Coaching Episode with Betsy
I love when my Empathy Rising podcast coaching episodes turn into full-blown strategy sessions.
Space Holder Betsy joined me for the most recent episode, and we really got to dig into some of the bumps in the road she’s hit while working on her side hustle.
She shares a ton of valuable insight including how she decided on her side hustle, why she started a podcast, and where she wants her business to be in two years.
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Show Notes:
Hey, risers. Welcome to episode 122 of Empathy Rising. Before we jump in, I want to remind you that the Three Surefire Ways to Grow Your Online Audience... Even if You've Never Done it Before training is happening tonight. So you have one last chance to register. If you haven't joined us yet, you can still snag your spot. It is taking place at 7:00 PM Eastern tonight, 4:00 PM Pacific. And the link to register for that webinar is marissalawton.com/grow.
I will be sharing three proven audience-building strategies that worked for not only me but for five previous rounds of side hustle students. So I'm finally ready to share these approaches because I know they not only work for me or for someone who's more extroverted or for someone who's, you know, more seasoned in the online space, but they work for brand newbies, people who are introverted, people who want to do business differently, or whatever.
These audience-building strategies work for lots of different people, and they've been proven now over five rounds of running Side Hustle support groups. So I believe in them, and I believe in the information that I am teaching in this training.
Go ahead and register over at marissalawton.com/grow even if you can't join us tonight at 7:00 PM Eastern or 4:00 PM Pacific, because you will get access to that replay. So the replay will be available for 48 hours. That way you can watch it on your own time if you can't attend with us live. There's always benefits for joining live.
You'll be able to ask me questions directly and you'll be able to kind of get the feedback from all the other participants and stuff like that. But there's still value in that replay. So even if you won't be able to be there on time with us, or in real-time with us, still go ahead and put your name and email in the spot because you'll get that replay sent over to you and you'll have access on your own.
Alright, I'm excited about this episode. It's the first coaching episode we've had on air for a while. We did a lot of these in season two of the podcast, but not so many in season three. So I'm really excited.
Coming on the show today, we have Betsy Byler. She is a clinician coming out of Wisconsin and her side hustle is to help other professionals treat people with substance abuse without having to go back and get that LADC certificate, or whatever the letters are in your state. Being able to treat addictions and substance use and substance abuse relying on the clinical skills that you already have.
So Betsy is a current Space Holder student, and so you'll hear us talking about things that she covered in that course as well as next steps to take beyond that course. I hope you enjoy this episode and let's jump into coaching with Betsy.
[Marissa]: Hey, risers. Welcome back. This week I am chatting with Betsy Byler, who is a space holder student and also has a new podcast out. So we are going to be talking all about her work and how she's helping therapists continue to treat substance abuse without necessarily having to go back to school and without necessarily having to go get another certification. That is so prevalent in our industry.
So Betsy, why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself and tell us where you, where you're located, and what you do clinically, and what you're branching out of the therapy room with this new podcast?
[Betsy]: I've been a therapist since 2003, and I live now in the Northwestern part of Wisconsin, about two hours south of Canada, and didn't ever really think I'd find myself here - I'm from Chicago. So I live in a town of 600 people.
That's a little weird. We have a larger area, of course, that I have spent the last 12 years. I was a director of an agency for outpatient, mental health, and substance abuse programs. I went into private practice in 2019 - in the fall of 2019 - and that's when I found you. And I knew I wasn't hitting burnout. I hadn't been in that place.
And I think partially because I was administrative. Part admin, part clinical. I haven't spent the last 17, 18 years doing full-time therapy work I did for a long time, but I think the shift helped me avoid that. But I knew that someday I wouldn't want to do full-time therapy and that there's an amount of money that I can make as a therapist doing private practice.
And it totally depends on how many hours I want to see clients. So I had planned on working on a side hustle long before I knew COVID was going to happen. And then when COVID happened and I realized that I just couldn't do as many telehealth visits a day as I could in person. I'm not really sure what that is. I'm an extrovert, and there must be something from video that I'm not getting that I normally would in person.
So I found that I couldn't do seven, eight sessions a day. I was wiped at five and that is, you know, we have been a single income family because my husband stayed home with the kids and raised them and now they're gone and out, but it's one of those things that we have a simpler life. That's what we want.
We live in a gorgeous house in the woods that I still can't believe is ours, and I don't want to work all the time. And so COVID happened, and I really found that this was the moment to work on my side hustle. And so Space Holder came out and I think it was from an email I got from you. And I was like, oh, yep, I'm in. This is what I'm doing.
So I know I skipped over what I do clinically. I'm a trauma therapist, and so I'm EMDR trained, and then I also do substance abuse work. I'm a person in long-term recovery, and I've trained therapists as a clinical supervisor for the last 12 years.
So that's my background. I love angry teenagers, the angrier the better. So teenagers, young adults, and older adults. I like little kids on a case-by-case basis. They're cute and wonderful, and there are other people more skilled than me. So that's what I'm up to. And the side hustle came out of, or the podcast came out of this thought of what could I talk about for the rest of my life.
And I realized that I love talking to regular therapists about addiction and substance use. Because over the years I've heard so many people say, oh, that's not in my scope. I can't do that. I wasn't trained for that. And for me, having trained therapists over the years, I feel like I got an understanding of what basics they need, what people need.
Because there's a ton of information, and how do you know where to start and what to include? And for me, I spent 12 years doing that and I thought, well, maybe I could bring this to other people, to other therapists who feel ill-equipped in this area and aren't sure where to start. And so the podcast was where I started.
[M]: I love that. And there's a few things that I hear in your story that I kind of want to tease apart because I think they're really important for the listeners to hear the first one is, you know, that you were doing this and you were taking your experience and you're literally translating what you've done clinically, just taking it, like literally skill for skill and just putting it into a different container, putting it into a different arena.
And I think so many times clinical or clinicians believe like "my skillset is pigeonholed". Like "I know how to do one thing and one thing only", and that's one of the things that I really try and open our eyes to is, you know, like how many people in this world just need to be listened to and listened to well, right?
