Podcasts

Episode 016: Ultimate Guide To Creating An Irresistible List Building Freebie (part 2)

Create A Creative Business That Celebrates Your Ideal Life

Today’s episode is sponsored by my free downloadable PDF checklist – How To Create A Highly Irresistible List Building Freebie And Attract Your Perfect Customers The Easy Way! Stop guessing what your ideal audience wants and start filling your email list with ‘Buy Ready’ people actively searching for your digital products, online courses, artwork, workshops, retreats or 1 on 1 client services!

You can download your free copy today at: getpaidforyourcreativity.com/irresistiblefreebie-checklist

Episode 016 Show Notes

If you listened to Episode 015 of the podcast then you know that I’ve declared July as “Create Your Creative & Financial Independence Month!”

So if you’re an online entrepreneur or entrepreneur that markets their creative products and services online you need to build and nurture an email list.

Why is this important?

To have the ultimate creative and financial independence in your own business, one that you can run on your own terms you need to cultivate a loyal following of people that not only love to hear from you. But are eager to purchase your art, products, classes, and services.

Your email list is one of, if not the valuable asset you own in your business.

Even if Facebook or any social platform went away today, your email list is an asset that you have complete control over. One that you’ll need to nurture and curate overtime and when done right will quickly turn from a random list of names and email addresses into a list of engaged fans eager to become paying clients and customers.

One of the best ways to get this started is by creating a valuable free offer, often referred to as a lead magnet or VFO.

So as I mentioned in Episode 015 I decided to declare the month of July 2019, and dedicate every episode of the podcast on list building including:
Episode 015 – Create a list building freebie part 1
Episode 016 – Create a list building freebie part 2
Episode 017 – *Surprise Guest Interview 1 (July 16th)
Episode 018 – *Surprise Guest Interview 2 (July 23rd)
Episode 019 – Irresistible List Building Freebie 5 Day Challenge (kicks off July 29th thru August 2nd)

As promised from Episode 015 on today’s episode I’m going to cover:
* How I added over 600 plus new subscribers to my email list in less than 30 days
* 15 Totally Irresistible Freebie Ideas! To see the complete list of options visit the Ultimate Guide to Creating An Irresistible Freebie Blog Post
* I’m also going to share details about a very special opportunity to get some, one on one support from me in a small intimate group virtual setting when the doors open for the Irresistible List Building Freebie 5 Day Challenge that kicks off July 29th!

If you’ve struggled to figure what your lead magnet should be, the focus of the topic, how to put it together, how to market it and use it to attract “Buy Ready” leads you definitely want to get in on this opportunity to get some free support from me and do it the company of other creative entrepreneurs just like you.

Resources Mentioned In This Episode:
Ultimate Guide To Creating An Irresistible List Building Freebie

In part 3 of the series, Episode 017 – I’ve invited a very special guest that I’m super excited to introduce who works in a highly sought after and specialized niche. She’s developed unique freebie that’s helped her grow a small but mighty list of loyal raving fans that read everything she sends!

You’ll especially want to listen to this episode if you think you need to write a lengthy ebook or need a large list to have a thriving business this is the podcast episode you definitely don’t want to miss.

So stay tuned when episode 017 goes live on Tuesday, July 16th!

And if you enjoyed today’s episode and it inspired you in some way, I’d love to hear about it and know your biggest takeaway. Take a screenshot of you listening on your device, post it to your Instagram Stories and tag me! @createaproneurpodcast

I’d also love if you subscribed to the podcast and left a review at https://getpaidforyourcreativity.com/itunespodcast

Lastly, I want to invite you to help contribute to this podcast by submitting a question for the Listener Question of the Week edition of Create A Proneur Podcast. All you have to do is go to https://getpaidforyourcreativity.com/QA and record a question (under 3 minutes or less) that could be featured on an upcoming episode!

