Andrea Nordling 0:00
Welcome to the profitable nutritionist podcast my fur brand. I’m extra super caffeinated, revved up excited to record this episode today. Because truly, this is a resource I wish I had five or six years ago when I was banging my head against the wall trying to consistently sell online. Because I struggled so much, especially with launches, it was a dirty word to me, I hated the word launch I, I was kind of scared of it, to be honest. And I’m gonna tell you all about that, including the strategies that I changed along the way. So I could go from avoiding launches, not planning out promotions, I started calling them promotions. So it launches because I had a deep fear of the word launch, we’re gonna get over that right now let’s just call them launches. And then I’m gonna tell you about how I went from that frame of mind. And not making any money to loving launching in my business and consistently hitting my goals. And really looking forward to every time I get to launch not I have to, or I should launch but I get to launch. And that is totally available for you too. So this episode is going to be packed with equal parts mindset, and strategy around launching, I have to preface everything that I’m about to share with you with who this is going to be the most useful for. I am giving you advanced launching strategies here. This is not beginner stuff. In fact, if you haven’t made at least $10,000 Selling your one offer yet, do not even think about complicating your marketing by doing a launch the way that I’m going to lay out here, it will slow you down. And that is not necessary. In fact, I would say the advanced launch strategy here that we’re going to talk about today is best suited for selling an offer that you’ve already made well over 30k, maybe 30k to 50k selling. Okay, that’s an arbitrary number. I’m throwing out arbitrary numbers here. But what I want to convey is that you don’t do this in the beginning. You just get scrappy and you sell and you tell people the words, I can help you as often as possible. You don’t need complicated online funnels, and launches to do that and trying to set them up prematurely will not help you make money, it will hinder you. Okay, you hear me this is not beginner stuff. So proceed with caution. You’ve been warned. This is not a strategy that I teach in the profitable nutritionist program, because it’s not the foundational skills of organic marketing, and selling and really high level client delivery that’s going to result in quickly making money and getting client results in your practice. And that is what I teach in TPN. This advanced launch strategy is a component of what I teach in the streamline and scale mastermind. It’s built on the foundational concepts that you learn in the profitable nutritionist program. But this is an advanced method of selling and evaluating that we do together in the mastermind. So if you’re still listening, you’ve been warned, launching is not a beginner business strategy. Let’s say that again. Launching is not a beginner business strategy is a skill to work on after you have successfully sold your offer many, many times, and you’re ready to pour gasoline on that fire and systematize it. Okay. So I feel like I’ve really done my disclaimer here. This is not beginner stuff. But if you’re not a beginner, and you want to launch better and you want to love launching and you want to improve your launches, a of all you need to come into the streamline scale mastermind, because this is what we do. And be you’re going to love this episode because I’m going to talk about launching in a very different way than you’ve ever heard before, a guarantee that so what is a launch? Okay, launches, as I am going to define them for you today are just dedicated promotion periods. That’s it. So don’t get confused about what the heck the word launch even means. It is just a dedicated period of time. It’s a it’s a finite time period with a defined start date, and a defined end date, where you are sending one coherent marketing message with one clear call to action. That’s it. It’s a promotion period that you can effectively evaluate afterwards because it has a clear start and finish. Okay, that’s a launch. And yes, you’re always marketing and selling in your business. But you’re not always launching. So do want to differentiate between just your regular marketing and selling and a launch. They’re different. If your marketing is a volume dial that is always turned on, then your launch period is when you crank it all the way up, it’s turned all the way up for a defined period of time before you turn that volume dial back down. Now notice I didn’t say you turn it off. You’ve heard me say this before, but your marketing and selling is not an on off switch. Even if you have closed enrollment periods, like I do, you’re still always selling you watch me do this if you’re a longtime or even just a little bit of time listener to this podcast or if you’re on my email list and you should be if you’re if you’re listening to this podcast, you have to be getting my emails by the way. You’ll notice that I do this even though you can’t always join either the mastermind or the profitable nutritionist program. I’m always selling you on why you need to take the next step of joining because I know that I can help you the very best if you join one of those two programs. So I’m always going to be selling you on it, I’m always going to be telling you, if you like this, then you need to be in the program because we do it even better in there. So I’m always selling, it’s not an on off switch, this is a volume dial. So even if neither of those enrollment periods is open for either TPN, or the mastermind, I’m still always selling the volume is still on, you’re still going to hear me marketing and selling. But when enrollment is open, and you actually can go join the volume dial is cranked way up, it’s not an on off switch, Never turn your marketing or selling off. This is a big mistake that I made for a long time in my business. And it’s why launching was so painful for me for so long, because I thought that the volume was usually turned off. And then when I was launching, I would switch it on. And it felt very, very awkward to suddenly be showing up, be sending a bunch of emails and be kind of ghost my people for a long time and then show up and sell to them only when I was selling to them. That feels terrible. So if that is has been your experience thus far, and launching hasn’t been very fun for you, because it has felt icky, it’s probably because you have been using an on off switch instead of a volume dial. I wish someone had told me about this six years ago, that the purpose of lodging is not to make a lot of sales, and therefore it’s not an on off switch. That’s a really fun side benefit. But it’s not the purpose, the real purpose of doing launches, is to get comfortable failing, I’m going to say it again, the real purpose of launches, what you’re really going to find the value of launching is for you as an entrepreneur and for your business is that you get really comfortable failing, you fail better, you anticipate failing, and you plan for failing, and you problem solve for failing and you get comfortable with failing, because it happens about half the time. And you realize the more you do this, it’s just not a problem. It’s not a problem that you fail about half the time, it’s just, it’s just part of it. And it doesn’t stink so bad. And it doesn’t take you so long to get back up and dust off and go again, when you realize, oh, it’s just part of it, it’s not a problem. About 50% of the time in your business, you’re going to be hitting your goals, and about 50% of the time, you won’t be hitting them. And you’ll be evaluating and troubleshooting and figuring out what you need to do differently. And what you need to be thinking differently so that you can hit those goals. Those are the only two things that are happening. Either you’re hitting the goals or you’re not. And you’re figuring out why. That’s it. That’s what you do as a business owner. But most people think it’s a problem when they aren’t hitting their goals. So they’re thinking that an entire 50% of the time, when they’re not hitting their goals that something is going wrong, like they aren’t good at selling or the price is too high, or they need to change their offer, or their audience isn’t interested, or they’re bad at launching, or it was the wrong kind of launch or the launch was too long, or it was too short. No, stop it. It’s just part of it. 50% of the time, it’s not gonna be working, and you’re gonna be figuring out what to do or think differently next time to make it work. That’s it. You’ve heard me say this before, but you just need to sell more often. We all do we all need more at bats and just practice swinging. If selling is swinging, we just need more at bats, we need to keep practicing. And when you strike out, do you make it mean that you shouldn’t have taken a swing and that you’re bad at baseball? No, you just keep going. And you realize that you just learned something from that at bat that you can take to the plate with you next time. Watching is the same way. So I didn’t know this. Like I said, I wish someone had told me this six years ago, I may not have listened at that point. So hey, it’s great that I can share it with you now. And I’ve learned it the hard way. I didn’t know what a launch was when I started my online business. And people talked about launches. I remember, the very first online course I ever took was called Launch Your Signature Course. And it was about creating an online course. And it was very meta, because I’ve never even done an online course before. But I knew I wanted to create one. So it was going through this course and it referenced launchers quite a bit. And I truly did not even know what that meant. So I did a Google search, what is launch mean? And it basically took me to a NASA website.
