Laurie: Welcome everyone. I’m excited because in this episode I’m going to be chatting with Heather Nasella who is a certified personal trainer and she went through the FOCUS method and we are going to be talking about her experience, her results, and how it’s going to shape her business going forward.
I hope this is really helpful for you as you are starting out your business or you’re at a place where you need to generate some cash quickly, bring in some new clients ASAP. I’m hoping this really gives you the framework and some ideas and the energy to go ahead and use the focus method to jumpstart your business. Welcome Heather, let’s take a look back.
Now Heather came to me last fall, the fall of 2021, and we were working together and at that time, shifts in her business, shifts in her life, Heather needed to pivot quickly and kind of bring in some extra cash quickly, which the focus method is really good for. So we went through the process, we used the method, we got her some new clients, we got some cash in her business pretty quickly, and we are going to be breaking down her entire experience.
So you and I had been working together in October, you’re like, “I need some money right now” and I said to you “Great! do I have something for you?” And you were like “no, let’s not do that, that doesn’t sound right.”
Because I think this is something we see a lot of in the online spaces: run a launch (I’m doing air quotes) run a launch and people will just show up. All you have to do is run a webinar and people will sign up.
All you have to do is send out an email and that’s great if you’ve built an audience and you’ve been cultivating these relationships for years. But if you’re kind of like newer and you’re like, look, all I have now is a fairly, I have a small social media following, I have a little email list if I have anything, and I need to get some cash in the door, basically for proof of concept of this business. Because I don’t want to keep investing time, money, energy into building this business, if it turns out that nobody’s ever going to pay me.
And it starts to feel like that, right? In that beginning space, you know, we’ve kind of been sold this, “just post on social media, people raise their hand, and then you just send them a link, and then they sign up.”
What was your experience like? Because you’ve been a trainer for a while. When you were first starting out, what was your understanding or expectation for the client getting process?
Heather: I would definitely say it was like, put content out there. So it was like, advertise or market, like, talk about what you do. And people will just ask questions, and you’ll just answer them. And then you’ll talk, and then they’ll become clients. But that’s not how it happens.
Laurie: What was happening?
Let’s see, I was putting out content, no idea what I was supposed to be doing. Nobody was engaging. And nobody was asking any questions.
Laurie: Do you see a difference now? Like, do you have is there the content that you’re putting out now? Is it different than the content you were originally putting out?
I would say a little bit. Some of it is like some of it, I think is good. Some of it definitely speaks to my ideal client.
I would say the two things that I personally think I haven’t done yet, is I need to speak more to my ideal client. And I need to be more obvious and more direct about what it is that I do. And not like, “hey, I’m a trainer, hire me” but just like, kind of really more throw it in their face of what I do. Because I’m not doing that now.
Laurie: For the record, it is okay to say “I’m a trainer, hire me.” You can.
No, I know.
Laurie: Sometimes people need that level of, you know, direct statements, like, “right, oh, you are a trainer, you’re looking for clients, great!” Timing works out.
But right, but that only works for the very small percentage of people who are like, yeah, you know what, I do need a trainer. Everybody else is kind of in that nurture phase, not to mention that social media is not generally where people go when they’re looking for solutions.
Right.
Laurie: They’re going to be entertained, they’re going to connect with people, they’re going to, you know, laugh at reels and be out in the world and be social with people. They’re not necessarily looking to for for solutions to their problems.
Right. And I actually had asked that in like a group I belong to just to find out like, I kind of labeled it more as in like inspiration, slash, motivation, kind of like I felt like a lot of people said that they get a lot out of like, groups, like Facebook groups, that’s where they kind of go because they can like have these conversations with people like I was surprised that not a lot of people were really going to reels or Instagram or tick tock for like, this motivation, right? Like the workouts or whatever. Because I’ve had a few people say that that’s where they went.
And I was like, Huh, I wonder if everybody goes there..
Laurie: Groups are a good place where people ask questions, because they’re looking for, you know, that community of other people like minded.
Right.
Laurie: And also, when people are looking for solutions, what else do they do? They Google like, ‘personal trainer near me’, OR ‘ how do I have more flexibility? So I don’t, you know, pull muscle every time I carry groceries.’
Right.
Laurie: When you said “I need money.” And I said, “Great, let’s, let’s test out this FOCUS method here. Here’s what we’re gonna do….”
So you are at a place, this wasn’t like your first rodeo, you’d worked with clients before, but it was, you know, a 3 month package or a 6 month package or something.
