007 Rules Are Optional, Clients Aren’t
Understand your ideal customers through the power of smart questions and we ask why templates should be treated as flexible guides, not gospel.
We unpack how asking the right questions helps define and connect with your dream clients, along with a deep dive into the role of risk tolerance and trend adoption in customer behaviour. Plus, we challenge the sacredness of templates and explore how to break them in all the best ways to suit your personal brand and marketing needs.
If you’ve ever wondered how to keep up with all the connections in your head, spoiler alert – you don’t. We dig into tools like Notion and the magic of writing everything down, especially when it comes to thoughtful networking follow-ups. It’s not about being a machine – it’s about being memorable.
We also tackle the oh-so-common conundrum of starting a personal brand from scratch, especially for those fresh out of a corporate gig. The secret sauce? Start by understanding who you actually want to serve. Risk tolerance and trend adoption aren’t just jargon – they’re real-life traits that help guide your content, messaging, and energy.
And finally, let’s talk templates. Just because you downloaded a free customer avatar worksheet doesn’t mean you have to use it word-for-word. We explore how breaking the rules (with purpose) helps you create marketing that feels like you – not a copy-paste from some “guru.” So if you’re ready to do branding your way, it’s time to book a session with Zoë Wood of the Video Confidence Coach. Let’s untangle your brand with clarity and sass.
-
00:00 – Acknowledgement of Country and catching up on public holidays, Geelong podcaster events, and coffee shop kerfuffles.
06:00 – Updates on local networking events and shoutouts to the Geelong Chamber happenings.
12:00 – Question 1: “How do you keep this all in your head?” → Tools, Notion, second brain systems, and habits for remembering connections.
18:00 – Following up in thoughtful ways builds reputation and trust in your network.
24:00 – Question 2: “Where do I start building my personal brand?” → Start with your audience, not yourself.
30:00 – Identifying the people you want to work with and balancing energy with strategy.
36:00 – Let’s talk templates! The Customer Avatar template and the gift of adaptation.
42:00 – When breaking the rules is the right move – how one client did it and why that’s a win.
48:00 – The 5-3-1 rule for social content and why you don’t need to follow it like a robot.
54:00 – Wrapping up with key marketing takeaways and a gentle reminder: customers come first, always.
-
2:13
G'day, everyone and welcome to this week's video, confidence, connect with me. Your host the video, confidence Coach, thank you for your patience. This morning, I was a little bit running late due to some family stuff, but we are here, and I'm here for you. Thank you so much again for all of those who were ready for last week, and unfortunately, it was a public holiday and had to do some family errands. It's been a very family centric quarter for me personally. So I thank you so much for your patience during that time. Let's get started with acknowledging the country before we get in to today's live stream. Are we all in frame? My hair is a bit big today. We all in frame, beautiful. I would like to acknowledge and pay my respects to the wadawurng people of the Kulin nation, the traditional custodians on the lands on which I conduct my business. I pay my respects to the elders past and present, and I stand with the traditional custodians on the lands and working towards a more equal future. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people continue to face discrimination and disadvantage due to our country's colonial past. I stand with them in their fight against injustice. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. And I thank everyone for who is joining us today on the live stream. We are definitely hitting the summer weather here in my neck of the woods. Yes, I am aware that it is October and summer is technically, like, starts in December, but down this way, of course, realistically, there's like seven seasons, and we're at the moment where everything kind of hits you at once. The heat just kind of like last week, it was like 1718, Max. And now it's like, okay, we're doing 25 and I'm like, Oh, great. I'm already at volley, but we're not ready for summer. I am not a summer girly. So for those of my clients who are, I tip my hat off to you. Have a wonderful time. I'm just gonna stay indoors where the heat is manageable. But of course, I should stop blathering on. I want to welcome everyone to today's video. Confidence connector. For those who do not know, it, is a weekly live stream that I hold from 10am to 11am Australian Easter stem time. And for those who are in Australia, throughout the various states, daylight savings is coming up on Sunday. So will we be going forward an hour? So we're losing an hour to do the math there. So just so you know, because it will affect all of us, and it will definitely affect me and my ability to keep on time for at least the next two to three weeks. So here we are. So before everything gets worse, we'll be alright this week at the video confidence coach last week, we held the Geelong podcasters event on a public. Holiday, which, of course, when I first originally booked it, I didn't realize it. It was a public holiday for my state of Victoria, for the grand final, of which neither of us were in. So nobody cared. Of course, they did care. Football is the national sport AFL specifically, Aussie rules football is the national sport down here, and it does have a tendency of impacting things. I worked with the AFL for a fair few years. Worked in lyrical football. I just, and I don't care for it a job as a job, but I commend all of those who are won the grand final and those who lost. I commiserate. You'll get them next year. But digressing, the Geelong podcasters event went really well. Of course, we had myself and a nice, beautiful person that