Andrea Nordling 9:13
It wanted me to launch something into the atmosphere. So I mean, I just had to learn, I didn’t really get my answer from the Google what I’m trying to say when it came to launches, but I didn’t know any of this. So if you don’t know this, or if you haven’t known this, you haven’t been very clear on how to create a real launch strategy for yourself. How do you know what kind of launch you should do? Should you be launching? Should you be launching often? What all of that we’re gonna talk about it today. And if you don’t know, it’s totally fine. I didn’t either. But I have learned quite a bit from doing this. Not not so well. And I have changed my strategy. And I have learned how to launch really well. And I think that at this point I can say I have pretty good authority on how to much. So that doesn’t mean that I make my goals all the time. Remember, 50% of the time you will 50% of the time you won’t. And you’re going to be figuring out, huh, why was that? What was I thinking? Or doing that got me that result? And how do I change it for next time? And I’m no different. Okay, so in the beginning, and maybe this wasn’t even the beginning, but I’m trying to go back in time. And I was trying to figure out when I was planning this episode, what the exact progression of launches and offers were for me, and I don’t exactly remember, but I know that I did a few open closed launches, meaning the thing I was selling was not open for people to buy other than during the launch period. So and that’s how my programs are now you can you can buy them when they’re open, you can’t when they’re not. And there is a method to that madness. I know that a lot of you listening to this are going to be wondering, but why do you do it that way? And why isn’t it just available for people to buy all the time, there are a few different reasons for it for me, in my business, I’m going to be totally honest with you that when I made that decision, in early 2021, for the profitable nutritionist program, I made it because I was so resistant to launching, I hated it so much. And I had failed at it so many times that I made it a personal mission of mine, to master launching. And the way I decided to do that was to have my offer open, close launches only not open for enrollment all the time, and to launch a lot and to get better at launching and to lean into that resistance. And to figure out what I was resisting so much in the launching, because I knew it wasn’t the launch itself, I knew that it was failing. And I knew that I didn’t like feeling like I had failed. And I didn’t like that emotion of resistance that I was feeling around it and I decided I’m just gonna embrace the failure, I’m gonna figure it out, and I’m gonna launch a whole bunch of times, and then I will probably turn it evergreen so people can join all the time. And I’ve decided not to do that. And that may very well change in the future, but no time soon. Because what I found in structuring the program to be open for enrollment at dedicated times, it’s roughly quarterly, and then closed the rest of the year, what I’ve found is that it really, it takes a lot of my focus to open and to sell. And I prefer at this point, and what I have found over the last few years of selling the program, that way, that it really helps me to focus on delivering to my clients when I’m not selling all the time. So since I have an offer that supports that, that’s what I’ve decided to do, it helps me really focus on delivery in the program, and just selling a few times a year. Now, if you are listening to this, and you think but I sell one on ones. And I’m always selling and I don’t have a program like that, I totally get it. I’m not saying that you need to adopt the same strategy. In fact, when you follow the process that I’m gonna outline today, you make all of those decisions. So we’ll talk about that in a minute. But I will say that even if you sell one on ones, and people can schedule consults with you and hire you at any point, launching may still be something that you want to start doing, I have definitely have students in the mastermind that sell one on ones. And they do launches because remember, your launch is a dedicated promotion period for you to generate data and to evaluate. So you’re learning how to fail better, you’re learning how to face your fears of failure. For many of us, that’s a big one. And you are learning how to really systematically evaluate and manage your mind for a specific period of time. So that’s a lot of what we’re going to talk about when I explained my launch process and how I plan launches and how I suggest you plan launches and an advanced level. And a lot of it has to do with managing your brain. So what I’ve learned over, let’s see, over the last two years, I would say of open and close launches and not hitting my launch goals most of the time, by the way. That’s the basis of what I’m going to teach you. That is the basis of what we’re going to talk about here and what I go into great detail with and coach on quite a bit inside the mastermind. It’s everything I’m gonna share today at a much higher level. Of course, in the mastermind, we just have about an hour today I’m gonna give you this process, but just know that if and when you ever apply for a spot in the mastermind, this is what you are going to get coached on a lot and we are going to really dig into it for your business. So if you really want to learn how to master launches in your business and grow your demand, and systematize your selling so that you can make six or multiple six figures in the next 12 months selling your offer. Go to build a profitable practice.com/mastermind and add yourself to the waitlist. Now as you’re listening to this in real time, you should know that applications for the mastermind will be opened February 6 through the 10th for the April class. And again this is where we will be creating and refining launch plans together. Very intimate small group. Anyway, so fun. I love the fact that we can do this in the mastermind and we can do it together because the room is very small so we can really dive into each other’s launch plans. I’m very hands on with review Doing the launch plans and people’s strategies and their launches so that we can feel better, they’re still failures, of course, we can feel better, make more money faster, evaluate faster, and have bigger goals basically, is what we are doing. So I keep saying advanced launching, and I want to do a little explanation of what I mean by that is, when I say advanced launching, I mean, well thought out and well planned, which I’m going to talk a lot about when I give you my process here, as opposed to what I did for a long time. And what I know many people do when they launch, which is throw something together very last minute, and see if it works. And that will serve you, especially in the beginning of your business or in the beginning of launching that will serve you because you will get some data, you will get some sales, you will generate more people paying attention to what you’re doing. But it is not a sustainable way to launch. So I want to give you a much better way to launch and I want to just once again, make the disclaimer, this is advanced stuff, okay. So if the first time you go through this process, and you plan to launch this way, if it doesn’t go the exact way you want it to just know that this is a skill that you’re going to build, you’re going to keep refining it, you’re going to keep planning, it’ll get better and better, easier and easier, the more that you do it, especially if you are properly managing your mind and your expectations along the way. Okay, so what the heck am I talking about? How do you create a well organized launch calendar and launch plan, and ultimately a well organized business? Well, you have to have a plan. So first of all, in your launch, you’re going to make an exhaustive launch plan. Okay, that’s first and foremost, for my students in the mastermind, you know that we start by actually zooming out and making your long term business plan. So we do an exercise where we create a three year business plan. And then we work backwards from that plan to make our two year and our one year and then our quarterly plans as such. So for this episode, I’m not going to explain the three year plan process. But just know that in the mastermind, we have already created your three year plan by the time you start making your launch plans. And the first component of the launch plan is a little bit of check in just to make sure that your launch and your goals align with your three year plan. So advanced launching means that what you’re selling and how you’re selling, it serves your business long term, it is not just a quick cash grab. This is a core fundamental of Advanced Business Strategy and something I teach in the mastermind a lot, you have to be willing to leave money on the table short term to serve your business for the long term for the long term viability and sustainability and goals that you have for a year from now, two years from now, three years from now, you have to be willing to be patient and leave money on the table sometimes.
