Ep. 45: How Referrals and Relationships Create a More Profitable Business With Tara Newman (Republished)

Meg Casebolt 0:01
You’re listening to social slowdown a podcast for entrepreneurs and micro businesses looking for sustainable marketing strategies without being dependent on social media. Social media is a double edged sword. It’s a wonderful way to stay connected. But it also can feel like an addictive obligation. And it’s even more complex for businesses, your audience might be right there, but you’ve got to fight with algorithms to maybe be seen by them. So whether you want to abandon social media altogether, or you just want to take a month off, it’s possible to have a thriving business without being dependent on social media. This podcast is all about finding creative, sustainable ways to engage with your audience without needing to lip sync, send a cold DMS, run ads or be available 24/7 Let’s get started. Hey, all it’s Mike Casebolt. I’m so excited to share this episode with you today with Tara Newman. You may remember her back from Episode 13, where we talked all about how much money you need to make in your business in order to establish yourself and to make a living, not just to have kind of a hobby in your business. The reason that I’m sharing this new episode with you today with Tara is because later this week on August 23 at 1pm I’m actually hosting a masterclass with Tara. So I love her approach so much that I wanted basically went to Tara and said, How can I support you? How can I do a better job of introducing your work to my audience. And so she’s hosting a masterclass, just for people who love the social slowdown podcast and love it for search. It’s called three ways that online business culture is stopping you from getting paid like an expert. And I think this is so important, especially because so often when you are kind of trapped in this social media vacuum, kind of yelling into the echo chamber, you feel like you’re having people ask you to follow them and give them likes, or maybe they’re promising you exposure, but you’re not actually getting paid in real dollars, you’re not able to make a profit in your business, you feel like you’re always running, running, running, but it’s not easy on your energy. And that can be really draining to your bank account. And you might be spending a lot of time on social media, but it’s not actually leading to sales. Or honestly, guys, you might be getting your traffic from search, but you don’t necessarily know how to convert that traffic into clients. And Tara is such a genius when it comes to teaching sales and figuring out whom should you be talking to who should you be engaging with? How should you price yourself? And what are the tasks that actually convert leads that don’t require a ton of time. So definitely go sign up for the master class on August 23. We’ll have a link to that in the episode description and in the show notes. So you don’t have to, you know, go looking around for that. If you’re listening to this after the fact, I want you to go over to the bold leadership revolution.com Sign up for Tara’s email list. Go check out her podcast through that so that you don’t miss the opportunity to get more of Tara’s wisdom and brilliance into your ears regularly. Now because I want to introduce you to Tara with her and her team’s permission, we are actually republishing an interview that I did with Tara on her podcast back in May, all about how referrals and relationships can help you create a profitable business that maybe you’re spending so much time doing mass media types of marketing, like even SEO or search or if you’re spending so much time trying to be found on Instagram or you’re running a ton of Facebook ads, but you’re not necessarily tapping into the network that’s right in front of you. That might be a big drain on your time and your energy and take way more time to convert those leads into clients than it would if you just developed your relationship and referral network. So without further ado, let me share this conversation with Tara Newman of the bold leadership revolution.

Tara Newman 4:07
Hey, everyone, welcome to the bold money Revolution podcast. I’m your host Tara Newman. And once again, we have a guest on the show super excited we have Meg Casebolt mag is my SEO person. And like we’re doing, I’ve explained to every mag that I’ve might help is kind of up and down. And my energy is feeling particularly sensitive right now. So the best way that I can be producing these podcast episodes is just to invite on somebody who’s going to interview me and we’re going to have a chat about money.

Meg Casebolt 4:41
I love this idea. I also have a podcast and there are times where like especially I’m very impressed at how often you do solo episodes, because I’m an extrovert and so I thrive on other people’s energy and their prompts and when I have to sit down and crank out a solo episode is very draining to me. So I think This workaround that you’ve come up with is awesome.

Tara Newman 5:02
I didn’t realize you were an extrovert.

Meg Casebolt 5:04
Oh, you’re right.

Tara Newman 5:06
I was like, No, I didn’t, I really didn’t realize so so you’re gonna get to hear a conversation between two Ravenclaws. But I do not realize that Meg was an extrovert I am. I’m an introvert and becoming more reclusive by the day. I think there aren’t too

Meg Casebolt 5:21
many extrovert Ravenclaws. So maybe that’s why you thought because I’m such a nerd. Because I go so deep on things. There’s like, kind of an expectation of extrovert, but no, I’m a very strong Enneagram. Seven. I am like, enthusiast all the way. So when I have to record solo episodes, it’s rough on me, man.

Tara Newman 5:41
Yeah, yeah, I just get ideas. And I’m like, I should just talk about this. And then like, this one would talk about and, you know, but I tend to, to script them or outline them or whatever. And then I’m just like, you know, what, we’re just gonna go with the flow, and we’re gonna have a conversation is that feels way easier. Absolutely.

Meg Casebolt 5:58
So Tara, I am so thrilled that you invited me on to talk about this, because you and I are having all these private conversations about both marketing your business and lead generation and your business. But also, like, one of the things that I love about the approach that you have to business is that it’s not just grow your business at all costs, and get in front of the largest group of people humanly possible. And so you and I have that in common where we’re like, get in front of the right people for the right reasons. And forget about the people who aren’t really talking, who aren’t your people, you know. So I’d love if we could start with kind of an explanation of the bowl profit Academy as you would explain it, and how that fits into the people that you’re trying to reach, and what they’re trying to do with their lead generation strategies.

Tara Newman 6:47
So the full profit Academy, one is something that I feel really passionate about, and that it’s like, my desire to democratize business education for women, especially in the online space, because I, I don’t think there’s a lot of quality online business education for women. And I think that, considering where most women are in the revenue size of their business, it’s a lot of it is very pricey. Yeah, potentially, you know, even even overpriced. So the first layer of this is democratize business education for women, give them a quality learning experience with the mentor, the person that they’ve signed up to learn from, because we’re seeing that too, right? You think you’re going to come in and learn from the the person and then you, you wind up not really learning from the person to just, I have a real passion, that learning is the way there’s no hack, there’s not a cheat, there’s not a tactic, there’s not a secret, you have to learn some of this stuff for yourself, if you want to be self employed.

Meg Casebolt 8:05
Yeah. And I think that’s something that a lot of the marketers out there are trying not to talk about is that there’s a certain level of critical thinking, that needs to go into this that you cannot outsource, you know, if you’re leading a business, whether you’re the solo person in that business, or you have a team behind you, you have to come up with the frameworks, you know, you can’t just slot your business into something that someone else created and expect it to work for you. And I think that’s true, whether it’s your business model, or the way that you market, a lot of that has to be figured out through trial and error and like self, I don’t want to say self actualization as if we’re at like the top of the pyramid, but that idea of like, knowing what works for you and what your goals are, because so many marketers out there are like, just grow and grow and grow and grow and grow. Without saying, Well, what do you want your business to do for you? How much money do you need to make?

