S1E2: Make Money With Your Message
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Welcome to the Women Rocking Business podcast, because there’s never been a better time to be a woman entrepreneur. I’m Sage Lavine, and I am here to call you forward to rock your Business, sister. Let’s dive in.
All right. This episode is for you if you are looking to get more clear on the message that’s going to grow your business even bigger.
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If you feel like you’re in any kind of message soup or niche soup, like we call it at Women Rocking Business. If you’re swimming around in any level of ambiguity, confusion, overwhelm, or if you’re just out there trying to help everyone and in the process of trying to help everyone, you might be helping nobody, or maybe you’re helping people and they’re not paying you what you know you really need to make in order to stay in business. Because here’s the thing at a certain point. If we don’t get you making the amount of money that you really need to thrive in your life, we risk you running out of the finances that time, the enthusiasm, the inspiration to really start and scale your business and having a clear message.
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Having a clear niche is what allows you to scale and grow a business and really reach more people. So for those of you who are interested in this conversation, let’s dive in.
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I was a major major niche switcher. And in fact, some of my entrepreneurial friends used to tease me because I literally, within a year’s time, was doing coaching around life purpose, helping people get clear on their life purpose. I was doing relationship coaching at the time I was married and in a pretty happy marriage. So I was coaching around relationships through referrals that were coming to me through one of my relationship colleagues and my life. She was sending me her clients, and I started to do some business coaching. I was also in the women’s empowerment conversation. So literally at one time I remember having about 11 or 12 clients, you know, here’s the, here’s the truth is that every time I chose a niche, I would get clients, you know, this was way back in the beginning of my career when I was really resistant to even having a niche.
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So I just decided to try it on. And it’s something I recommend to all my clients, you know, if it’s not working for you the way that you want it to be working in business, you know, we have to learn to imitate before we innovate. And it doesn’t mean that we can’t imitate and innovate at the same time, but it’s so important to be willing to try something on, especially if you’re resistant to it. And so I challenged myself to choose a niche, even though I just wanted to stay as a women’s empowerment, you know, consultant, spiritual mentor to many, right? And every time I put a more specific message out there, I would get clients. And so there was a time when I literally was running around from session to session, three of my clients were doing life purpose work with me.
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So I was putting them through a set of tools and modules around getting clear on their purpose, their career path, doing an inventory of their passions and what they really wanted to be doing in life. And then I had two or three more clients in the relationship niche. I was putting them through these different exercises and handouts about their relationship and what was working in their relationship and what wasn’t working in their relationships. Then, I had people starting businesses and I was putting them through a different set of handouts. That was when I realized, “Oh my gosh,” this is way more work than if I had one kind of client, right. If I just had one kind of client, it’s not that every single client would be the same, but then I could start to create some order to what it is that I’m doing.
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So what’s true for you is that yes, absolutely – you can go get clients without a clear niche. You can enroll people in your services without having a super clear message, especially if you’re a strong leader. However, it gets in the way of you being able to really develop a system, a framework, a body of knowledge, a body of work that you’re putting your clients through. And it can slow you down. If you’re somebody who wants to walk the path of being a thought leader, and if you want to really be a bold stand for something on this planet, having a clear message and a clear niche is just essential. So I wanna dive into the three keys that I see are possible to help you really Make Money With Your Message.
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I want to dive in and really share the three keys that I believe are essential to really making great money with your Message, helping a lot of people and building a business that really works for you rather than you having to work for the business. Because the more you can scale, the more you can be in your zone of genius, right? And then you can hire people to help you do all the things you’d rather not be doing in your business. And so having that body of work that’s bigger than yourself, it really is the first step to reaching more people. You get to be out there bringing a message to the masses, even when you’re taking a nap or walking on the beach, right through video or through podcasts or through training programs or through books.