Andrea Nordling 17:52
So I see a lot of people launching something an offer, or in a way that is not in alignment long term with our business. So I always want to say okay, first of all, let’s just make sure let’s check in, does this launch plan? And does this launch in, in and of itself, serve your goals for your business, your long term business plans, how you’re selling, and what you’re selling? Does it make sense? If yes, then move forward. And I want you to plan out your launch calendar. Hopefully, the launch that you’re planning is two months in advance. Now if it’s a month in advance, that is also fine. I feel like that might cut it a little bit close. But you’ll learn that as you do it. So if you do it just a month in advance, and then you realize there wasn’t enough time for you to plan and to execute with plenty of brain space and plenty of time for you to coach yourself, then I would extend it to two months. But you can evaluate that for yourself. I like to plan really far in advance. So I plan out my entire launch calendar for the year. And since this episode is coming out at the beginning of the year, that might be a great idea for you. Don’t be stressed that you have to if this is the first time you’ve ever really planned to this level, then hey, just do what you can and evaluate and iterate for next time. But if you are so inclined, you certainly can plan out your calendar for the rest of the year for your launches, then nothing ever catches you by surprise, then you are never going to be in that space where you realize, oh my gosh, I haven’t sold this for a while I need to do it. The timing is I have a trip coming up in two months. And I have this this month and I have this short window I need to cram in a launch and do it thus and so we coming up here and I have two weeks to get it all put together. That is very stressful. Okay, that is not what I want you to do. So the more planning the more time you give yourself in the further ahead you look in the future, the better your launches are going to be. And the more calm you are going to be, which is a huge component of successfully launching your brain space and your attitude about your launch is going to be really important which we’re going to talk about. So first and foremost, make sure that your launch goal and your plan aligns with your long term goals and plans. And then give yourself plenty of time. While you’re at it, plan out your launch calendar for the rest of the year, so you know exactly what’s coming up. And you’ll always be giving yourself enough time, highly recommend. Third, you’re going to create your launch plan by answering the following questions in detail. First of all, what is the timeline of your launch. Now, if you have planned out everything for the year, you’re not going to do this. For every single launch, you are going to do this just for the the next one that’s upcoming that you’re actually planning in detail right now. So for me right now I have all of the launches for the year on my calendar, I know exactly when they’re going to be I, of course, could change them if I need to, but I probably won’t need to because I’ll just schedule around them. If something huge came up like a family vacation or something that we had to change, of course, I could, if I mean, I’m sure, but I like to know exactly what’s happening when and then plan around it that works really well for me. So I am not going in detail for every single launch for the rest of the year. And making all of these going through and answering all of these questions for each launch right now, I would only be looking forward to the next one that I’m going to start creating the content for so just know that you don’t need to do this for everything on your calendar, just the next one. What I want you to do is I want you to establish what is the timeline of the launch? Meaning what is the start date, and what is the end date? Yes, there has to be an end date, because remember, you need to be able to evaluate the data that you generate from this launch. It is very distracting to imagine that not to imagine it’s not really imagining we’ve been taught this, let me go back, it is not going to serve you as well, to think that your launch is here to help you make sales. Okay, that is what we’ve been told, that’s not you imagining anything, if that’s what you think the launch is for, it is going to be much more useful for you to think of your launch as a period of time with a start date and an end date that you are gathering data, and you’re learning how to fail and be uncomfortable. That’s what’s happening in the launch. And we’re gonna make sure that both of those happened in spades. And then at the end, you probably do have a lot of sales and money that have come from the lunch, that is a happy bonus, that happens 50% of the time, I would say roughly 50% of the time you make your goals on that. But either way, we’re going to make sure that you get a lot of data, you learn a lot, and that you learn a lot about yourself. Okay, so it has to have a start date and an end date. Otherwise, how in the heck will you know what you are evaluating when you’re done? Now, you’re gonna have a start date, you’re gonna have an end date, if you have resistance to an end date, because you want to keep pushing the end date until you get your result, then you’re not getting the point here. And how do I know this, I’m like nodding my head going, I’ve done this, I understand where you don’t want to put an end, and a hard deadline on the launch. Because you want it to just keep going until you make your goal. And then you can feel like you got your gold star and that you didn’t fail. But we’re not going to do that, okay, we’re going to be okay, if we fail, we are going to survive, we’re going to learn a lot and it will be better next time. So put a start date and an end date on your lunch, then I want you to establish what your goal is, what measurable goal do you have for this period of time? put a number on it, how many clients? Is it? How many consults? Is it
Andrea Nordling 23:24