Tara Newman 9:05
Yeah, we’re creating a lot of chaos out there. So you know, there’s this democratization of business education, there’s giving women a better place to to learn and to have fun and to come together in community and learn together. There’s a lot around learning for women that has trauma associated with it. So how can we provide a learning environment that takes into consideration inclusivity and all the ways women and people in general have been traumatized by the educational system? Which is why I think sometimes some of the these courses that people buy are attractive to them because they can learn in hiding almost, hmm. But um, you know, I, I don’t think I know there’s data. I know that courses are not effective, effective ways of transferring the knowledge you actually need it. Your business all the time. And so and then on top of that, it’s okay, let’s get women, let’s get female experts who have decided to earn income independent of an employer. Whether you consider yourself self employed a solopreneur, a business owner and entrepreneur that you have chosen to earn income independent of an employer, let’s get you paid like the expert you are, let’s give you left corporate and you had a six figure salary, let’s give you a six figure salary, let’s get you better than what you’re making a corporate. And that is what the whole profit Academy is about is get paid like the expert that you are. And in order to do that, you need to understand how to generate leads, you need to understand how to convert these leads into sales, you need to understand how to communicate the value of what you do and position yourself in the market. And you need to know what the hell to do with the money you’re making. Yes. So after you do that, you need to know what the hell to do with the money that you’re making. So that you can pay yourself so that you can build wealth so that you can make smart money decisions about your business, so that you can pay off whatever potential debt you might have, or back taxes, oops, that happens, right? And so you can really get your money working for you. So all the strategies that we teach in the bowl profit Academy, are, first of all, they’re frameworks. So you’re going to take them and you’re going to make them work for you, your personality, the way you like to do business things that you’re really great at. But they’re going to be the most profitable strategies for your business for any business, because that’s often what’s not being taught in the online business space is profitable strategies. They’re teaching very expensive tactics. In my aha,

Meg Casebolt 12:03
yeah, and especially if you’re being taught that, you need a funnel that costs ad revenue, in order to sell a $27 product, then you have to do everything at scale. It’s a much more expensive marketing tactic, then go ask your next door neighbor, if they need help. And obviously, for all of us, it’s not in that local space. But having those warmer leads of people who already trust us or can be connected to us through referral streams. You don’t have to go out and spend, you know, big bucks and apply mass marketing strategies to a small business. That’s not the way that small businesses have historically run.

Tara Newman 12:43
I know. But this is like a big myth that’s now happening in the online business space as women come in. And they think that like referrals, or word of mouth is like a dirty word. Oh my gosh, yeah. And that, like, it only counts, if it’s a lead that’s been generated through like a hashtag, or SEO, or, or an ad or something like that. And they don’t think to go where they already have connections and where they’re already warm, and even hot leads. And, you know, it’s also weird, because in the online business space, there’s a lot of churn, there’s a lot of customer churn that you don’t see in traditional businesses, and traditional businesses have really grown and flourished through long term business relationships. And, again, we’re not seeing that nor is that hailed as important, or whatever, it’s, for some reason, it’s always about the new the new the new client, the new client. And that’s really expensive.

Meg Casebolt 13:46
Yeah, and it’s, I mean, you know, I, I deal in cold traffic, I’m an SEO expert, that’s what I do is try to get new people to discover you and warm up to you. But even in my own business, I think between 75 and 80% of my leads come from either, you know, business colleagues that are in my communities, or design partners, people who are designers who are looking to do SEO on their websites, and therefore we outsource to them. So it’s like, you know, even those of us that are teaching how to get cold leads. Most of my leads are still coming from warm referral sources. And that’s not a weakness, that’s a strength. When I do get somebody coming in from SEO. I’m like, Oh, that’s cool. Something’s working. Right. But that’s not that’s not the primary driver of business. And unless your business model is such that you are selling sponsorships, or you’re selling books, or you need to really have a ton of traffic, it’s certainly not the most profitable way to get new leads for your business from cold because it takes so much longer in that sales cycle to turn somebody who has no idea who you are into a client versus you know, if somebody says hey, have you heard of Tara, there’s that implicit sense of trust from somebody that, you know,

Tara Newman 15:04
there’s two statistics that really freaked me out when we talk about this stuff. One is, you know, I’ve heard this one, it’s a range between 50 to 75% is like, I’ve heard this range 50 to 75% of your leads are not a fit for your offer. That freaks me out. But then the other one that freaks me out. And I always share these, because I just want to temper it’s like, can we just have a moment of reality? Because I feel like you know, we live in a if we, if you’re in the online space at all, it’s like this, just this real non reality. And then the other statistic is only 15% of your leads are ready to buy from you right now. Most of them need to be warmed up over a period of time. Which is often why if you’re running a launch model, it’s so tricky, because you it’s like a churn and burn, right? Like you bring leads on, you’re trying to sell them or like an evergreen funnel you’re trying to get them to buy in the first week, or, you know, in this launch window, and then they wind up, one burning the list out because they’re sending so many emails and people like done, and then you gotta rebuild, or there are the business owners burned out. And then they don’t send emails for a while, and they’re not warming keeping those leads warm. So when they go to launch again, it’s like, oh, we were starting all over again.

Meg Casebolt 16:28
Yeah, and you’re paying for those leads in a lot of cases, and then not actually generating them into clients, you’re not having that sales conversion. So that’s, you know, it’s not the, I don’t want to say it’s not the best way, but it certainly is not the most sustainable way to generate leads

Tara Newman 16:46
in the bull profit Academy, I have a checklist of like how to know when you’re ready for paid traffic, it’s not that I don’t think paid traffic is good. I just think there’s a you know, you have to do some things first to be ready for it. I think, you know, you get to a certain point in your business, I think you get to a certain revenue level in your business, I think you get to a certain skill set, where you know, and you have confidence around converting the warm leads that you already have. And then you can go and use, you know, paid traffic, but that’s not always the way it’s taught. And that’s not always the way I think women sometimes see it as a as a quick fix.

Meg Casebolt 17:23
Yeah, and I think women, you know, especially women, business owners, or, you know, leaders in some way, we’ve been socialized to not toot our own horns to not ask for help to always be giving, you know, in the, the Nagurski sisters wrote that book burnout, where they talk about human giver syndrome, and how we are always giving, giving, giving, and then the takers are coming in and just expecting us to be giving for free all the time without ever asking for reciprocity. And that’s something though

Tara Newman 17:57
reciprocity problem. Yeah.

Meg Casebolt 18:02
And it’s not even like reciprocity is the goal, it’s that there are going to be people in your audience that are kind of leeches, and they’re just going to hang out and watch your free stuff forever. And as somebody who has a podcast, and a YouTube channel and an email list, I know that there are tons of people who are following me who are never going to give me a cent, right. And so I try not to spend time getting those people I want to fight you have the people who are interested in self identify, come out of the woodwork because there are going to be those invisible people are hanging out that are ready to buy or they’re not ready now. But they will be in six months. And so the content is a way to continue to nurture them so that when they are ready, they’re coming to me not to my competitor, but recognizing that cold traffic doesn’t convert quickly.