Episode 015: Ultimate Guide To Creating An Irresistible List Building Freebie (part 1)

By Rodney Washington

Create A Creative Business That Celebrates Your Ideal Life

You can download your free copy today at: getpaidforyourcreativity.com/irresistiblefreebie-checklist

Episode 015 Show Notes

I’m declaring July as “Create Your Creative & Financial Independence Month” and if you’re an online entrepreneur or entrepreneur that markets their creative products and services online you need to build and nurture an email list.

If you want to have the ultimate creative and financial independence, which to me means having a cultivated audience that you have complete control over, one that you can nurture and curate and over time you’ll turn into engaged fans that become paying clients and customers, one of the best ways to do this is by creating and growing an email list.

So for the month of July 2019, every episode of the podcast will be focused on list building including:
Episode 015 – Create a list building freebie part 1
Episode 016 – Create a list building freebie part 2
Episode 017 – *Surprise Guest Interview 1
Episode 018 – *Surprise Guest Interview 2
Episode 019 – Irresistible List Building Freebie 5 Day Challenge (kicks off July 29th thru August 2nd)

In today’s episode we’re going to cover:
* What is an Irresistible Freebie?
* What makes a Freebie Irresistible?
* The benefits of having an Irresistible Freebie?

I’ve also have some valuable resources for you including:
How To Create A Highly Irresistible List Building Freebie That Attracts Your Perfect Customers
Ultimate Guide To Creating An Irresistible List Building Freebie
Create An Irresistible List Building Freebie The Easy Way (in just 5 Days!) Challenge (details coming soon)
Episode 013: Choose! My Personal Take On Ryan Levesque’s New Book & How Creatives Can Use It To Choose The Best Idea For Them

Then in part 2 of the podcast, I’ll reveal
* How I added over 600 plus new subscribers to my email list in 7 days with an Irresistible Freebie!
* The best tools for creating your Irresistible Freebie!

And as a bonus, I’m going to give you my top recommendations for over 15 Totally Irresistible Freebie Types and how you can you pick the one that’s right for you and your creative business!

So stay tuned when Part 2 goes live on Tuesday, July 9th!

If you enjoyed this episode and it inspired you in some way, I’d love to hear about it and know your biggest takeaway. Take a screenshot of you listening on your device, post it to your Instagram Stories and tag me! @createaproneurpodcast

I’d also love if you subscribed to the podcast and left a review at https://getpaidforyourcreativity.com/itunespodcast

Episode 014: Creating Your Own Customer Appreciation Plan (in a 5 easy steps)

By Rodney Washington

Create A Creative Business That Celebrates Your Ideal Life

Today’s episode is sponsored by my brand new roadmap – 57 Ways To Monetize Your Gifts and Create True Security For Yourself! Includes access to four bonus templates called the Creative Entrepreneurs Path to Cash and map your journey to an ideal business that celebrates the life you want to live.

Download your free roadmap today at getpaidforyourcreativity.com/57waysgift

Episode 014 Show Notes

“Nobody cares how much you know until you show how much you care, don’t believe me? Ask a disappointed customer”

It’s been said that acquiring a new customer is anywhere from 5-25X more expensive than keeping an existing one, in this episode of the podcast I’m going to give you some tips and strategies on 5 ways to up your customer service game by keeping your existing customers happy so they’ll reward you with new referrals on auto-pilot.

In a former life, I worked as a trainer at the Four Seasons hotels and regardless if you’ve stayed at one of their properties or not the #1 thing the company prides itself on is creating the best experience possible for its customers.

Extensive data is collected on its guests so no matter what property you’re visiting it’s known company-wide your likes and dislikes. No matter if you’re in Shanghai or the Maldives if you’re allergic to feather pillows you don’t have to tell them, they know.

So with that, I give you my first tip of five customer appreciation practices.