Laurie: And once that client finishes the package, you have to either sign them up again or find new clients to take their space. So you didn’t have that recurring revenue. And you didn’t have dependable monthly income, which leads to the panic, right? We’ve all been in the panic. “Oh, gosh, this money that I made, it’s not forever. What do I do now?” So I said, “Okay, we’re going to do something called the FOCUS method.
You’ve already got your foundation, you already have your business is set up, your socials are set up, you’re legal, you’re official, skip to the next step. What’s your offer?” You did a four week jumpstart. We basically used the holiday program that you kind of tweaked it a little bit. You adjusted it for your audience. And so when I brought this up to you, what were your initial thoughts?
I’m sorry, I have to use my personal Facebook page to do what now?
Laurie: And the reason that we use the personal Facebook page is?
Because that’s where people already know, like, and trust you, because they’re already like part of your circle.
Laurie: So you don’t have to build that up.
But I didn’t think anybody would would bite.
Laurie: Going into it, you’re like, “this is not gonna work. I’m not using my personal page, because these people either …. ” I’ll let you I’ll let you answer this. Why did you think it would not work?
Um, well, because, okay, so one, it was kind of like, well, these people already know what I do. So if they needed help, they would just have come to me and asked me.
Laurie: Seems obvious.
Yeah, right. It seems obvious. But again, you live and you learn.
And and I think there’s also this kind of, there’s this fear of like, Oh, my gosh, I know these people in real life, if I suck at this, or I can’t get them the results that they want. Like, now I need to be like face to face with these people. And that’s hard.
That’s a really, really hard, like feeling to kind of deal with, like, almost like you’ve let them down, like you took their money, and you didn’t give them what they wanted, because you’re afraid you’re not going to be able to.
Laurie: because there’s so much trust, right? For some reason, you don’t have that pressure with internet strangers.
Oh, absolutely not. because like, I don’t know them from a hole in the ground. Like, I’m not going to run into them someplace.
Laurie: Right? You never have to encounter them. So it’s almost like working with people who already knew you, it kind of forced you to bring it.
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Right. Which I would argue I would do anyways, but 100% you’re more like worried about giving them so much value, because you don’t want to let them down.
Laurie: Your thought was my personal Facebook network, like my friends, they know what I do. If they want a trainer, they know where to come. And was that the case?
No, I mean, I shouldn’t say that. There were a couple of people who I know, that had come to me, they were like my they were my clients back when I when I would put them in for like a six month thing. So I had a couple people, but that was it out of all my 200 Facebook friends.
Laurie: Let’s talk about how this went. So we did a little bit of kind of warming up your audience here posting on social, but what you did announcing, “hey, you know, I’m a personal trainer, here’s what I do” want to tell me what that post kind of look like?
I was like, hey, I’m running this program. And I’m looking for this, I think I was looking for nine people who would be interested. I don’t remember the exact post but that’s pretty much what it was like. I’m just like, “Hey, I’m putting this out there. This is what I’m doing. This is what I’m looking for. Let me know if you’re interested.”
Scary as it was, I did it.
Laurie: So holding your breath, you hit, you hit the post button. Close the computer lid and ran away. So what happened?
I got people that were interested. I want to say that maybe even it was my first post that everyone had somewhat made said that they were interested because I only think I did one maybe two posts on my Facebook on my personal Facebook page. And between that and then like Instagram, for some reason, Instagram, even though it’s I’ve got like friends and the same people on Instagram, it doesn’t seem to affect me the same way as it does on my Facebook personal page. Literally, it’s like almost the same, not all of it, but a decent amount of the same people.
For some reason, posting on Facebook personal is way different than posting it on Instagram. But yeah, anyways, I think I ended up getting, I would say about half because then I DM people individually too. So let’s talk about going for the no.
Laurie: Was that part of your hesitation to, in posting on your personal page, the no, the hearing the no
actually, I would say hearing the no wasn’t as scary as getting a yes. If that makes sense. Not that I was scared to get a yes, I was super excited to get a yes.
But at least then it’s like once you reach out and somebody says no, you’re like, sweet, excellent. We’ve had this weird, awkward, you know, back and forth now and we can move on from it. You know, it was it was almost easier to get the no because then you just knew where where people stood and you’re like, fantastic. This is great. Thank you so much for being honest.
Versus like a yes, you’re like, “Oh, crap. Like I really I gotta deliver …what if I can’t do this?” you know, so those are actually easy.
