A No-BS Answer to What It Really Takes to Build a Successful Online Business

Hey hey, Kathryn here! I’m so glad you’re tuning in. If you’re new to the show, welcome. I’m so glad you’re here. If you’ve been around for a bit, you know I’m all about keeping it real with you. Showing you all the sides of entrepreneurship (& life). I mean it’s all connected, right? 

Ditch the cookie-cutter approaches to stand out

Dancing and pointing on reels

Employ marketing strategies that align with your unique energy expression

Sell high potency offers that are in full resonance with your dream clients

Create curated experiences for your clients that make them feel seen and heard

Mass profits versus luxury experiences

PRE-RECORDED INTRO:

Hey, hey, Kathryn here. I'm so glad you're tuning in. If you're new to the show, welcome, welcome. I'm super stoked that you're here. If you've been around for a bit, you know, I'm all about keeping it real with you showing you all sides of entrepreneurship and life. I mean, it's all connected, right? And if you saw the title of today's episode, you know, I'm about to share with you a No BS response to the question I keep getting asked from my audience and potential clients that are looking to invest in Elevate, which is my signature experience. And that is, how do you really build a successful online business, Katherine? Like, what does it actually take? Because there's so much contradictory information flying around the interwebs, about what is the right way and the wrong way to achieve success in this online space? And there's a lot of things out there, Kathryn, that don't resonate with me. You know, I don't want to dance and point on reels. And I don't want to be on social media all the time. And I don't want to sell in this way, you know, so what does it really take? Like, can I be successful, if I'm not buying into all of the things that have been sold to me, and maybe you have built a wildly successful business, and you are, you know, you've hit a plateau or sort of a dead end, because the model in which you're operating in isn't sustainable. But you bought into that, because somebody sold you on the idea that was the fastest and best way to achieve success. Or maybe you've been hustling your butt off for the last outerknown, two years, and you have landed clients and attracted clients, but you're on the verge of burnout, and you're looking for something different. Or maybe you've invested in programs and coaches, and you still aren't where you want to be in business, and you're starting to lose hope? Because you're wondering, what is the actual way to build a successful online business. And I'm just looking for somebody to dish it to me real and not try to sell me on their program as the missing piece, or the magic pill that a lot of online marketing gurus do. I want you to keep tuning in, if any of that resonates with you. And you're like, Heck, yes, Catherine, this sounds so familiar to me. And if you're not an online business, and you're a local brick and mortar, let's say I still think you're gonna get a lot of value from this episode, because what I'm about to share with you, really is what I believe the path to success. And that path to success isn't going to look like my path to success. And that's going to be the running theme throughout this episode. And a lot of people will get annoyed with me because they want me to like hand them this like manuscript of like, here are the exact steps to take. And I can guarantee you, if you take them, you're going to be successful. But that's what I feel like is the problem in the online space. And that's where I feel like OS marketing people have done business owners a massive disservice. And that is selling you on the idea that there is some secret manual out there, that's going to guarantee you success. Because I don't actually believe that to be true. I believe there are a variety of different ways that you can achieve success. And it's about finding one that works for you. And that brings me to the very first thing that I believe is key to standing out online and being successful. And that's ditching the cookie cutter approaches that you've been sold on for so many years, right? Those cookie cutter approaches that worked for your guru and worked for your mentor and worked for your coach. But when you tried to go put yourself in those, they didn't work for you. And that could be for a variety of reasons. It could be the strategies that they're selling, it could be the way in which they want you to sell and market yourself like I don't know, dancing and pointing on reels or, you know, reaching out to people at cold in the DMS or prospecting other people from Facebook groups, or you know, doing a lot of what I call bro marketing, the push marketing the, you know, going out and plucking people out of the interwebs. And that feels counterintuitive to a lot of online business owners, especially heart centered, purpose driven soul led business owners that don't want to be pushy or forcing their way, you know, to find clients. So that's the first thing that I say is key to standing out online and that's ditching the cookie cutter one size fits all approaches to marketing. It's why I started this podcast. It's why I believe that US marketers have done y'all a disservice. And I can call us out because I am a marketer and I've been doing this for 20 years. And I know that a lot of clients that come to me and work with me inside of Elevate COMM For that reason, because they know within that space Bass, I'm not going to shove them in a box and tell them that this is the way they need to do it. We work very closely to cultivate and create strategies that are in alignment with who they are and what they stand for. Which brings me to the second most important thing, if you want to be successful in the online space is employing marketing strategies that align with your unique energy expression. And what I mean by that is, when you're a personal brand online coach, consultant, thought leader, changemaker, whatever you want to identify as a personal brand, you are the face of your business. You've got to employ marketing strategies that are the true essence of how you would express yourself naturally as a human being. And where most people go sideways is they go, they go against what their unique energy expression is. And they employ marketing strategies that don't align with that, for example, called DMing people right, or dancing on reels and pointing and or prospecting people in Facebook groups or talking in a way that doesn't sound like them.

