• 5 Systems to help you scale your business

    Being a bustling online entrepreneur can be amazing. With all these wonderful systems to help you scale your business… To onboard clients… Make you more productive… Heck even make building a website a drag and drop simplicity. But with us now doing everything, because systems have made them so accessible, what systems are really helping us and what ones should we avoid?

    In this blog I’ll cover off the system I use, that actually help me run my business (and they really do help, they don’t hold me hostage)

    First up, Xero

    You need a low tech accounting system that both you and your accountant love and Xero seems to keep him happy as much as it does me. It was super easy to get to grips with, and even though I don’t have an accounting bone in my body, it ‘just made sense’. Bank accounts sync and it even recommends transactions that match up, which you can then set up automation rules for to save time the following month.

    There’s a mobile app for snapping receipts on the go and invoicing is really straight forward.

    It’s really an ever useful system that I honestly couldn’t be without! Nd you will need an accounting system that even you can use as your business scales.

    Second up, is ConvertKit

    Now my 30 something butt did wince a bit when I first got ConvertKit, but there tech support is amazing and once that penny drops, it does make sense.

    As your business scales and you set up various different income streams it’s extremely handy to keep track of who has bought what in the past, where they came from (if they downloaded a freebie along the way). Because then you can easily see what’s working and what isn’t

    Once you get really up to speed, you can run automations and target only the people you really want.

    I run it alongside Flodesk (because I can’t resist a pretty email newsletter… something ConvertKit don’t do And Flodesk isn’t quite there yet on the functionality front)

    Canva in a number 3

    If anyone says “only the ‘real’ people use Adobe”… Tell them you don’t care, because you found something that saves you HOURS!

    Sure as an ex-Adobe person, I recommend that the off the shelf templates on Canva should be tweaked to your brand fonts, colours and adjusting them a bit so that it doesn’t look the same as everyone else’s… But this is an absolutely gem!

    Social media, presentation slides, workbooks, website graphics…. The options are endless. Helped by the fact that there are so many creative people out there designing custom templates (just check out fiverr or creative market) I’ve even got a few in The Content Shop!

    Trello in at 4

    Couldn’t be without Trello… Guilty as charged, I’m a Trello addict! I use it for To Do lists, DIY waiting to be done around the house, recipes that we like… You name it!

    It’s just a dream for running my business and especially my content workflow, so I can keep track of what content is going out and where. What’s waiting on me, what’s waiting on someone else. As you scale your business and start outsourcing parts of tasks, it’s a brain saver! Best part is, it starts at free! (And even now I’m only using the $5 per month version)

    Lastly, it has to be Elementor

    Elementor is the webpage builder that I use on my website, for landing pages, sales pages, my membership (The Content Academy). I already am I big fan of WordPress, but Elementor takes it to the next level. A bit like Canva, you can find so many talented people who design templates you can just import and customise to your branding.

    It just means that when it comes to launching a new offer, of tweaking wording… If it’s a 2 minute job, you don’t have to wait for someone else to do it. These are the things that can really slow you down, unless you have a dedicated in house team (or a particularly amazing outsource team).

    So there you have it, the 5 systems I couldn’t be without for running and scaling my online business. Do you use any of these? What are your favourites? Looking for help with scaling your business? Check out how we can work together to position your business for long term sustainable scaling through ‘Simplify & Scale’. You can apply here.

    5 Systems to help you scale your business | Content Clarity | Being a bustling online entrepreneur can be amazing. With all these wonderful systems to help you scale your business… To onboard clients… Make you more productive… Heck even make building a website a drag and drop simplicity. But with us now doing everything, because systems have made them so accessible, what systems are really helping us and what ones should we avoid?
  • Why ‘ready made’ content is killing your business

    Ok, it’s not often I take such a strong stand on something, so get the popcorn at the ready for this one. There is an influx of ‘ready to go’ business tools everywhere you look. Whether it’s social media captions, blog posts, Canva templates and I’m going to give you a bit of a danger warning run down of where these ‘so called’ time saving practices can help your business and which ones are doing more harm than good!

    You see content has the opportunity to be so powerful, driving lead generation & sales into your business (and work on auto pilot too!) So, it’s important to become purposeful & intentional about your content and get it right, rather than view it as a tick box exercise.

    It’s time we step away from the ‘just get it done’ mentality and instead worked smarter to make business decisions that aren’t based solely on time saving, but also on the end result. 