Tara Newman 18:52
No, it doesn’t it takes a takes a lot of work

Meg Casebolt 18:55
and may not convert at all right. And that’s

Tara Newman 18:59
yeah, I mean, statistically, it may not convert at all. But I mean, I do think that we have a reciprocity problem, big time. And I think it’s about fair energetic exchange. And even if you’re somebody who listens to this podcast, or or whatever listens to Meg’s podcast, or you know,

Unknown Speaker 19:20
leave a review. Yeah. Like, if

Tara Newman 19:23
you’ve been listening and you have taken something away, or you’ve taken action, even once, if you have the time to listen to the podcast, you have the time to take a few minutes and leave a review. That’s it. That’s fair, energetic exchange for me. You know, if you see a content creator, and you’re using affiliate links, buy from their affiliate link, it’s not going to cost you anything. And it may be drops a couple of pennies, dollars, whatever, in this content creators bank account, because, you know, we have to support women making money we have to support women and pay them and stop demanding free, unpaid labor, especially from women. And a lot of the marketers who teach this like give, give, give, give, give their men. Yep, they’ll men, and it’s different, it is different for men, like I cannot tell you this enough, it is different. And so women really have to be supporting women, whether it’s through sharing content, whether it’s through leaving a review, whether it’s giving a referral, whether it’s you know, buying from an affiliate link, or like, I see people that use the buy me a coffee link, buy them a cup of coffee, if you’ve gotten value out of what they have done, because I am telling you, women are exhausted, women are exhausted,

Meg Casebolt 20:54
and nothing that you Well, aside from buying from an affiliate link, but nothing else that you just said, costs money, there are plenty of free ways to support other business owners that you want that you value, what they’re producing.

Tara Newman 21:07
And let’s face it, if you’re a business owner, and you’re not supporting other business owners think about that energy. Yeah, nobody’s going to support you. Like don’t like I love when people, I’m going to start a podcast and I’m like, do you listen to podcasts? And they’re like, No, I’m like, Well, why

Meg Casebolt 21:22
are you going to start a podcast? If

Tara Newman 21:24
you won’t even listen to somebody else’s Podcast? I’m not getting any reviews, when was the last time you went and left somebody you

Unknown Speaker 21:30
review? When was last time you asked, or us but like even did it yourself? Right? Like,

Tara Newman 21:38
I want engagement. And so I give engagement,

Meg Casebolt 21:43
just expecting people to react to you without having that same behavior. You know, sometimes I’ll throw a link to something that I curated in my email along with what I’m creating, it doesn’t cost me anything to say, Hey, I listened to this podcast Tara put out and it was really awesome, you should check it out too. And people in the same way that referral, you know, leads are going to be received in a warmer way. Because they’re coming from somebody that you trust, you can curate other people’s content as a way of proving your own thought leadership. Especially Ravenclaws, where we’re like, look at these nerdy things that we actually think of like a raven coming and bringing things into a nursery being like, look at the shiny thing, right, like, people appreciate that. They want to hear what it is that you’re listening to, and what you’re reading, people love when I give book reviews, because they’re like, great. Now, I don’t have to read that long. Because Mike did it for me, you know, but it’s there’s something about sharing what you value, whether that’s a lead referral, or, you know, the things that you’re listening to what you’re buying the things that you’re loving, people love that. And so go write a review, share it with your audience, there are tons of ways that you can continue to raise your own profile and leverage what you love, in order to get people to get to know you even better, and trust you as a human. Because so much of the crap that we’re creating is impersonal. Yep. And that’s also a way that you can, you know, get yourself in front of other people that can support your network, if I’m sharing your podcast, and people are saying building takes all of this is relationship building, if you’re running a business, and you’re not thinking about who you’re like, establishing relationships with, then you’re missing a key component of how you can grow in a sustainable way. You know,

Tara Newman 23:34
I think that we, we’ve just given people the wrong idea, especially us introverts, who, like you, like we tell them we tell the internet tells them, like you just need a keyboard, you know, and you can just like fire away links, and you can fire away content. And you don’t have to talk to anybody, you don’t have to have a you know, do any kind of like discovery call or sales call or, or build relationships or anything like that, you know, you can sit on a comment thread on LinkedIn. You know, instead of getting on a call and meeting somebody and having a conversation and understanding, you know, what they’re what they’re going through, whether it leads to a sale or not. You know, I’m always willing to get on a call with people and build that relationship, because you never know what might come out of it. But, you know, we’ve really told people that they don’t have to do that, just send them a link, they’re gonna click on the link to buy and that’s not really how it works.

Meg Casebolt 24:33
Yeah, and even like, I have a lot of content on my website, because that’s what I do. And I get pitched by people all the time called pitches and emails, hey, we have the software, don’t you want to add it to your Roundup? 567 times these complete strangers are asking me for something, if any of them were to reach out and say, can we just hop on a call? Can I buy you a cup of coffee like I’ll pay you for your time, or if they were to just go by Could consulting call with me and say, we’ve got this great piece of software? Can we use your platform? What partnership agreement can we come up with here? I would be there for it. But this feeling of people just saying, like, I deserve your attention, I deserve, I am entitled to your audience, I am entitled to your work without putting in any effort to get to know you. It’s symbiosis. No, that’s not the right word. It’s parasitic, right? Parasitic.

Unknown Speaker 25:31
It’s costly.

Tara Newman 25:34
It’s costly. And I know that there’s even a lot of women who would receive an email like that and be like, Oh, my god, somebody saw my work, and they liked it. And they, you know, want something from me. And so they’ll they’ll give to that person, even though it’s not like really a quality connection. Because, you know, I think women, especially online, feel like they’re screaming into a void.

Meg Casebolt 25:56
There’s something really powerful about wanting to be seen and acknowledged and recognized, whatever that acknowledgement is. And we’re lowering our standards for what we expect, because it’s just so exciting to be found and to be seen. And I think that’s part of the social media, the ways that we’re using social media of just like, well, somebody liked what I said.

Tara Newman 26:23
Next appeal to it. Yeah, and

Meg Casebolt 26:25
there’s a lot of instant gratification in it, where, you know, I can go write a really incredible blog posts that can bring me traffic for years, but it’s gonna take years to get there, right? Versus I can go to Instagram, and I can post a selfie of whatever I’m doing right now. And I’m gonna get likes from it in the next 10 seconds. There’s something exciting about that being seen in the moment, especially in this like, isolated pandemic, you world, knowing that people are seeing you for whatever you’re doing, even if it’s not valuable. Hmm.

Tara Newman 26:58
Yep. And like, right, this is where I’m like, Okay, well, likes and follows. And comments. Don’t put food on the table.

Unknown Speaker 27:11
And it costs a lot of time. That’s an energy.

Meg Casebolt 27:15
And that’s something that we’re not talking about, is the the emotional labor of social media. Yep. The time and the resources that we’re spending on that engagement with other people in hopes that they’ll engage back with us. And, and Tara, you did a really good job of like, asking questions and polls and using it to develop conversations for the people in your audience. But if you’re just coming in, and broadcasting and not, and just using it as a megaphone, versus a conversation and dialogue tool, then it’s not gonna be worth the time and attention that you’re putting into those. It’s just, you’re gonna be yelling into a void, which is how we’re all feeling anyway.

Tara Newman 27:56
Well, you know, I think that’s like, where the wrong strategy cost you money and doesn’t mean me and why it’s not profitable. So I think we talked about this on the podcasts that I did on your podcast, I think so. Where, like, experts who run service based businesses are using influencer marketing tactics. It’s the wrong strategy. And they’ve paid to learn the wrong strategy. And now they’re using it and it’s not working. So they’re, it’s not getting them paid. Yeah. Right. And that’s like, when you show up on your Instagram with, you know, look at my life, or, like, here’s what I want to talk about today. Or, you know, you know, without having like a clear purpose and without really positioning yourself as the credible expert, who then has something of value to offer that somebody should get into a fair energetic exchange with you for Yeah,

Meg Casebolt 28:55
and I think so many of us are in the space of, because we have a personal brand and our face is the face on our websites and on our social media, we feel like we have to share our personal lives, as opposed to being a thought leader in the space and letting your face be seen as i This is the face of an expert. And they we’ve been told that we should be authentic and we should be vulnerable and we should give behind the scenes because people want that people want that from the Kardashians. They don’t care what you’re eating for your breakfast, and they only want it from the Kardashians. The Kardashians are shilling whatever their, you know, their protein shake that they’re getting paid to Shell is or detox tea or whatever, right? Like, you don’t need to give into those tactics to prove that you’re a human. Instead, you can talk about what it is that you do that you’re really good at. And let people find you for that instead.