So it shouldn't be a surprise that you've built this business that really isn't in alignment with who you are. Because you've been employing these tactics or strategies that somebody else has sold you on, as the key to building a successful online business when in reality, that isn't true. Because the truth is, when you employ marketing strategies that align with your unique energy expression, you're able to show up as your true self as your fullest self, you're able to connect with people and form relationships in a way that you naturally would. And you're doing it in a way that can't be emulated, because it's unique to you. It's unique to the way that you function and show up in the world. It's the way it's the unique way in which you do things that other people really can't emulate. And when you get that synergy, things become so magical opportunities land in your lap, that you are like, how did this happen? You know, clients come into your orbit that in a way that doesn't even feel realistic, there isn't that push or that force, to get people to come and pay attention to what it is that you're putting out. Because they naturally want to be in your space. Because energetically they can feel how authentic and real and raw you are, because of the alignment that you've created in your marketing with that unique energy expression that you have. Because here's the thing being sought after. And having people reach out to you and want to work with you really starts and ends with whether or not you are leaning into an owning your elevated edge or your unique edge as I call it right? Are you owning what makes you you? Or are you emulating what everybody else is doing? Are you trying to fit yourself into these cookie cutter approaches that somebody sold you on. And that's what ends up happening when you try to fit into that cookie cutter approach. You end up just emulating or sounding very similar to everybody else online, it can be very robotic in a lot of ways. I've heard a lot of my clients say that I feel very sort of like robotic and scripted. It doesn't sound like me. And I just want to get paid to be me, I just want to be able to show up in this online business space, being me, and not having to conform to what other people say is the way to be successful. Which leads me to the third point. And the another really key point to building a successful online business. And that is selling high potency offers that are in full resonance with your dream clients. I see so many of my clients who come to me before, when they enroll in Elevate, and they've got all these offers. And they've created these offers based on what they think will work, what they think is going to be successful, what they think their audience wants, what they think is an easy sell. And it's not a high potency offer, because it's not something they freaking want to sell or they're obsessed with or they know is like highly transformational. And so they end up creating these offers multiple of offers to try and sell and to be successful. And they end up hustling their butt off to sell these offers, because they're not high potency offers. And they're not in full resonance with their dream clients. So they end up attracting clients that deplete their energy, or they attract clients that you know, are not getting the results that they've promised because they're not in resonance, they're not a match. They're not the right clients, or they're getting clients that you know, forfeit payments, or don't show up to calls or don't put in the work or are stuck in victim mindset. And they wonder why they can't seem to attract these dream clients that everybody talks about. And it's because they've created offers that are not in full resonance with the type of people they want to work with. And if you're not creating high potency offers, you're one not going to attract people that are in full resonance of your dream clients but you're also really going to struggle to sell, you've got to be obsessed with the thing that you're selling. But you also have to know that you've put that heart and soul into it and that you're doing it because you 100% and believe in the work that it is and you believe in the transformation that it can offer. That is high potency, right is when you are literally creating an offer that is so freaking juicy that you can barely wait to get out into the market and help the people that you truly want to help not just help anybody for the sake of helping anybody, you know, it's a common conversation that I have within elevate with my women is they are of service people, and they want to help everybody and they want to change the world. But they end up stretching themselves so thin to try and serve the masses, that they deplete their own energy in that process. And they're creating, like I said, all of these offers to meet everybody's needs. And nothing is in high potency, right. And when you don't have an offer that's in high potency, you have a really hard time creating potent as fuck messaging, because you're selling something that you're not 100% in alignment with or absolutely love. And what that requires when we create