    Social Media Captions

    Imagine if we were all running around with the same logos and colour palettes? You wouldn’t stand out, would you? So, when it comes to social media captions, don’t be tempted to let it slide.

    Tone of voice & brand personality is one of the things that makes your company you… And if you’ve got copy and paste social media captions, you aren’t going to be showing any of that brilliant DNA of yours.

    Sure you can “insert your offer here” or “insert your customer problem here” but if you honestly read it through, would it even show the smallest glimmer of your vibe? Nope.

    If you struggle with idea generation, try social media prompts instead. This way your vibe can shine, you’ll stand out and you still save time. Or if you really struggle to write, speak with a copy writer who can take on the caption writing for you and do so in your tone of voice.

    Blog posts

    When it comes to sourcing blog posts for your website, make sure you’re getting them from a copywriter. Again for the same reason as the captions. Your tone of voice is part of your brand and if you’re using ‘cookie cutter’ posts that you’re adding a couple of lines to, not only are you missing the mark entirely, but Google frowns pretty heavily on duplicate content on websites.

    Content isn’t just ‘stuff’. It’s helping lead generation and sales in your business for years to come… So, spend the right amount of time to put one together. It’s well worth the effort for both your audience and the search engines.

    If blogging is something you struggle with, check out my FREE downloadable blogging checklist, to ensure every post you put out there is 100% supercharged and doing its best for you.

    Canva Templates

    I LOVE Canva, there’s no denying that… But when you’re using Canva, you have to make sure you brand any templates to your own colours and fonts. Don’t’ be tempted to fall down the time saving rabbit hole and use them ‘as they come’, because that’s when you start to look like everyone else and where’s the point in that. You’d have been as well saving your time and not bothering.

    Even if you buy your Canva templates from Creative Market or Etsy… If they don’t come customised for you, take the time to do this (you just do it once) and even move the layout around a little. That way your brand stands out.

    Not everyone is a natural born graphic designer, and that’s fine!  But get it right once and that time saving you were seeking is yours time and time again.

    Looking for more ways to streamline your content strategy, then check out The Content Academy… My monthly membership for savvy business owners who want to scale online without the overwhelm.

    Why ‘ready made’ content is killing your business | Content Clarity | Ok, it’s not often I take such a strong stand on something, so get the popcorn at the ready for this one. There is an influx of ‘ready to go’ business tools everywhere you look. Whether it’s social media captions, blog posts, Canva templates and I’m going to give you a bit of a danger warning run down of where these ‘so called’ time saving practices can help your business and which ones are doing more harm than good!
  • How to create a value ladder of offerings in your business

    When it comes to scaling your business, the first thing you need to address is your current offerings. Are you maximising your full potential by using a value ladder offer suite? Now I’m not going to ‘jargon’ you here. Let’s just get clear on exactly what a value ladder is:

    A value ladder is a way of structuring your offers in line with the journey that your customer takes, from initial ‘toe dip’ to committing to your highest ticket offering. This enables you to maximise your income potential from every customer who enters the journey and allows your customer to buy confidently from you.

    I’m sure you’ll have already heard about how important it is to build the ‘know, like & trust’ factor with people and a well-executed value ladder offer suite can actually help with that. Because you can start right from a free lead magnet and use micro commitments from there. This way your offerings are working alongside your content strategy to ‘warm people’ up on auto. So that you always have a constant stream of leads and sales in your business.

    Why would you have a value ladder?

    Having a value ladder in your business allows you to take your foot of the gas. You no longer have to be walking the journey with each and every one of your customers 1:1. They can walk it alone, with the support of your content, offers and kick ass automation systems (sounds great right?!) Yes, that means you can be waking up to sales notifications because you were in the right place at the right time.

    So many people offer lead magnets as a way to get people on their email list… But stop at that point. They maybe have a loose welcome sequence (at best) and they aim to keep those people in a holding pattern until they’re ready to ‘open the cart’ on a course, membership etc.

    But imagine if you had a series of offerings that you could be drip offering to those newbies… Say a $10 dollar offering at first, then a $40 offering… You get the point! Increase the value you provide in your offering alongside the price. So that when you finally announce your high ticket $xxx or $xxxx offering, they have already been exposed to your personality, your knowledge and that conversion happens far more easily (without those sleazy sales tactics I know you hate!)

    How can you implement a value ladder in your business?