It doesn't only have to take place in the therapy room. It can take place in multiple different containers. So I love that you recognized the value of your skills and that you could translate that to other places.
[B]: Thanks. It really was listening to a lot of your podcasts before. I mean, like I said, from November 2019, I found you, I think it was "online income streams and therapists", I think was how I found you. Cause I didn't know.
And then I found you and I was like, this is exactly what I'm looking for. This is bizarre, cause how often on your first search do you find exactly what you're looking for? But I really did have that vision from listening to you about how I could do this differently.
And since then, I've seen really easily how some of my former staff, as I've talked to them about, wow, I could see totally a side hustle. I had two people who were fully, like, loved working with autism, people with developmental delays, which as therapists, that's not super common.
I was like, oh my gosh, they could totally do side hustle or a membership group. And then your quiz came out and it was, even more, I think, affirming for me of helping me narrow down what I want to do as opposed to what feels like work. That was a big deal.
[M]: Yeah. That's the other thing that I really wanted to highlight. It's kind of funny. You said "what could I see myself talking about for the rest of my life?", and I used to teach this as your time square moment. I would say if I was to give you a bull horn, like, you know, a megaphone or whatever, in the middle of Times Square, what would you be so passionate about that you would yell out in front of thousands of people?
And then I started working with people from New York City, and they were like, yeah, we would never do that. So I had to change my example, but I mean, if I was in a crowd of a thousand people, if you wanted me to get up and talk about something, it would have to be something that I was really passionate about.
So if you find yourself in this, you know, deer-in-the-headlights situation, what could you talk about? That's a pretty good indicator. That's your thing. Right? And that's what, you know, I'm picking up from you is this is something that you were so passionate about. You said you could talk about it forever. And you're translating that into revenue, which is super cool.
[B]: Yeah. I mean, that's absolutely the hope. I know that starting it now, I don't need it to make money right now cause I'm still doing clinical work, but wanting to plan for the future because I just know I'm a girl who loves leisure. I like to read books and lay on the couch with my husband and my cat.
And I want to be able to do something really cool as the years pass on. And hopefully be a grandma someday. Not yet, but hopefully that I can just have something that's making some money in the background that I already did all the work for. And it was hard at first thinking, what do I want to talk about?
Cause my specialties are trauma, working with teenagers, working... I mean, there were tons of things I could have chosen, but I was thinking about what's not going to feel like a pain to do. Like what can I do easily that I actually enjoy and that I already have history people around the area? Different healthcare agencies and colleges have wanted me to speak about substance use.
And so I've done that a lot, but I don't necessarily want to teach average folks, but more like other colleagues, because I feel like that has been a joy in my life doing supervision. I don't necessarily want to be responsible for people anymore because I really enjoy not being responsible for budgets and agencies. And so this was just a good fit.
[M]: Well, so again, there's some really cool things that I'm picking up from you is, like you said, we live a really simple life in the woods and you're like, we don't need this to make money right away. And it seems like you are really attuned to what you actually need from this income stream.
You know, there's so much out there with these online teachers that are teaching, make six figures and, you know, 10K passive months and all of this stuff. And that's glorious. Like, of course, we all want that. But at the same time, having this realistic vision of, okay, what do I actually need and how can I get there first? How can I get to this?
I talked to this a couple of episodes ago with my friend Megan Hale: how can I get this to this level of enoughness with my income with my revenue. And then from there, if I want to set a big, huge goal, or if I want to go hard at something, I totally can, but being in line with what you actually want and need from the income stream makes a huge difference.
And you're like, I want ease. I want leisure. I live the simple life. I don't need maybe a million dollars. While it would be awesome, I don't need it right now. Like having that really grounded sense, I think, is something that makes online income much more realistic and much more possible.
[B]: That was something that I think directed me towards your stuff more than some of the other stuff I found because I'm not interested in...and here's the thing: I want to make money. I am not a social worker. I didn't get that message. Right?
Like a lot of social workers get. I'm an LPC professional counselor, so it was a little less self-sacrificing, the message that I got in grad school. But also, money's not an end goal. I just want to be able to afford to live the way we want to live, support the causes we want to support, and not work myself into the ground and find out that at retirement I'm exhausted and do not want to do anything.
When I did the space holder course thinking about how much do I want this to make a month? How much is that a year then? How much is that per program? Because then I knew this would be worth it. If I could make this amount of dollars, then this would be worth it for me to do.
And I don't mind how many hours this would take a month. And that was sort of making sure I don't over-commit because one of the things for myself is that I don't do things that I'm going to resent later, like for anyone, for any reason, Like I don't commit to things I'm going to resent later.
I want to make sure that everything I'm doing as much as possible is done with acceptance and openness so that I'm not like "this sucks". And I don't want to... I can't believe I have to do this or that kind of thing. So with the side hustle, I was like, I can do anything, but I can't do everything.
And so I have to narrow this down and keep it really focused. And your process really helped a ton as I was thinking, like, cause it was really hard. Cause there's so many ideas. There's so many things I could do. But in the Space Holder course, like it just narrowed it down.
[M]: Yeah, that's really cool. Well, I appreciate that feedback, and the thing that I love was like, "I found you through searching these terms". I'm like, yeah, I wrote that down. Good for me. Now I know how to like, continue to do that avenue of marketing, or at least I know I'm doing something right.
So let's switch gears and talk a little bit about the work that you're you're doing with what came out of Space Holder, and you said before we started recording, you told me a little bit about having some programs, perhaps some passive courses, maybe some courses where you exchange a little bit of time and then perhaps a group program, which is much more, you know, high touch.
But then again, for that high touch, we get a higher price point and things like that. So out of those programs, the first thing you decided to do was kind of launch your podcast. And so in that case, it sounds like - and I'm also picking this up from what you said too, is your message and your platform are more important to you than necessarily the revenue right now.
Cause we could have taken some different strategies to get you to a launch and to get you to money coming in the door quicker, launching the podcast is a little bit of a slower strategy, but it allows you to be that thought leader, to put your opinions out there, to put your content out there. And so how has that process been for you? What's the name of your podcast? What are the things you're talking about?