1. Collect Data As You Onboard Your New Customers
For example, see if you can find out special occasions on your client’s life, for example, find out about their birthday (could be their own and/or perhaps the anniversary of when they started their business)

Ask them about any milestones they’ve experienced, especially if your program has contributed to that milestone) for example, celebrate their best or most recent launch. In other words, celebrate their wins, I’ll deep dive into ways to do this in the next tip.

Other options: Ask about their favorite author, flower or food item, travel destination, hobby or interest.

The best time to do this is as your onboarding all new clients and/or students into your programs. Other options are as their going through your program. You can do the same if your only sell products as well.

2. Celebrate Their Wins
Everybody knows what it feels like to work for something, especially something that seems really hard and that everything you do feels like a constant uphill climb. It can feel like you’ll never get there, or you’re so busy trying to get through it all that miss mini-wins along the way.

When you can celebrate your clients and customers wins no matter or small or seemingly insignificant can go a long ways towards showing them you care about them and their progress.

3. Send Something Physical
Because we live in a world dominated by digital this and email or text that, we’ve lost touch with physical the touch.

But for now, if you really want to stand out from the crowd and up your customer appreciation game strongly considering sending your customers something in the mail. Think of it this way,

“Our physical mailbox is the one box in our lives that doesn’t have a spam filter” (that’s a tweetable)

Ways to do this?
Remember the data I asked you to collect on your clients and customers from tip #1?
Here’s your opportunity to really wow and show them that not only do you care but that you’re listening.

4. Have A New Customer Onboarding Plan
One of my favorite entrepreneurs in the online marketing space is Amy Porterfield.

At the time I’m recording this podcast episode I’m going through a fantastic copywriting program called The Copy Cure by Marie Forleo and in the course, one of the featured bonuses is a mini training by Amy Porterfield.

Where she walks students through how to set up an onboarding sequence delivered by email exclusively for newly acquired clients and customers.

According to Amy, from the moment you acquire a new customer, it’s your job to support and reassure them that they made the right decision to do business with you.

You can do this by setting up a multi-part email series delivered via an autoresponder service like Aweber, GetResponse or ConvertKit just to name a few.

In The New Customer Onboarding Sequence, Amy suggests following up with your beloved new customers through a series of welcome emails that will set the tone to engage, inspire and delight them.

5. Caring Always Outweighs Features
In the online entrepreneurial world, it seems everyone is focused on building a better mousetrap. At the end of the day, a customer purchasing that mousetrap doesn’t care about anything other than getting rid of the vermin infestation.

In other words, all your customer wants is the result they paid for, and ultimately for you to care that they get that result.

So I wrap up this last tip and this episode with the quote I shared at the start.

“Nobody cares how much you know until you show how much you care, don’t believe me? Ask a disappointed customer.”⠀

And with that said there, you have it, five specific ways to up your customer appreciation practices and turn paying clients and customers into raving fans that reward you with repeat business and referrals.

I hope you’ll take this info and run with it to position yourself for lasting success.

Resources Mentioned In This Episode:
Postable
Photostamps
Irresistible List Building Freebie (sponsor)
90x Planners
Zoom
Google Docs
Aweber
GetResponse
Convert Kit
Mind Your Business Podcast
1-800-Flowers
The Copy Cure (closed for enrollment until 2020)
Amy Porterfield (Online Marketing Made Easy Podcast) one of my favorites

So if you enjoyed this episode and it inspired you in some way, I’d love to hear about it and know your biggest takeaway. Take a screenshot of you listening on your device, post it to your Instagram Stories and tag me! @createaproneurpodcast

I’d also love if you subscribed to the podcast and left a review at https://getpaidforyourcreativity.com/itunespodcast

Episode 013: Choose! My Personal Take On Ryan Levesque’s New Book & How Creatives Can Use It To Choose The Best Idea For Them

By Rodney Washington

Create A Creative Business That Celebrates Your Ideal Life

Download your free roadmap today at getpaidforyourcreativity.com/57waysgift

Episode 013 Show Notes

In episode 11 of the podcast (3 Lessons from My First 60 Days of Running The Podcast (and how you can apply them to every project you create) I talked about the power of choice and the importance of choosing well.

