business visibility made easy.

We've got to put a strategy behind your content to make it work for you. Content for content's sake is noise. Cont stratage content needs strategy so that it invites people to your list, so that it introduces your lead magnets to them, so that it shares your paid offers, so that it starts conversations, whether in the inbox or in the DMs. Social media is the top of the funnel.

It is not the whole funnel. It's just the starting point. Social media is where the relationships start and they begin. Your email list and the DMs is where they get deeper by having those conversations.

Now, here's another mistake I've seen a lot. And if you've known me for any length of time, you've heard me mention this ad nauseum. Most profiles, most social media profiles are not optimized for business growth. And it is a massive pet peeve of mine.

Also, fun fact, a major pet pet peeve, just to be really weird here for a second, is when I see a man who has his shirt tucked in with pants that have belt loops, but he has no belt. That is a massive pet peeve. Okay, I've squirreled us off into a ditch. See what happens?

That was not in my notes. And look what happened. All right, back on track. Most profiles are not optimized for business growth.

Now I teach Facebook, but I want you to know that what I'm about to share with you and what I teach applies everywhere that you're given a social media profile: Instagram, LinkedIn, Substack, communities that are um housed on mighty networks, circle, heartbeat, uh, oh gosh, what's that other one? School. People that land on your profile should immediately understand who you are, who you serve and how, how they can connect with you, and how they can land on your list. That's another strategy we dive deep into in business visibility made easy.

And when it starts to work, people's minds are blown and it's so fun. Business grows through content that attracts your ideal clients to your list and to DM conversations through building relationships, not from going viral. Oh, let's talk about that for a second. This really gets my goat too.

People think that they've got to go viral to have success. Uh no, no, my friend, I haven't. You don't have to worry about it either. Going viral is a great dopamine hit.

That's fun. Makes you feel really cool for about 15 minutes, right? There, there's my 15 minutes of fame. I went viral.

But if it doesn't grow your email list and it doesn't lead you to have a conversation in the DMs to convert your buyers faster, then it's not even worth thinking about. There are so many people that it breaks my heart. They're like, but I just want to go viral. But if I could just go viral, no, I am proof.

You do not have to have viral social media or a massive list to have a business that provides you with the income you want. If you're curious about my list size, DM me or email me, and I'll be happy to share it with you. A year or so ago, I want to tell you this story. A year or so ago, this gal hired me to help her grow her business.

Super intelligent, wonderful gal, great content, all the things. She had 500,000 followers on Instagram. Guess how much money she was making? Zero dollars.

Because she was focused on chasing the vanity number and not focused on the things that actually grow a business. The boring things like patience and consistency, list growth and leads and conversations and building relationships and being patient. Remember this. I want you to write this on a sticky note.

Clients rarely come from viral posts. They come from conversations. Clients rarely come from viral posts. They come from conversations.

All right, let's recap and we're gonna land this plane for this week. To build a sustainable business without burnout, this looks like one primary platform. Pick your poison. Is that gonna be Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Substack, Snapchat, YouTube, whatever?

Your weekly content system that I just walked you through, how you can create one piece of regular weekly content. And then from that piece, everything else is born. Throw on a free lead magnet, throw, throw in your free a free paid, uh, not a free paid offer. That doesn't make any sense.

Throw in a free lead magnet post and a paid offer post, and you're done with your content week in, week out, makes it easy. Clear lead magnets that are valuable to your audience, things they want, that consistent list growth, and those conversations in the DMs and in the inbox. And my final point for you, my friend: a business that grows consistently should not require you to constantly push harder. It should feel structured, repeatable, and sustainable.

All right, my friend. So I have a free short training that's going to walk you through what I shared with you about the 90 and 30 strategy, the 90 days of content topic strategy that I mentioned. And it will be in the show notes. But also you can go to tracybeavers.

biz forward slash 9030 show notes. 9030 show notes. I would love to hear your thoughts on this episode. I ask you that every week and nobody ever emails me or DMs me.

But anyway, send me a message about it. Tell me what you thought. If you think thought it was great, or even if you thought it stunk, I can take it. I'm a big girl.

But I do want to know what you want to hear more of. And then if you loved it, share it with a friend who needs to hear this today. And you hear me say this every single week. I know I sound like a broken record, but I'm hoping it's sinking in by now.

Don't go it alone. This is a freaking roller coaster of emotion. And one day you're the bee's knees, and the next day you're like, oh my gosh, I'm on my knees. I mean, you know, it's freaking hard.

And if you think you're alone feeling that way, you're not. Come join my community of support, my free Facebook group called Be a Confident Entrepreneur. You're gonna get more support than you can ever imagine. You can promote your offers with us.

You can join our free networking events, and the links for everything are in the show notes, just waiting for you. Have a great balance of the week and weekend. And remember, when one of us rises, we all rise, so that is why we have got to keep cheering each other on. Hey, thanks for tuning in to create your online business success.

I hope you found today's episode packed with actionable tips and inspiration. And listen, if you want to dive even deeper with me and connect with a community of like-minded entrepreneurs that totally get you and understand what you're building, then join us in my free Facebook group. You get to promote your offers anytime, network with other entrepreneurs just like you, and possibly find some lucrative collaborations. Just search for Be a Confident Entrepreneur, get visible, grow your email list and your income over in Facebook.

Or, if it's easier, just click the link in the show notes. We cannot wait to welcome you in. Let's stay connected so we can create your online business success together.