[B]: So the name of the podcast is All Things Substance and it's hosted on my website is betsybyler.com, and it's on Apple and Spotify and Stitcher and all of those. And I'm on my 28th episode. I did the first five at one shot and then every week since then, and it's a learning curve, certainly for the editing, but I really have enjoyed that part.
I don't enjoy doing show notes and stuff. Someday I'll have someone do that for me. But the editing part I don't mind. I know that's not your, like your gig, when you do editing, but I really have enjoyed doing it and having it come out really well. I've had people comment that the sound is really good, that the editing is really good, and it sounds like I've been doing it longer than I have.
So that was really helpful. The podcast came out of "I need to have an email list". So one of the things that you've talked about often, there's about building a base of people who, you know, you're building the like know and trust, and I really did not want to write, I hate writing.
I'm decent at it, but I use dictation software for my notes cause I just hate it. And so even though I type fast, I just can't stand it. And so the idea of doing a blog was like, absolutely not. That feels like torture punishment. So podcasts though was like, oh, I could do that. I enjoy talking. And the feedback I've gotten over my career is that people do like hearing me talk about things. And so that's how I decided on that.
It's a slower base, but it is something that ultimately... what I'm concerned about is that the information that the therapists would be getting in order to help add substance abuse to their scope of practice, that there is kind of a... you have to build on certain foundations. Because if you don't have a base foundation on, say, brain science or whatever, you might not know all the things you need to know later on.
And it's a little like math that way. It's not super complicated, but it is something that I felt like I needed people to listen and put this picture together of what it takes to treat substance use and what they need to know. And so the information is really important to me as a person in recovery and someone who's worked with people in recovery and all stages of addiction over the years, I'm super passionate about different aspects of recovery and addiction.
So that part is really important how I came to decide on the process. So for my ladder, so to speak, you know, the podcast is at the bottom. This is where people get to know me and are getting used to the way I am because I have a certain style and not everybody is going to dig that. I know when I get feedback from trainings, 90 percent of it is onboard. And then somebody complains that I swore and I'm like, you're not going to dig what I say then.
I mean, it's not that I swear constantly, but my podcast is listed as explicit because I'm not going to police my language and I can speak professionally without swearing at people. But if there's something I'm going to say, like, I'm just not interested in getting slapped with some sort of like you swore and it said it was clean.
So I just went and said, fine, it's explicit, whatever, because if people don't want to listen to me, they don't want to listen to me. And that's alright because I am me. And if I'm going to do something that is a side to everything else I do in my life, then I need it to be as effortless as I can and as genuine as I can.
And that's just me and who I am. So part of it was how much do I want to be in touch with people? And when I took your quiz and read all the different things, and there were some of them that I was like, oh, hell no, I don't want to. Like that's no, no, no, no. And other times I'm like, Ooh, that sounds fun.
And I realized that it's so personal as I've been on calls with you and listening to other people and I can totally see how they would want to do that. But for me, I'm like, oh no, that's a lot. And so I was like, okay, so I know I want to have something that's passive for someone who... I think you had said in the middle of the night, they could buy something.
But I do like coaching in some ways. And so I don't necessarily want to do the one-to-one work. I might do consultation Sunday, like in a group setting, but the idea was doing a self-study course with support and then a group program. And I decided to offer it four times a year at... I believe it was five weeks.
And then I set the cost was, I don't know, 2000 or something. So it was really based on what the value would be, not on the time. That was one of your big things. Like not how much time I'm giving them, but the value of what it is. And so that was hard for me to get around. Cause I was like, well, someone paid for this.
But that's kinda my process where I'm headed someday. I might do retreats. Cause that sounds really cool, but it's sort of, that's on the upper part of the ladder. If everything works and I'm able to make a success out of it, that's where it could grow to. Or doing consultations with groups of people who want some extra support around their clinical work with substance use, not so much supervision where they count the hours, but like staffing cases, that kind of thing.
Like I enjoy that case consultation more. And so that's kind of the steps of that ladder, but the podcast was the very first thing that I knew I just needed to do to get things off the ground and get it out there, even though it is slower.
[M]: So, what are your next goals? So we have the podcast up and running. We've got 28 episodes, which is awesome from October to now. I mean, that's fairly consistent, which is great. I don't think I was that consistent in the beginning, so that's really good. So how is the podcast for you? Are you still enjoying it? Is it something that you want to continue? Do you see it being your long-term marketing strategy?
[B]: So my kind of internal plan is that I want to make money from it at the end of about two years, like I have in my mind. I mean, if it happens sooner, that's great. And you would probably tell me it could happen sooner, but for me, I don't... that's not my forte. I'm just going, okay, so how long do I want to do this before I see something from it? How long can I do it without being annoyed?
[M]: Sorry, I'm just going to interrupt - by make money do you mean monetize the actual podcast, like get a sponsor for the podcast, or by make money do you mean launch the courses and whatnot?
[B]: I don't really want to do sponsored stuff unless it's really seamless and it doesn't seem jarring. And I dunno, it's just not my... I don't really want to be beholden to anybody else for any reason if I can help it. I'm a little oppositional as a human. So no, I'm sure not. But I do want, so by the end of two years, and I'm hoping before then, of course, to have, I don't know.
I think I would launch if I have like 400, I think is what you had said one time, I forget where we were, you were talking about like, if you want to do something at this size, then, you know...
[M]: 400 or 500 on the email list, you mean?
[B]: Right, right. Yeah. So that's kind of where I'm at. And for me, I'm giving myself two years to get there. Because it is slow. I mean, it's been 28 episodes, and like I said, there's like 80 to a hundred consistent listeners and I get some contact from listeners about like, oh, I got your freebie, and oh, I really love this. And so that's been really cool. It's just, people, by nature, I think we test things out.
Like, do I like this? Do I like this? I'm the same way when I read books. Like Kindle unlimited. I don't have to think about whether I'm invested in this book. If I think it's lame and I'm only like a chapter two in, I'm done. Cause I don't have time to make up, you know? Like we don't have extra time.