offers inside of Elevate, I actually ask the women to forget about what they've been taught, and to forget about the types of programs they've gone through. And to forget about all of the things unlearning it you've probably heard this often, right? You just got to unlearn how to be. And it's so true. It's like unlearn, and you're standing inside of elevate and this experience, I want you to also forget about how you're learning in this capacity, because it's so easy to emulate what everybody else is doing and lose your part of who you are. But really lose your voice and your essence in the process. And it's what we don't want you to do, right? So I want you to think about if you're like Katherine, well, what does what goes into, you know, creating this high potency offer, I want you to take a moment and go, go daydream, I just want you to walk away. And just daydream about what you would love to bring to existence what you would love to share with your audience and with the world. And what does it look like? Right? The greatest innovators of the world you think of people like, you know, Elon Musk, or Einstein, you know, they dreamed right? They dreamed big, I think of Dyson, right, the vacuum brand, or Sara Blakely, with Spanx. You know, they, they had a dream, and they dreamed big, and they didn't care what was out there in the market already. And they didn't try to emulate what was out there. They tried to be different. And they tried to bring something unique to market. And that's what a high potency offer does. Number one is it's it's 100% in alignment with you. And it's something you can deliver because it's your brilliance, you're the only one with this brilliance and gift to be able to bring it to the world in this capacity in this way. But you're also looking at the market going How can I change? What's going on? How can I deliver it in a different way? How can I innovate? what's already happening? Right? How can I improve on what we've already been doing? That's potency, right? When you go in doing same, or I'm just gonna change the name of the program, and I'm gonna have the same sort of modules, you know, it's same, it's cookie cutter. And that to me dilutes the potency of what it is that you're selling. And we don't want that. And that also then dilutes the type of clients that are coming into your orbit, they no longer become the full resonance of those dream clients that you want to work with. Because your clients and the people in your orbit in space can feel that, right. It's all energy, they can feel that they can feel whether it's a high potency offer that you're putting out, they can feel whether it's something you absolutely adore teaching, or helping people with, right. And that's the beauty of, you know, the women that I get to work with, because they often come in with this preconceived idea of like, what they want to build. And within the first 60 days, they've burnt that down, and they're reintroducing or introducing something completely different. That's been sitting on their heart for a while, but they just didn't know whether or not they could do it. Or they just didn't know if you know, do I have the permission actually put this out there. This is like, so fricking different than what we've seen out there in the market. Anytime I have a client or a potential client that says to me, but I'm different Katherine, and I just do things differently. I'm like, I would love to work with you, because that is what I want. And that is what I want to help my clients with and give them the permission to be is just to be them. Right is just to show up as themselves as the fullest expression of themselves so that they can create those high potency offers, and they can be in full resonance with their dream clients. The fourth piece of this is creating curated experience for your clients that make them feel seen and heard. Right that this The difference between creating offers that are for mass profit versus highly personalized and bespoke experiences, this does not mean that you have to have one to one. And that's all that you do. Not even at all. But if you've seen a lot of the programs, do it yourself courses out there, they were, they were created for mass profit. They were created to sell and make money. They were not created with the idea of having clients get results. Because if you actually go and look, if a program had 15,000 People go through it, I would love to see the success rate of these programs that have been out there in the coaching space, right, you probably have some of those programs that are collecting dust in your virtual library that you haven't even opened or you open for a day and didn't do anything with them. There's no shame in that I have programs that are collecting virtual dust too. But what I'm saying is those programs were created for mass profit, they were created to influence the buyer to buy. And they use tactics like FOMO and false urgency to get people to invest on a dream to get people to invest in the result. And not the pathway to achieving that result. Right. But what I mean by that is they sold you on the result 6k Your six-figure years, multiple