    Having a value ladder in your business allows you to take your foot of the gas. You no longer have to be walking the journey with each and every one of your customers 1:1. They can walk it alone, with the support of your content, offers and kick ass automation systems (sounds great right?!) Yes, that means you can be waking up to sales notifications because you were in the right place at the right time.

    So many people offer lead magnets as a way to get people on their email list… But stop at that point. They maybe have a loose welcome sequence (at best) and they aim to keep those people in a holding pattern until they’re ready to ‘open the cart’ on a course, membership etc.

    But imagine if you had a series of offerings that you could be drip offering to those newbies… Say a $10 dollar offering at first, then a $40 offering… You get the point! Increase the value you provide in your offering alongside the price. So that when you finally announce your high ticket $xxx or $xxxx offering, they have already been exposed to your personality, your knowledge and that conversion happens far more easily (without those sleazy sales tactics I know you hate!)

    How can you implement a value ladder in your business?

    How to create a value ladder of offerings in your business | Content Clarity | When it comes to scaling your business, the first thing you need to address is your current offerings. Are you maximising your full potential by using a value ladder offer suite? Now I’m not going to ‘jargon’ you here. Let’s just get clear on exactly what a value ladder is:

    Ladder step 1 is your entry point to your value ladder and should be free. Give value… Make sure you understand your ideal clients problems well and give them a quick win.

    This can be an e-book, a how to video, free lesson or module from your digital product (course or membership).

    By giving them a quick win, they’ll be hugely grateful. You’ve taken that first step to helping them solve their big problem.

    Ladder step 2 is your next step. This is a low price point and should progress naturally from your free offering. Keep it under $50, but think about the price your audience would naturally & easily commit to as their first paid step.

    Keep it passive at this stage… You don’t want to be offering anything that requires your time (heck no!.. not yet). This can be a paid masterclass, swipe files, templates. Or if you gave a free lesson or module from a mini course in step 1, now is the time to offer the remainder.

    Ladder step 3 again is the natural progression from the previous step, but at a higher price point. Again the aim is provide value and solve a problem. You can start to offer ‘power hour’ sessions at this point, but you can keep this passive then even better… Maybe a higher value course, group programme.

    Ladder step 4 This is your end goal… This is usually your highest value offering, so this could well be a 1:1 service, high ticket course or group programme (it really depends on your offer suite).

    At this point on the customer journey, you’ll have already proven your experience, your customer will have had quick wins and trust your ability. So people who get this far will have very little objection as to whether they would like to work with you.

    All these steps can be automated through email software providers like Convertkit or Flodesk through a series of emails. You can of course use software such as Clickfunnels to manage your route also. Meaning you can sit back and let this happen and just be waiting eagerly at the last step to welcome those people into your highest ticket offering.

    You can have a shorter or longer value ladder… Don’t feel like you have to iron clad this. Get in tune to what works for you. Sometimes adding or removing a step can make the winning difference.

    If you’d like some help creating a value ladder in your business, book a discovery call for my 1:1 ‘Simplify & Scale’, where we can talk about how your business can scale with ease through offerings and simple automation systems.

    How to create a value ladder of offerings in your business | Content Clarity | When it comes to scaling your business, the first thing you need to address is your current offerings. Are you maximising your full potential by using a value ladder offer suite? Now I’m not going to ‘jargon’ you here. Let’s just get clear on exactly what a value ladder is:
  • 10 creative lead generation ideas

    For business owners, knowing how to generate leads consistently (and passively) can feel like the ultimate challenge.  Especially if you’re in a competitive market and it seems like everyone is offering lead magnets promising the world in exchange for that all important email address. So how can you stand out and have your ideal audience saying ‘heck yes!’ at your lead gen idea and have those email addresses consistently dropping into your sales funnel?

    Solve their biggest problem

    Don’t just throw an ‘ultimate guide to X’ together and create literally an ‘everything you know on the topic’ freebie. People don’t want the A to Z, what they want is the A to B. Show them how to solve something.

    This doesn’t have to be an ebook either. This can be a webinar, masterclass video. Something you probably already have in your arsenal, you just don’t fully realise the potential yet.

    Give a personalised experience

    Ok, so this one isn’t so passive, but works really well.

    Say you’re a social media manager, you could give someone a quick 5 min video review of their Instagram account. Make 3 simple, but massively transforming, suggestions about their account. This can take someone from freezing cold to asking where to sign up for your services in literally 24hrs.