Tara Newman 29:50
You know, it’s interesting because people on my Instagram, I asked them and like I’ve got this I have this thing like if you’re not going to engage with me if I put a post out and you don’t engage with me, I’m going to be gone. For a few days, like, it’s a two way thing. I’m not here to entertain you, I cannot be an entertainer. Like, I don’t know what frickin house of, you know wizarding house that is, but it’s not Ravenclaw

Meg Casebolt 30:12
Oh, that’s awful puffs for sure those are out there dancing like court jesters. Ravenclaws are like, where’s the research? Where’s my citation? Yeah, so

Tara Newman 30:22
it’s not me. So like, you know, I put up the engagement posts for a reason, because that’s what I consider fair energetic exchange. And I will continue to give if you give to me. And if you’re not going to give to me, I’m just gonna go to something else. Because I’ve got more important things to do with my time. And I’m already nurturing people in enough ways. I’ve got a podcast, I send regular emails, and there’s plenty ways. So anyway, so I, you know, asked people like, why are you here? On my Instagram and stuff like that? And, or what, what content do you want to see? And they did say, behind the scenes, they wanted to see how I work with my clients. And they want to know how I think, like, the behind the scenes for them means like, you know, my thought process in, you know, for my strategies and things like that. Except that’s what people pay me for. Yeah. Right. Like to know how I think to shift your perspective to, you know, like, yeah, like, if I have time, I’ll show up on Instagram, and I’ll talk about some stuff a lot of times, it’s for me, I’m just testing, messaging or content or, or something, or, you know, just, you know, wanting to get some research in. But like, for me to engage with you in a way that lets you into how I think and to shift your perspective so that you can get an insight so that you can then take action in your business is what people pay me for in the bolt profit Academy. Wanting to know how I work with people, you got to work with me, like, I don’t know how to demonstrate that any in any other way, other than how I’m already how I’m already doing it. So, you know, I think we have to be really careful around where we’re, we’re placing our effort and attention, because you know, we’re in this whole, like, don’t charge for your time, like not dollar dollars per hour is a terrible thing. But like, I count up how many hours you spend on social media, count up how many hours you spend creating content, and then balance that with what you’re making? Would you be better off working at Starbucks? I don’t know. Right? Like, you have to really consider the time that you’re you’re giving out versus what you’re giving, you know, taking in. Because just because you’re giving doesn’t mean you’re going to receive working harder, doesn’t guarantee you more money. As a matter of fact, the less hard I work, the more money I make.

Meg Casebolt 32:57
And that blows people’s minds when they actually go and take a look at that. But it’s also like, what, what is the strategy that is going to get you the most return? And we’re not tracking that in our own businesses. We’re going well, everyone else is doing this. So I should be doing it too, as opposed to going back and looking at where did my last five clients come from? How can I replicate that success? And what is the benefit that I’m getting from the different tactics that I’m using? And some of that is trackable? And that’s, that’s where you and I come together is that like, what, where are my clients coming from? And how do I track how they’re moving through my website, and where where am I acquiring new search traffic and that kind of stuff that I geek out on. But a lot of it is invisible. Even when you have all those tracking mechanisms in place, there are going to be people who are listening to your podcast for a year or two years, or like, I bet there are a lot of people who are finding you now and then go back and listen to two years of your content and feel like they get to know you by that point. And you have no idea when they’re discovering you how long it’s taking for them to go back into those back catalogs which of those specific episodes they’re downloading, because they see the title and they’re like, that sounds like something I would benefit from. So recognizing that what you’re putting out into the world, if you’re setting it up in a certain way can continue to be beneficial to you long term to get people into your world without you needing to be constantly hopping on one to one sales call so that when they’re ready, they can find you but you can’t you don’t know who’s listening to your podcast.

Tara Newman 34:27
So what’s happening is, is that if you’re, you know, I get that because people come to me a lot and they’re like, Oh, I’ve tried so many different strategies. I don’t know which one worked. Right. And so that’s a lot of what we do in the bowl. Profit Academy is like let’s help you figure out what’s working, dial it in, create a process and a system so that you can do it over and over and over and over again. Right. And like that’s part of the reason why the program is 12 months. It’s a year because we’re doing that kind of work and it takes some time to find it. trends and defined data. And we also, I, you know, I don’t want to give anybody the illusion that we can build a business in six weeks. I don’t want anybody to come in and feel like they have to take action, all the action TEDx and all the action, right? Like, I like people to come in and feel like they have the space to breathe, people have said, it’s like, you know, going for business therapy, and they join. And it’s not actually uncommon that women join, and then kind of crash for like, 3060 days because they feel supported. But they’re so exhausted. And you know, we the curriculum in there is intentionally designed for that I’ve got chronic illness, like I run my business, the way I do for a reason, it’s the most highly profitable strategies that are easiest on my energy. And that’s what’s in there. Right. So it’s like the burned out business, woman’s Haven. And so we want to be training them to stop looking at the shiny objects and stop getting sucked into the noise. People tell me all the time, like when they start working with me, the noise stops, because they found what they’re looking for. So they can tune it all out, they don’t have to keep dipping back into the noise. So like, Let’s tune out the noise. Right? So we can find the things that work, but so that we’re not distracted. And we can actually look for the low hanging fruit. Because there is so much low hanging fruit for everyone. You’re missing opportunities, you don’t know how to spot them, you are never taught or trained, you’re too busy, like being distracted by something that’s happening, that’s shiny, to actually go and then get good. And it takes some time. Get really good at creating those opportunities, creating those leads. So you know, things like Meg was saying people come and listen to this podcast, and I can see that my downloads are increasing, but I can’t see who they are. Except I found a way to do that. Well, no, I know, I found a way to take my content that people really love and that they find bingeable. And to create opportunities on the back end for people to binge, special content. And for me to be able to see it. And then when they do that, I can reach out and be like, hey, and we’re going to start doing this, we’re actually going to start offering like little rewards for people. Because to your point, I want to pay attention to the people who are taking action. But I don’t know who they are, unless I can see them in some way. So you know, we’re tracking who’s taking action, and we’ll reach out and be like, Hey, listen, we want to give you a fist bump, we saw that you took massive action. And like, here’s a reward for you for doing that. And so there are ways that you can do it. But you have to be really good at and being willing to look for things, not in places that people are traditionally telling you to look for them because they might be wrong. Yeah.

Meg Casebolt 38:12
And I love that you have those kinds of back end things that are trackable, and you have automations probably set up to just flag you to reach out, it doesn’t have to be an automated outreach thing it can be, hey, we noticed that this person got you know, finished this set of trainings, you and I both use the same software called member vault that does a lot of this for us and then can just email us and be like, hey, Tara, this person just finished this, this free training, go reach out to them and kind of like give you that information. So you don’t have to go in and look at the analytics all the time. But you can still do that personalized outreach without needing to go track down those hot or warm people in your audience. Correct?