six-figure million-dollar businesses, whatever the result is the freedom, lifestyle, financial freedom, time, freedom, you name it, right, whatever that result is the body that you want the Beachbody that you want the mum that you want to be they sold you on the result. They didn't sell you on the pathway to get that result. And when you enter that program, you realized the pathway was a cookie-cutter pathway, which is what most programs and courses are designed based on, which for me is based on mass profits, it's I'm going to sell this program, I'm going to sell the result and make a ton of money on that. And if my clients go through it, and they get results, awesome, I'll use some of those testimonials to sell more of my programs and courses, versus selling people on an experience that's bespoke to them that allows them to create the pathway to success and get the results they want that are unique to them. There is a massive difference, a massive difference. And what used to work in the online space, no longer works, mass profits, people see right through that. Selling somebody on a result based on somebody's secret sauce, secret sauce and step-by-step processes. People see right through that. So if you want to be successful in the online space, results-driven programs that are designed around personalized experiences, or helping people craft their own unique path to success, is what I truly believe is going to be the thing that stands out in the online space. Especially if you're a coach and consultant and you're and you're wanting to make the transformation in this world, you've got to figure out how to create highly curated experiences for your clients where they feel 100% seen and heard, and not just another number, or not just another person in the program, or not just a profit, a number, a sales number, and they grow their program to mass amounts of people. And they forget about all the people that have invested today, right? It's why within Elevate, I am so passionate about maintaining the integrity of that group, that I'm not going to grow it to the masses for profit, because I am far more interested in client results. When people invest in the experience with me, I one want to help them create their own marketing strategies that are all in alignment with their unique energy expression, and craft really potent offers that are in full resonance with their clients, Dream clients, but I want them to carve out their own path to success, a path that is unique to them and not one that I've laid out for them. So the results that I sell that you can achieve when you enroll and elevate. There's a variety of them. It's based on what you want, and you get to set that. That is what I believe wholeheartedly is going to be the thing that sets businesses apart in the online space because people have invested in a lot of programs and Coaches and courses and all the things and they're still not seeing the results can be that they want. We're like I said, You've built a business that isn't sustainable. Because you were sold on a model that isn't sustainable. The model I think about in the online course space is launching, right? When I entered this space, nearly four years ago, it was all about launching and how you build up this momentum, and you don't share anybody your prices, and you drive people through this experience with you. And then you sell to them at the end of it. Well, everybody's gone through that, well, I won't say everybody, but a lot of people are like, numb to that experience, right? Because they've been through it. And it's not sustainable, energetically not sustainable. It's also very much built on what I call a masculine approach, right? It's the push energy. So I'm going to push hard for this launch period, I'm going to make a bunch of money, and then I'm going to crash energetically. And then I'm going to go do it again. And I'm relying on having to be in a push energy to be successful. Instead of being in a receiving energy, where you can receive all the time, right where you're open to receiving. And that's where I do 100% believe your offer is going to be an indication of how that is if you have a high potency offer that you know people want all the time. They're going to want it all the time. And if you create a highly curated experience for people where they feel seen and heard, they're going to talk about that experience and share that more widely with their audience and people and you're going to get that word of mouth. And then you can sit back and lean back in your business more instead of feeling like you have to be in this push energy all the time. But the whole big point of this is ditching the cookie cutter approaches that you think and believe are the pathway to your success. Because those approaches that are being sold to you are your gurus and mentors and coaches approach it worked for them, it doesn't mean it's going to work for you. And that all starts with really leaning into an owning your elevated edge. And understanding what your unique energy expression is, and trusting that trusting that wholeheartedly. It's why I'm really, really excited because I've