If you missed it, in Lesson 3, I talked about a newly released book I just finished reading called, Choose: The Single Most Important Decision Before Starting Your Business by Ryan Levesque

My initial impressions of the book, these are my key takeaways:

Get clear on the market, and the audience you want to pursue before you start creating offers. You want an audience with a proven track record of purchasing products and services similar or exactly like the ones you want to offer
Keep an open mind about your initial offers, even with all of the research and testing Ryan suggests in his book ultimately you’re going to have to rely on your intuition so it’s best to approach your initial projects from what the author suggests “a practice business” mindset.
I think this is key because as creatives we tend to become overly attached to our offerings and if an audience doesn’t respond the way we hoped it can be debilitating and stunt us from moving forward on a potentially good idea made better with some tweaking.
This leads to another key takeaway from Ryan’s story, first, he didn’t try to reinvent the wheel, he didn’t try to build a different mousetrap, he just took an existing offering with obvious flaws and using his intuition, made his iteration better. In this case study, it was an info product on how to make jewelry with scrabble tiles.
Second, he didn’t rely solely on passion. Ryan didn’t have a passion for scrabble tile jewelry making. Actually, he was introduced to the idea from his wife who dabbled with the craft in her spare time. She’d purchased an info product from someone on Etsy and when Ryan saw it he assessed that he could improve it. He didn’t have to go in search of a proven market he had that, what he wanted was an opportunity to serve an existing market with a better offering.

So moving forward that’s the focus of this episode, how to find a market with a proven track record of purchasing the creative products and services you want to create.

Ryan calls this “a sweet spot market”

To do this he suggests conducting a series of self-assessments to first get clear on your interests and how you might be able to pair your talents and skills to a viable market.
To aid in this self-discovery process the authors created a generous bundle of handy worksheets to accompany the book, you’ll find the URL peppered throughout the book.

One of the worksheets I’m a particular fan of his Business Idea Brainstorm Worksheet, here’s a brief overview of the framework of this particular worksheet.

First, Ryan suggests when exploring particular markets you might be considering by completing this statement.

I want to help people ______?

I want to help people learn how to watercolor paint
I want to help people bake sourdough bread
I want to help people learn how knit baby caps and sweaters
I want to help people design a blog with WordPress or Squarespace
I want to help people Self Publish their first or next book
I want to help people take beautiful photos with an iPhone

According to Levesque, the completion of your “I want to help people” statement becomes the basis for a foundational Keyword that you’ll use to conduct further research on Google, Google Trends, Amazon, and some of my own personal suggestions of other tools you can explore as you’re doing your research. I’ll talk more about in a moment.

But first, you want to check in with yourself on your level of interest and/commitment before you start investing a lot of time on research. So for each of your “I want to help people” statements Ryan’s created this worksheet with a self-assessment checklist to determine your level of commitment to truly serve people based on your responses.

Those 4 areas are:

Would you “Die on the Hill” for this?
Are You Passionate About It?
Does It Suit Your Personality?
Can You See Yourself Still Doing This in 5 Years? (I spoke more on the five-year commitment in episode 11 of the podcast)

TOTAL (Tally Your Ticks)

At the end of the assessment, you’ll take your top three and those become your three Keywords areas you’ll reference as you conduct your research.

A particular question that I liked from Ryan’s book is, “Would you “Die on the Hill” for this?”

For example, when considering investing your time, talent and resources to a project ask yourself, “Would I die on the hill to teach people how to bake a beautiful loaf of sourdough bread?”

“Would I die on the hill to help people teach people how to beautiful images with their iPhone?”

It might sound a bit drastic but, when you think about it, it takes a lot of work, commitment and dedication to start a business so if for nothing else you gotta admit the question cuts straight to the chase.