And so for people on podcasts, they have to get committed to having you as part of their like rotation, so to speak. And so I know that that's just going to take a little while because what I'm talking about isn't... I try to make it not dark and I try to make it interesting. But the nature of what I'm doing, trying to teach people is, I mean, it's, it's not roses, you know?
So that's where I'm at with the programs and what I'd like it to do. And in my brain, that's where I'm at. If after two years I can't make a go of it, that's kind of my line and where I would have to kind of reevaluate what I want to do, but in my heart, I'm committed to doing the podcasts for at least.
[M]: So on a level of like one to 10, if 10 is like, super-aggressive, how do you feel about your growth? Like how hard do you want to go at getting new listeners, getting new email subscribers? Or are you just "I want to share what I share and if it turns into a subscriber, it turns into a subscriber and that's awesome". That would be more like a one.
[B]: I would say probably seven.
[M]: Okay. So pretty aggressive, like really kind of wanting to make this grow, wanting to...
[B] I do. Marketing is hard for me in that it's not something I necessarily enjoy. I do enjoy it more than I thought. Like, as I've done some Facebook ads that I have been like, oh, this is kind of fun.
Like seeing numbers come in and stuff. I was kind of surprised by that. But I really do want more, and like I check my Libsyn score, like my Libsyn stats for - that's where my podcast is hosted. I check them all the time.
[M]: Oh yeah. Like in the beginning I would check them every day. Did I get another listener? Sometimes like three times a day I refresh it.
[B]: It's fun, you know, to see what country they were from, and it's just been really... so I didn't think I would enjoy it. I don't know why I thought I wouldn't, but it's been interesting. And so I am motivated more than I thought I would be.
Yes, I want to do this as a service to my like colleagues and across wherever. And if I'm going to put the work into it, I do want people to listen. Otherwise, it feels sort of like... I'm not doing this for my health.
[M]: Right. So talk to me about your podcast episodes. How many times do you have a call to action in each episode, a call to action to download your freebie?
[B]: So it's part of the end of every podcast. So I don't have it broken up in the middle like how you have had your quiz in there. So right as I finished the episode, then it says if you're ready to take the next step in, etc, etc. And so then once in a while, I will, if it's natural and something that I don't plan, but sometimes I will say like, this is why I created the treatment planning tool so that you can do this, this, and this.
So that's how it is. It's at the end of every episode. And then if it's natural, I'll throw it in.
[M]: Do you listen to my podcasts all the way to the end? Sometimes perhaps? Maybe?
[B]: Well yeah because I know your podcasts... like I know the intro. I built my original intro, literally went through yours, and timed it, and what you were saying, and what the point was. Yeah and literally built it off that. Now I've shortened it since now that I'm past kind of the intro, but I, yeah, no, you're right. I don't know. I don't know that I listen once I know you're done with the day.
[M]: So I've changed my intro with each season. Cause I'm on like season or year three right now. But my outro's been the same since day one. I've never, never changed it. I probably should.
And there are probably people who listen to it, especially newer listeners. Right? So newer listeners probably listened to the entire thing, but you know, I bet like when I have my favorite shows, usually, I push that forward 30 seconds. Cause I skip through their intro until like they're actually talking and then I'll click off well before their actual outro with the music and everything.
When I'm in an active promotion, I will say right in the beginning, like I always say, Hey risers, welcome to episode, whatever. Like I start the same way every time. And then, you know, just start talking, oh, you know, today we're at the beach or whatever.
And then I say, now don't forget, before I jump into this episode, I want to remind you, I have this challenge coming up, or I want to remind you that this is starting soon or whatever. So when I'm actively in a promotion, meaning I'm gearing up toward a launch or gearing up toward something where I'm being intentional about growth, I will promote at the beginning, the middle, and the end.
So three calls to action in each episode. Now, if I'm between launches and stuff, I don't do it that often. I always had one promotion going on in an episode because for somebody that could be the first time they've heard me.
So I need to try and grab them onto my actual email list into my actual like, sphere because somebody could just listen once and never come back. So I want to try and get them to the actual audience that I own, which has my email list. So I always actively promote one thing in every episode. If I'm going gearing up toward a launch, I promote three times: beginning, middle, and end.
What does that bring up for you?
[B]: I have been thinking that I need to do something to interact with my people more. I just don't know what that is. So I have an RSS feed that goes out and, you know, each time my podcast goes live, I'm posting on social media, etc. And so all of that's happening, but I feel those people who are listening that are consistent listeners, they're already here.
I mean, they're here, they listen. I have a message of "if you have an idea or a question you want to ask me, or something you want me to cover on the podcast, let me know" et cetera, but I don't have any real, that's more passive.
And in fact, I just... it was really interesting. Cause you know, the internet a lot of times can be really ready to correct you about something. And I had an episode where I uploaded the wrong edition of the podcast and it wasn't edited. And an old coworker of mine, he's like, I was just listening to your common claims about marijuana and it, I don't think this is the edited version. I was like, what? I'm like, is there music? He's like, no. So it had been out for like a month, and nobody had said anything to me. I mean, it's, it's edited enough, but there were like some pauses in there.
There was no music, things that I wouldn't allow. And so I was like, oh, okay. So either people just think, oh, this was a mistake and somebody must have told her already, or it's just not, they're not as connected enough. Like if I have found something like, and I've said, I've sent emails to you.
And I was like, Hey, just so you know, this thing, isn't this link isn't working or whatever, because I'm like, well, maybe no one told you. And I don't know. But I do feel like there's some need for me to do more in some way that's new and interesting. Not just more crap for somebody's email inbox, you know what I mean? I just don't know what that is.
[M]: Right. Well, I heard you say like marketing is becoming more enjoyable now that you've gotten into it. What we need to do is we need to split marketing into two categories. So there's lead acquisition, which is getting new people and there's lead nurture, which is moving those people toward the sale.
And it sounds like, I don't know. You tell me: which one do you like better? Do you like going out and getting the new people, or do you like nurturing the people that are already there?
[B]: I haven't done either. Well, um, that's not true. I have things set up. I've been on a few podcasts, which I think is the easiest way, honestly, to get new listeners. In my opinion, that's how people have found me more.
