3 Reasons You're Getting Overlooked in Your Niche

Courtney Elmer 0:00  

You're listening to the Antifragile Entrepreneurship™ Podcast. This is episode 143. And it's been a minute since I have done a solo episode. And I am not just bringing you one solo episode, I'm bringing you three, because last week I hinted at a brand new series that I would be dropping on the podcast. And this is it, it is here. So if you're an online business owner who is struggling to generate leads consistently in your business with social media content right now. 

Courtney Elmer

And if your revenue or your lead gen has been inconsistent and completely unpredictable for at least 90 days or more, well, this episode and the episodes are head are for you, my friend, because I am lifting the curtain to reveal the exact social media content strategies that we've implemented here within our own company this year, to double our social media content engagement to triple the growth of our email list to increase our email open rates from an awful embarrassing 10% to up to 98%. And to increase our revenue from a little bit here and a little bit there to steady five figure months. So stay tuned for this social media content episode. 

[Intro]

Courtney Elmer

All right, my friend buckle up because we have a lot to get through in the episodes ahead. Because a few weeks back, I sent an email to our community asking about the biggest challenges that you're facing in your business right now. I was really curious to hear because you know, as times change and things evolve, sometimes the biggest challenges you're experiencing change, too. And I wanted to know what was the biggest thing that is keeping you up at night right now. And I read every single response. And what shocked me, what shocked me was not what you were struggling with. But the fact that you are all struggling with the same thing. Social Media content

Courtney Elmer 2:36  

Now the universal challenge, that is a major issue for most online business owners, is lead generation. And many of you spoke to this in your responses. You said you are sick and tired of trying organic strategy after organic strategy trying to make something stick. You're done with paid ads. Not to mention they're more expensive now than they ever have been. And you hate social media content. And you know that you have so much to offer people. You want to help you know that what you have to share is valuable, you know the level of transformation that you can provide. But you're starting to doubt yourself, because people aren't engaging with your social media content.

Courtney Elmer

For years, I struggled with social media content and lead gen to just like you so much so that I would be lying if I didn't say that there were many times that I wanted to quit as my husband about all the tearful nights. I can remember, like yesterday, my son was really young at the time. And sometimes the only time that I would have to myself in the course of a day would be to put him in the stroller and go for a walk in our neighborhood. And I would pop in my air pods and I would listen to podcasts. Because I was desperate to find the solution to my marketing and social media content problems. I didn't get into business to market my business.

Courtney Elmer

I got into business to help people. And back then it felt virtually impossible to grow my following online like I might as well been doing door to door sales because it felt like the same level of rejection. And this was before all of the Facebook ad changes or a bajillion Instagram algorithm updates and long before TikTok even existed. This was way pre pandemic. And I was desperate because everything was on the line, this business had to work. And people had told me that organic strategies were slow. Organic is the long game hit with ads, you can grow faster. And that made sense in my brain. But I didn't have a huge budget for ad campaigns. And the ad campaigns that I did try for a few dollars a day, you remember back when people were teaching about that, oh, $1 a day put ads out there? 

Courtney Elmer

Well, yeah, those totally flopped, I was so ready to find a social media content and marketing solution, that would give me the highest return on the investment of the most valuable resource that I had available to me my time. But none of the organic strategies that I tried were working, and I was tired of feeling the pressure to show up daily with amazing social media content. Most days, I was at home with like spilled coffee on my shirt, you know, building Legos, cleaning up spills on the floor, you know, I didn't have it in me to put on makeup every day, or to come up with something insightful to say, not to mention my time was extremely limited, because at the time, my son was home with me full time. And I knew that creating social media content that only had a lifespan of 24 hours, was not the best use of my time. 

Courtney Elmer

But then one day, something changed. And suddenly, we went from averaging around 10%, open rates on our email list, to up to 98%. open rates regularly to our general email list our entire list, not some little segment of it, that would make it super easy to fake those numbers, our entire general list many 8% open rates, we started seeing more engagement with our social media content in the form of DMS, from people reaching out, asking to work with us signing up as customers, we tripled the growth of email list subscribers, and added 1000s of dollars to our bottom line as a result. 