    Run an online quiz

    Bring your brand personality alive with a fun (but effective) quiz. This is a fun way to get people to engage with you and is like those Cosmopolitan magazine quizzes you used to fill out in your 20’s!

    This can be anything from ‘What Sex in the City Character are you” to something more linked to your offerings, like “What type of content planner are you?”… You get the idea! There’s a number of software’s you can use, but Typeform is really easy to get to grips with.

    Industry experts interview

    These are super popular… It shows great dedication to your business industry and your desire to help and support and gives a heap of value to your new audience.

    Chances are you may already have some interviews you carried out on podcasts, YouTube videos or maybe even a Live that you saved to IGTV. Dig them out and use them as a way to start capturing leads in your business.

    1 day access to X

    Perhaps you have a course, or a membership. A great way to generate leads for that offering is to offer 1 days access for $1 or even free. I would highly recommend charging (even if it is just a dollar) to act as a micro commitment and detract the freebie hunters.

    Or indeed if it Is a course, what about a taster module?

    Templates

    Templates are another great lead generation piece. Say you design Canva templates, or Adobe templates… Using these to attract people to join your email list will work wonders and also giving them a taste for what you can do for them.

    Filters & presets

    Similar to templates, if you’re a photographer or help improve their own photography skills at home, giving Lightroom presets or Photoshop actions, will save people soooooo much time! To give someone the gift of time, will really make them a super fan!

    If you do use video transitions in Premiere Pro, or After Effects projects to do cool text, or even luts to colour grade… Again, people will LOVE YOU!

    Sales email copy

    This is another huge time saver for people. Not everyone is a natural born writer and can struggle to put together even an Insta caption, so imagine when it comes to sales copy on web pages or email sequences… Eek!

    Giving your proven email sales sequence, or your sales page layout, will be a massive draw and have people signing up to your email list on the double!

    Checklist

    As humans, we love that satisfaction of being able to tick things off… Hugely satisfying. So offering people a checklist to support a ‘how to’ i.e how to audit your Instagram profile. Where people not only get the knowledge, but also the checklist to support it as they go about carrying it out. Really beneficial (and something people can use again and again)

    Workbooks

    Similar to checklists, a supporting workbook to a knowledge piece really adds value. Because if a lead magnet not only gives the information, but aids the execution of it, it’s one above what everyone else is doing. So look for opportunities to go one step further in your industry.

    If you’d like more support with your lead generation process and learn how you can automate your sales cycle in your business… Check out The Content Academy, my membership for creative business owners to support you in setting up and running a successful sales cycle in your online business, so you can SOAR!

    10 creative lead generation ideas | Content Clarity | For business owners, knowing how to generate leads consistently (and passively) can feel like the ultimate challenge.  Especially if you’re in a competitive market and it seems like everyone is offering lead magnets promising the world in exchange for that all important email address. So how can you stand out and have your ideal audience saying ‘heck yes!’ at your lead gen idea and have those email addresses consistently dropping into your sales funnel?
  • How to create content for every stage of the buying cycle

    Content marketing is something that bamboozles many business owners & entrepreneurs. But once you understand the buying cycle, you will feel like you’ve put glasses on for the first time and you’ll be saying ‘ah ha’ when you finally realise just how powerful your content can be for you (and doing a lot of the hard work for you.)

    It’s easy to get into a cycle of ‘showing’ just as a tick box exercise. Loosely showing people your products or services, perhaps what you had for lunch and marking it off on your to do list (hurrah!!)… But, that’s probably not getting you the result you expected – Hence why you’re reading this! So, let me tell you how you can unlock the power of your content and use it to properly support your business growth… Like the sound of that? Great!

    First things first you’ll need to understand the buying cycle, which in short is the process (or cycle) people go through when they first realise they need what you sell and when they buy.

    This can be simplified into 6 stages:

    How to create content for every stage of the buying cycle | Content Clarity | Content marketing is something that bamboozles many business owners & entrepreneurs. But once you understand the buying cycle, you will feel like you’ve put glasses on for the first time and you’ll be saying ‘ah ha’ when you finally realise just how powerful your content can be for you (and doing a lot of the hard work for you.)

    Which I like to simplify into my 3 stage D.N.A method – Discovery, Nurture, Action.

    Now typically people focus on creating content for the awareness stage AKA “hey, look at me” and purchase “here’s what I sell”. But now that you see these different stages infront of you, you’re probably already thinking “ah ha”… Because what about that bit in the middle, right?