So I've worked on that, but I don't have anything for sales. So I don't have any way to move them forward. I would like to move in that direction, but I feel like I'm not quite ready.
[M]: Are you emailing them every week? You don't have to be moving them somewhere. You just have to be building a relationship with them.
[B]: I am, but it is not personal. Like I didn't write it that week. You know, it goes out after my podcast launches for the week to say, this is what the podcast is about, you know? Thanks for listening, etc. But it's not like a separate email like you would do about a topic where you're blogging on it or something like that.
[M]: So yeah, that is one thing that I think that you could fix easily is making that nurture more personal. It is technically doing more because it would be actually writing that email, but the nurturing doesn't have to be putting yourself out there more necessarily.
Like the hustle part, the way I look at it... here's how I conceptualize it for my business, is lead acquisition is about hustle. It's about getting new people. It's about putting myself out there doing visibility marketing. And then the lead nurture for me has a very different feel. It has a homey feel. It has a grounded feel. It has lower energy because I'm still very passionate about it. And I feel like it's just more, maybe more intimate is the right word there.
So yes, it's another thing you're doing, but in my world, it's not another energy needing to be out there kind of thing. It's more of an "I can do this from the corner of my couch, with a blanket, and just type a really heartfelt email". So it would be adding something to your list, but it necessarily wouldn't be with that frenetic kind of hustle, visibility energy.
[B]: That doesn't bother me at all as long as I know what I'm doing, or at least have an idea or a topic. Part of the struggle I would have with say a membership site is I don't want to have to come up with that kind of content all the time. You know? And so that's why I didn't want to do it that way because that just doesn't appeal to me.
But sending an email to people, like I'm a very relational person, which is why I'm not comfortable with just passive. I mean, I could do it, but like why? So I don't mind. I mean, I love building relationships. That's how I am as a therapist in general. So that doesn't bother me at all. As long as I have an idea of what I need to do because each week I do have to come up with content for the podcast and you know, do the research, put it all together, transcript all of it.
So I don't want to have a big thing to solve every week. But if I had an idea or a plan, like that's not hard to execute.
[M]: The other question I have is of your freebie: do you have a nurture sequence that is moving them to a waitlist or anything for your program?
[B]: I do. So I have an email course that I developed when I was working on Podcast Launch School, the bundle that you and Joe Sanok did. And so I have an email course. I don't know how successful I feel like it is. It is definitely more personal. It is taking the parts of my freebie and explaining them in a little more depth with some case study, you know, sort of stories so that people can have like, oh, this is how this works kind of moment.
I don't know that I think people get through the whole thing. And so I haven't decided what I want to do about that.
[M]: What did you build it on?
[B]: What do you mean?
[M]: Like what email platform are you using?
[B]: Oh, so I'm using MailerLite. I really did do exactly what you told me to do. Like, I just did whatever you told me to do. I'm like, alright, like I'm oppositional, but I'm not dumb.
[M]: So if you go up to the top of your MailerLite, there's this tab that says "automations", and then if you click on the automation, you'll be able to see how many people are falling off. A natural fall-off is normal. If for every hundred people that take my quiz, I think probably 60 or 70, make it all the way through, because I have about, I think I have eight or nine emails to follow the quiz.
I have to look. And I think it's either seven, eight, or nine, which is not really helpful. But for every hundred that take the quiz, there's 60 to 70 that get to email seven. So normally we expect fall off there. It's actually part of the point of your email sequence.
One of my Side Hustle students is like: Why am I emailing every day? They just opted in. And that's exactly why you're emailing every day is because if they're invested, they're going to want those emails. They're going to respond to those emails. In mine I said, please reply if this is you and I get replies to those emails almost every day because they're the people who opt-in and who do reply and to do make it all the way to the end.
I can directly tie those people to those who are in my programs. And then the people who don't finish the sequence, they either weren't going to buy from me at that time or they probably were never going to buy for me. So it's good to have people falling off at that point.
[B]: I feel like the fall-off is not solid. Like, I mean, I'm sorry that's not what I mean. I think something's not working because I think that the click rate, you know, that's what all they'll show. I feel like too many people aren't even engaging with that at all. And I also have a quiz and I, you know, also on interact or try interact, I can see who starts or who's used it.
And I just haven't had a lot of success with that. And I did test the quiz on my former staff, the other therapists, and asked them to take it and tell me what they got. And like, what do you think of these questions? Does this sound offensive?
I just feel like it's not hitting. So I've done all that work, and I'm not upset that I did it. I think it was important, but I feel like, I don't know. I feel like something has to shift for it to be more useful.
[M]: So we need to identify where the breakdown is in the funnel. Is it that people are starting it and they're not finishing it? Are people starting it, finishing it, and then not doing the emails? Like where is the breakdown?
[B]: Well, if we're talking about the quiz, people aren't starting. They'll go to the page, and then they won't start. And I don't know why. I've looked at the questions. I don't know what that is about. Most people who start it finish it, but that number is pretty small.
Now when it comes to the email course, I think that they open for the first, I don't know, three or four emails. And then it sort of falls off.
[M]: So we're exploring a few different things. Like I was talking about before, there's lead acquisition and there's lead nurture. So lead acquisition would be how many people we drive to the opt-in.
Then we have a question of conversion. How high is the opt-in converting? And then once the opt-in has converted for that person, then they have moved into lead nurture. So your opt-in, or that conversion, is really the mechanism that moves them from a lead to like a prospect or a lead to a potential customer.
So we have three things we need to look at: how many people are we putting into the conversion, the top of the funnel, right? We know it's a big circle. A bottom of a funnel is a small circle. So the conversion happens in the middle of the funnel where the people come out the bottom of the small hole, right?
Not as many people come out of the small hole as go into a big hole. So we have lead acquisition going in the top. We have the conversion happening, and then the people that come out the bottom and the ones that need nurturing. So of those three parts, which feels like it's hardest for you, or it feels like it's not working for you: getting new people, converting people, or nurturing people?