how many people buying your program? Is it whatever it is that you’re doing? I want you to have a measurable goal. So that you know, did I make my goal or did I not make my goal. And you’re not going to hold yourself hostage with this goal, the point of the goal is not so that you beat yourself up. If you don’t make it, it’s not so that you can feel good about yourself. If you do make it it’s just a piece of data that you are going to use to inform your decisions for the rest of the lunch. So what measurable goal Do you have? Make sure that you have one? Okay, something that you can evaluate against? Then again, I want you to check in and audit this goal. Is it in line with your long term business goals? Is this goal going to get you closer to your three three year goal? In the mastermind? We call it the three year plan? Is this in line with that? Is it going to get you closer to that? Or is this going to be a distraction? Sometimes I see people wanting to sell something that they don’t want to be selling long term or something that is not going to like not that it is an offer that they’re going to intentionally transition out of that’s not what I’m talking about. If that’s part of your three year plan, that’s totally fine. What I’m talking about is selling something completely unrelated to what they want to be selling a year or two years from now. Like some like just thinking, Oh, I have this quick thing I could sell it my people love it and organizing a launch around it. If this is not going to serve your business long term. You probably don’t want to do it. So check in with your goal is this in line with your long term plan? Then I want you to consider and figure out what What your deliverables are going to be for the launch? Meaning how will this launch be conducted, put it on the calendar and figure out the dates for each thing that needs to be created and delivered. Now, most of the time, your deliverables are going to fall into one of the following categories. Video webinar, a free training a challenge, you can do a launch through an email series, or if you’re on social media, you can do a series on social media videos, hopefully, you would download those and also put them on your website. So people on social media could see them, the sky’s the limit, but you want to grab the lowest hanging fruit for you. So what is that? What do you already have created that you can tweak? Or you can build off of? What have you done before that works that you can tweak and make even better? What can you repurpose that already worked really well? What comes really naturally for you and feels almost too easy to create? What is that for you? If you have never done a five day training before, don’t don’t do a five day training. If you’ve done a one time workshop, and it worked really well, or a webinar or something like that, do it if you write really well, and people love your emails, do an email series launch around a theme topic, we’re going to talk about the theme of your launch in a second, make it easy for yourself. So I want you to think about this launch, not as being where you do what you’ve seen other people do. It’s where you do what comes easily for you what is the lowest hanging fruit for you, that doesn’t mean that maybe you won’t be learning a new skill or you will be working on a new skill. But it does mean that you aren’t starting off with something that’s going to be a really heavy lift for you. Does that make sense? I’m sure it does. Okay. So the structure of a launch generally will be that you are giving free value. And you’re connecting with your audience and you’re teaching them something or giving them a win, leading them through a win giving them insights, teaching them about something about the problems that they are, it doesn’t have to be all of these, I’m giving you many examples, many ideas, you might be teaching them about the problem that they think they have, and educating them on why that isn’t actually the problem. The problem is something else that you have the solution for. There’s lots of different things that you could be doing in a launch, but you will be giving them something free, you will be teaching them, you’ll be delivering some sort of free value. And after that, you will be presenting the solution, which is working with you. And that’s where you’re going to be selling so there’s two components to a launch, it’s going well, I don’t know if every launch is I would imagine it is that you will have free value followed by a promotion period, where you are saying, okay, that’s what I do. Now you want everything that I do come and work with me, this is what we do. Here’s the next step, you get to decide what that is going to look like for your launch? Is it going to be a video? Is it going to be a webinar? Or is it going to be a five day training a three day training a challenge? Like I said you can do I’ve done many entire launches around an email series that educated on a topic, like a theme, sky’s the limit, okay, you grab the lowest hanging fruit for you. So figure that out, figure out what the deliverables of the launch is going to be and how you’re going to do it. Now secondary to that after you figure out how you’re going to deliver it, but you might figure it out at the same time, I want you don’t isolate the theme. What is the theme of your launch? How are you organizing your content into a somatic transformation? Or revelation or information for your people? And then how is your call to action, the logical next step after they learn that or after they experience that and hear from you. Okay, so think about the theme being? How are you going to organize your launch deliverables into one cohesive theme, where your call to action is the next log logical step for them after they tune in? And that brings us to the next thing I want you to answer, which is what is the customer experience going to be as your people go through your launch? So you’ve looked at what are the deliverables deliverables going to be? What is the lowest hanging fruit for you to get put together? And to create something that’s not going to be the heaviest lift imaginable for you where you are right now? How are you going to thematically organize the content in that deliverable for the launch, so that it makes sense so that it isn’t just random information being thrown out? It actually is taking your person closer to a result or an understanding, or I would say to a result, and the result can be an understanding the result doesn’t have to be that they actually solve the problem that people come to you to solve. It can be the result being that they have an understanding of what the next step is they can have an understanding of how they got to the point that they are now and why what they’ve tried before hasn’t worked and that they need to work with you that can be the result in and of itself. So when I’m explaining this, please do not miss out Understand, and think that I am telling you, you need to go teach your entire process that you teach your clients for free, and then hope people come and work with you. That’s not what I’m saying. And in fact, we could do an entire episode on what to teach in the launch. But I’m going to stay very focused right now, that’ll be a separate episode, or coming to the mastermind, of course, we talk a lot about that. But for this episode, I’m talking about creating your plan. Alright, this is high level launch planning and evaluation. So you have set your timeline, your measurable goal, you’ve made sure it’s in line with your long term goals of your business. And it makes sense. And now you’re getting into the nitty gritty of exactly what that launch is going to look like how you’re going to deliver content, how you’re going to deliver value to your people, what the theme is that that content is going to be organized around so that it makes sense. And it’s taking them on a logical journey that is going to commence with them taking the next step with you. So that your call to action, whether that’s booking a concert with you, or hiring you, or joining your program, or buying your course or coming in your membership, or signing up for your workshop or your retreat, whatever that is for you. That that is the logical next step, after they go through this content, then you are going to think about their experience as they go through the content. So what is the transformation, or the value that your people are going to get out of the launch, this is going to drive your theme so that you might kind of figure this out together. But I want to to really isolate each of them as separate, that the person’s experience of your launch, whether they ever hire you ever buy from you or not, needs to be defined. And this is going to help you launch so much better, because it’s going to put you in the position of thinking about someone else’s experience and not yours. Now, just psychologically, as humans, we don’t like that icky feeling, where we’re selfishly greedily thinking about only our own gains, we don’t like that. And so we tend to as entrepreneurs, shy away from promoting our own stuff, unless we are consciously redirecting our brains back to why it’s valuable for us to be promoting. So if you feel like, Oh, it’s so icky for me to sell, I don’t love that part.