    Here’s 3 things you need to think about when you’re planning content for these stages:

    1. Are you attracting people with the right content?

    So, sure you may well be used to going out with content that says “ here I am and here’s what I do”, but these days you need to think beyond that. You need to attract people in a way that really wows them.

    Start thinking about the problems that your business solves for people. Make sure you get that across in your discovery content, to really grab attention and instantly relate to the people you want to attract.

    i.e Instead of me saying “Hey I’m Pamela and I can help you with your marketing”… I could say “ Don’t you just hate it when you get to 4pm on a Friday and you’ve not posted a thig on social media”

    The aim with this stage is to get them to say “Gosh, that’s me!”

    2. Are you nurturing through your content?

    So this is the bit people often forget about. These days it’s not enough to only provide content for discovery & action, because if you leave people to fill that nurture gap themselves, they’ll simply fill that gap with someone else’s content to help them consider & realise they have to buy a solution and you can lose the sale.

    Start thinking about those problems you solve and start to provide valuable content that illustrates the ‘why’ and ‘how’ you solve that problem.

    3. Are you selling through your content?

    Now this is a default ‘easy grab’ option for quick content creation AKA “buy my thing”. But again go a step further here. Don’t just tell people what you sell & the price of it,… Tell them why they need it. Think testimonials from other customers, demonstrations, the transformation they’ll have… What the end result it AKA the utopia!

    This is just one of the things we cover inside my 1:1 content coaching. Where we work together to create and implement simple & manageable marketing strategies for your business to help you scale online.

    How to create content for every stage of the buying cycle | Content Clarity | Content marketing is something that bamboozles many business owners & entrepreneurs. But once you understand the buying cycle, you will feel like you’ve put glasses on for the first time and you’ll be saying ‘ah ha’ when you finally realise just how powerful your content can be for you (and doing a lot of the hard work for you.)
  • Instagram Reels Vs Stories – What are the differences

    Although Instagram Reels have been with us for some time now, it’s only now that business owners are starting to think about how this could benefit them and is it something they want to add into their content marketing plan. Not only that, sometimes it can be a confusing decision between Stories & Reels. So with that in mind… What are the differences between Instagram Reels & Stories?

    First up, you’ll find both of these in the same section of Instagram, so both are easy to access… Alongside Live also.

    Stories last 24hrs

    The main difference is the longevity of Reels Vs Stories…Instagram Stories only last 24 hours (unless saved to a highlight). So they are very much there to serve as a behind the scenes ‘story telling’ tool.

    Reels on the other hand stay present on your dedicated Reel feed indefinitely. So that message can always be viewed and right now Reels are still being shown on the explore page for a number of days.

    Execution

    Most of the tools are similar, in that there is music options, gifs, texts on both… So you might be thinking I could just post that as a Story. But it’s the execution and essence of Reels that’s different.

    Stories, although 15 seconds in length, have inherently being used to story tell… So you can be there for 4-5 Stories listening or reading about something.

    Reels on the other hand are largely used to convey a message in a quick & concise manner (and in a creative way). Making businesses think more creatively and when it comes to being quick in execution… I find there isn’t time to think about much else beyond executing the message. Which I quite like. It almost leads you in a more natural direction and lets you ‘just be you’.

    If you’re looking for the dimensions for Reels cover images, you can find that here.

    Discoverability

    When it comes to Reels, they are currently being featured on the explore page, Stories aren’t! So it’s a really strong way to get people to discover your account in the first place. Excellent for topping up that buying cycle in your business!

    Stories, although can be discovered via hashtags, it’s less likely. This format is more for those who are already following you… So great for nurturing people in your buying cycle.

    Shareability

    Stories can be difficult to share. Sometimes you need to screen record something if you really want to share it… Which let’s face it, people just won’t do.

    Reels though… Super easy to share! Which again aids discoverability on the platform and keeps that buying cycle topped up!

    So which one is your favourite execution? I love both, but really enjoying Reels. You can find me on @contentclarity on Instagram.

    Instagram Reels Vs Stories – What are the differences | Content Clarity | Although Instagram Reels have been with us for some time now, it’s only now that business owners are starting to think about how this could benefit them and is it something they want to add into their content marketing plan. Not only that, sometimes it can be a confusing decision between Stories & Reels. So with that in mind… What are the differences between Instagram Reels & Stories?