[B]: It's really hard because I feel like I need to work on all three. So I'm struggling with... I feel like I know less about the first two. In terms of building a relationship with people, that's not hard for me. So I feel like I can do that. I'm not getting responses to the questions that I pose in the email, and perhaps they seem rhetorical maybe? But then it's the first part of: I'm just a podcast out there.
There's tons of them for therapists. You know, well I think there's tons of them, and I don't know how to stand out further because I think there's a limit to how many people feel like they have the capacity to learn more stuff. Do you know what I mean? I just think there is. And so my ideal client is post-grad, post full license, probably less than 10 years because after that point, it's harder to convince those of us who've been in the field longer that we need to do something.
You know, like it just is. But younger therapists in the field, not necessarily age, but experience, they are well aware that they are missing information that grad school didn't tell them everything they needed to know. And they are kind of freaked out by that usually. And that's sort of where I hit.
That's where I hit them as like, you figured this out when you got into full-time practice, and now you have productivity and everything else, and you've got clients who have every sort of problem under the sun and you can't specialize this early. So here's a way to know what you need to know about these things without having to spend a bazillion hours in school again, or spend more money that is going to be student loan debt.
So that's where I'm trying, those are the people. And so they're usually going to be 30. And so I have an ideal person too. I guess I feel like I have all the basics of how this is going to work. I just don't know how to bring more people in. So now that I talked through that, maybe it's the first one.
[M]: Well, of the three, the one that is the most important is that conversion, because... I was thinking of this analogy, and I don't know if it's going to make sense, but like, the idea of a fire hose, right? If we turn the fire hose on, but the fire hose doesn't actually put out the fire, like, let's say it's not shooting water.
Let's say it's shooting something that's actually flammable. That would be very counterproductive, right? So if we have an opt-in that's not converting, but we're just driving so much traffic to it. And we're putting all this energy into lead acquisition, then it's like, this doesn't matter.
Cause it isn't actually going to do what we needed to do. So we need the opt-in to be converting one way. I described this as like you've built a colander instead of the funnel, right? So you're pouring all this water in the top, instead of it coming out the bottom of the funnel, it's going out to the sides of the colander.
It's just streaming out the sides. So no matter how much effort you put in, no matter how much water you pour in the top, you're not going to get out the bottom, what you need to get out. So we need to figure out this opt-in, whether we go all-in on the quiz or whether we go all-in on this email course or whichever one. It sounds like the email course is performing better or feels more fun.
[B]: Yeah. The treatment planning tool is what's connected to the email course, and I would say that about half of my listeners have downloaded it.
[M]: Okay. So leading with the treatment planning tool, right. That's what it’s called, treatment planning tool? Okay. Leading with that, what I'd want to see over the next 30 days with three calls to action in each episode is so that'd be like four episodes. If you're replacing weekly with three calls to action each episode, and want to see how many new people come into the treatment planning tool and what those convert at.
So let's say we drive 20 new people and 10 of them get it. Boom. We're good. We're good to go. That would show me alright, you go all-in for as much water into that as you can because it's actually working. If you get 20 new people and only two of them grab it, then we know we've got an issue with this conversion.
It's not worth it to turn the firehose on it. Because this part you have here, you have a colander. I'm so mixing my metaphors...
[B]: I'm totally following, I got it.
[M]: So there's no point in putting a ton of water because it's not going where we need it to go yet. So we need to do a little bit of testing around this. I would test it for the next 30 days with three calls to action in each episode, so the next four episodes we can measure.
So what you would do is look at your MailerLite landing page. Before you start this experiment, see how many people have gone to the landing page. See what it's converting at now. Let's say you've had a hundred visitors it's converting... and you said you have 45 people on your email list, right?
So let's say it's converting at 30%. I mean, it would be actually a little bit more than a hundred people, but 130 people have gone. You'd have a 30% conversion rate and 45 are in. It's not perfect math, but it's close, right? 45 people are on the list. So we write down those basics. Now for the next four weeks with doing the three calls to action in each episode, then I want you to look weekly, not every day because I'm the type of person who looks every day too, especially when I'm doing something new.
So just look weekly after each episode to see how many new people have been on the page and how many have opted in. And we're going to measure that over four consecutive weeks. Then we'll know, is this the right opt-in? If we know it's the right opt-in, then we can talk about the other ends. We can talk about lead acquisition and we can talk about lead nurture.
[B]: So I have a question about the landing page. So where I direct them is to my website to a specific page. And there is a form that is connected to MailerLite. But that is different, I think. Then is that just a landing page, and I'm not calling it that?
[M]: A landing page has the sole purpose of collecting an email address. So you cannot click to like any of them. Like main navigation. You can't click to your homepage, your about page, any of that. There's no footer on the page. You can't click to any other links below. It's simply like a whitelisted page with a banner image at the top or whatever and then you download your thing and then name, email, submit.
That's all that a landing page should do. So you can absolutely have that built on your website or you can build them right on MailerLite.
[B]: And then, what is the URL then? Cause if you do that landing page, is it on marissalawton.com?
[M]: So I route it, I put it in the back of my Squarespace site with a link. Basically, you can do it on WordPress. You just need a plugin. I think it's called "pretty links plugin" or something like that. So I take the link from MailerLite and then I make it look like it's marissalawton.com.
Like, if anybody's listening, if you do this with marissalawton.com/roadmap, this is one of my old opt-ins, type that into the browser and then hit go. And then if you go back and look at the URL, you'll see that it says something different. It says, it says like subscribe, page.com/a bunch of gobbledygook. And that's actually a MailerLite page, but I've routed it from marissalaw.com.
[B]: And I haven't done that, so I'm probably not getting the information. Because they have to use the form to sign up.
And so it's just a short little form. It's not some giant thing. So I am getting information from that, but it's not a landing page. Like they could get distracted by anything else, you know, around like, whether it's the other things they see on the navigation or the footer or whatever. So they could get directed away.
[M]: Yeah, so it's converting, but it's not optimized is what I would say. So you could optimize it more. You could remove the header, you could remove the foot, or you could have more landing page style and you'd probably see your conversion rates go up.
[B]: Okay. I appreciate that. That's helpful.