I met, and we essentially went to the cafe and it was closed, even though I was informed and checked multiple times ahead of time that the cafe wouldn't be closed, I was affirmed by three different people. Noah's open. We're open. We're open. I'm like, okay, cool. I got there and it was closed. I'm like, Oh, that's okay. That's fine. It's alright. I did see about 15 people in like, the 10 or 15 minutes that I was there, waiting for my colleague to come along that didn't realize it was closed, either. So I don't think it was just a meeting, but that's all right. So we just had a beautiful time. We walked down the street, went around the corner to the Asian convenience store, got ourselves some melon soda, and went down the waterfront, where there was lots of lovely people's beautiful day. So we had a lovely time sitting there in the shade, talking about podcasting and all, of course, as always, all of those donations from those events go straight to the wadawurng Co Op out our way to help support our help support the First Nations of the region that we live in. This is the first week of the month. So we are currently on the fourth of October. So for anyone who's watching us in the replay, it is about 10 past 10 on fourth of October and the first week of every month. I'm not sure about your business, but for mine, it is grind week. So everything happens now has to happen this week. And Whew. It is a beautiful time. And I just realized I forgot to update the title, and I apologize if I confused everyone there. We do get this from time to time where I just accidentally forget to update things, and I'm busy trying to make things work for our favor, as opposed to trying to get things absolutely perfect. All right, I've updated that now for us. So coming up for myself, and for those who are in the local Geelong space, I might see you at the upcoming events that we have. We have the Harwood Andrews breakfast, which will be Thursday, Wednesday next week. So if any of those who are part of the Geelong chamber, I'll see you there. Look forward to seeing you then. And we also have the Geelong chamber October after five, which is somewhere I should check but it will be happening either next I don't think it's next week. I think it's happening the week after. So again, if you are a Geelong chamber member, I look forward to hearing you then, and I have another slot for a networking event this week, so feel free to let me know if there's any virtual events, or any virtual networking events that you are hosting, or maybe you are attending, and you would like us to come along and maybe have a chat. Feel free to comment below. And I'd be interested to I'd be interested to learn more about networking opportunities that you have on offer in Australia. I do do international networking events, but as soon as you can imagine, the time zones are a little interesting. But here we're getting into the meat of what we're talking about today. So of course, today I have got two podcast topics that I would love to chat with you about. And again, if you are watching on the replay or you're watching us live, feel free to comment any of your questions in the chat, and we'll make sure to answer them during today's session, because this is an hour for you, not just for me to create marketing materials, but as an opportunity to reach out to you and talk to you. So if there's anything that you want to discuss, about personal branding, about marketing, about video confidence, or just video marketing in general, we can have a nice chat about it. So this week, I've gotten two questions from one from a past client of mine, and one from a prospective lead that I'm having a chat with regarding my mentoring services and what they asked. So the first I've got two questions. The first question that we got asked was, how do you keep this all in your head? So they were specifically referring to I was discussing as we were having a virtual chat, and they mentioned something that I think they had mentioned an event, and they weren't entirely sure. Hey, we met in an event a really long time ago. I don't really know what it is, so I go over to my notes, my fairly detailed notes, I like to call my second mind, and I go in there, I type in her name, and she pops up. She has three registers in my little it's almost like a CRM, but it's more a note taking software. And I could tell like, Hey, we've got the one that she went that the event is happening today. So I've got her name there. I've also got her name in the one that we met in about four months ago, and the one that we met back in 2020 and I mentioned to her, Oh, we met this time, and we met this time. And she her head almost looked like it exploded, with her cat on her lap, of course, and she was very surprised. And of course, by the time that I we had talked about this, we were in what is known as a breakout room in zoom, where you're pulled away from the main group in a zoom virtual setting. And honestly, we only had like five minutes, so we were going to the chat. And her main question for me was, how do you keep all of this in your head? And the truth is, I don't. I have multiple tools and multiple systems that I've developed over time of running a business, arguably 15 years now that I've been running a business, and I've used these tools to be able to build up my collections of knowledge so that I don't have to think the way that I heard it from, I think this honestly, was a YouTube video, like, five years ago. Or what have you thinking about the brain as a working organ? Because that's what it is doing. It's doing the stuff in the background, you know, keeping you breathing, keeping the blood flowing, like doing it's all its things. But when it comes to remembering things, My memory isn't that great. I do do my best to improve it, but there's only so much that I can do genetically, and also chronic pain wise, does impact my memory over time. So what I do is I use that instinct or habit to be able to, quote, unquote, keep everything in my head and I write it down.