Courtney Elmer

So as I read all of these survey responses, and I've had conversations with many of you recently, via email, and in my DMs, I felt more convicted than ever, to lift the curtain and show you exactly what we did to solve this problem. But in order to understand that, we first have to talk about the three major mistakes that are causing you to get overlooked in your social media content right now. So that you can fix them. Because if you're listening to my voice, and if your revenue and lead generation has been inconsistent for the past few months or more, even if you're posting consistently social media content.

Courtney Elmer 7:38  

And maybe you're starting to question your expertise, because you feel like no matter what you do, others aren't seeing the value in what you have to offer. And it feels like you're beating your head against a brick wall, then pay very close attention. Because these three mistakes are sneaky. And they are prevalent. And they are hurting your business growth. And I want you to know that what I'm about to share with you, I share with so much love. Because this is not something that people out there are teaching. And how else would you know what mistakes you're making with your social media content? Unless someone tells you I know you've given it your best effort to grow. 

Courtney Elmer

I know that your lack of growth is not because you haven't tried. I know you've tried with your soical media content. And I pulled our Instagram community the other day, asking them what they thought the causes of their lead generation problems are. And they said number one, they think it's because they don't know what kind of social media content their audience wants from them. Like they haven't figured out what kind of social media content their audience wants. And they're thinking in their mind, like if they can figure that out, then they'll be able to generate leads. They also said that it's because they haven't found the right strategy for their business. They don't know what the right social media content marketing strategy is. 

Courtney Elmer

And they think that once they find that, then they'll be able to generate consistent leads. And the other reason that they said was that they don't know where to focus their time, they feel like they're being pulled in a whole bunch of different directions. And they don't know where to focus their time, because they only have so much time they want to make the best use of it. And so far, everything we've tried feels like a total waste of time. But I'm here to tell you that all of these things are merely symptoms of a much deeper root cause and that all of these symptoms, not knowing what kind of content your audience wants, haven't found the right social media content marketing strategy yet not knowing where to focus your time. All of those things are symptoms of the mistakes that I'm about to share with you. So you're ready.

Courtney Elmer

Mistake number one, sharing how to content, posting how to content is the worst way to grow your following and it could be tanking your social media content engagement. The other day I was on a client call. And she was telling me that she had developed this framework work to teach what she teaches. She's in the health and wellness space. And she had developed this beautiful framework. It was an acronym, each word had a meaning. She was walking me through this framework. And she said, But I'm really struggling because I feel like if I teach this, like this is the same stuff is what's in my program. So how is it any different? And what do I teach? And how do I put this into social media content? 

Courtney Elmer

And I told her, I said, Well, the first mistake here is that we don't want to teach the same stuff to our audience in our social media content, that we're teaching in our programs. And the reason is, because the how the how to, that stuff should always be behind a paywall. And her eyebrows went up, and her eyes got really big. And she started nodding her head and she's like, okay, that makes sense. Tell me more. And so here's the thing, it's normal to think that you have to post social media content to be successful, because that's what you see the most of on social media content. I can think of probably 10 Instagram influencers who teach reels. And the bulk of what they teach is how to how to hook people how to do transitions, what to say, in your reels. They're teaching people how to do something in their social media content. 

Courtney Elmer

But then you look at someone like Alex or Mozi. And you look at any video that he puts out there, he is not giving you tutorials, but he delivers insane value in every single video he puts out. How on earth does he do it. And it's because he's teaching what and why in his social media content. And what why social media content is effective, because it helps you create a gap in your ideal clients mind that drives desire and demand for what you offer. So in all of your social media content outside of your programs, you simply need to teach what someone needs to be doing, what mistakes they're making, what's causing these mistakes, and why all of this is important, then you monetize the hell. 

Courtney Elmer

Because if someone wants your help to do what you're telling them they need to do, then that's what they pay you for. So you can either keep posting how to social media content and keep struggling to increase your following. Or you can make a simple shift to teaching what and why social media content and still provide an insane amount of value. By helping open your audience's eyes to the mistakes that they're making, that are causing the problems they're experiencing,

Courtney Elmer 12:40  

and what to do instead. Exactly like what I'm doing in this episode, right now. And if you're sitting here right now listening to this, chances are what I shared with you was valuable. Because if you have been making that mistake, if you have been teaching how to social media content, maybe you didn't realize that that's not what you should be doing if you want to create social media content engagement. So that would have opened your eyes to seeing something from a new lens. And that's where the value is. So let's move on to mistake number two, because maybe mistake number one resonated with you maybe it didn't. 