Laurie: So a little bit, a little bit of like that pressure that you’re talking about that pressure to show up and deliver and like actually serve the client and especially ones that you have to see afterwards.
Right, right.
Laurie: So tell me about your no list.
I think, originally, I think it was 25 I was going to get to NO I didn’t end up getting to the total 25 before I ended up filling the program, or like almost filling the program I think either I was looking for nine and I got eight or I was looking for 10 and I got nine I can’t remember but I just kind of like I made my list and I probably had 20 at the time and just kind of would slowly add people on I was like I got another no I might like add somebody else on just so I knew I could keep going but I just started at the top and I started like talking DMing people and I collected my notes at least 20 of them.
Laurie: Tell me as you were collecting your notes what was your process there? I have to imagine like you didn’t just add a name to the list and go okay Sam the butcher …okay “Sam the butcher do you want to work with me? I am running this program, are you interested?”
So most people that it depended on who was on the list so most people if somebody was like close to me like somebody I ran into but somebody that like I would talk to or converse with an acquaintance whatever or even like or even a really good friend even though I thought like maybe they could benefit from it I phrased my DMs as kind of like hey not sure if you saw my post this is what I’m doing I’m just really trying to put it out there …didn’t know if there was anybody that that you know that might be interested in a program like this?
So I wasn’t even asking them directly I was actually just asking for their help. some people would be like maybe… I’ll send them over to you or somebody else would be like oh I don’t know anybody and then some people would be like actually, I’m interested so I didn’t really come straight at them.
it was more like a “hey I just need some help, would you be willing to help me?” it’s kind of an indirect ask, which is way easier and not only that but I think people are a little bit like “…but wait what about me? like, don’t don’t you want to know if I’m interested? like this sounds great…I would sign up for this! I want to know more about this!”
Laurie: I think you said you got 9 signed up for this, so what your thoughts going into it
definitely beforehand I was like okay like I don’t know Laurie if this is gonna work but I’m gonna trust you but I don’t know …. like these people know me and these people haven’t haven’t talked or asked any questions to me yet. and then after I did it it was like “holy crap, I might actually be able to do this! this might actually work! I knew what I was capable of, but I was like oh there might actually be people out there that want to work with me!
Laurie: … and not only that but people that you had no idea wanted to work with you and people that weren’t raising their hand to say “oh you know what I really need like something to I need some kind of fitness program I need some accountability I need some guidance”
They weren’t just sitting out there advertising that they needed help, and it wasn’t until you put it underneath their nose and said “here I have this thing are you interested in this? or do you know someone interested in this thing?” and they were like “yeah”
You went from highly skeptical but cooperative which I appreciate and I do appreciate your faith in me …to “holy crap this is this actually works yeah I got I got nine people in this program” and it’s funny because I want to tell you that Avoid the Holiday Hangover program, I think we we talked about this before, but that for me saved Christmas one year. I was coming into late late in the fall and I had people up for renewal and they’re like “oh maybe I’ll get back with you in January, I’m going to take the holidays and take it easy I’m going to be too busy for workouts.” and I was like “um… uh well this this money was going to pay for like Christmas so I kind of need to figure something out” and I threw it together.
It’s like a like a holiday self-care program but it’s really not focused on what what you eat and make sure you exercise every day but it’s really about boundaries and time management, stress management, and really just in being present for the holidays. it’s not even it’s not holiday specific, it’s not food specific, or exercise specific, but tell me what it looked like for you to run this run the avoid the holiday hangover challenge
I mean it was great because I liked that it had all those aspects because people aren’t looking to be super strict in the holiday season, it was the perfect program to run at that time and I feel like it was it took some stress off them and probably why it was even easier for them to sign up knowing that it wasn’t going to be super strict but it was really just about learning new ways to kind of deal with the holidays and how to kind of go into it intentionally. actually I really enjoyed running it because it allowed us to really talk about habits and the things that are important to to kind of get us through that super stressful time of the year so it was a great program to run
Laurie: What did it look like in terms of when you were actually running the program… what kind of content you provided, how you delivered it, so if I’m signing up for your program what did it look like in terms of of components, features, and benefits
So how it kind of looked, like with anything …everybody’s like really gung-ho at the beginning and then some people trail off at the end which is like I know that I was expecting that wasn’t a big deal because it really turned, at that point, once people had signed up it was just really as long as I was providing everything I said I was providing, I can’t force people to take the information and do anything with it.
