LY Podcast: Ep. 57: Three Marketing Myths Busted to Sell Digital Courses

Melissa Anzman (00:00): This is the launch yourself podcast, episode number 57, all about busting those marketing myths to sell digital products for more information and show notes, go to launch yourself.co/ 57. Welcome to the launch yourself podcast. My name is Melissa Anzman. I'm a bestselling author and the founder of launch yourself where we help experts grow profitable digital businesses each week, we will peek behind the curtain of how you can launch yourself and your business to the next level with actionable tips and strategies you can implement in your daily life to grow your profitable digital business. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let's get started.

New Speaker (00:45): I don't know about you, but I feel like everywhere I turn, I'm hearing what we should do and how marketing must be and all of the processes and best practices that so many people just sort of say. And the hardest part is, is it totally depends on who you're hearing it from because it's all different advice. And so it gets really confusing for my clients as to what to actually do from a marketing perspective. And so I wanted to take today's conversation and really bust some myths. Like I used to love that show MythBusters. And I want to sort of use this episode to bust those marketing myths that have you feeling all the shoulds and really have you questioning, how should you spend your time and what's most effective when it comes to marketing to get results. Now, one quick note about all of those outside pressures. Before I dive in to shattering these three marketing myths, I'm going to have some truth bombs and tough love in just a moment. So you are forewarned with that. The first thing I want to say here is it's imperative that you stop waiting for a guru to save your business.

Melissa Anzman (02:09): I really want you to hear that stop waiting for a guru to save your business. I didn't really know this was a thing until I dug a little deeper and saw a pattern with some of the smartest entrepreneurs that I know and clients that I've worked with, but you may be waiting for that guru if you're perhaps following or buying or hopping more like it from coaching person to coaching person, looking for that one magic thing to fix your business. I have a really good friend who illuminated this for me by accident in that we had worked on some of some things together. We've been in some coaching programs together, like we're just in the same circles.

Melissa Anzman (02:59): And I saw her constantly blowing up her tactics to do and start the new tactic for the new guru that she was working with. And it was really interesting to me now she had great success with just about every tactic, cause she has a really strong business. She has a strong presence. She has great content and she hasn't super amazing offer, but she kept changing directions. And when I asked her about it, she was like, well, this person says to do this. So I'm doing it. And it got even more granular when it was something like, Hey, should I have this specific thing on my webinar page or not? And it was an interesting question to me because it was kind of an obvious answer. And I'm not saying that to say a question is dumb. I don't believe questions are dumb, but the whole point here is she didn't know.

Melissa Anzman (03:56): So she had to wait for the guru to answer a pretty easy yes or no answer. Yes or no question, excuse me, on her webinar registration page. Right? And so it made me understand or dig deeper as to what's going on. And the thing here is, is she was waiting for the answer. She was waiting for a guru to solve her problems. And I want to tell you, you need to stop doing this and it's a little bit of a difficult lesson, but here's what you should do. Instead. It is imperative for the longevity of your business, like imperative. If you want your business to be more than just a flash in the pan or a one product pony, or what have you to understand deeply the strategy behind the tactics that people are teaching you and invest your time to learn that and understand it.

Melissa Anzman (04:55): You want to know enough to be dangerous before you blindly follow a guru. So if someone is there to teach you, let's just say Facebook ads or to teach you how to do a funnel, just doing what they say is not going to get you long-term success. It's easier. It feels more like a magic bullet. It definitely takes a lot less time and you feel a little smarter, right? But the thing here is, is without understanding the strategy behind what they're teaching you, you're not going to be able to replicate or troubleshoot or really understand how it works for your business. And I didn't know that not sort of understanding the strategy was a missing component. It's taken me 10 years in my own business to understand that that's missing for so many people of just not digging deeper. The, that I am, I like to dig in.

Melissa Anzman (05:58): You know, me, I'm a fact finder I will troubleshoot and do all those things. So that was my natural Mo. But if that's not your natural emo, if you are the person who says, Hey, I want to learn how to do this in three steps. And you take those three steps and apply it. I want to encourage you to take some time, to really dig deep and understand the strategy behind it. And then follow the 1, 2, 3 steps, if it makes sense for your business, but really knowing how it works, why it's going to skyrocket a result. It's going to be able to work for you more than just the shirt short term, but also long-term as the market changes as the platform changes, as the way we sell change and gurus, the ones who are teaching us, they frequently change their tune. Both when their tactics or processes stop working for them, which means it probably never worked for you or stopped much sooner for you than for them.

Melissa Anzman (07:07): And like they have to change their business. They understand what works at the, at the core of the strategy of what they're teaching you. And so they're able to pivot it into a new platform. I mean, I could give you hundreds of examples off of the top of my head of people who have pivoted because of a strategy G change, which really confused the people who were following them because they didn't understand the core strategy. So I'm not going to name names. Now, if you want them, you can reach out. But please understand that a guru is not going to save their business, your business. They are not all knowing. They are not some sort of genie with future seeing powers. Although that would be awesome. They simply understand the strategy and are trying to teach you the tactics. So take some time to take a step back and really dig in to the strategy so that you can be that superstar to now let's do it again into these social media marketing myths and let's get those busted.