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So that brings me to the first key to really making money with your message and that is to be willing to use your life as a PhD program, that’s been preparing you to take a bold stand. What I mean by that is that you have this clear point of view around what’s for your clients, you are taking stand for their transformation. So I’m going to use myself as an example at Women Rocking Business, we stand for WOMEN building freedom-based businesses that gives back.
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We stand for women doing business from a place of collaboration rather than competition, a sense of generosity rather than a sense of scarcity or urgency, and empowerment rather than powering over. And it’s because we have this way of doing business that’s allowed us to stand out in the marketplace. There’s a lot of business coaches out there, but our clients come to us because our way of teaching business resonates with them. And so when you align your business message with your deepest values, then you become really, I believe an unstoppable magnet for your clients.
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So there’s a concept in Japan. I actually lived in Japan several years ago. There was a concept there called Ikigai. And Ikigai is translated as a reason for being we’re going to go ahead and put the Ikigai diagram in the show note at the heart of Ikigai is really the visual representation of the fact that your most successful livelihood overlaps with what the world will pay for. And so feel into the philosophical meaning of this Here, right? It’s this concept that I am me because you are you that my gift actually can’t live or thrive in the absence of you.
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For those of you that aren’t serving as many people as you’d like to be serving, this is an opportunity to perhaps get a little bit more humble, perhaps stop making it about you and what you want to teach. And to start getting really curious with those in your life, who would be interested in the kinds of services that you provide. Right? In other words, I see a lot of entrepreneurs being a little bit self-centered when it comes to their Message saying things like, well, this is what I really want to say to the world. And, you know, I just want people to know X, Y, and Z. And I’ll be honest that come from place…
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What do I want to say? It’s a little egotistical, right? Instead play with asking yourself the question, what does the world need from me? What does the universe need from me today? What does the universe need from me this week? Right? Because at the end of the day, I actually was least excited about business coaching. In the beginning, I made up this story that I was going to spend my life having to help people understand what to put on their website or help people understand you, Google algorithms or digital marketing or social media advertising. But what’s true is that I can teach all of those things to my clients and I do, but that’s not the conversation that I have to be in every day.
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Right? I can create trainings that are evergreen. I can bring in experts to help me to teach the things that aren’t in my wheelhouse. And I can be a stand, a global stand for the way we do business and help women be wildly successful with our unique framework, because I’ve chosen a niche because I’ve chosen a specific outcome that people actually want. It’s very marketable. People fly from all over the globe to come and learn the process of we teach at Women Rocking Business. That wouldn’t happen if I were standing for something that was murky, no I’m standing for something very clear. My life has been preparing me to stand for Women doing business as Women.
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You know, when I was a little girl, my mom’s relationship with money was absolutely sideways. I mean, when my mom married, my dad, my grandfather actually gave my father copies of my mom’s social security paperwork, bank, paperwork, birth certificate. My grandfather gave that stuff to my father. When my parents got married and my grandfather said to my father, “she’s yours now.” So I come from a long line of women who have been disempowered around money and through my own process of becoming financially empowered, creating millions of dollars of revenue every year at Women Rocking Business, going from being a school teacher from Iowa, who used to make $28,000 a year to managing a team of dozens of women, making over a million dollars from stage.
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At one event, I’ve been forced to learn about my own value, my own boundaries. I’ve had the opportunity to grow as a woman in ways I never could have even imagined my business has been a spiritual path for my own path of self-realization. And really that’s why we’re all doing this, right? You’re not peddling a factory full of widgets. You’re here to self-actualize through your business. That’s why you’re here.
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That brings me to the second key. Okay. I want to take a moment and pause for a quick Rock Your Business commercial break and let you know that we’ve just launched a Make Money with your Message Bonus Training for anyone who buys my book, Women Rocking Business, the book hit number one, when it was recently published with Hay House. The book is a 12-step system for any woman to go from just having an idea to building a six or an even seven figure business with simple and elegant Business strategies that are based in women’s values. You know, women are starting businesses one and a half times faster than men, but we’re also failing faster than men.