I can try to support and guide ..so people signed up, I was offering support, checking in with the group daily , was providing accountability. I provided workouts with some modifications for people, I offered one-on-one chat support so that we could break down their goals and see where they wanted to go, how they could start getting to their goal through the holidays, and then where they could go beyond that.
I tried to always make sure that there was some sort of engagement in the group because that’s what people enjoy doing, they like that accountability and support that’s kind of everything and I think there are people who definitely benefited and took it and loved having that that accountability.
Laurie: so following the focus method right so the f was foundation which you already had before you showed up. your offer ..so that was your avoid the holiday hangover challenge.. it was 30 days ,or four weeks, between Thanksgiving and Christmas and you capped it, you said “I’m looking for a specific number of people to participate in this program. This is the outcome that I’m going to provide, this is what it’s going to look like.
The c was collecting your no’s, which was making your list, you reached out to people, collected the no’s. You said you didn’t finish collecting the no’s but that’s okay because you got a good number of people participating. The u is under-promise and over deliver right, so it sounds like you didn’t tell everybody all the things they were going to get but you showed up with all of this stuff. You had your chats, you had workouts, you had modifications, you had daily engagement, you had like weekly challenges
Yeah that was part of it, every week we had a weekly challenge that if people did everything that was asked, then they were entered in to win a prize at the end of the week, so that was a good way to keep people engaged and having fun.
Laurie: So you definitely under-promised and then over-delivered and then at the end, the whole point of this is that you want to get some social proof. We really want to be building up that bank of testimonials that we can then use in our marketing to attract and bring in new clients right because those those testimonials really help potential clients see themselves in your program and working with you.
Tell me about the testimonials that you got
So they were really positive, which was which was really awesome, because people who I know kind of maybe didn’t give it even 80% and I was thinking like ‘oh gosh, they’re not going to be like happy” like there were things that did help them and change for them even though they weren’t 100% in and that made me feel really good, like people were getting stuff even if they didn’t get everything that I gave them because I mean you do give a lot um but they were still able to take away stuff and then still had a very positive experience um so that made me feel good and honestly like getting the testimonials and being able to like put them out there and share them with other people and kind of have that proof that like no like I can help people, I promise you I can. it just feels really good
Laurie: I’ll tell you the more testimonials that you have ,the less work it is to actually attract clients especially if you’re using it in your marketing, you put them on your social media, you put them in your newsletters, you put them on your website, the more proof that you have that you are who you say you are and you can do what you what you say you’re going to do… and that you can help people who are willing to show up, do the work, and be present and put in the effort to work with you, I mean, that is that’s gold for your business” You can’t buy those, you cannot put a price tag on great testimonials and really authentic stories of people who are happy with their experience with you.
Right, exactly.
Laurie: okay so it was uncomfortable at first, you got through it, and it was awesome, sounds like?
yeah it was great
Laurie: so it was at a turning point for you in terms of you realizing that you can make money yes yeah all you have to do is go out there and put it out there
Yeah you have to put it out there because, again, you thought people know what I do if they need my help they’re going to come to me, and they don’t, right?
Laurie: you need to really be front and center with what it is you do, how you can help, and that you are open to taking clients so and even if people knew what you did they could say “oh you know Heather you know she never really posts about her business I assume she’s doing great, she’s too busy for me, yeah she never posts on social so she must be too busy right with all her clients, she doesn’t have time to share you know anything about what she does with her Facebook friends I see how she is
that’s going to be my that’s going to be my new post “sorry I’ve been so busy with all my clients I haven’t been able to be here but I’ve got I’ve got two openings who wants them?”
Laurie: you being busy is actually you know that’s that’s a trust signal right there. so next step so it was uncomfortable.. it was a little bit weird… but you were like “oh all I have to do is let people know that I have this thing they can sign up for it and people will give me money?” okay.
so knowing this, what do we do now?
the same thing well I mean we’re gonna tweak it a little bit right so the unfortunately with the focus you really have to uh it’s not one of those things you can just constantly run so if you’re gonna redo if you’re gonna do it repeatedly you know we make some tweaks to it first time you do it like you’re just getting the testimonials yeah
you don’t have to charge a lot it’s 30 days and you want to make that price point really attractive to people but not so low that you’re getting the people who aren’t going to do anything, you want them to have some some skin in the game, as people say,
ultimately I want to run the same thing but where you still have the same stuff right? you have your foundation you have your offer you’re going to collect your No’s uh
obviously you’re still going to under-promise and over deliver, and still get the social proof, you’re still doing the focus method but this is going to be more like I’m just going to go out and talk about my one-on-one program and putting it like really in front of their face being like here you go and just collect No’s that way
I think it’s a little bit scary because now I’m going one-on-one and I’m still going to be reaching out to people who probably don’t know me very well or they know me like really well and then it’s still scary because you’re asking for more. it’s really scary to put yourself out there.