When you download the bundle which you can get on a secret URL provided in Ryan’s book you’ll get the following bonuses:
-> Market Brainstorm Worksheet (This Worksheet is a starting place for you to begin thinking about the market you might want to focus on.)
-> Ryans 25 Profitable Niches Ideas
-> Business Model Brainstorm Worksheet (Ryan has a high preference for educational products and services (digital products, workshops, masterminds, etc)
There’s an infographic Ryan calls the (In, Up, Max) One Page Business Model
*In (entry level product) could free or paid, and usually under say $500
*Up (second tier level of service of product) in the $1000 and up range
*Max (highest touchpoint level of service) these can in-person experiences like workshops, tours, retreats, etc.)

This infographic was the only area where I had a little trepidation. Personally, I’m not particularly a fan of the “In, Up, Max” model because I think it’s been so over and/or missed used for two reasons.

The first, some creative entrepreneurs may feel they either can’t charge a premium price point, that their market won’t support it. Or if they can’t figure out what to offer at a higher price point finding themselves stuck consistently underpricing themselves.

On the other hand, if you can figure out what to offer at a premium price point and can sell your offering on a regular basis, why make customers go through tiers to ultimately get to your premium offer?

Start with a premium offering and reverse engineer your entry-level offerings something for free or very low-cost like a mini class, ebook, downloadable templates or something similar.

A brilliant feature of Ryan’s work is his red light, yellow light, greenlight process for determining if a market and potential audience are truly viable and worth pursuing.

He’s designed a specific worksheet to aid in this process to aid you as you’re conducting your research.

So a moment ago I said that the completion on your “I want to help people” statement becomes the foundational Bullseye Keyword that you’ll use on Google, Google Trends, Amazon, and some of my own personal suggestions of other tools you can refer to as you’re doing your research. I’ll talk more about in a moment.

This worksheet is where you’ll record your findings. Using three checkpoints total you’ll enter one of your top three keywords and enter into Google and Google Trends to see if there’s what Ryans calls a sweet spot level of interest to continue researching the viability of the market related to that keyword.

So let’s say that one of your keywords was teaching people how to paint with watercolors (may not yield the best or any results in Google Trends just typing “how to paint with watercolors” I entered “watercolor painting” and got better results.

According to Ryan specifically what you’re looking for in Google Trends is an ranking area on the graph in the middle not so high that it’s too much competition making it tougher to get a piece of the saturated pie or so small where’s just not enough interest to make a go of it as a business.

If you find a trend in your area of expertise that’s not too high or too low then Ryan marks that as a Green Light. If it’s too high mark it as a red light, it’s too low it’s yellow.

So assuming we search resulted in a sweet spot area on Google Trends as we did with “Watercolor Painting” then we can move our research over to Amazon and enter the same keyword in Amazon Search and again according to the author what you’re looking for is between 3 and 7 sponsored listings on the first page in Amazon.

He says if it’s a zero to 2 that’s a yellow light, meaning the market may too small and to proceed with caution and if it’s an 8-9 or higher that’s a red light meaning there may be too much competition.

Again anything between 3 to 7 is considered a sweet spot so for our watercolor painting example, on my initial Amazon research I found 6 sponsored listings for books on watercolor painting meaning (according to Levesque) that particular result is considered a sweet spot.

I feel what the authors created here is a perfect roadmap to helping creative entrepreneurs discover their sweet spot. It’s my sincere hope that you’ll use Choose to help you make the best possible business decision to support your creative expression and bank account.