12:02
I used to write it down in a paper diary, and then, as many people and especially some of my mentees, can attest to this, you just forget it because it's in a book somewhere, somewhere, somewhere, and you can't find it. So I moved all of my notes into a digital format. So I keep everything in what is known as a notion. So this is an online tool. Think of it as your own little Wikipedia. You're able to create this little system however you like. Of course, mine is hella messy and very confusing, which is why I use a search function mwah to its best ability. So when it comes to thinking about your brain trying to instill habits that make things easier for you in the long run, even though it might be a pain in the moment. So say, for example, I was at this virtual networking event and met this woman. And what I do with that at my virtual networking events and also in my in person events, but to a lesser degree, because you're in person, it's kind of harder to do this is I take notes. I make sure that I write down their names to the best of my abilities, and make sure I have details on them, just like, hey, we talked about this and we talked about that check on them in a month or two when their kids are back in school. And again, this is not me trying to keep tabs on people. This is more of a method I do just to make sure that, hey, we talked about this a month ago, I want to bring it up to you, not necessarily as a lead prospect, but as a thoughtful gesture, because we had a very insightful discussion, and I know that you were very in the moment, interested in actioning it again, not necessarily as a lead thing, but it can be helpful as a lead thing. There's lots of clients at the moment that I have been especially over the past five years, who I just met at networking events, virtual and in person, and I followed up when I said I would follow up, and then they come back to me. They refer people to me. They never, they hadn't worked with me, but they refer people to me. And that is something that when you are trying to build a network, just helps you grow, helps you become more, more well known, but also helps you become more what's the word trusted in the networks that you wish to grow in, because you are seen to show up, but you're also doing the work you're you're actually reaching out and say, for example, I'd say specifically, over the past two weeks, every day, I have seen someone out in the wild. And when I say out in the wild, I mean, I've seen their name pop up in like, an awards listing. Or, for example, one of my past plus past leads had got an MC gig at a third prestigious event, and I sent them an email said, Congratulations on the great event that's well done on you. I know this is part of your big goal, and I'm so glad this. This step is, you know, so big for you. I look forward to see what more you can do. Now, I'm not expecting a response from this. I'm not expecting a I'm not even expecting a thanks or anything. Like that, just so you know, me wanting to give goodwill to people that I have connected with in my network. Now, of course, this has all been tangentially related to what I was discussing just before, but the reason that I say this is because your brain is working so hard just to do everything else that it's got in the that it's got to do in your life, to be able to take the burden off your brain and keep that information and knowledge, especially timely knowledge, in somewhere where you will look when the time is right. So say, for example, if something is related to time or calendars, I put it in my calendar. I actively put it in places where I know, hey, when the time comes, I'm going to see it, I'll action it. Usually it's a quick email or a message or something really, really simple like that. And that improves my network and trust. But also, I don't need to think about it. I don't need to remember stuff. And I use my notion system, like I said, my like internal second mind wiki, if you will. And this allows me to put a lot of details regarding whatever I talked about or networked with this networking person, for example, and then I don't have to think about it again. It's in there. It's in the cloud. I can search it up when I need to, and if I would like. I haven't really used any of these services, but if I needed to, I could easily use the AI feature and go, Hey, where does you know, show me the responses of where this person comes up, and give me a detailed outlook on where we've met in the past. And if I wanted to do that in the future, sure, for now, not so much. So. Next question before we begin, and I realized we're doing pretty well today. The next question that I had today reached out by a potential lead of mine who is very overwhelmed. They've recently finished a well, finished a career, but they had finished up at a fairly prestigious job that they had held over the past three years, and they're ready to move on, but they weren't totally sure how or what they were going to do. They have a sub they have a personal brand somewhat, but they that's more of an organic personal brand that they've built in over time in the industry. So they came to me, we had a 15 minute discussion, and of course, this is an obligation, obligation free discussion of just generally what we've talked about. She gave me some of her details ahead of time so I could do a little bit of research into what she was doing. She is particularly in FinTech, which is financial financial technology. So think about banks, yes, but there's also, you know, Supers, loan managers, mortgage brokers, all those that realm of people there is going to be, like, there is definitely financial technologies in those spaces. And like, for example, she doesn't necessarily work in the financial space, but she works with the technology that in current, in turn, works in that fine FinTech space. Okay, I guess. And the question that she had for me was, I want to reach out on my own. So of course, she had finished her job, and she's in a pretty decent financial position where realistically, she could take the next two or three years off before moving on to another position. And she asked me about her growing her personal brand. Where do I start? Because she wants to take the knowledge that she has gained in her industry over these past 20 years. Don't quote me on that, over these past however many years, to be able to help people and serve people the way that she did initially when she first got into the industry. It's not that when she grew into the more prestigious parts of the company that she was in that she lost, oh, my apologies. I just got a notification that we have lost connection, which is not necessarily a bad thing, it's just something that I might need to deal with if I want to keep going, hopefully or not, the internet has been playing absolute funny buggers today. I have no idea why. So I'm going to keep talking for a little bit before we get on. We haven't even technically started today, but that is what today is all about. Is a chance for me and you to answer questions i
19:44