Tara Newman 38:52
Correct. So I think that people are really listen, like doing the work isn’t as sexy as having things just magically appear overnight. Yeah, right. Like ads are great. Like they’re quick they could be a quick fix, they could things can move quickly. But you have to know what to do with the leads once you get them in order for that to happen. But there’s really no quick fix you know, my husband said something to me that was like super profound he runs his own business. And he said to me the other day and he runs a manufacturing business so very different than like us with an easy peasy service business. But he said and he it’s funny because he’s very rarely online. He’s he’s got a brick and mortar he’s got a big team. He’s doesn’t have a lot of time for being online but like a few years ago, I remember him falling down like the rabbit hole of like, the bro marketing and like the 10 10x everything, the cardones of the world and him being like really enamored by like this concept of like 10x All the things and it didn’t go well, it didn’t go well. And he said to me the other day, you know, I don’t have to make all the money he was I just have to make enough money consistently over a long period of time. So I don’t have to 10x anything. Yeah, right. And that’s really what’s true. It’s like people don’t realize the relationship between time and money. And how, if you’re going to be constantly banging up against time, when is this going to happen? How long is it going to take, I need it to happen overnight, this is going to be the quick fix. You’re never ever, ever, ever going to get to where you want to go, I can guarantee it,

Meg Casebolt 40:46
then you’re going to be in that same boat of like, I’m just trying all the things and when it doesn’t work, I’m going to change it, I’m going to change it I’m going to change, you’re never going to give things the time to breathe to see if they’re actually making a difference. It’s slow,

Tara Newman 40:59
steady compounding action over time. And that’s the first thing that people say when when they come to work with me, they’re like, I have a really hard time taking consistent action. Yeah. And so it’s, you know, it’s training people giving them the habits. And really, that’s how, how money and wealth

Unknown Speaker 41:18
is created. Yeah, I was just thinking the same thing. Yeah.

Tara Newman 41:22
In your business, or you work for somebody else, wealth gets created, slowly, over long periods of time, taking consistent action.

Meg Casebolt 41:30
I think there’s a lot of us who see this online marketing as like, I’m gonna go buy a lottery ticket, and some day, this lottery ticket is going to give me a lump sum $10 million, right. And that works. And it works for some people. And

Tara Newman 41:44
for some people, however, it is not sustainable. Usually, they hit it once, they have no idea what they’ve done, what to do with the money they’ve made. So they go and blow it or like they’ve made all this money, but there was no profit there. And they’ve made mistakes. And I’ve seen a number of them, like write blog posts about it, which I appreciate their, their transparency and their vulnerability. And I hope that they’re learning as they’re going. But it’s also not sustainable. Oh, my god, somebody told me the best story. So all right, so I love these these money stories. So when I say best story, I mean, like, it’s like worse to like, this is why you’re gonna be like, Okay, I’m buckled exactly what people do in the online business space. So somebody told me that they have a client, they know someone, and I’m just gonna try and change some information here. So it’s not that they make a million dollars a year, like about $100,000 a month selling Beanie Babies. They’re not selling Beanie Babies are actually selling something else. But it’s just like Beanie Babies. And, you know, on like, you know, auction sites and things like that. But every month, they put the exact same amount into buying inventory. So, let’s take the LuLaRoe example. Like we were rich, right? Like, if you sell $50,000 worth of LuLaRoe leggings, but every month you’re putting $50,000 into inventory. You have zero? Yeah. And then what happens is, at some point, people are gonna not want this janky cruddy LuLaRoe leggings, and you’re gonna have $50,000 worth of inventory sitting in your attic, and you will be negative $50,000 Instead of positive, however much money you thought you’d be making, right? Yeah. So same thing in the online business space, if you’re going to make $100,000 a month or whatever. That’s like, you know, $10,000 a month and it’s taking you almost $10,000 and Facebook ads. You have a big goose egg. And maybe it doesn’t take the truth of $10,000 in Facebook ads to to make $10,000 a month but pretty close in some cases.

Meg Casebolt 44:21
Yeah. And I think as service businesses, we think like I would never do that i because we don’t have inventory. We don’t have overhead, we don’t have the same. We do have overhead we don’t have like rent, right? Like a lot of us have more lean businesses, but we don’t treat them that way. We’re like, I’m gonna go invest in this fancy software, or I’m gonna hire a team of virtual assistants. Like it doesn’t just have to be Facebook ads that can eat into those profits, especially if you’re not pricing your products appropriately. Then you can be making tons of sales, which feels like a really good number. Oh, I made 1000 sales this month of $9 products right like And even though you’re doing that, then your customer service fees are gonna go up your processing fees like everything that you’re doing, there’s a expense to it.

Tara Newman 45:10
Mm hmm. You know, I know a woman who is a service professional. She’s an attorney. And Trump’s real simple business. That’s just her and she charges her, she builds her her hours. She is somebody who is a lovely, lovely human being, but is very introverted and socially awkward and has some social anxiety. I think, I don’t know, whatever she charges, like, let’s say $200 an hour, it’s like drastically lower than any other attorney would charge. And she just says, like, really general business type stuff. But like, let’s say she works, you know, 15 hours a week. And she works 48 hours a month, she makes 1548 hours. And let’s so for the year, she works 720 hours, that’s a pretty part time. Yeah, work schedule. All of her business is, you know, word of mouth referral repeat. And so she charges $200 an hour that will give her $144,000 in revenue for the year. Right. But she’s got no overhead. She’s got no social media nonsense. She’s got no ads, she’s that is profit, off of like, I would take maybe $18,000 out of that for taxes. leaves her with $126,000 for working 700 hours a year? What’s wrong with that? Yeah. What’s wrong with that? Like, I mean, maybe she has some systems and stuff like that, but it’s not going to be anything at all. She’s definitely taking home, six figures, she’s definitely able to contribute to retirement and things like that. And she has none of the stress. So why are we Why is it wrong to charge dollar per hour.

Meg Casebolt 47:10
And if you know what you’re gonna do with the money, you know, she might live in New York City, and $100,000 a year isn’t enough to live on, or she might live in Kansas. And you can have a really nice quality of life if you live in a low cost of living area. And like you said, like if you know that you’re going to be contribute taking some of that money and contributing to a 401 K, your Roth IRA, like making those financially the good financial long term decisions, then you also have a plan for how you’re going to retire because that’s something that nobody is talking about in this space is just year over year growth and reinvest in the business. And nobody’s going Hey, have you set up your self employed Ira yet? So that way, you don’t have to do this until you’re 100 years old? Yeah. Drives me crazy that nobody’s talking to small but especially women entrepreneurs, like we have really limited financial literacy information, because it was always like, Oh, that a lot of us were dad took care of it. My husband takes care of it. And then when we were in the corporate world, it was I just the 401k is there for me. And I just need to hopefully max it out. And that’s all we were told there’s not a lot of knowledge of after you get the money. How do you make it work for you long term?