[M]: So that is what I would say your next step is, to test this opt-in. Let's guarantee that it's the right one. Then we can start on the driving traffic. Cause you say, you know, building relationships, that part I've gotten the bag. It might involve sending more personalized emails.
That's the easiest thing to do. I would tell you to do that before. I'd tell you to open up a Facebook group or something else like that. Opening a Facebook group is amazing for relationship marketing, but it's more work. That, in my opinion, is more work than just putting a little more effort into your emails.
So that would be my first line strategy there. And since relationship comes easier for you, then I think what we really need to focus on once the opt-in is dialed in is lead acquisition. And we can do that in a lot of different ways. Going on other people's podcasts. Podcasts could be a great way cause it sounds like it's of use to you.
It feels more natural to you, and it's driving traffic. People are listening to one show. They're likely loyal listeners to others. It's easier to get a podcast listener to listen to a different show than it is to get a YouTube watcher to listen to a podcast because you have to switch mediums. So I think that's a great strategy.
If you enjoy social media, you can do it. I've never... I won't say I've never, I did not use social media until this year. And it's only because I hired it out. I don't do it. So I personally have never done social media for my business. It happens under the Marissa Lawton brand, but it's not me doing it now.
So social media is another traffic driver. Visibility events are another traffic driver. So we can talk up here in the lead acquisition, in the traffic phase, like which of these do you want to be doing? Which of these fits into this lifestyle of ease that you're looking for, that feels more like what is like Betsy's style.
And so we can talk about traffic drivers. Let's just make sure that opt-in is locked in first and then we can drive all the traffic we want, especially cause the lead nurture comes easier to you. And I'd say for most clinicians, that's true. Like building relationships, that's much less intimidating.
It feels much more natural than going out there and getting new people into the funnel.
[B]: Yeah. And I feel like, you know, I did do quite a bit of work on the opt-in, the email course, and if it didn't work, it didn't work. But if it could work better, I would appreciate that because I do feel like at least I'm hoping it's useful.
And when people do respond to an email, I'll say, let me know if you have any questions or I'm really excited. You know, like I'll respond really quickly so that they at least know that I'm paying attention. If it did better, I would feel a lot better about that, I guess, to do other things.
[M]: The first thing I would do is optimize the landing page and then I would do this kind of four-episode test. Okay. What's your website on, is it on Squarespace or is it on WordPress?
[B]: It's on WordPress.
[M]: I don't know enough on how to do that. On Squarespace, you just go into the backend and you add a little code and it takes the header and the footer off. But on WordPress, I'm sure there's a way to build a page or to bring it up.
[B]: And MailerLite has a... like there's a plugin on WordPress that I use. And so I'll just have to do a little looking and research and I can always ask my designer if I need to find it.
But I appreciate that. I hadn't thought about it... the landing page thing was just a little confusing to me, which I know it sounds interesting, but I was like, okay, I understand the point, but where do you put that in the world?
[M]: And you know, as a Space Holder student, you have lifetime access. You can always hop into one of our monthly stakeholder calls and we can take a look at it too.
[B]: Cool. Well, I appreciate it. That's helpful. I have known that I've needed to move forward. So I feel like instead of the beginning of the end or the end of the beginning, so to speak, I feel that I'm past that beginning, but now it's that sort of long middle road.
And that's where I did all the things in space holder and in podcast launch, like did all the things I needed to do and here I am, and now I'm like, okay, so now what on this timeline? And so I appreciate the feedback.
[M]: This is why I like to build in benchmarks, because if we want to hit a certain conversion rate and we're blowing it out of the water, then I mean, we're in really good shape if we're hitting it right on the mark.
Okay, great. Keep going. We may have a little fluctuation. It may dip. It may go up and we'll see. We're still measuring if we're wanting to hit this conversion rate and we're not quite there, let's fix it now before we get six months down the road. So that's what we need to know is from you is are we hitting this conversion rate?
If yes, green light. So right now I'd say you're at a yellow. We don't know yet if this domino is falling, if we're hitting this benchmark, so we're going to do the experiment. If we get a red light, let's fix it. Now, if we get a green light, then full speed ahead. Right? And so having these benchmarks built into your business to know, am I meeting this indicator? Am I on the right track?
Those are the things that are going to give you, you know, we call them leading indicators. Those are the things that are going to give you the indication that you're going the right way or that you're doing things, setting things up correctly, that things are falling into place.
So that's the work of the middle, right? You built it now. We’ve got to make sure it works. When it works we can scale it. So you're right in the middle.
[B]: Yeah. I appreciate that. That's hard where I feel like I am, I just haven't known what to do, and I did sign up for the masterclass yesterday, but I had clients all day, so I haven't watched it yet. I was looking at that, like, I don't know if that's where I am at the moment or not, but it sounds good.
So I'll listen to that and see how that goes too. So I appreciate the feedback and advice on where to go next.
[M]: Do you have any other final questions?
[B]: Not at the moment. I think you've answered them, and I can see what the outcome is after the 30 days and see what the conversion rate is.
What would a typical conversion rate like? What's a good average conversion rate. I mean, clearly higher is better, but what, what should I be looking for?
[M]: So industry standard is 30%. Some people will say 20%, but I really think we should go to 30%. If you're converting at 30% organically, then that's a good indicator that you can go ahead and run ads because anytime you run ads and you bring in cold traffic, that is going to go down, right?
Warmer traffic is good, people are like, oh, Betsy, let me put in my email. They're gonna, they're going to convert. But somebody who's brand new to you, they're gonna be less likely to convert. So if we can get it converting at 30% organically to our warmup, Then that gives us room to run ads. Once you run ads, we'll probably dip closer down to that 20%.
So that's what we want to see. So for every hundred people that get to the page, we want 30 of them to be saying yes.
[B]: Okay. That's helpful. That's actually not as high as I was fearing, so that's good. I know that you've said conversion rates in terms of who ends up buying is, I mean, it's much, it's a much smaller percentage, but I didn't know where we were at on that.
[M]: Yeah. That's the thing that I think is the most eye-opening for people. Like when you were talking about how you have a hundred people listen to your podcasts. I have four to 500 on average. Like some of my episodes, if they're real catchy, they'll have 600 downloads, but most of mine are like 400 and people are like, oh, I thought you had tens of thousands to have the business that you have. And I'm like, Nope.