To the video confidence Connect. Apologies for that. We have been experiencing some major internet connection issues over the past week. I have no idea why I thought we were on a very secure line, and I guess we weren't. But back to it. So as I was discussing before, we got cut off, and that is fine. We are here now. So I had this person who was a potential lead for me who wanted to branch out on their own and grow their personal brand. Over the past 20 years, they have organically grown their personal brand, but not really intentionally, more just stuff that they've done over time. And they wanted to ask me with now this new direction, new time and energy that they're putting into growing their personal brand, what where would they start? And my initial prompt or question for them was, not, where should you start, but what does your audience need. Who are your audience? Why do you want to serve them? And what is your motivation to do? So? Because it's always about the audience. That's why, even though this month, sorry, this weekly opportunity to chat with you virtually face to face, I do as an opportunity to, you know, market myself and grow my own personal brand. I also want to take I also mainly do it to be able to offer a opportunity to answer people's questions as easily as I can, without burning myself out, because that is what I want to do. I want to serve the people that I focus on, that I want to work with, and, for example, the type of people that I want to attract. Now, of course, this doesn't have to be you to a T. These are just the people that I tend to attract with the way that I market myself, the way that I network and the way that I draw people in. So for example, the audience that I essentially pitch myself to are usually small business owners or ex corporate ease who are moving into a small business setting where they are growing their personal brand. I work on their marketing side, being both their mentor and a guide to help them with marketing themselves, usually on a diminished either timeline or budget or energy that they have to devote to marketing themselves. The people that I work with are usually women or non binary folk who are based in Australia and who are usually around between 45 to 55 which seems to be the demographic that I'm working with at the moment. But of course, this doesn't necessarily have to be the case, and I work with people who want to serve and who want to do better. They just don't know how. They just don't know where to market and they don't know where to put their energies first. Because, as you can probably imagine, with growing yourself your small business or your personal brand, it is still a trial and error endeavor. At the end of the day, a good quote that I heard recently was and a quote that is sticking with me. It is surprising that trial and error, in all its ways, still includes error, and that is something that has hit myself and a lot of people that I work with in the sphere of O Damn, there is, actually is error in trial and error, and when you are starting out. And this will carry on to today's podcast episodes that I will be discussing with you is just because someone who maybe you admire or is a role model for you, the way that they have achieved their level of notoriety or their level of market saturation, if you will. If we're getting into marketing terms, the way that they have done that is because they're not an overnight success. No one ever is an overnight success. They have worked incredibly hard. They put their customers first and made the decisions around the type the type of customers they want to attract and the people they want to serve. That is how they have grown. And of course, there, I'm not saying that as someone who is growing a business or a personal brand that you need to stick wholeheartedly with this customer base or this group or this avatar that you have made for yourself. You don't have to stick with them wholeheartedly if you're finding that it's not working for you, because at the end of the day, you are the one putting in the time and the energy and the effort to help these people grow. And if that is something that is draining you as opposed to fulfilling you, then we need to pivot to a different group. Pivot to you know, be able to pivot you. Yourself to be able to both balance working for the customer as well as working for yourself, those two things that we need to balance. So again, I went on a bit of a tangent from one question, and here we are again. This is what usually what happens when I have conversations at networking events. To be perfectly honest, we have questions and we have a back and forth conversation. I make sure to ask questions, and we, you know, have a bit of back and forth and engage. And we always end up in a weird spot in the conversation that we never really intended to when we first asked that question, for example, like, how do I branch out on my own? Where do I start? But I hope for yourself, if you are looking to break away from the corporate life, and even though I have consulted and worked very adjacent or very close to people in corporate I Am Not Myself, someone who has ever been in the corporate career, mainly because no one would hire me, and I've never really had the Opportunity, nor wanted the opportunity to walk in corporate, because I like to make decisions for myself, and that is why we are running a small business, and we are here nonetheless. So with today's day, we might have some pretty short podcast episode questions today, or we might just have one podcast episode today. I'm sorry, one podcast episode recording today before we move on to the other things that we were discussing. Today's episode is going to be talking about the templates that are guides that are meant to be broken. And I'll describe what I mean more In today's podcast right. Ready? Let's go. You.
7:20
Templates are just guides that are meant to be broken. Welcome to the video, confidence coach, cast with me. Your host the video. Confidence coach, Zoe wood, welcoming you today's podcast where we're going to discuss, again, a story that is prompted from my conversations this week, and we're going to go into a little bit more in depth, into the mindset and maybe something that might be useful for you when you're looking for templates or guides or rules online, and when you hear from marketers or people in spheres of interest that you're currently engaging with, and they give you either a template or a set of rules to follow, Everything is all made up. We can always bend and break these rules and templates to our own needs. But before I begin, I want to acknowledge the traditional custodians on the lands on which I work and play, the wadawurrung people of the Kulin nation, the traditional custodians and owners of the land on which I conduct my business. I stand with them in their fight against injustice. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. So let's get on to today's topic. So as always, as when I record these podcast episodes, it's usually once a week during my video confidence, connect live stream again, those who are watching live, hello, feel free to comment below all my podcast episodes usually get prompted by a story that I've had, that I have talked to either a client of mine, a prospective lead, or at a networking event. And this particular week, I was at a networking event, a virtual one based out in Brizzy, and I met someone. So we have a group of us in a Zoom Room. There was about 15 of us, and we got put into these breakout rooms, which are individual screens with one or two other people, or maybe three other people in the room. And I was paired with one of my past clients, which I we did some work together back in 2020, which is almost going to be five years ago now, and what we just and we essentially got into this topic of set, checking in how they were going and how their life has changed since I last chatted with them, And it looked like that they had made a very large pivot in their life, that they had stopped working with the company that I was working with them in, and they went, had some babies, and now they're coming back into the industry, but working specifically with startups and the work they were doing. And she. Wanted to thank me wholeheartedly for the template that I gave her, and I said, I love you, but which one? Because when I work with leads and work with clients, both mainly with my coaching and consulting clients, I have a lot of tools, a lot of IP that I use to help break down these larger concepts, especially