Andrea Nordling 32:19
It’s because you’re thinking about you. Just tough love here for a minute. It’s because you’re thinking about what you are getting out of that transaction when someone buys from you. And that does feel icky for a lot of us. So the reframe here is what are you providing to your people? What is the transformation that they are going to get out of this launch, when they interact with this content, when they sign up for your thing? And they go through it? What is the transformation they are going to get? What is the value that they are going to get? It can be big, it can be little, it can be super profound, it can just be an aha moment on what their next step needs to be, you get to decide what is the transformation that they are going to get out of the launch? And what are the three emotions that you want them to feel during the launch? This is really ninja next level, I promise you this is when my launch has changed. When I started very intentionally establishing what the emotions are, that I want my customers to feel whether they have bought from me yet or not, I think of everyone is my customer. How do I want them to feel during the launch? Very, very specifically, sometimes. And it depends on the theme. It depends on the launch style. But some of the emotions that I have very intentionally created in the past have been supported, understood, held, motivated. So is your is your mind going here? These are some of the very, very specific emotions that a launch can deliver. And when you think about this, when you think what is the emotion that I want someone to feel when they consume this content, it’s going to make your content so much better. It’s going to make your launch so much more laser focused. There’s another one focused can be a theme or a an emotion that you would like your people to feel while you are delivering the launch value to them. It’s going to help streamline so much. So instead of looking at a blank calendar and a blank sheet and wondering, how do I launch, what should I even put on there, I don’t even know what I’m supposed to be saying I don’t even know how to do this. You now are starting to see what you could be doing and how you could be organizing some content together and how you could be stringing a theme together. That’s going to take them through a mini transformation or a mini AHA of some sort that is going to help them feel a certain way. You are totally in control of that and it’s going to make your content so much better when you’re focusing on their experience in this way. This is advanced launching thinking about you Your people’s experience. So want you to get really detailed with that. Write it down, how do you want them to feel while they’re in the launch? Whether they buy from you or not? During the launch itself? How do you want them to feel? Okay, so now you have your timeline, your goal, you’ve audited your goal to make sure it’s in line with your long term plan, you have isolated what type of launch you are going to be doing. And a little note on that, I would suggest that you pick one type that you like, and then you stick to it. And every time you launch, you do it again, and you make it better. And then you do it again, and you make it better. And you do it again, and you make it better. Instead of always doing a brand new piece of content. And a new launch wants you to just think about iterating on the same one over and over and over again. This has also been a huge change in launching for me over the last few years, I’ve created a few signature launches. And I have just read on them over and over and over again. And I keep using the same webinar, the same free trainings. And I just tweaked them a little bit for the next time. And I tweaked them for the next time. And I tweaked them for the next time. But I’m not starting over from scratch. And that makes launching so much less stressful for me as I’m planning it. And as I am executing it, but also, as I’m evaluating it, because I know what I’m actually evaluating. I’ve done it, I know exactly what I am measuring and what I am trying to improve from the from the last time I did it. And I kind of know what to expect. So it just makes it so much easier. Please make your life easier by doing the same launches over and over and over again. It’s going to help you so so so much. Okay, next in your plan is how are you going to be overselling during your launch? Meaning? How are you going to structure your launch so that you actually make your goal and you may or may not make your goal? Remember about 50% of the time you won’t, however, you’re going to be hedging the hedging the what is that the outcome in your favor, that’s not the word I want. But you know what I’m saying you’re gonna hedge your bets a little bit here by making a plan for selling more than you think you need to sell. So for example, if I am in a launch,
Andrea Nordling 37:17
and my goal is 30, new enrollments, I am actually over selling and planning for and troubleshooting for and problem solving for 60 people. So I think that a good rule of thumb is to double your goal. So whatever your goal is your measurable goal that you’ve established for this launch, I want you to double it. And I want you to make your launch plan your overselling plan for double the number that you actually want. How and the reason for this is simple. We just need more at bats. Like I said, we need to sell harder, we need to sell more, we need to say more, we need to explain. There, we need to like get into the details and explain our process more than we think we do more often. I’m not saying more in detail, although that could be true. I mean, more often, like people just really need more repetition, we need more repetition in our selling and our people, our audience needs more repetition in hearing from us, because you cannot assume that someone has actually retained the information that you’ve given them five times 10 times 15 times, they may have opened those emails, they may have read them. And then they quickly forgot. So just know that repetition, repetition, repetition, very, very important. So how are you going to build that into your launch plan? How are you going to oversell for twice as many people and problem solve for twice as many people as your goal actually is, because if you problem solve for twice as many, then you’re probably going to be doing just about what you need to do for your actual goal. We totally underestimate how much just how much it actually takes to make our goals. And I’m not saying it has to be hard. I’m not saying it has to be complicated. I’m not saying you have to be a hustler, and be just doing all of the things. I mean, we need to turn up that volume dial louder than we think we need to. So for you figure out what that is what is louder for you? How do you oversell and how do you intentionally plan to oversell for twice as many people as your goal? Actually, it’s make a plan. Like look at okay, so for me, when I’m looking at 30 People, I’m really looking at 60. And I’m problem solving for that and then figuring out how are we going to get 60 people and I’m thinking about 60 people, it works really, really well by the way to double your goal and to problem solve for that. And then what happens is that you’re actually going to be selling people for the next launch. So here’s what I have found in launching very, very consistently and at a much higher level the last few years that I have been selling people for the next launch or the next launch or launch a year from now, by what I’m doing this one At the end, it is the long game. I want you to know this in your business. And this is why especially in the