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But when we learn to build businesses that align with our innate values of collaboration, rather than competition empowerment, rather than power over. And when we build businesses based in generosity, rather than using scarcity or manipulative selling tactics, I see women grow and thrive as successful business owners and CEOs. And in our community, we see that 90% of businesses are succeeding rather than 90% failing. And so we have a special promo happening right now, where when you buy the book, you get access to our full training course, Make Money With Your Message, which is a five video module course where you’ll get our simple proven system on how to Make Money With Your Message.
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And I’ll walk you through getting clear on your mission statement, really understanding who your clients are, how to find them, how to sell to them in a way that feels authentic. And with integrity, you’ll learn to match your offerings with the things that your clients are struggling with the most. And you’ll get my freedom formula on how to grow business and make great money and just 12 days a month or less. So go grab the book over at www.womenrockingbusiness.com/book and get the bonuses so that we can get you going because your clients they’re waiting for you.
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That brings me to the second key to really getting clear on your message is for you to market downstream instead of upstream. Write this down. You want to market downstream instead of upstream. So what I mean by that is that you’re actually marketing toward what your ideal clients are asking for rather than having to educate them about what they need. When I see a lot of entrepreneurs, consultants, coaches, and healers kind of step into the personal development space, I see them educating people about why they might want to hire themselves, right? And the mistake here is that when people are thinking about making an investment in themselves, we don’t want to be educating them about why they need us.
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We want to make sure we position ourselves to solve a particular problem for them to solve a fairly pressing problem for them. Because here’s the thing. When people are investing in their own personal development, they’re up against some kind of a challenge. It’s not easy to change. It’s not easy to transform. It’s not easy to transform your relationships. It’s not easy to transform your health. It’s not easy to start a business. And so when we make an investment to support us through the challenges in life, the last thing we need somebody to be doing is jumping down our throats about why they need us, right? We want to make sure that we’re positioned as a solution to people’s problems that they’re already in touch with.
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They’re already complaining to their friends about, we want to use their language, right? And so when we listen to people complaining who we would love to help, we pay attention to their language, what it is that they’re saying is the problem. And we even take the time to do potential client interviews. Here’s an example of this. One of my clients came to me and she was doing workshops around the path to self-love. And she was so confused because the first workshop she did, she had like 20 people there. It was called the path to self-love, but she had done six workshops after that one, and hardly anybody had shown up. She’s like, what’s going on? And we together determined that that first workshop that she hosted was full of about 20 people that had been following her that had been in touch with her.
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It was kind of like the low hanging fruit that she had developed over several years of just being a leader in her community, giving people advice, being somebody who people looked to for answers. And those people who were warm connections were eager to listen to what she had to say, but the Message, but the Message of the path to self-love. It wasn’t magnetic enough for the public. So we worked together and we helped her to retitle her workshop. Her new title was attention. Women leaders, the three steps to triple your free time and find balance within a busy lifestyle. And she, once again, was up to 20, 25 people attending her events with this new title, right?
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It’s much more specific. Attention women leaders, three steps to triple your free time and find balance within your busy lifestyle. And you want to know what the coolest thing is. She was still teaching self-love techniques. She hardly changed anything about the content of the workshop. She just changed the title. So here, what I’m saying, when I put a stake in the ground for you to be willing, to put a title on your event, that is actually magnetic because the sign on the door doesn’t have to match the thing that people get. When they walk in the door. Now stay with me here. I’m not saying bait and switch.
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I’m not saying promise weight-loss and once they come give them chocolate ice cream, but what I’m saying is people actually buy at a very low level of complexity. So there’s some great research out there that illustrates what level of expertise do people buy at, right? And if you and I have been studying our craft, you know, we’ve read books, we’ve attended seminars, we’ve been watching motivational speakers. We’ve been doing our own personal work. We have a level of expertise in the area that we like to talk about. It doesn’t mean that we’re the most amazing expert ever. And I know some of you don’t always feel like an expert. I think most of you would admit that you have a certain level of knowledge about the subject that you’re wanting to bring to your client.