created this beautiful quiz experience for you, that will help you understand what your elevated edge is, will help you understand what that unique energy expression is for you. But also how to create experiences for your clients or potential clients that are unique to you. This quiz is so beautifully crafted, it's been eight months in the works. I've been working very closely with Shanti ZOC, who you know, is a quiz funnel specialist. And she's an absolute gem. And I absolutely love working with her team. And I'm also really excited because she's going to be on the next episode of the podcast, I have her on as a guest to share a little bit about the process that we worked through. But this is a an amazing process that we went through. Like I said, it's eight months in the works, a lot of heart and soul went into it a lot of thoughtfulness. And I we really, really, really wanted to deliver something that would help you, as that online business owner really stand out in the online space. But do it in a way that feels so freakin good to you. And feels 100% authentic to who you are. Because there's nothing worse than creating a business that could be wildly successful, but where you're having to sacrifice who you are in the pursuit of that success, right, there's nothing worse than having to feel like I'm giving up and sacrificing my personal values and who I really truly am and what I sound like to sell and to help and to, you know, be a coach and a mentor and a business owner. I don't want to do that. And so this beautifully crafted quiz is going to help you uncover what your elevated edge is and discover what that unique energy expression is. But also highlight and outline your star map so to speak, for your unique experiences that you can offer your clients. It's what I call the stepping stone to really unlocking you know who you are and trusting that the shiny supernova that you are, is, you know the thing that's going to really help you stand out in the online space. It's all about unlearning all of the things that you thought you needed. In order to be successful in the online space, so the link for that is in the show notes. Of course, it's at creatively owned.com backslash quiz. It's a beautifully crafted quiz, the results that you get are unique to you. And they are, honestly, they're the depth and the breadth of them is phenomenal. And again, so much thought and soul went into this, that it's not just, you know, a little Lancer here, here it is, this is what you are. But there's a lot of really great takeaways and information there for you that will help you own your elevated edge, step up into the next level supernova that you are, and I believe that you are and really stand out in the online space because you are, you know, employing and creating marketing charities that align with your unique energy expression, and that you've ditched the cookie-cutter one size fits all because I 100% believe that ditching the cookie-cutter one size fits all approach to marketing is the key to standing out. And is really only possible, like I said, when you employ marketing strategies that align with your unique energy expression. So I'd love for you to take that quiz. I would love for you to share with us on social media on Instagram, tag me and let me know which energy expression you are. There's four of them. And they're so lovely and so beautiful. And I will share with you later on which one I am. I'm going to actually see if you guys can guess which one I am. But I would love for you to tag me on instagram with which energy expression that you are what is your elevated edge. And also tune in next week when I have Shanti Zak on the quiz funnel specialist and copywriter extraordinaire who helped me birth this beautiful quiz into the world so that I could share with you my amazing listeners, my audience, my clients, all of you that are in my orbit. Like I said, it's always a pleasure. I'm super stoked that you're here. I'm always loving that you're here and I want to learn and know who you are. So please tag me on Instagram because it is a different beast when I'm sitting here staring at a microphone by myself and as a four six manifesting generator I thrive on community and I just want to know who's in my community so that I can connect with you and get to know you and understand you and know where you're at in business and, and all of that. So with that, I'm going to leave you but be sure to tune in next week when Shanti is on to talk about the process that we undertook to bring this beautiful quiz to life so that you can like I said, ditch those cookie cutter one size fits all approaches and really own your elevated edge because that to me is what will help you become that sought after entrepreneur. Cheers!

Now on Episode #42 – I totally mixing it up with our next guest, Shannon Lohr the founder and CEO of Factory45 where she helps idea stage entrepreneurs launch sustainable fashion brands. Shannon got her start in 2010 when she co-founded {r}evolution apparel, a sustainable clothing company for female travelers and minimalists that was featured in The New York Times, Forbes.com, and Yahoo! News.