Tara Newman 48:32
Yeah, it’s really funny, because I gotta tell you, so after having these money, conversations pretty in depth for a while now. There’s this one real challenge that I have. And when I did the workshop that I did the other the other week I at the end, I said to the woman, I said, You got to tell me, I said, did I meet you where you’re at? Did I present this too far ahead? Was this too elementary? Because I’ve got really smart women, PhDs, master’s degrees, decades of expertise under their belt, like rock stars in their traditional jobs, accomplishments, accomplished really accomplished women. And the money conversations are like kind of like all over the map. And even the business acumen is all over the map. You know, I have people who say to me, you know, when you said this, I wasn’t sure what you’re talking about, like I have to frequently and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with this, but I frequently give terms and definitions and I’m like, you know, selling you on terms and definitions and not the world’s most sexy thing, but you actually need them. So like, this is what traffic is and this is what a lead is and this is when a lead becomes a prospect and this is when a prospect becomes a buyer and this is like because we’re getting in trouble for not Not having this information. And so, you know, when it comes to the money Conversations, I’m always trying to figure out what is the appropriate on ramp for women, and then of course, there’s like, you know, maybe multiple, you know, on ramps, but like, what’s the one, what’s the on ramp and, and I get a lot of women who just come to me and they’re just frozen. They’re like, I’m debilitating fear. I’m making money, like, Oops, I’m making money. Like, by the way, it’s always an accident. It’s this is like I said to this, and I said to them in the bold profit Academy last week, I said, my clients making like 15 million, it’s an accident. My clients making like, tons of money, there’s not a plan, they just happens like, but when you are a micro business, you need to know you have to actually have that more dialed in, than if you were a larger business that’s maybe been around for 30 years. And like legacy clients are just calling you out of the blue all the time. And you don’t have to maybe do as much proactive selling, it’s very, very different. And they’re like, Oops, I’m making money, but like, I’m debilitating. I’m debilitated in fear. And I don’t know what to do with it. And I feel irresponsible. And it’s confusing. And it is,

Meg Casebolt 51:18
I think that there’s so many like, even if you go Google, I remember googling this in my business when I hit that like kind of tipping point of making consistent income month over month. And I remember Googling, like, how do I know how much I’m supposed to pay myself? Is this a percentage? Is this like a, like, I need to set a salary? How do I decide what that salary is? And there was nobody out there. Eventually, I had a CPA that was like, here’s how much you need to pay yourself. And we set up the S corp, and we did all the things right. But like, there’s a weird, like, when you’re in corporate, somebody says, here’s how much your value is, here’s how much we’re going to give you month over month. But as somebody who’s self employed, it’s like, should I be paying myself? Like, first of all, how do I pay myself? Do I just transfer it from one bank account to an hopefully we’ll have two bank accounts, right? Like, do I just transfer it from my business account to my personal account, and I did that for years. And then finally, I put myself on payroll, and I figured out what I should be paying myself every month. But I didn’t know even what that number should be. And Profit First helped with that, that I could say, what’s the percentage allocation that I’m talking about here? But even then I’m like, I just want some extra details. It’s so much more than a service business needs sometimes, because like I said, 30% 50% like, and how it was so overwhelming, even for I think that I have a pretty good grasp of financial literacy. And it was still a lot of self doubt creeping in going through this process of, well, what if the money isn’t in the bank account next month, and I just left money in my business bank account, because I didn’t feel comfortable paying myself unless I really needed it. You know, there’s this strange transition that happens.

Tara Newman 53:00
Yeah. And I think too, for women, they don’t always understand what the purpose of their money is, at home, because they’re not having a collaborative conversation around what those financial goals are. When I asked on Instagram, like about your financial goals, I got revenue numbers. And those aren’t financial goals. That’s why you would your financial goals or why you would need the revenue. So we got a lot of women over working for money that they may or may not need, based on what are your financial goals,

Meg Casebolt 53:36
if you think your financial goals or buy a house, but what you’re working for is buy a yacht, or buy a second house or whatever, you’re gonna be burning yourself out when you don’t need the money or you’re just investing in the wrong things once you get the money because you don’t know what you’re supposed to be doing.

Tara Newman 53:53
I think women also have been conditioned to see their money as extra as like the icing on the cake as not important. There’s also a whole host of my clients that have come to work with me thinking their husbands were the like mad scientist behind the finances, when they realize they actually didn’t know what the hell they were doing. Like it she wants she winds up being the mad scientist behind the finances, which is actually in the data. That’s what the data shows. It shows that women care way more about certain most most aspects of their finances, long term goals planning for retirement healthcare, college savings, like all that stuff, then the men and so you have a woman who’s like, wandering, lying awake at night like wondering, are we saving enough? Are we planning well enough? Do we have enough do we? And like, we’re leaving it to the men to decide and they don’t care as much as we do, and they’re sleeping fine. Right? And so and so that’s like a real big disk. connect to and when you have your own business, you have the greatest tool to creating wealth in the hands of women who don’t quite understand the power and the magnitude of what they have and what they can create. And that’s really what I’m trying to wake women up to, and like, help them build the confidence around that and be excited about that, like, be excited that they have those opportunities, and that they can make those changes. And, you know, at the workshop that we did, around what you need to know about your money to build your wealth in any economy. There were obviously like, nobody’s teaching this, right. And it’s like, Chris, we’re starting with the true end in mind. And we’re building a business around that true end, with the runway to get there. So nothing in your business has to happen overnight. It has to happen over five years, over 10 years, over 15 years, over 20 years. But you have to be able to stay in the game. And you’re not going to do that with the strategies that they’re giving you online, you’re burning out really fast, you’re exhausted, you know, even I get fatigued, and I need to take a break. And I’m able to do that, because I’ve built these things in you know, so, you know, we’re having these, these more real conversations. And what’s interesting is like, what pops up for folks? You know, and the differences and like, the beliefs that we have around retirement, the beliefs that we have around wealth, what we think generational wealth is versus what general generational wealth actually is? Or, like, why might you want to build generational wealth? And it’s really interesting to listen to these conversations. Because, you know, I shared a lot of women are interested in like, what’s my legacy, like, this generational wealth thing is really popular right now. And I generational wealth starts with knowledge, starts with literacy starts with your literacy, and then your ability to go and teach that to the next generation. It doesn’t start with money. But, you know, I’ve had a couple of women, they happen to be in Canada, who have said, like, you know, why are we why are you working so hard for your children? Like, why are you leaving, you know, looking to leave so much money behind. And listen, we all have different perspectives, you get to do whatever the hell you want to do with your money. And you get to work for as much or as little money as you want. That’s the whole point of following my framework, is you get to decide that for yourself. But for me, you know, we don’t live in Canada, we don’t have good social supports. None. So I’m really considering what social supports my kids might need. Not what I’m dead. But like No, even as an even when I’m still living. Like, because my husband and I are 100% privileged 100% had advantages, but have also worked really, really hard for what we have to provide basic lifestyle to provide more than enough, so we’re not we’re not worried about what’s coming. And I want you to secure I want my kids to not have to do that. To be honest, I don’t necessarily want them to be spoiled.

Meg Casebolt 58:34
Right, right. And security is different than spoils is different than a

Tara Newman 58:37
tie. I want them to feel like they’re working with like the hounds of hell with their backs. You know, that they have to earn, earn, earn, earn, earn, and we have no idea what the future our economic outlook in our future. And I’m not saying that to be catastrophic or doomsday at all. You know, I’m very much a realist. And starting now, starting way ahead of, you know, as given as much runway as I can, is kind of like how I think about it, so I am looking to leave something to them, or to to be able to provide for them later in life. You know, I watched a lot of my friends, you and I have had this conversation where, you know, women start businesses out of necessity. And one of the reasons why you started your business was because of childcare. Yeah. And you didn’t you were like this doesn’t make sense. Like I don’t have the money. I don’t have enough money to pay for childcare and work like I’d be negative. I was like at that really weird, like, salary where I was making too much to not quit. Yeah, but not enough to really thrive with paying for childcare. And I watched my friends who had who came from more affluent families be able to stay at home or, you know, had spouses that could support them or, you know, were in a position where they could make different choices, I was not in that position at all, I had to work. Or I was watching friends who had parents who were willing to like, reschedule things to take care of kids. And, you know, maybe they were working shift work, and they took a different shift to an I didn’t have that either. And I’m like, I just remember the immense pressure. And I’m gonna cry.