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And that level of knowledge is usually like a level seven, eight or nine at an expertise scale of one to 10, right? On a scale of one to 10, you’re going to be like a seven, eight, nine, 10. Some of you were like Sage, I’m a 12 like good job. You’re a 12. But that level isn’t where people buy. You know, many of you are out there using metaphors in your, in your marketing. You’re, you’re, you’re using flowery language. You’re using sophisticated metaphorical titles. And that may be one of the reasons why people aren’t showing up as much as you want people actually buy. And they use their money and their time when you are marketing at a level one or two or three, right?
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Are you picking up what I’m laying down? So that’s why a title like, attention women leaders, three steps to triple your free time. It gets people’s attention because it’s twelve-year-old language. It’s simple. It’s magnetic. So try it on, give it a try, right? Rather than resisting it, rather than rebelling against it, would you be willing to give some simple marketing titles, try and see if they work? See if they pull, because if they do, then you’ll get to help a lot more people. You can get out of your own way. And that brings me to the third key of really making money with your message. And that is that money loves order. Write that down: money loves order.
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It actually says this in the Bible, right? Money loves organization. Money is attracted to that, which is orderly. So what I’m speaking into here is that people invest when they can feel like there’s a structure they can lean into. If you’re somebody who’s helping women who have gone through transition, right? If that’s your message, I want to be able to help any woman who’s gone through a transition. Well, here’s the thing, a woman who has gone through divorce is going through something so different than a woman who has lost her child or who lost her job. It’s so different.
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And so in order for that woman to really invest her time or attend a workshop or get on a video and really feel safe or feel like you would be the mentor for her, she needs to feel like you really understand what she’s going through. And if you’re trying to speak to the woman who lost her job and the woman who just went through divorce all at the same time, chances are you’re going to lose her. And so money loves order. Money is attracted to that, which is clear and simple and magnetic. And the Message claiming concepts that goes along with this key is something that we teach our clients to do, which is we encourage our clients to niche for now.
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What I mean by that is that you’re going to have a starter niche. You’re going to have a niche that helps you to get started. Your niche is going to help you get some traction in the marketplace, get some attention so that you can be a big fish in a small pond, rather than having to be a small fish in a big pond. When you’re the big fish, you’re going to get people’s attention. People are going to be pointing at you and they have certain problems, and they’re going to be telling their friends, right? You might say to me, well, Sage, Tony Robbins, and you know, Gabby Bernstein and you know, all of these other people, they’re generalists, they’re out there talking about spirituality and leadership and Money and career and health.
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And I’m here to tell you that most thought leaders actually got their start within a certain niche, especially in the last five years. And the market is showing indicators left and right that micro niching and creating more and more specific niches to get momentum is even more important than it was years ago. So Tony Robbins actually started out talking about alkalizing, his body, health, and weight loss. He actually started out in a niche and as his following grew, he now gets to talk about what he wants. Gabby Bernstein’s a great example. She is very specific around the law of attraction.
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Is it possible to get momentum in a spiritual niche? Absolutely it is. But those who actually create success in a more spiritual, more metaphysical niche, they’re still focusing on something very specific that people are interested in and people are interested in the law of attraction and they especially were years ago and Gabby got started. I got a chance to meet Gabbyy. And we talked about this and she said to me, Sage, I don’t think that I could have started the way that I started now in the way that I started years ago, right. We spoke together at the hay house conference and she agrees that she got started in a time where there were less spiritual teachers on the scene.
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And so she was able to stand out quickly if she were starting now with a Message. She said she’d probably be narrowing down even more than she is now. And so we have to niche for momentum, write that down niche for momentum and niche for now my team. And I even joke, and my clients and I joke NFN sister NFN “niche for now,” because we’re going to spin out. We’re going to have days where we think that everything we’re doing is all wrong and we chose the wrong thing. And that’s why it’s so hard. And if I were to just switch my niche, then it would probably be a lot easier and people would just be aligning up to hear me speak. And all of that, of course is not true.