mastermind, we talk about making your one year two year three year plan. And we really commit to those plans. Because that is the way that you need to be thinking about your business. It’s not just what you’re doing this month, it’s not just what you’re doing this year, it’s where are you going long term. And if you are looking at a long enough time horizon, one launch doesn’t matter. Okay, two launches doesn’t matter what you do this year, it doesn’t matter as long as you’re going in the right direction. And the way I really like to think about that, so that I know that I’m going in the right direction is thinking about over selling for the next lunch. So I think I launched this time, so that people are really aware of how I can help them for the next time I’m watching. And for the next time after that. Now, of course, I’m going to have results this launch too. And I’m going to have people that buy. And I’m going to help a lot of people this time. But I’m, I’m thinking about this is not a one and done. I’m thinking about the next time the next time the next time. And that makes it so much more enjoyable to launch. This is what I want for you, I want you to think of your launches, as just one of many. You’re just doing this one, so that you generate data so that your next one is better, so that even more people are served next time, so that even more people are talking about it next time. They’re even more people coming and paying attention next time. Or the same people are paying better attention next time because as a double edged sword. Remember you’re overselling for the people that are there, you’re turning up the volume so that they hear it better. They hear it more often just more repetition. But also you’re overselling because you’re just planning for more people. And you know that there might be coming this time, they might be coming the next time, or maybe a year from now, I consistently have people joining my programs that have been looking at the sales page for over a year, they could see I could see when they join what they’ve been doing. And I’m looking at that sales page, every single launch, they’re thinking about it, they’re thinking about it, they’re thinking about it, and I keep showing up, and they keep showing up. And at some point, the time is right for them. And they’re in. Now, that’s what overselling is that’s knowing that this launch is actually in service of the next one, I just gotta get done with this one, get some data so I can do another one and make it better. And then I need to do that one. So I can just get some data, I can evaluate it and make the next one better. Thinking about your lunches that way is going to make them fun. It’s gonna make them a fun challenge instead of a drudgery. asked me how I know this, I’ve done it both ways. Okay. The two final components of your launch plan are going to be your pessimism plan. So I learned this from my coach, Stacy, she, I think read it in a book it we call it strategic pessimism, how are you going to be strategically pessimistic about your plan. And this is a key component to my launch plans. I actually do this first. Now, here’s what I do, I just make a list of all of the things that could potentially go wrong in my upcoming launch. And remember, I’m making this plan two months in advance three months in advance, you might be making this weeks in advance, hopefully a month in advance at least. And what you’re doing is you’re just looking at, okay, what could potentially go wrong here, make a list. And then you’re going to solve for each thing on that list in advance. And you’re going to schedule it on your calendar, if necessary to make sure that you have enough time allocated to figure it out. So for example, some things that end up on my strategic pessimism plan are the links being wrong in the emails, the sales page, not working the right way, the checkout buttons on the sales page not being turned on, because it’s not open all the time. So we have to manually go in, we have to turn on the buttons on the checkout page when the launch is open.
Andrea Nordling 43:45
Let’s see some other things. I’ll be honest on my strategic pessimism plan, some other things are me not getting things done ahead of time far enough in advance, so then I’m not stressing about it. So I plan ahead, I know that this is something that could go wrong. And so I plan for it. I make sure that there’s enough time on the calendar, I schedule every single thing for the launch well in advance, and I look at it to make sure that I’ve given myself enough time. Okay, how do I know this? Because I’ve done plenty of launches where I didn’t give myself enough time. I was a hot mess, very, very disorganized and frazzled, getting emails ready to send the next day. And that’s not an enjoyable experience for me. But it’s also not an enjoyable experience for my audience that’s going through the launch because remember, I have now created an experience for them. And I want this experience to come to life and I can’t do that. If I am behind the scenes hustling, trying to get things sent out the day of and always feeling like I’m only one step ahead. Because if you’ve launched that way before first of all, it’s very stressful. It makes you need a vacation at the end of your launch. But second of all, what you probably haven’t realized but I now do realize because I do this differently is that if you don’t have Have everything scheduled in advance for your launch, you are always just doing your tasks, you’re getting the next thing, the next email the next post, the next whatever it is the next video recorded during the launch instead of having everything done in advance, and then during the actual launch, you are experiencing it with your customers. And you are seeing that where the holes are, you’re seeing where the gaps are in their understanding, you’re hearing their questions and you have actual space and time to figure out how to answer those questions so that you can troubleshoot in during the launch, you can actually fix something if it isn’t working. Instead of being so busy just trying to get the next thing on the to do list on that you can’t see the forest for the trees. So the reason I’m giving you this very detailed planning process, because I really, really want you if you’re going to be launching, I want you to get everything done well in advance. And then just have the pleasure and displeasure at the same time of sitting with your human brain during the launch. And just having nothing else to do other than watch the launch. Think about your people think about their experience, the emotions that they are feeling really get in the weeds with the questions that they’re asking figure out if there’s something that you’re missing, is there something you could do better, and kind of evaluate in real time, sometimes there are things that come up during a launch that you can fix right away if you’re aware of it. And sometimes you’re going to have to evaluate it and fix it for the next time. But you’ll know the difference between those two things, if you have plenty of whitespace on your calendar during the launch itself. So instead of working on the next thing and trying to get ahead, I want you to just think about your launches as the most relaxing time in your business. Because you actually don’t have anything to do other than enjoy the fact that you planned everything in advance. It’s already scheduled, it’s already done. And you’re just thinking about your people. You’re onboarding them, you’re making their experience amazing. And that’s part of your plan. So the way that you do that is you figure out what would stand in the way of that. This is your strategic