when you're taking on a new project and you just need to find a place to start. And this tool that I like to use a lot, which you can definitely see on my website and on my YouTube channel, is my customer avatar template. And she said to me, she thanked me so hard, so wholeheartedly for giving her the template and also giving her the tutorial on how to break it down and how to use this to her advantage, and but she and she wanted to reiterate, and she said, but I had to adapt it to my own needs, and I'm so sorry for, you know, tweaking it and breaking the template, because I just needed to make this work for what I needed to. And I had to stop her there and say, Don't apologize. A tool is meant to be used, even if it breaks. And a line that we eventually came out of our five minutes together because, of course, this was a our networking event, and we were going between rooms rooms, the tidbit that we came out of it both together was rules are meant to help guide us, but they are there to be bent. There are there to be bended and maybe even broken. And that is a mentality that I wanted to bring in today's podcast episode discussing about when you are not sure where to start on a project, or you know you need to achieve some sort of either way of thinking, way of doing a project or an activity or in action. And there are people now, of course, these could be marketing gurus or people outline or just people who have gone through the work of doing something that you're about to do yourself to hopefully make things easier. There's a reason why tutorials exist. There's a reason why step by step guides exist. They have existed for a very long time, but I want to stress to you that, especially when coming across these out in the wild, or maybe they're even advertised to you, either on social media or in your email list, or however, that adapting these templates for you to use, because at the end of the day, these tools are tools. They are meant to be used to help you gain the knowledge to help you achieve what you want to achieve in the way that you need to achieve it. These are supposed to be used by you, and they are supposed to provide a foundation there's you. That is why they are usually quite generalized, and usually templates and tools are usually quite first or low stake type introductions into the knowledge that you're trying to acquire, because they're supposed to be designed for everyone to use, or at least the people who are interested in the subject that you're trying to engage with are using, and they are trying to provide a foundation for you to then go off and find more details about that particular subject, or that particular you know, focus, or whatever you're doing, and that's what I don't think a lot of people quite understand, especially when it comes to coming across templates, or you're hearing these, for example, 531, rule, or these various different ways of constricting information to be able to make it easier for you to again consume format in your brain and then spew out again, either teaching, for example, like in a podcast or a live stream, or maybe even teaching your team if you're working with a team, or maybe teaching your higher ups something that is important about how you do something or why you do something. So I want you to think about when you come across these tools, it is okay to break them. It is okay to bend and break them. Of course, doing your best to kind of keep the original off to a side. So if something breaks completely, you can always go back to the original and go, okay. You were here. You worked. Maybe I might follow you a bit better next time it is important to evaluate and adapt them to suit your unique needs and situations, blindly following formulas or templates or rules without any critical evaluation of your specific circumstances can stifle your own creativity and adaptability, because, again, these things are supposed to help you, these tools and these guides are supposed to help you achieve whatever you're wanting to achieve with them. So use them as the starting point that they're intended to be. Now, of course, for a lot of people who are working in industries who provide these tools are usually trying to keep them as the starting point, so then you can go and maybe hire them for more money, of course, than just free or maybe just your email address to help achieve what you want to achieve. And if that is not in the cards for you right now, maybe because you don't have the time, the money or the energy to be able to afford that. So using these tools as the starting point that they're intended to be is also okay. Being able to use them to personalize and personalize your experience on growing your personal brand. I know I said personalize a fair few times in that section there. Use them as the starting point that they're intended to be, but don't be afraid to break them either sticking to a formula or a template wholeheartedly isn't going to be beneficial to you. And of course, I have said this multiple times over today's podcast, but the rules at the end of the day are meant to guide us. So a one that example that I can come with over this past month is I'm working with someone on their marketing. And they have a lot of different faculties. They have five to 10 different things that they do in their business. And as you can imagine, that overwhelms them, but also overwhelms me when I'm trying, I'm trying to do my best to support them and trying to give them some sort of direction. So the way that we brought this all back down. And of course, this is what we do every time is we bring it back to the customer, we bring it back to the client, we bring it back to who are you doing this for? Why do they care? And then we start with that. And I discussed with them, when it came specifically to their social media, they do get a lot of traction and a lot of leads generated, specifically from their Facebook page, but also their Instagram page as well. And they've slowly acclimatized to both, even though social media wasn't really their forte and continues not really to be something that they enjoy doing. And I have discussed with them how, hey, once we get to a stage where we know what we're doing, we know what we're focusing on, from there, we can start getting other people to do this work for us, if that is what you want to do. And again, you have now the tools and the knowledge to be able to clearly help, clearly help someone who is going to help you with social media. So I digress, but when I talk to them about some rules, so say, for example, the 531, rule for pieces of content. They were quite surprised. It's like, oh, you're, you know, giving me these rules and I have to stick to them. No, these aren't necessarily something
17:13