Meg Casebolt 1:00:30
Okay, I can tell, you get wrapped up in this, but it is there’s, there’s this feeling like you need to take care of your own. And the social safety net is not there to help you with it. And so you have to make hard decisions in the moment. And for me, that hard decision was, I don’t know what the hell I’m doing here. I’ve never run a business, I never wanted to run a business, I consider myself a very reluctant entrepreneur, because I wanted to go run a nonprofit, you know, I wanted to go save the world, I had these very lofty goals about what I wanted to do. And the financials did not line up for me in that way. And I didn’t know how to make these systems work for me. And the systems aren’t built to work for us as the middle class, like we can really get off on like, we really can democratizing Indigenous education piece here, I want to,

Tara Newman 1:01:22
which is why building wealth is like, to me, especially for middle class is so important because like, I’m thinking to myself, like what if my daughter does want to he does want to have children? Yeah. And we still don’t have a way for women to actually, like, take time off and be with their children, well, then I’d be able to provide that,

Meg Casebolt 1:01:45
yeah, I have a child who’s on the spectrum. And there are things that he may not be able to do as an adult. And knowing that when he’s so young, it’s like, we have to start to plan ahead for that, which is that he may not make what is considered a successful income due to his disabilities and limitations. And that’s okay, like we can help provide for that. Now, we can plan for that now. But we can also get him the resources that he needs, which some of which are out of pocket expenses.

Unknown Speaker 1:02:12
That’s a whole other conversation. Right is the

Meg Casebolt 1:02:17
content. Also, one thing I wanted to come back to is the way that women approach financial goals being different than the way that men do and the way that that impacts our families, and our communities. So I’m coming to this from the perspective of like, I have a master’s degree in Community Economic Development, the thing that I studied was in, you know, giving micro loans to women in the developing world and seeing what happened. And what happened was, if you give money to men, the men hold on to the money, or they spend the money for themselves like this is, this is not just me being kind of generalizing things, it’s just

Tara Newman 1:02:54
absolutely tell you that my husband has not considered my daughter, you know, yeah, take a we’ve to have a child and the early stages of her having a child, not because he’s a jerk, but because just not socialized into thinking.

Meg Casebolt 1:03:09
And what they found in you know, this was in the 1990s, is the studies were started in Bangladesh, and they have been replicated around the world. But the idea is, if you give money to men, it will not impact a larger community. If you give money to women, or you give a goat to all women, like it doesn’t even have to be money, if you give resources to women, the entire their families, their extended families, their communities all improve, because women’s financial goals are not always self motivated, which is really important, but also a little bit detrimental to the women. Because if they just took that, you know, the money from the milk from their goat, and they went and took care of themselves the way that some of the other members of their household would, they would probably be better off, but it wouldn’t impact the community. And those are the financial goals that we’re talking about here with legacy with investing with wealth generation with thinking about the future and not just how much money can I put in this bank account? How much money can I invest in my stocks this month? It’s bigger than that. And when we are simultaneously saying I want to help others, and also saying I don’t deserve to make money because I’ve been socialized to believe that I have to give for free and that my value is not women or

Tara Newman 1:04:25
women will make money and then give it all away. Yeah. Which I see like and this obsession with making an impact, and not really understanding what that looks like or what that means. And then just believing that it’s all about giving everything away.

Meg Casebolt 1:04:41
Yeah. And now there’s a lot of pressure to be like, I’m going to offer a sliding scale services for people from marginalized communities or I’m going to, you know, have a bunch of scholarships, and I’m all for using that for inclusion. I am not for creating more work for yourself when you don’t have financial stability because you feel indebted to an idea that’s out

Tara Newman 1:05:03
there oxygen mask on first. So you know, it’s about having enough. You decide what your enough is, yeah. And then once you have enough, you can then start to talk about more than enough. So I get called out a bit, usually from the dudes in the online space around the fact that the whole profit Academy will help you is there to help you get to $250,000 in revenue, consistently, year over year, because when you’re there, you can make six figures, you can bring home six figures in in pay based on the Profit First methodology. And they’re always like, Well, isn’t that limited thinking? And I’m like, No, that’s reality, right? Like, let’s get these women to making six figures year after year after year, because that’s when they can put their oxygen masks on. And then they can start to go for more than enough. I’m not saying that’s the only amount of money you should make. I’m saying when you get to that point you get to have you get to make some decisions around what that looks like for you, and your desired personal freedom and the meaning you know, how meaningful you feel about your work and the purpose that it brings you and all those other things. But like, let’s get to a place where we can take care of ourselves first, because then when we could do that, then we can give. And that’s like my biggest concern right now, with women, small business owners. And you know, what we’re seeing in the economy, the economy is like a little rumbly tumbly. I’m not speculating that we’ll have a recession, but

Meg Casebolt 1:06:37
it looks 14, there are some signs happening.

Tara Newman 1:06:40
There’s there’s some pretty good signs happening. And again, like if that happens, it’s not catastrophic. Like, you’re already going to be in it for six months before you realize you’re in it. Because we need two quarters of negative GDP. before they’ll even say it’s a recession.

Meg Casebolt 1:06:58
What was Josh Lachman said and westwing We don’t use that word, let’s call it a bagel. We don’t ever want to use the phrase recession. It’s just a really dry bagel,

Tara Newman 1:07:07
you know, and it’ll be like, the great recession was like, 18 months, right? Like, this is not a long period of time. Yeah, this is like, it’s, I’ve been talking about this on social media. And I said, like, it’s turbulence, right? Like, it’s gonna be a bumpy ride, you might feel a little sick in your belly, you might need a barf bag, but you’re gonna be fine, we’re gonna land safely. And my thing is, is like, we have to make sure that we are positioned, I know that the news is scary. I know that like, every other day, something’s happening to you like sap your energy, but we have to find ways to keep going, we have to keep taking steps, stop even looking at what’s happening today, and focus on three years from now. Because here’s the thing, we can’t stop spending money. We have to find we have to go out and make more money so we can continue to spend, because that’s what’s gonna keep small businesses going small business owners making money and spending money with small business owners is what’s going to insulate and protect that economy. And then when small business owners particularly women make money, what did they go and do, they go and make sure that the population who is the most affected by the recession and inflation have food and gas cards, and clothing, and they’re gonna go to their school, and they’re gonna be like, Hey, do you know families who are in need, they’re gonna go to the local food bank and say, here’s a check, they’re gonna

Meg Casebolt 1:08:30
cause each other. That’s what women do. We take care, that’s what

Tara Newman 1:08:33
women do. And so we have to continually and I said this on my, my stories this weekend, from Instagram, we have to keep making money, we have to keep thinking I’m going to make more not because that’s greedy. But because you literally need to just keep making more, that is how this works. Like, if you hit $100,000, in your business one year, you have to then go make another $100,000. The next year, you don’t get to stop, the balloons aren’t actually not going to fall from the sky and celebrate that, like you’re the reward is, is you get to do it again. And again, and again. And again. So this whole concept around like, making money is just a thing that we have to go and do.