pessimism, you hope for the best but plan for the worst. So you’re going to just strategically look at what could potentially stand in the way of that being how this launch goes with me getting everything done in advance being very high level and them having the experience I want them to have what is going to get in the way, figure it out ahead of time your brain knows you can look at your plan and you know where the holes could be, you know, if you’re going to sabotage yourself, by the way by not coaching. And so that’s the last item on the list, which is your self coaching plan. Now, inside the mastermind, we do a lot of discussion and have a lot of tools about how to self coach and how to get coached during the launch in the mastermind. But for your purposes here, I want you to just think about when are you going to be alone with your brain? When are you going to coach yourself, when are you going to get all of your thoughts and all of your doubts and all of your uncertainty about the launch? When are you going to sit with that. And just get really familiar and comfy with it. I want you to put that on your calendar. For me, when I do a launch, I have everything scheduled in advance. And during the launch itself, I have scheduled self coaching time, I also get coached by my coach and my peers. I have that built in as well. Because I know from launching many times that there is definitely a point in every launch, where I feel a lot of doubt, I feel a lot of uncertainty. And I feel like I’m not sure if this is working. Guess when that is it’s in the middle of the launch. It is because human nature tells us and shows us over and over and over again that people take action on the first day. And on the last day. And in between, you’ll have some some activity here and there. But for the most part, when you’re launching and your cart is actually open and your call to out you’re repeatedly giving the call to action. Some people trickle in in the middle. But for the most part, that’s when it’s the quietest and that’s when you’ll feel a lot of doubt. And you’ll wonder is this working? Well guess what? You need to have time on your calendar to be coaching yourself, you need to plan for that you need to have resources and white space so that you can check in with your strategically pessimistic plan that you’ve already made. And remind yourself this is how it goes. Maybe part of your strategic pessimism, I’ve never done this, but this is something that came to mind. Maybe part of that plan is to create a video for yourself to watch in the middle of the launch, to remind yourself exactly how it probably will go. So if you’re feeling Hey, self checking in self, I just want you to know you’re amazing. Your plan is great. Be proud of doing this be proud of being in the process. Process. Pride is a real thing. We’re proud. We’re gonna choose to feel proud. And if you’re feeling doubt right now, or if you’re feeling inadequate, or if you’re feeling
Andrea Nordling 49:47
less than in any way, get some coaching. You just gotta remind yourself maybe you just do a video like that. I don’t know. Put it on your calendar though. When are you gonna be coaching yourself? When are you going to be alone with your thoughts and really look at what they are and celebrate Whether you’re getting the results you want or not, because remember, a lot of the times in the launch, you won’t be getting the results. But you will be getting the results of data and of what to improve for next time. So celebrate that just as much, we don’t only let ourselves feel good, when we get the results that we don’t that we want. I mean, naturally, that is what our brains want to do. So we as a species do that. But we as advanced launchers, and entrepreneurs that are listening to this episode, we don’t do that. Because we know that that sucks. That’s a terrible feeling. We can’t just be only giving ourselves the joy of feeling proud and a feeling of accomplishment and a feeling progress when we meet our goals. Because what is going to result from that is either having tiny goals, so that you always achieve them and never have to feel failure, or never feeling good ever. And always beating yourself up and always feeling behind and always feeling like you’re not doing the right thing. Neither of those need to happen. It’s totally optional. The third option, which I highly recommend you take is just to know that you’re going to fail, it’s going to happen, because your your goals are big, and they’re worthwhile, and they mean something to you, and you’re going to figure out how to reach them. So sometimes you’re gonna reach them, sometimes you aren’t, but not it means nothing about you. Either way, you get to just be proud of yourself all the time, you get to be proud of yourself for showing up, you get to be proud of yourself for making the plan and executing the plan and serving your people. And you get to just be proud of the consistency and of the fact that you’re stepping up to the plate. That’s what you get to be proud of. So the question becomes, now, as you plan your launch, this is an advanced strategy I’m gonna go back through. But as you plan to plan your launch, how do you make sure that no matter what results come from it, it’s not a waste of time for you? How do you ensure that in advance, that’s what I really want you to be thinking about when you are making this launch plan for yourself and then executing your launch plan and going through a launch and then evaluating it afterwards, on what you’re going to do differently next time. I want you to be thinking about this, how am I going to make sure that whether I whether I get my goal or not, no matter what results come from this launch, it’s not a waste of time for me, okay, that you’re going to get at least your desired results, either in monetary gains, which is probably your goal, or in insights and data that you can apply to your next lunch. You get to decide this ahead of time, how am I going to make sure that no matter what results come it’s not a waste of time for me? How are we going to do that? Okay, let’s go through again, you are going to set your timeline, that’s a hard start date and an end date. So you know what you’re evaluating don’t have a start date to a lunch that never ends, it’s a terrible idea for you and for your people, they’re going to be confused, no doubt on when they’re actually supposed to be taking action. And you’re going to be very confused, because you’re never going to have a spot where you can evaluate from. So your timeline has a start date and an end date, you have a measurable goal for the launch. It is in line with the long term goals in your business. It’s not just a quick cash grab, that came out of left field to actually serves your business long term, you have chosen a launch type and some content to deliver that is going to be low hanging fruit for you. Relatively speaking, that doesn’t mean it’s easy, but lowest hanging fruit possible. Okay? Something that comes naturally feels like it’s it’s doable for you to create and to tweak over time. And then you are going to think strategically about a theme and a customer experience for your people as they go through this launch, you’re going to really figure out what the transformation or insights are that they’re going to get that are going to be their quick win. And that will drive your launch theme, of course, and result in your call to action, the one call to action that you’re going to have being the logical next step for them. It’s just all going to make sense, it’s going to be a journey that you’re bringing them on your launch is a journey where they’re starting within their brain where they