that you have to stick to. It's just a foundation. So the 531 rule, off the top of my head, it is a way of breaking down posts that for every five posts you do, three should be educational and bringing new people into the sphere of what you do and how you do it. One should be, one should be a very pinpointing, selling post specifically talking about the current project or campaign that you have going on, like explicitly saying talking about your current campaign, and then the other one left can be fairly free in regards to what you want to do with that particular post. Now I'm not saying that this particular rule has to be followed. So what I'm saying for every five posts that you have three should be educational. One should be selling. And then, of course, the other one can be whatever you want it to be. And that gives you enough rules and that flexibility to be able to create those five pieces of content over a week, over two weeks, whatever your schedule is like, because this enables you to again, start a foundation. Start, a start, a start, a starting point. Break down this wall of overwhelming information, specifically about social media, but marketing in general, into really easy, breakdownable tools that you can think about yourself, put it into a system and a process that you can, in turn, give to someone else if you have that ability, or just remind yourself whenever you have to do social media, like, for example, for a couple of my clients that I usually don't get people on board to do social media anymore, I just help my legacy clients out from time to time, and we do social media once a month, again, following these basic foundation rule sets that we've used and we've thought about over time to the point where it's all second nature. At this point, we guide the ship, my apologies, we guide the ship in a particular direction, but we know that we have to do three posts a week. The posts have to be client focused, and one of them has to be specifically aimed at our corporate clients. Boom, done. Cool. We've broken down this really big overwhelm of, what do we put on our social media? Of, yeah, every single month we know exactly what we're going to put on our social media. And breaking down this even more is, don't take what anyone says as the gospel truth. Now, I am not religious myself, but what I mean by the gospel truth is that what someone so, for example, someone who may have a larger audience than you, may be more influenced than you, or is just further along in their journey than you do. What they say isn't always going to apply to your situation, because the way that they grew online, for example, 10 years ago, is not the current situation that we're living in now. And how you would grow now is very different to how you would grow 10 or 15 years ago, and using a template as your foundation is useful because it gives it gives you that knowledge, that foundational knowledge for then for you to bring in other tutorials, bring in other knowledge, maybe even talk to people who are more knowledgeable about the subject that you're wanting to particularly grab onto. And maybe you can spend that energy and time to talk to someone for that hour, to be able to again, you've have the knowledge, and that foundational knowledge from these templates, these rules, these guides, these tools, to then be able to be better informed once you go to, say, a networking event, or you go to a seminar, or maybe you take an online course. Whatever it may be, use these to your advantage as the foundational knowledge that they are. These aren't the be all and end all. These aren't a thing that is going to bend and break your business. It is okay to take parts from one tool and take parts from another tool if it is going to help you and help you grow. And if not, then that's okay, let it go. You're not hurting anyone by not using the tool. And especially with a lot of lead magnet or people that I work with, they've got your email address, and maybe they might be the right fit in the future. And if not, that's okay. You can just unsubscribe. The transaction has occurred. And as I mentioned before, not everything will work for every situation. So it's okay to bend and break to make it fit you. So hopefully, for today's podcast, you've gone a little bit of an idea of my mentality when it comes to guides and templates. I have a very large list of templates and guides that I'm currently working on uploading to my website to have it be available for people to be able to break down these large concepts when it comes to marketing, and be able to break down these thoughts about, where do I begin? Where do I start? How do I even begin to grow a personal brand? Zoe, well, you don't think about yourself. Thank you so much for listening today's podcast. I will finish up today, and if you are interested in joining me for any mentoring or any coaching regarding growing your personal brand, you can always hit me up at Vcc dot training. Have a beautiful week. I'll See you next Week. You
24:02
I'm understanding your ideal customers through questions. Welcome to the video, confidence coach, cast with your host the video. Confidence coach, me. Zoe wood, I would like to pay my respects to the wadawurrung people of the Kulin nation, the traditional custodians and owners on the land on which I conduct my business. Always was be, always was, always will be Aboriginal land. I apologize for my tongue twisters as so today we are going to discuss understanding your ideal customers and what I mean by this. And there's a lot of buzzwords today that I'm going to make sure, and I'm going to do my best to clarify for those who are not in the marketing spaces or any information for you, who maybe have just stumbled upon this podcast today. Essentially, your ideal customers, as you can probably imagine by the title itself, is the customers. So these are people who are going to buy from you and the. People who are ideal customers are people who are either going to be raving fans. They love what you do, they love the message, they love the products, they love the services, and whenever they see an email from you, they're going to probably buy from you within the next you know, 24 to 48 hours, these the ideal customers. And of course, everyone that you work with, or that you cater to in your small business or in your personal brand. Again, these are what these customers for your ideal customers are just a small segment of a much larger group of people when it comes to marketing, but it also comes to business decisions as well. I work with plenty of clients and also customers. For me, they're both interchangeable. There is discernible difference. But again, clients, customers, kind of the same thing for me and for today's discussion. And the reason that I bring this up is because when you understand who you are targeting and why you are targeting these specific group of people. This help this then help in turn, my words are gone. Bit weird. This will then help you do a number of factors. And I'm not just talking marketing here. I'm talking in regarding to brand decisions, to business decisions as a whole, because at the end of the day, the customers are the ones that pay you. These are the people who are going to put in the work to pay from you, to follow you, to listen to you, to leave comments and engage with you, and thank and I thank you, MD for your comments on our LinkedIn live stream today, these are the people who are going to engage with you and can continue to engage with you. So those are the type of people that you want to attract, which in turn impacts your marketing, which then in turn impacts your business direction and the decisions that you make. Because even though, for example, I work with a lot of sole traders, or people who are building their personal brand, which in turn means that I'm dealing with a lot of people who are the who are also the face of their brand, are also the ones working behind the scenes. It's slightly easier to be able to focus on your ideal customer, because you haven't got multiple people trying to sway the conversation. So when it comes to identifying your ideal brand, I'm sorry, ideal brand, identifying these customers, usually it comes in a couple of ways. First way is because you've worked with people like this in either the past or you're currently working with them in your business. You know, hey, this particular type of person I love working with them. They are easy to work with. They pay on time, they listen to what I have to say, they do their best to follow my advice, or they take the products, or they rave about us online. These are the type of people that I want to bring on, and I know this because I have worked with them. I have engaged with them, I have spoken with them, and I have asked questions. You see where we're going with today's podcast and