So when people dig into the numbers and see like, sometimes the numbers are a lot lower than you think you need in certain places. And sometimes they're a little bit higher than you think that you need in certain places. But having that information, it really just ends up being math at that point.
[B]: Yeah, I do appreciate that. I remember I was thinking about how unobtainable this all sounded in the beginning. And then I think I heard you talk about... it was when you were talking about your YouTube channel versus your podcast that you had in the beginning and the numbers. And I was like, okay, Marissa has been doing it for this long.
And she has this many listeners, like, that's not impossible. Like that's not impossible because it felt like... so someone, you know, the woman whose podcast I was on last, or I'm going to be on in May, she has like 70,000 downloads a month. And I was like, my brain breaks. Like, I mean, granted she's reaching a totally different audience, you know, very different, but it was like my brain doesn't even know how to calculate that high, but I don't know what she's doing with it.
’Cause she's not... this isn't a therapist. Like this is a person in recovery doing stories and whatnot called The Bubble Hour. But I don't know that she's selling a bunch of stuff, but it's like the people we're looking for in what you are asking, what you're leading us to do is much more tailored and less like throw pasta at the wall, you know, sort of thing.
And I don't want to do it the other way. So it helped me understand better what was obtainable when you were talking about that and why you went that way. Because I know you're successful and you're honest about it in a way that isn't... it doesn't make me think like, wow, I could never do that.
It's like, wow, she's doing really well. And she's giving me the process and oh, I could do this. I could do that. It doesn't seem quite as unattainable as some of the other stuff might. Cause I've looked at some of the other stuff online, and I'm not criticizing people, just saying that it felt too overwhelming for me.
I think I'm a fairly bright individual. And I just couldn't. It made me feel like it was math and my brain was like, nope, we're not doing this. So I appreciate how you put things together. And the Space Holder course was invaluable. Like I can't even express how good it is and how helpful it was to me. So really, I love it.
And I know I've tried to explain that to you, but I want for people who are listening, who haven't maybe done it, or aren't sure, like, totally it's completely worth it. It's also a tax write-off. So like, go do that. I didn't know what that meant really until I went into private practice and now I'm like, oh, I can write that off.
[M]: Yeah. Especially with so many people letting go of their offices, I'm like, get all the write-offs that you can.
[B]: Oh yeah. I'm facing that decision right now too.
[M]: Well, thank you so much. Before we hop off, share what your podcast is, or you shared the name, but share again, the name of the podcast. It's on all the major players. And then also your website. Share everything that you have for people to take advantage of.
[B]: Thanks. So the podcast is called All Things Substance. It's a place for mental health therapists to hear about addiction and substance use from a mental health perspective. And it's, again, it's on all the major stuff, all the major players.
Episodes are usually 30 to 40 minutes, maybe 40 on most days. And you can find it there, or you can find it at betsybyler.com and it's under podcasts and all the previous episodes. And there's always a transcript of the episode in case you want to read what I wrote, and there's always a massive amount of links to extra information or information where I got the backup for what I'm saying.
My point is to not just bring information but to make sure it's accurate and relevant. And research-based so that you can count on the fact that what you're hearing is accurate. There's a lot of inaccurate stuff flying around, and I know as therapists, we don't have time to sort that out. So again, it's betsybyler.com.
You can visit me on LinkedIn, on Twitter, on Facebook, uh, Pinterest a little bit, but those other three are kind of the main ones that I ended up posting.
[M]: Awesome. Well really quickly, if you could share what your biggest takeaway from our conversation today was, as well as what your first action step is going to be.
[B]: Sure. Kind of focusing on the conversion rate and the opt-in. I mean, that was a big deal in creating that. This is where people pop in. This is the freebie, this is where they sign up. That was a huge push, I think, as part of how I got started coming out of Space Holder. And so that's important to me that it works. And so being able to talk through that was really helpful.
So having it announced more often, you know, the three times during the episode, I think is a really easy task. I mean, I record my own episodes. I plan them. So it's not difficult for me to decide how to work it in and just plan on doing it. And then watching that, how that plays out in the next 30 days specifically, so that I can see what's happening, that I think is going to be really helpful.
[M]: Awesome. Great. Well, thank you so much for being with us today. And I think a lot of people can listen to your journey and can resonate with it and find some value in, you know, having a passion for something and wanting to translate it outside of the therapy room.
Also, you know, making sure there's an alignment between this goal of yours and this lifestyle that you want to live and making sure that there's not a mismatch there. And then just moving forward one step at a time.
[B]: Thank you so much for having me, Marissa.
[M]: Thanks and I'll talk with you soon, and don't forget to come to Space Holder calls whenever you want.
[B]: I will.
[M]: Alright, I hope you guys enjoyed that conversation. It's always fun for me to dive in there and strategize and get into the meat of some of the things that are going on and think about what's the next best step.
Now you'll hear me say not the next right step, but the next best step. Having any kind of business, let alone an online business, requires pivoting and you know, showing up where you can and making experiments, and having an element of play in your business.
So we heard that throughout this conversation with Betsy talking about what are some possible alternatives for next steps for her, and what it would be like to try those next steps, and see where she can go and how she can grow from using those next steps.
If you are interested in Space Holder, since we focused a lot on that throughout this episode, stay tuned, keep an eye on your inbox. And if you're registered for the upcoming training that's happening tonight, you will hear more about this, but we will be doing a special edition of Space Holder and I will be running the course live.
Normally Space Holder is a self-study course, and you meet with me once a month just to be able to ask your questions. But in the month of October, we will be doing Space Holder live. So we will be meeting twice a week to go through the modules together in real-time.
So if you like access to me, if you like access to a community, if you like accountability and being held to a schedule and being able to accomplish things in real-time, Space Holder live could be just the fit for you.
So keep your eyes peeled because you will be getting some more emails and some more communication about that from me and you'll be able to hear kind of the benefits of going through Space Holder life. Alright guys, I will talk to you next week, and until then keep on rising.