Resources Mentioned In This Episode:
The book “Choose” by Ryan Levesque available on Amazon
https://trends.google.com
Keywords Everywhere (Google Chrome Extension) that reveals in your Chrome Browser popular related keywords and bid amounts
Udemy.com (to explore if courses on the topic you’re considering exists and if so begin copy stalking)
Skillshare.com (another option for researching potential markets and do some copy stalking)
Episode 011: 3 Lessons from My First 60 Days of Running The Podcast (and how you can apply them to every project you create)
Episode 007 : How To Create A Creative Products Business w/Jane Button
Ask: The Counterintuitive Online Method to Discover Exactly What Your Customers Want to Buy & Create a Mass of Raving Fans & and Take Any Business to the Next Level by Ryan Levesque

Bonus Video Tutorial:
Research Your Next Profitable Idea Using Google Trends, Google, Amazon, Udemy, and Skillshare

I’d also love if you subscribed to the podcast and left a review at https://getpaidforyourcreativity.com/itunespodcast

Episode 012: Communicating What You Do And Who You Serve (in 15 seconds or less)

By Rodney Washington

Create A Creative Business That Celebrates Your Ideal Life

Download your free roadmap today at getpaidforyourcreativity.com/57waysgift

Episode 012 Show Notes

The inspiration for this episode of the podcast came from my ebook 57 Ways to Monetize Your Gifts. Key #33

We live in a world where the demands on our attention is becoming shorter and shorter every day so when an opportunity to connect with people that might have a geniune interest in our offerings we have to get to the point quickly or we’ll lose them.

With that said, it amazes me how many times at conferences or networking gathering I’ll encounter someone who walks up to a microphone or complete stranger and immediately start “oversharing” their back story and/or work history.

You see whenever someone asks “what you do” that’s not really the question they want you to answer.

What they really what to know is… what can you do for me?

So in this podcast episode, I want to give you a simple framework for answering that question simply and succinctly that actually inspires the “right listener” to want to learn more about you and what you do without you having to “oversell” yourself.

But first, before I get into that I want to set up some context on how to re-think your “What you do” response.

If you know anything about copywriting then you know that the subject or header is the most important part of your copy.

For a headline to be truly effective it has to call out or speak to the “the right” person otherwise it falls flat or worse, ignored altogether.

Imagine being in a room face to face with your ideal customer and losing the opportunity to possibly connect with them because they don’t get what you do and how you can help them.

So for example, if I asked you what you do and your response was “I’m a painter” that response falls flat because it doesn’t tell me if you’re a house painter or an artist who paints.

But if you said, “I’m an artist and painting instructor that specializing in landscapes in oil, watercolor, and acrylic” or “I’m a watercolor painter and art teacher specializing in landscapes”

Now I’m clear on exactly what you do and if your “What do I do” statement makes me curious I’ll naturally ask more questions.

For example, if I heard the statement “I’m a painter and art teacher” those words would entice me to ask “Oh, where do you teach?” See how this works.

But that still might not be enough, let me explain.

SO to recap to have an effective “What do I do” statement it must accomplish three things:
* Tell the listener what you do,
* For Whom
* And what they get

So let’s explore how we can make our painting instructors “What do I do” statement even better,
Here’s our current iteration: “I’m an artist and painting instructor that specializes in teaching seniors how to paint landscapes in oil, watercolor, and acrylic”

Again, while it’s ok it can be even better, how does this sound?
“I’m a landscape artist and painting instructor (what) that specializes in teaching seniors (who) so that they can (result) get over their fear of painting (or not being artistic) and express themselves artistically for the first time.

The secret sauce is the completion of that so that… statement

Let’s say you’re a copywriter. A more effective “What do I do” statement would be
“I write copy (what you do) for online course creators (for who) so that… they get more students to sign for their classes” (result)

“I teach painting (what you do) for seniors (for who?) so that…(result) they can learn how to paint landscapes with confidence, even if it’s their first time picking up a paintbrush”

Again to have a highly effective “What I do statement” it must answer the following:
* What you do?
* For whom?
* So that they can…?