these things. And of course, I'm going to get into the types of questions you will ask your customers. And of course, this will require you to reach out to them, to talk to them, and to maybe get feedback from them on a regular basis. And of course, not every single customer, especially ideal, is going to have the time nor energy to be able to respond to you all the time, and that is okay. Dealing with rejection is okay. It's not you, it's them. It's also a case of this is there to benefit you. And for some people and for some businesses, giving you their money should be enough. And again, I'm not saying that to discredit you or anything that you have going on. I'm just saying that a lot of people, when they buy from a company, they're less likely to open up the feedback emails or provide any feedback of any kind, because they're just busy. They're just busy doing the things that you have told them to do, or are following the advice that you have given them. So these particular questions usually revolve around customer traits. So customer traits are essentially what are the actions that they are doing, which are then leading them to either seek you out or buy from you, or take your information for later when they need to contact you. So say, for example, we've recently had some plumbing issues, and of course, I rent, so most of these issues are being dealt with by the real estate agent who is managing the property, but if I was, say, owned my property, I wonder when that will happen, but if it does, I will need to have an emergency plumber on hand. I don't necessarily need them all the time, but I would like to have that on hand so whenever something goes wrong, I can pick up the phone. Boop, boop, boop, boop, boop. Hi, something's gone wrong. Toilets spoiledly. Please come help like I'm able to make that decision. I don't necessarily need to engage them straight away, but I got that knowledge in my back pocket. Now, of course, this is an action of someone who is diligent. Is this the type of ideal customer trait that you want to have on board for your customers? Or are you is your company or the business that you do more in League of people who are at that breaking point, people who are beyond the point of educating themselves, or this may become an issue for you in the future, they've gone straight to this is a problem now I needed to be fixed. Go through like Google, what I need to find out, bam, boom. Give me the answer now, is that the type of customer that you're wanting to work with, or is this very much relates to trend adoption or risk tolerance. So risk tolerance is essentially what is their level of risk in regards to, for example, when it comes to say, purchasing from a fashion brand, some people's risk tolerance are very low, like, they're willing to buy, you know, they're willing to spend 150 bucks on a, you know, pair of shoes or a set of clothes, and if they don't like it, they'll return it back. Their risk tolerance is very low because they don't really care too much, compared to some people who their risk tolerance may be very high because their income or their budget that they have set for close is very limited, so they want to do as much research as they can to make sure that they are following the trends. But of whatever you're focusing on, but also, or of the industry as a whole, but also they want to research to make sure that they're making the right decision. And this, in turn, will then, as you can imagine, impact how you market your company, which then will, in turn, how the impacts the decisions that you're making with your company. So say, for example, a good example of this is someone who I've worked with in the past who did life coaching. And as you can imagine, life coaching is a highly unregulated industry. There's a lot of people who have great experiences, but there's also a large amount of people who have bad experiences. And the way that you combat this is via testimonials, by reviews, by actual living proof human beings who are showcasing that, hey, talking with this person for 12 months on a regular basis gave me the courage and knowledge to be able to pursue my dreams. Now, of course, again, life coaches are not therapists. Want to stress that life coaching is not therapy. Want to stress that, but this then, in turn, impacts your marketing. Because, okay, the type of person that is my ideal client, their risk tolerance is fairly like medium to high. So in turn, I need to make sure I invest in getting testimonials from my clients, making sure that I get raving reviews. Make sure that I can show the growth of people before they met me, and then after they worked with me, making sure that you get proof of this. In turn, put that on your website, put that in your email list, then maybe trickle that down to social media, and then, in turn, this then dictates the processes on, say, for example, when you finish up with a client. One thing I highly recommend is ask for reviews. Ask for any they don't want to give you a review. Make sure you get feedback from them. They don't have to put it publicly just to get any sort of feedback on how you can improve to make things better for people like them,
33:34
and that, in turn, in dictates how you're going to run the company. You're how you're going to run the company, on how you're going to make sure that, Hey, how is this online, and what can I do to boost my reputation? Now, of course, that is one example out of 1000 that I could possibly give you today. And what I also discussed before was trend adoption. So, for example, your business may not be, you know, very much into the trend cycles, like, for example, with fashion or anything that is cyclical regarding, say, for example, heaters and then water cool, and then, you know, air conditioning units on, like, alternate, alternate sides of, you know, summers or, sorry, seasons, I should say, particularly. And this adoption with your particular customer audience is going to change depending on how likely are they to take an offer that you have. So say, for example, there's, you know, a good example, and I'm sure we have many of these people in our lives, the Apple fanboys, people who absolutely love apple and everything that they do, these people are what is known as trend adopters. They are early trend adopters. As soon as Apple even smidges mention something that they are going to release, boom on board. They are going to take it, they're going to grab it, and they're going to hold it in their predile hands. That is what is known as early adopters. Dollars. And then you have people who are about mid adopters, who see what the early adopters are doing, see the pros and cons, and then make an educated decision. And then purchase or not purchase, depending. And then you have people who are in the trend cycle, waiting till it is absolutely saturated in the market before they make a decision. Say, for example, people who are maybe the parents of when their kids were on Facebook, and now, for example, following the Facebook trend. Then the late adopters, these are people who, for example, your grandparents and now on Facebook. And all the young people have left Facebook because the early adopters, again, the kids have left because it's not cool anymore. But then this in turn impacts how you're going to market yourself, but also, as I mentioned already, how you're going to direct your business, the importance of gathering this information and creating these personas. So again, personas and avatars are very much in the same realm of the type of audience that you have in mind, the type of customer that you have in mind being able to answer these questions and put them into the type of person. For example, Coca Cola has 36 of these, up to 165 different types of people that are going to regularly buy their