Meg Casebolt 1:09:16
It’s kind of like, you know, like the biggest loser how they were like, you’re gonna lose 200 pounds, well, then the balloons fall from the sky. And guess what the next day, you still have to eat. And you have to choose what behavior you’re going to take at that point. There is no end point for most of the important things we do in our lives. We don’t breathe and then we stop breathing because we breathe enough. Yeah, everything needs to be sustainable. And if we can normalize the idea of something like consistent revenue and consistent small growth, not 10x, maybe 10%.

Tara Newman 1:09:51
I have never worked in a real business environment that actually promoted growth the way I see it promoted online. Yeah. I worked for a CEO 7%. That’s what he wanted 7% growth on operating profit every year, he knew if he had 7% on operating profit every year, that he can maintain the workforce, that he can offer bonuses that he could give raises, that he could, you know, do all of those things. And it was interesting, because it didn’t dawn on me until like, literally like 20 years later, just the other week why he was choosing, I think he was choosing 7%. Because he was thinking like an investor. Yeah, that’s what you get on the stock market, I’m ever, that’s what you get on the stock market. And he was he came from a very wealthy family. And he had other revenue streams, he was on advisory boards, he had his stocks, he had his dividends he had his properties he had, he had all these things. So like this business was just one more investment in his portfolio. And so therefore, it was 7% and Mike McCalla wits when he was on my podcast last year, he’s talking about how we have to stop thinking like even CEOs and start thinking like shareholders. And this is what he means is in your portfolio of revenue streams in your portfolio of investments, how are you using all of your investments, to create income for yourself, not solely relying just on your business, but using your business to fund these other asset classes. So that it’s not the only way that you’re continually making money that you have other passive ways to make money that are not info products with a funnel, because that’s not actually a passive income product. But really what you know, and we’re gonna, we’ve been making, I can go on for hours. And so what we’re, what I want to wrap us up with is that if you’re tired right now, I totally get it. I’m tired, too. If your health feels like it’s in the shit, I get it, mind you. If you’re like Tara, but I have money, trauma and money stories, I get it so

Unknown Speaker 1:12:02
to why.

Tara Newman 1:12:04
If you’re like by the system, right, like the system like misogyny and the patriarchy, I get it, I get it, I get it. And what I really want to encourage you to do is to think about what you want your role in society to be, and how your small business is going to help you with the roll with your financial goals with your own society, and to stop thinking to stop thinking about how can I get clients today, I understand that’s important. Totally do. But now is the time to start thinking three years ahead, and how was what you’re doing today, setting you up for continued growth and success,

Unknown Speaker 1:12:47
three years from now. Because the things

Tara Newman 1:12:51
if you’re just taking action for today, you’re only ever going to get today. If you don’t pick your head up and look forward and look for the path forward, and get in spaces that are going to challenge the way you think that are going to help you see what that path might be to give you clarity and perspective on that. That’s really where you need to be focusing your your time and your attention, and not on the shiny objects. And I also want to just say, I know there’s a lot of folks right now, who might even be feeling like apathetic, like why even bother?

Unknown Speaker 1:13:25
Right? Like,

Tara Newman 1:13:26
I am in the same matrix. As everyone else. I have had my moments, I’ve had my moments where I’m like, why am I even doing this? Why am I even bothering? You know, what is the purpose of all that? And I really want to bring you back to your original intent

Unknown Speaker 1:13:42
around why you started a business?

Tara Newman 1:13:48
What were you looking to do, at the very beginning, that you’ve most likely forgotten about, because your brain has been hijacked by the noise. So come back to that original intent. And I hope that this conversation provides some level of motivation for everyone to really get out there and to think about, where can I be making more money? What is the purpose for the money that I’m making? And how can I use this to not just you know, to first put my oxygen mask on grow well for myself, for a lot of the reasons that Meg and I shared with you. And then once I have that, once I have enough, how can you use your gifts to make more to support the social causes that you want to support? That was word salad, Maggie.

Meg Casebolt 1:14:42
No, I loved it, because there’s so much in there. Well, thank you so much for letting me come on and interview you which was really just an extension of what our Voxer conversations are where we rant at each other every day about this stuff. We just made it public this time.

Tara Newman 1:14:58
Do you think it was to ADHD? Do you think like We like took them all over the place.

Meg Casebolt 1:15:01
I think if we had to map this out, it would look like that like meme from Charlie Day. And It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia where we just bounced all over the place. But hopefully people caught on and they were able to grab on to the coattails and hold on tight.

Tara Newman 1:15:16
What’s one thing you want them to take away from this conversation today?

Unknown Speaker 1:15:21
I think

Meg Casebolt 1:15:22
not getting so stuck in the day to day and not getting so stuck in the the marketing strategy of the month. And thinking about what is what is the way that you want to grow? And why. For me, the way that I want to grow is relationships and leaning into those and not getting so stuck in the you know, what are my metrics, even though that’s what I teach, you know, is recognizing that everything can be a tool, but you need to find what works for you and your business and your life and your goals. And ignore the stuff that isn’t valuable to you.

Tara Newman 1:15:58
I feel like that’s really in alignment with the name of your company, love it first

Unknown Speaker 1:16:01
search. Like, there are going to be people who

Meg Casebolt 1:16:06
find you who don’t want you and you can’t cater to them. Right. But if there are people out there who are searching for you, and they find you and they’re immediately numbered with you and find the way to turn those people into your clients, this isn’t, you know, you I think Seth Godin calls it your minimum viable audience. It’s like you don’t have to be everything to everyone. You’re not running for

Tara Newman 1:16:25
that many people. You don’t need as many people as you think for che

Meg Casebolt 1:16:29
said for a while it was like you need a top 1000. But now some of the researchers coming out and saying like you really just need 100. Right? So if let’s let’s talk about this, like, if you had 100 amazing people, How would things change? Think about that as part of your business strategy, not the 100,000 million followers. But if you want 100 ambassadors who were helping you and supporting you, and you could help them, what would that

Unknown Speaker 1:16:53
look like? Yeah, reframe it. Yeah.

Tara Newman 1:16:58
All right, Mike, tell people where they can find you. You have a podcast, you have a YouTube channel.

Meg Casebolt 1:17:03
I have all the things all the ways you can find me I don’t always practice what I preach. Right? So you can find me over at love at first search.com You can search for us on YouTube. I love it for search. I also have a podcast called Social slowdown. That’s all about ways that you can market your business without being dependent on social media. We’re not anti social. We’re, you know, we’re not like you have to get off social media, you have to eliminate it from your life. We’re about setting up boundaries that feel good and recognizing when you want to be in relationship with people on these platforms and other ways that you can connect with people that don’t require you to be on this hamster wheel.

Tara Newman 1:17:42
Right? Just feeling like you don’t have to be there 24/7 You get to take

Meg Casebolt 1:17:47
and setting your own goals and values and boundaries in your marketing in the same way that you do for your business. Thank you so much for listening to the social slowdown podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe or come on over to social slowdown.com and sign up for our email list. You never miss an episode. We’d also love if you could write a review to help other small business owners find the show you can head over to social slowdown.com/review Or grab that link in our show notes for easy access. We’ll be back soon with more tips to help you market your business without being beholden to social media Talk to you then.

Please forgive any typos as this transcript was automatically generated by otter.ai.