What you do? Copywriter, Landscape Painter, Vegan Chef, Self Published Author
For whom? Seniors, new moms, stay at home dads, first-time job seekers
So that they can? The result they want (find a job, learn how to paint with watercolors, spend more time with their kids)

If you haven’t figured it out already your “What I do” statement is more about the customer you want to attract and less about who you are.
“I’m a vegan chef that teaches reformed meat eaters how to create tasty, nonmeat options so that they can prepare meals quickly and affordable.”

“I’m a vegan chef that teaches people considering veganism as a lifestyle choice that they have a lot of options for creating tasty, non-meat alternatives so that they can prepare flavorful meals quickly and affordable.”

When you nail yours and commit it to your memory so whenever you’re asked the question,
“What do you do?” You can say it naturally in 15 seconds or less!

If you’d like to share your revised statement with me, I’d love it if you’d send me a DM on Instagram and I’ll respond with a personal audio message.

I’d also love if you subscribed to the podcast and left a review at https://getpaidforyourcreativity.com/itunespodcast

Resources Mentioned In This Episode:
The book “Choose” by Ryan Levesque available on Amazon

Episode 011: 3 Lessons from My First 60 Days of Running The Podcast (and how you can apply them to every project you create)

By Rodney Washington

Create A Creative Business That Celebrates Your Ideal Life

Download your free roadmap today at getpaidforyourcreativity.com/57waysgift

Episode 011 Show Notes

Here’s some of what I covered on this week’s episode:
Depending on when you listen to this I launched the Create A Proneur podcast a few days shy of two months ago, April 9th, 2019 and in this episode, I want to break down my top three lessons I’ve learned from launching the show and how they can affect every project you create.

Lesson 1: Pick a project you’re willing to commit to for the next five years.
Now five years might seem like too long of a commitment but hear me on this. I’m certain if I’m still producing the podcast five years into the future (and for the record that date will be April 9th, 2024) I’m clear that the show and more importantly how I’m producing it, won’t be the same as it now.

For example, I project I’ll be publishing more than one episode a week, as a matter of fact, I’m planning to start dropping occasional bonus episodes in the next quarter starting in quarter two of 2019.

Do I have plans to do a daily show? Probably not, but I can definitely see at least two episodes a week on a regular basis in the future.

My point about having a five-year vision is that you avoid picking a project that doesn’t bring you joy or help you fulfill a larger vision. In other words, if you can’t see yourself doing something for at least five years, it’s probably not the project for you.

That’s not to say that you won’t experience drudge work on your journey but if every day was kittens and rainbows it wouldn’t feel like you worked for something bigger than you. Here’s another reason why a five-year vision is important, your five year dictates your one year, two years, etc, etc.

When you have a clear five-year vision with year by year milestone breakdown helps dictate your monthly and daily actions.

For me, I can tell you my two to three-year vision is to write and publish a book of the same title of the podcast and in five years, run an online and in-person “travel based experience” program that supports creatives to free themselves from the shackles of the “starving artist” to running their own thriving businesses based on their creativity.

My five-year vision is for the podcast to serve as a connector for creative entrepreneurs and an audience builder for my educational platform and brand allowing me to fully express myself.

Lesson 2: Consistency is everything.
This podcast is not my first foray in the game, I launched another show six years ago and my deepest regret I didn’t stay with it. I really didn’t have a clear vision and not just for the show, but for my life so the show felt more a project that I was dabbling with than a game changer that supported a larger purpose.

So before I decided to get back into the podcasting game again I made a commitment to be consistent. Producing at least one weekly episode is non-negotiable, so matter what life throws my way at the minimum I have to publish at least one weekly episode.

Even saying that out loud makes me feel even more committed because I know that my commitment will be rewarded not just in present but in the future. So you before you launch your next project ask yourself “what am I committed to doing consistently?”

It could be publishing a weekly podcast like me or a one new blog post a month or write 500 words a day of your book, or take and share a photograph on Facebook or Instagram.

Whatever you decide, get started and keep going and I’ll give you one last tip before moving on to my last lesson. Get clear on how you’ll be able to keep your commitment when life inevitably gets in the way.