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It’s a total lie, right? So people invest in themselves through your services because of what you stand for on their behalf. And this is pretty cool because when you are standing for something on your client’s behalf, you don’t have to bring in the hard sell. This is super powerful. If you can wrap your mind around this, because the truth is that you don’t have to manipulative or convincing or bring any hard selling in when it’s not about them hiring you. It’s about them investing in themselves through your services because of what you’re standing for.
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Right? I get to stand for Women, having a business that brings them the freedom, the joy, the fulfillment, the impact that they’ve been longing for for years. And that’s what I’m fighting for. I’m fighting for women saying yes to themselves, whether they invest in us or somebody else, I don’t have to be as attached. Now. Of course, I love it when women trust us and come to us, and we’ve gotten a chance to support tens of thousands of women over the last years to build six and seven figure businesses. But I get to keep my energy clean by being clear on what I stand for. And so what do you stand for? Because money loves order. And if you don’t have a clear outcome, a clear transformation that you’re standing for, it’s kind of like you’re selling air and what’s cool is with every client you serve, your body of work is going to become more and more clear, and you will become more and more effective at what you do.
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And so like Reverend Michael Beckwith says the universe doesn’t call the qualified, the universe qualifies the called. And so if you are willing to get out of your own way, choose a Message and get out there. I promise you and less clients are waiting. So get out there and take your Message for a test. Drive, lead a short workshop on a topic that you’re passionate about at the local library or the local bookstore, and see how it goes. See if people respond, CLARITY comes from taking action, not the other way around quick recap, key number one, it’s really Make Money With Your Message is to look at your life as a PhD program, preparing you for the bold stand and that you’re here to take in the world.
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What super power have you developed as a part of your sheroes journey? That would be a great question to journal on and to go and answer in the Women, Rocking Business Facebook group. In fact, head over to the Women Rocking Business Sisterhood Facebook group now, and let us know what is the niche you’re trying ON. Test your Message out on us. See how we respond. And key number two, to making money with your message is to market downstream, not upstream to give people what they’re saying. They want rather than what you think they need. And key number three, to making money with your Message is to know that Money loves order.
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Your message is going to benefit from you putting rails on it and to be willing to niche for now, knowing that once you have that momentum in your business, and as a thought leader, or as a speaker or an author, you’re going to be able to talk about all kinds of things that help people. But in order for people to recognize you, we need to have a clear sign on the door. Congratulations for being a woman on a MISSION. And what I know in my heart of hearts is that your clients are really are waiting for you. That the very desire that exists in your heart to change lives is equally matched by people out there right now.
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And this very moment and this exact moment right now, there are people out there waiting for you. And so sister, let’s get you out there. It is such an honor to have you as the very best part of Women Rocking Business. Your clients are out there waiting for you. They’re not just waiting for someone like you. They are actually waiting for you. Bye everyone. See you next week, you’ve been listening to Women Rocking Business. I’m Sage Lavine. And then the next step is to join our private Facebook group. The Women Rocking Business Sisterhood, and introduce yourself over there for the real and vulnerable conversation of what it really takes to launch and scale a business you love in that Sisterhood group. We have each other’s backs, each other’s sides and each other’s fronts. This is true collaboration. So go grab a seat in the Sisterhood, because we can go so much further when we go together. You’ll find a link to the private Sisterhood group and do our upcoming event in the show notes.
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And if you have a woman in your life, who’s growing a business or starting a business, please share this podcast with her so she can create her big dreams and take a moment to subscribe and rate and review the podcast, which helps us get our message into the hands of women who need it. I’ll see you on the next show and don’t forget, your clients are waiting. They’re not just waiting for someone like you. They’re actually waiting for you.