and I think that’s what I see a lot of coaches the biggest mistakes that I see in the beginning are the fear of putting themselves out there so they do a lot of hide marketing like they want to be able to put up posts that don’t have their face, they want to put up content that doesn’t actually make an ask because then if nobody posts or nobody responds…
I promise you you won’t die but you know people are really intimidated by crickets and No’s so they will they’ll do all kinds of things to avoid encountering them in the wild so right right so I’m going forward
so you’re going to do your FABS method, right? You’ve developed since this since the last time, you’ve developed your FABS method, we’re going to start talking about that – your offers a little bit different so your social content leading up to this to kind of warm people up and it’s going to be a little bit different, but you’re really going to make sure that you’re intentional about the content that you’re putting out beforehand.
and again it depends on how big your audience is so you know the bigger your audience the less you have to do that one-on-one but the more one-on-one contact and conversations and connections you have the more likely you are to fill your program right
yeah that’s what I’m working on right now is that working on that content. I know what I offer in my one-on-one program, so now it’s just a matter of really narrowing down that content and being comfortable with the call to action, being like ‘work with me, I have this.. want to know more?” Being more obvious versus like “hey if you have any questions”
so a hard call to action versus a soft one yeah because a soft call to action is like oh I’m hoping somebody is gonna read between the lines and figure out what I’m saying and and send me a very direct message saying you want to work with me because that’s way easier than me saying I have client spots
yeah and being more you know out there yeah I mean it’s okay to be direct there’s nothing wrong with being direct especially you know when you believe when you’re when you’re madly in love with your offer like so you have a program and you just think it is amazing and you know that the things that you can help people with with this with this program I mean who are you to not share it if you I mean isn’t it kind of mean to know that you could solve a problem yeah don’t yeah that’s kind of how you feel it’s like I was talking to people like you know and they’re kind of doing their own thing but there’s part of me that’s like I can help you with more if you know like I it’s like you really just want to jump in and be like listen like just trust me I’ve got you we’re gonna do this together um so you do feel kind of like come here like you’re excited to be able to share stuff with them exactly and that excitement like harnessing that excitement and turning it into confidence right and and I have a solution I can help you with this I know how to help with this and like you said you talk to people who have you know are kind of doing their own thing and they’re doing great but you know that there’s a piece missing that you could help with and it’s okay to kind of shine a flashlight on that and say um so what about this over here so what are you doing about this is this a problem are you struggling with this and that’s okay too you I mean if you are if you know that eventually that’s going to be a problem for them go ahead and go ahead and ask them and maybe even create content around that saying hey you know what working working out on your own is great until blank until you realize that you aren’t working on this or you are not incorporating this Heather this is fantastic so I’m really I’m really pumped for you because I love to see coaches who go from okay that the spark is is is dying you know to oh my gosh like this can happen for me like you see that you see the finish line you see the top of the mountain you know that the money’s out there there are things you have complete control over getting it you can control how much money you make in your business you just need to be willing to do the things be a little uncomfortable stretch a little bit and hear no the noser I think if I had to tell anybody I think the nose are the are are one of the best things because one it gets you comfortable with hearing no and two you know exactly where people stand like if somebody says no I’m not interested like nothing is like it’s it’s a great I don’t have we don’t have to spend any more energy back and forth about this because you told me where you are I’m cool with that great and everybody that you talk to can either be a potential client or a referral partner exactly even if they’re not in the market like their whole network is full of potential clients and then you can open up that to you know maybe you know somebody and you know if you think of anybody who could use this feel free to send them to my website or send them to my facebook page or send them to my dms so how do you feel now I am so ready I’m all in I’m 100 ready like I will talk to be I will do all of the things I have no problem doing all of the things I don’t even care about getting uncomfortable at this point anymore be comfortable with being uncomfortable for a little bit and I promise it gets easier
Laurie: okay Heather thank you so much for coming on today and talking about your experience with the focus method I look forward to hearing all of your results with the next round!