Courtney Elmer

But mistake number two, is a huge one that I see so many overlooked entrepreneurs making. And it's consuming other people's social media content. Consuming other people's social media content is one of the fastest ways to tank your social media content engagement and get overlooked in the online space. Now, I shared a story with you a moment ago about me walking the neighborhood listening to podcasts, because I thought that's what I needed to do. In order to learn what I needed to learn before I felt comfortable and confident enough with putting myself out there. And that's why it's normal to think that this is what we do, We read other people's books, we watch other peoples social media content, we listen to their podcast, we consume their content, we assume that it's a valuable use of our time, because it's helping us learn something. 

Courtney Elmer

It's helping us develop the courage and the self belief needed before we put ourselves out there because there's a belief deep down that if we know enough, then people can't reject us. That if I look like I've got it all together, and if I know what I'm doing, and if I appear like I'm smart enough and that I know enough, then surely people will see me as an expert and therefore they won't reject me and therefore I will be successful. But when you consume more social media content than you create, what happens is you silence yourself. So to be a thought leader, you have to share your thoughts. But how can you even hear yourself think when you've got everyone else's thoughts floating around inside your head? So the simple soul Lucien here is that you got to tip the scales, you have to start creating more content than you consume.

Courtney Elmer

Because if you continue to stay in content consumption mode, then you probably won't need a crystal ball to predict where your business will be six months from now, or a year from now, if you continue reading other thought leaders books, instead of writing your own, or listening to their podcasts, instead of using your voice on your own, watching their videos, and not putting out much content of your own. Do you think you'll be any closer to your own goal of being seen as a recognized thought leader? Probably not. So the simple solution here is to start noticing how much time you spend creating content, versus how much time you spend consuming content, and then make the necessary adjustments. Because you should be creating 80% of the time and consuming 20% or less. 

Courtney Elmer

All right, so if you're with me, let's continue. Because the third mistake that I want to bring your attention to you today is a doozy. And it is blaming your audience, for your lack of results. It is so easy to put the blame on our audience for the results that we are not getting. I'm so guilty of this. And it's the worst thing that you can do when trying to grow your community. Why? Well think about it, what quality of friendship, do you think you'd have someone if deep down you were blaming them or resenting them for not being a good friend to you? See what I mean? 

Courtney Elmer

Yeah, sure, maybe you text them every once in a while you'd paste on a smile when you see them, and you nod your head, but you're not really listening when they're talking to you. Because all the while you're feeling insecure about your friendship, because you're wondering what they're thinking of you. You're wondering if they really like you, you're wondering if they like what you have to say, you're wondering, do they even care? How can I present myself to make this person like me? It wouldn't be the best of friendships? What? No, not at all, because the best friendships are the ones that are built on trust. They are the ones where you can let yourself be fully seen and valued and love for who you are. But how can you fully trust someone or see them or value them, if you're blaming them at the same time, you can't. So in business, we're faced with choices.

Courtney Elmer 17:35  

And you have to make a choice, you can continue to blame your audience, for the lack of the results that you want, and make it their fault for the results that you're not getting. Oh, they don't like what I have to say, Oh, they don't want the content that I have. I don't know what content to put out there. They don't like anything that I put out there. And on and on and on. Or you can take a look at how you're communicating right now. And see if there's anything you can improve on your interface. You know, therapy doesn't work because the other person changes. It works because you change. 

Courtney Elmer

So we may not have control over what our audience likes or doesn't like or who they choose to follow or not follow or who they engage with or doesn't engage with. And it means nothing about you. Because what you do have control over is how you show up. And the work that you put into making the relationship as good as it can be. All right, we're gonna pause right there. Because we have covered a lot here. This is some deep stuff, we had to do the heavy lifting first and get all of this stuff out of the way. Because how would any system or any tips or any advice that I give you in the episodes ahead possibly work? If you don't realize that these mistakes could be undermining your progress. 

Courtney Elmer

Next week, we're going to be talking about why social media content is the worst way to grow your following. And the reason you might be unknowingly tanking your own engagement. I will see you back Hear next week and until then go with your EffortLESS Life®.