Melissa Anzman (08:14): So the first myth I hear is you need to be all over social media to generate a ton of sales. Listen, this is so false. Like I want you to hear that it's false full stop. Nothing could be further from the truth. If social media isn't your jam, by all means, please stop forcing. It is specially stop trying to be on every platform all the time. A Gary V K, you're not Gary V you don't have a team of like 40 people doing social media marketing. I don't know if that's accurate for his team. I know he has a big team doing that, and maybe you have a team doing it. But my whole point here is it's not something that really is exciting to you, and it's not honed in stop doing it. Social media can be great, but I know several coaches who have seven figure businesses who don't post on social ever.

Melissa Anzman (09:14): Like some of them don't even have an Insta account. So, and like, personally, if you follow me, you know that I'm not on social hardly ever. It is so hard for me to do that. It's just not natural for me. So what have you and I have a successful business? So my point here is, is social media is a marketing tool. And you should think of it that way for your business. When you set out your overall marketing strategy and plan, really understanding are your people on that platform and like, do you like being there? Does that make sense for you where there's overlap, be there and also your time and effort should be focused on what brings you quickest to cash? Always whether that's you're working on a strategy or vision or the tactics like social media marketing, the point here is, is you don't have to be everywhere.

Melissa Anzman (10:10): In fact, you could be spreading yourself too thin in the wrong ways to be everywhere because that's not quickest to cash. And it's not a pre-wash requisite to be successful with digital products or coaching or one-on-one services. It's not. And so I want you to take that pressure that you've been feeling about having to be on social media for the last five, 10 years. What have you take it off? It's not true. And if you still aren't convinced, there was a time before social media, my friends, and there were successful businesses before then, as well, even successful online businesses before social media marketing. So really understand that this is a tactic. This is something you should consider for your own marketing plan. And if it fits, but there are no musts here when it comes to having to be on social media, the next myth is to sell a digital product.

Melissa Anzman (11:11): You have to sell it on Instagram and you can insert Instagram for whatever place you've heard you had to be. You don't like, I really want you to think about how actually hard it is to sell on Instagram. You don't own your followers. You can't influence really how many people see your offers in your post. And so on. Like, it's really hard to even just build a following. There it's that much harder to successfully sell there. Now it can be effective, whether it is Instagram or Facebook or what have you, it can be effective is specially. If you're committed to being on one platform and spending the time and effort to grow it organically, it can absolutely pay off for you, but it is not a must. Even the easiest or dare I say, recommended ways for you to sell a digital product. Like it's, it's not easy.

Melissa Anzman (12:12): And the other thing here, a little plug is I said, you don't own Instagram. The only thing you do own is your list. Your email list and selling via email is usually a lot more effective and predictable than selling on Instagram. And so if you're split as to how to spend your marketing time and angle and effort, I want you to default to what brings you quick, quickest to cash, which is going to be your email list and being able to sell there versus having to sell it on the gram. I totally dated myself with that, but that's okay. The third and final myth I want to bust is your messaging or your posts have to be perfect in order for it to convert. Now that couldn't be further from the truth. And I know, you know this, as you have seen other posts in your feed, other friends in your space who are rocking it with less than stellar marketing messaging, it may even have you spiraling down the comparison, the comparison train, stop that like there's no need for that.

Melissa Anzman (13:20): But the point here is, is your messaging has to be focused relevant. And the one that I truthfully struggle with the most consistent, that doesn't mean it has to be perfect. Your ideal buyer, Jess needs to jive with your message and your marketing messages as a whole. And the thing here is if you aren't getting sales, it means that you just have to continue to tweak your marketing messaging. Now, a little behind the scenes here, I've been working with a big name coach this year, specifically around like how to sell more things via paid ads. Now more on that soon, but for this conversation, one of the craziest aha moments I had is the last time and effort that we spent on crafting amazing posts or ad copy, the better things performed. So being clear and specific is always going to be more important than being perfect.

Melissa Anzman (14:26): And there are ways that you can ensure that your messaging is set up to convert. Like there are so many things that you can do to be more influential, to be more clear, to ensure that the way you're talking is directly aimed for your one and only buyer out there who can then be multiplied over and over again. The point here is stop waiting for perfect stop waiting for that thing to be super cute or having all those things put together in order for it to resonate with you. The marketing messaging is not going to hold you back from here on out because perfect is not necessary. And in fact, even people who have perfect air quotes, their messaging continue to tweak their own messaging as the market change, as their offer change, as they get better and clearer about what they do and who they do it for and so on.

Melissa Anzman (15:30): So I want you to focus on that type of messaging, messaging that set up for conversions rather than not doing anything, sharing anything, marketing anything, because you don't quite feel like it's perfect. I hope this session really busted some marketing myths for you because this is critical. When you are ready to start selling your digital product or course.

New Speaker (15:59): To join the free launch yourself workshop, where you'll learn why your digital products aren't selling nearly as much as you plan for and how to diversify and scale your income by launching the right way. Go to launchyourself.co/join.