are now. And you are taking them on a very carefully crafted a trip to a place where they’re going to have a new understanding maybe new results, but for sure a new understanding of their problems. And they are going to get off the train at the station where they get to either get circle around and get back on the train and go back to their regular life or they can walk out into the real world which is working with you and have a new future ahead. It was a very strange example. I don’t know it just seemed like that’s what I was seeing in my mind. So here you go. This is the train station where they get to go back in with their little their little suitcase and go back to their life as well as it was before or they get to come out and greet you and come into their new life. Okay, so that is what your theme, the customer experience is all about. Figure out what that is. And then when you figure out what your launch is going to look like you plan it on your calendar It’s well in advance, you have plenty of time to get all of the content created to make any new launch emails or launch posts or whatever that is, there’s so many different ways that you could be launching that I shouldn’t even give those examples. There’s so many different modes that you could be communicating in this launch. But hopefully, email is going to be one of them, especially in this advanced launching, you should be following up any other type of content with email as well. So figure out when you are going to do that, put it on your calendar, make sure you have plenty of time to create it, and that during the launch itself, you are not creating content, okay, you are not creating anything, you are not writing emails in the thick of it, it’s all done in advance. And the only thing that you have to do during the launch is just be with your brain. You might be coaching your clients, you might be mean, there might be things on your calendar, but you are certainly not creating any assets for the launch while the launch is going on. And you do that, by making sure that your plan is rock solid, you have figured out how you are going to be selling to more than the amount of people that your goal actually is. Okay, twice as many as what I go for highly recommend, you have been strategically pessimistic, and you figured out what could potentially go wrong with the launch and solved for it in advance and put it on your calendar, you’re just handling it, you’re not gonna be reactive, you can be proactive, and just make sure that you have a plan. You also have built in a lot of time for self coaching and reflection and mini evaluation while the launch is going on. So that you can really see what your brain is doing, and how that is influencing what your client’s brain is doing. Because we know that our clients reflect us our beliefs will always be reflected by our clients during a launch is no different. So this, my friend is an advanced launch planning strategy, you will not master launching the first time you do it. Even when you follow this process. You’re not supposed to I haven’t, it’s getting a lot better. I regularly have $100,000 launches now. And just a few years ago, I was scared to even schedule a launch or do a launch, okay. So just know that it’s not going to be perfect, but you’ll still get results. Just keep going you keep doing it, you keep trying again, and stepping up to that. Not supposed to master it, you’re supposed to fail as often as you succeed. That’s how you improve and how you grow. I bet that that’s exactly what you teach your clients, isn’t it that they’re going to fail, they’re not going to succeed right off the bat, the first time they learned something from you in the first time they try it, it’s probably not going to be a one and done thing where they just check it off the list. And never try again. No. So your experience in your business of launching, and selling is going to be the same thing. But your experience of that failure and whether you enjoy the journey and celebrate it every step of the way. Or you white knuckle every minute beating yourself up when things don’t go your way and feeling confused about how to fix it telling yourself you don’t know what’s wrong. That’s the difference. I just want you to enjoy the journey. I want you to appreciate the depths so that you can learn from them and then have higher highs. That is what you will find in the streamline and scale mastermind, you’re going to launch better, you’ll grow your business faster. But most of all, you’ll enjoy it more because you’ll be doing it with other successful genius peers at your side. And you’ll have a whole lot of advanced skills in your tool bag to dip into during those inevitable dips.
Andrea Nordling 58:26
I’m not gonna lie to you and tell you that there won’t be dips, there will be but you’re going to actually enjoy them and you’re going to use them to your advantage. Here’s the deal about the mastermind. It is a small intentionally intimate group of very high achievers with big goals. It’s a fast paced room, you get coached hard, and you’ll push yourself hard to think bigger and work smarter. Using the advanced strategies that you learn. I’ve shared just one of them today about how we plan for launches. Now, if your application for the mastermind is accepted, your commitment is to roll up your sleeves and apply the process for six months from April to October. It’s going to be the next class and to show up every week for coaching. So you’ll learn the full streamline and scale process in person with me and your genius fellow mastermind errs April 18 to the 20th in beautiful Cancun, Mexico to kick off the mastermind. And I have some surprises up my sleeve that I’m not going to share quite yet. But let’s just say this is going to be very lucrative and enjoyable six months for students in the group. Now, like I said, The mastermind is different than the profitable nutritionist program. Okay, this is advanced stuff. So applications are necessary for this room. And applications for the upcoming April class will be open February 6 to the 10th. And then after reviewing all the applications, we’ll be extending acceptance invitations by February 15. So you’ll know by February 15. If you’re accepted into the group, in which case you’ll get all of the details for the live event and making your travel arrangements and all that. So to get the details on the application process. sess and the live event, add yourself to the waitlist at Build a Profitable practice.com/mastermind. And then you’ll get everything via email. Again, that’s build a profitable practice.com/mastermind. Now, if you’re listening to this episode after the February application window has closed, you’ll be able to go to that page and get information on to the next application period on that same page. So it’s also linked up below in the show notes. If you haven’t taken notes, while I’m saying this, everything is linked up in the notes. Okay, I think that’s everything I need to tell you about launching and creating a launch process. No, it’s not enough. Let me say it is not everything I need to tell you about launching, I have tons to tell you about launching. But when it comes to advanced launch planning, I think that this is going to get you off to a really good start. So happy launching my friend 2023 is your year to really, really embrace some epic failures, launch failures might be part of that, and then spectacularly, execute those failures. Because while you do that, you’re also going to be succeeding more than you can imagine. I know that’s exactly my plan for the year, fail a lot and also succeed a lot. It’s going to be so fun. Have a wonderful, wonderful week.