For me, I can record a podcast episode on my iPhone if I’m away from home studio, I can also batch produce several at a time to stay ahead of myself in case I can’t I’ll be traveling, or just want to take time to work on other projects. Whatever arrangements I need to ensure I maintain my commitment it’s important to me that I’m consistent with my word.

It’s said that keeping your word to yourself when no one is watching is the epitome of integrity.

I want to be in integrity so I work to make choices that help me to keep my word. If I can’t trust myself how can I trust anybody else?

Lesson 3: Everything is a choice. Choose Well.
I chose to launch a podcast because I love to teach and obviously I love to talk. I’m currently reading a well thought out book titled Choose by Ryan Levesque. Choose is not your typical business book but not one of those boring, stoggy, “I’ve heard this a thousand times before” types of books on entrepreneurship.

Similar to the same it’s the subject focus is on figuring out what you’re passionate about and then trying to decide what kind of business you can start based on your passion.

This book is different, Choose is based on getting clear about a market, and an audience with a proven track record of purchasing products and services similar or exactly like the ones you want to offer, or at least are thinking about offering and matching them to a verified market.

Now I want to make sure I’m clear on one caveat. The author admits he has a preferential leaning (as do I) towards informational products and services like eBooks, courses, membership products and the like when investigating potential markets to tap into.

So for example, if you’re a watercolor artist, a potentially perfect profit center option could be launching an online course teaching watercolor painting, or if you’re a food photographer, similar.

There are so many lucrative opportunities in the online educational arena, that’s what Ryan’s book and accompanying support material accomplish so beautifully walking his reader through a series of exercises and activities designed to help you get absolute clarity not only the best potential market to consider but how to choose the best product and/or service deliverable based on your personality and the way you like to engage with your clients and customers.

At present, I’m still going through the book and support material so you can expect I’ll share more on findings in a future episode of the podcast, in the meantime, based on my current interpretation I highly suggest adding Choose by Ryan Levesque to your summer reading.

Choosing the right passion, the right market, the right deliverable makes getting paid for your creativity so much more of reality.

So many of us don’t take all the variables into account when we make our choices and risk we run in doing so is not being happy with them. If you experience a string of so-called “failed” choices makes it harder to trust ourselves in future.

One of the Mindset shifts in Ryan’s book I loved is when he talked about how he chose his first business project, a how to make jewelry with scrabble tiles information product.

His initial inspiration came from a crafter selling something similar on Etsy. He ordered the product and immediately discovered upon examination how poorly the product was put together.

Knowing he could do better he did just that and released his improved iteration of the info product and decided to view it as his “practice business” as Ryan put it, it took the pressure off getting it right and that gave him the inspiration to get into action.

I took several lessons from Ryan’s story, first, he didn’t try to reinvent the wheel, he didn’t try to build a different mousetrap, he just took an existing one with obvious flaws and using his intuition, made his iteration better.

Second, he didn’t rely solely on passion. Ryan didn’t have a passion for making scrabble tile jewelry making. He found a product in need of improvement, a fertile market already investing money in a market and an opportunity to serve that market with a better offering.

Sometimes we can find ourselves investing considerable amounts of time and money pursuing an idea or a passion without verifying if it’s worth pursuing.

Choose. The Single Most Important Decision Before Starting Your Business can help you choose well. Get your hands on a copy today!

Additional Resources Mentioned on the Podcast

Episode 007: How To Create A Creative Products Business w/Jane Button

Episode 004: The Passion Based Business Plan Part 1

Episode 005: The Passion Based Business Plan Part 2

Stay tuned for a future episode of the podcast where I’ll share more of my impressions and discoveries from the book and how I’m using it to create my own “practice business” projects and who knows, I may be able to score an opportunity interview with the author!

I’d also love if you subscribed to the podcast and left a review at https://getpaidforyourcreativity.com/itunespodcast

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