product. So in turn, they can then market themselves slightly differently, because they are an international company. But for you, starting off with just one marketing persona, being able to have a really clear idea of what you know, the risk tolerance is, what their trend adoption is, how likely it is. Say, for example, if you are going to offer something to them, how long, realistically you would have to wait to make sure the sales come in. So, say, for example, if you've got someone, if your particular market is very high risk, like risk tolerant is really high, like, they need a lot of proof. Then, in turn, you need to have a really long window before you, say, release either a product or a service or a course or something like that. You need to make sure that you prove along the way that, hey, we've tested it on multiple people and multiple you know, we've tested it on a lot of people. We've got grave reviews from all of these people and very little negative feedback. We have made sure that this product is flexible, that we've got payment plans like, again, whatever you need. You know this because you have asked them questions regarding their preferences and behaviors and motivations, and also just what you can see online. Of course, you can get these trends from ASIC. You can get, like, really big demographic trends. And I can do a podcast about that, of where to find these large, big demographic information, but when it comes to yourself, especially if you are a solo business owner, or you are just growing your own personal brand, either as a side hustle, or as you know, something that you're doing while working on a business that generates you money, then being able to have and grow this knowledge that you have about your particular target audience, or maybe even just following the type of people that you think are a good fit for your company, being able to follow them, maybe even friend them, either on, say, LinkedIn or Instagram. Again, do not stalk these people, but have a better idea of hey, these you know the for example, this particular person that I think is a really good fit for my custom avatar, goes on holidays once a year around this time. Cool, I'll keep that in mind. So, for example, when I release something in the future, maybe I don't do it around this time of year, because they're all going on holiday, and then we'll and they're less likely to purchase something from me before we go on holiday, because I am something that helps them with their workflow and their business, as opposed to then going on holiday mode again. These are very broad decisions that you making, but These, in turn, will help you guide these bigger decisions regarding your marketing and your business direction, knowing this information. And of course, this is something that is consistently worked on over time, you meet people who are in your ideal customer demographic at networking events, and you find them, you lock onto them, and you have a chat, and you find you're able to ask more and more questions of these people, the more people that you bring on board, because you know who you're aiming for. And the significance of considering these type of customers are, whether they are early adopters or more cautious, as I mentioned before, and also how they can impact the marketing messages and tactics that you use to reach them. Because at the end of the day, we are doing this for them. We are doing it for the customers who need to know more about you, because you are the solution to their problem, and sometimes they don't even realize they have the problem, or they need to be educated on why the problem can get worse without your help or your solution. And you're not going to get everyone but if you have this again, a good starting place of something like a customer avatar. Or an ideal persona, or just again, this information of Who exactly am I talking to? Why am I talking to them, and how can I solve their problem? Are they going to be receptive more in the morning than they are at night? This and then, in turn, impacts how you're going to, you know, do email marketing, for example, if you are going to invest in something into your website, are they more likely the person who's going to take a quiz, like a cute like 10, a 10 question quiz, because they're from the BuzzFeed, a Buzzfeed generation, for example, or are they like the more likely to be the person who wants immediate results from, say, a survey or something like that. Again, you can do this to grow your community and grow the type of ideal customers that you have on board, but you still need to reach out to them and to have these questions and knowledge. And questions and knowledge regarding what the actual answers mean is something that you need to work on. Hopefully work with me, but also you can work with other marketing professionals. Because if anyone who you come across who works in marketing who doesn't put the customer first, is a big red flag, you should step aside and just leave them to it, because they may be, for example, someone who's worked in marketing for a long time, or someone who's fallen into marketing, and they're very good at, say, the graphic design element, they're not very good at the whole business side of marketing, and that is okay. I am, to be honest, quite shit at both. But that's why I constantly work on it. I regularly invest in new courses to brush up on my knowledge and to do my best to be there for my customers and to listen to their queries and their quips as they have them, because that's why I'm there. I'm there to help and serve them. So ultimately, at the end of the day, asking who the type of people that you want to work with, and the type of questions that you want to ask, are about their trend adoption? How are they more like? When are they likely to take you on board? And also, how risk averse are they and as to when on where, whether or not you need to provide more information leading up to any sort of launch in your business. I wish you all the best, and if you're interested in coming to me fourth coaching or marketing strategy, as I mentioned throughout this podcast episode, feel free to reach me out. Reach out to me at the VCC dot training. I apologize if my words have been a little bit skewed. Today, it is getting quite hot in here, and my words are slurring. I promise everything is okay. It has just been a month a year a week, and we're not done yet, but I'm here to sell, to help you and to serve You, and I wish you All the best. Bye. You.
43:24
Thank you everyone who joined us today for the video, confidence, connect and again, if you're watching on the replay, hashtag replay, feel free to reach out in the comments. I do my best to respond to everyone. Thank you so much to MD for commenting in today's live stream over on LinkedIn. And I hope everyone enjoys and feel free to subscribe to me on YouTube as well as LinkedIn, where I do these once a week, 10 to 11 on every Friday, I do my best to of course, last week was an anomaly because public holidays and commitments. God love family. I thank you all again for your patience, and wish you all the best for the upcoming weekend and week ahead. See you next week where we'll discuss more About everything that we do. Love you. Bye. You.
The above livestream episode description and transcript were generated with ai.
Watch the livestream playlist
Listen to the edited livestream in a podcast episode
Who is your host?
Zoë Wood, your Video Confidence Coach connects the dots between personal branding and video marketing. Helping women and non-binary folk in small business, find their way in the world of marketing their passion without the energy drain.
Find out more about how to grow your personal brand with the power of video right here on vcc.training
Related weekly livestreams
