Today on the Zero Noise Marketing Podcast, we’re excited to be talking to Diana Lidstone, the entrepreneurs’ GPS. Dianne teaches her clients to develop a distinctive road map to guide them out of the swamp of busy work and hustle and increase the kind of activity that will get them to their business goals. We’re especially interested to hear her take on something she calls the properly diversified marketing mix. So get ready for some fresh thinking on your business. Get ready to get rid of the noise in your marketing. This is the Zero Noise Marketing Podcast.
Episode highlights
1:35 Most entrepreneurs by default are stuck in a state of perpetual hustle.
2:45 They’re (entrepreneurs) totally overwhelmed by what they should do for their next best step in your marketing and very often I find that they’re putting in so many hours in their business but not seeing the results that they want so they feel that they’re overworked and underpaid.
3:17 More marketing isn’t the answer.
3:45 First is by recognizing what stage of business growth that you’re at.
4:00 We go from you know one stage to another and I believe there are certain activities that are appropriate at different stages of business growth.
4:38 Stage 1-A glorified employee.
5:13 At the glorified employee stage you need 3 things: Clarity, Cash and Connections.
6:30 You will make more money if you work one on one with people.
6:45 Next stage: Manager Level
7:11 You know you’re ready to do all of this when your agenda is really full of working one-on-one with people or as I like to say you’re making good money but you have no time to spend it.
8:05 At every level you have a new devil.
9:29 When we’re working outside the zone of genius or the zone of magic those are things that we’re not really good at and those are the things that we need to learn to delegate.
10:23 Delegating we could tell, could liberate you to provide the highest level of value that you’re capable of delivering.
10:42 The next level up the thermometer so to speak or my grow meter is what I call CEO. And CEO is really about being the visionary. And what I mean by that is you spend more of your time working on your business rather than in your business.
13:15 Then you can get to what I call legacy level. And legacy level is just that maybe you’re thinking of leaving what is the legacy you want to leave in your business, maybe you’re thinking about an exit strategy or maybe you’re thinking about diversification.
15: 33 To try to build several businesses at once typically is going to just take you longer than it would normally if you focused on one.
17:13 Put these in place and move on to the next phase. And this is how you build a strong foundation. It’s kind of like you know building a foundation for a house.
17:46 Entrepreneurs are creative by nature that’s why they’re entrepreneurs.
20:03 Your distinctive natural advantage is actually a combination of three things: acquired mastery, demonstrated results and effortless talents.
23:14 Your entrepreneurial DNA is basically around the strengths that you already have in your business.
29:27 Three mission critical elements: strategy or roadmap (90-day strategies), marketing mix and primary differentiator.
30:53 Business must be dynamic it must be changing and evolving.
31:44 Strategy is about a worthy target it’s not about a straight trajectory.
34:57 When you go up to the the manager level and you’re talking about leveraging, speaking is a very effective use of your time.
38:06 Three deadly words: “I am a”. You’re putting yourself in a box with all the other.
Jaeson: So we’re on the show today with Diana Lidstone. Welcome to the show Diana. How are you today?
Dianna: Well actually I think your listeners are going to hear me kind of sniffle and whatever but one of those sprinkles that all is good.
Jaeson: Well it’ll distract from my deviated septum so that’s pretty good.
Jaeson: Well that’s awesome. So the reason why Diana is on the show is because we’re kind of kindred spirits when it comes to the marketing world. Diana is a no-nonsense zero noise kind of marketer and that it’s part of the package that she offers
to her clients and helping them get down to the essentials in whatever it is they’re doing in their businesses. So first of all Diana when we were talking before you mentioned to me that most entrepreneurs that you talk to by default are stuck in a state of perpetual hustle. Can you maybe expand upon that?
Diana: Sir, I’d be happy to. Yeah, I mean you know you and I’ve been entrepreneurs for many many years and I’m sure we’ve seen you know lots of different things but lately I’ve been noticing certainly a lot of entrepreneurs stuck in as I say this state of hustle. And I you know if I could say it can blame the internet or social media. But you know they see all these things out there and they think that they should be doing them. So state of hustle kind of looks like this: you think you need a website so you create a website and then you go well that means I need a blog. So if I have a blog I need a newsletter. If I have a newsletter I should post the newsletter or the blog on Facebook. Well if I’m on Facebook I should be on LinkedIn. So maybe then I should be on Instagram or maybe I should be doing Facebook ads. And then maybe I should write a book do a webinar and they’re just bouncing all over the place with you know with little and gaining little traction in their business so they’re totally overwhelmed by what they should do for their next best step in your marketing and very often I find that they’re putting in so many hours in their business but not seeing the results that they want so they feel that they’re overworked and underpaid. Basically and that’s what I call the state of hustle.
Jaeson: Right so they’re trying to scale which is natural. Trying to scale and grow but they feel that the only way to do it is to pedal harder.
Diana: I mean you know more marketing isn’t the answer right?
Jaeson: Right. So what’s the cure? What’s the cure to that? I think we’ve all been guilty of that really.
Diana: Oh, for sure. Well I look at it this way that I strongly believe that there are a couple of ways out of hustle and the first is by recognizing what stage of business growth that you’re at and I you know I when I’m in front of people I draw this basically it looks like a thermometer and it’s four stages of business growth and you know the thermometer rises and we go from you know one stage to another and I believe there are certain activities that are appropriate at different stages of business growth. And what I find is that a lot of people are doing marketing activities and other activities they’re not appropriate for their stage of business growth.
Jaeson: Could you give me an example of that?
Dianna: Sure. So let me just briefly explain what I mean by these four stages of business growth and if we again if your listeners can visualize their thermometer. Stage one is you know down at the bottom of the thermometer and I call that a glorified employee because I think that when we all start our businesses we feel like an employee because we’re doing it all right. We’re doing the admin, we’re serving the clients. We’re doing all those things but that’s also where I see these people focusing on things like well I must need a fancy tagline or a 15-page website or paid advertising and those are not the things that people need to build a strong foundation for their business growth nicely at the glorified employer level. You need three things: you need clarity and when I say clarity I mean clarity on you know what is your true overall message that you want to get out there. You need clarity on what’s your offer, what is that thing that you’re selling. And you need clarity on how you can consistently provide outreach or in other words be visible so that’s clarity. But you also need to generate cash which is another C word so you know how do you generate cash the quickest in your business when you’re first starting out. And the set and the third C is what I call connections because when we start our businesses typically we don’t have a big you know there’s many words you could use you could use email lists, you could use tribe, you could use audience. Whatever you know suits your particular business. Because you need people to have contact with in order to sell them something. So a lot of people think at that stage that will you know I’ll make more money if I do a group program but actually it’s counterintuitive. You will make more money if you work one on one with people. At that particular stage and I say you graduate from the glorified employee to the next state which I call manager level and at the manager level if we think of a manager in a business this is somebody typically who delegates. And so that’s one of the things that manager level is that you delegate things off your plate, you start to leverage by now shifting into maybe group programs and then the third thing you focus on is systems. But you know you’re ready to do all of this when your agenda is really full of working one-on-one with people or as I like to say you’re making good money but you have no time to spend it.
[ctt template=”10″ link=”_42c9″ via=”no” ]You know you’re ready to do all of this when your agenda is really full of working one-on-one with people or as I like to say you’re making good money but you have no time to spend it. -Diana Lidstone[/ctt]
Jaeson: Okay. So that’s the clear sign that you’re ready to shift from employee to manager.
Diana: Right. And it’s a sign that it’s now time to okay how do I leverage like how do I basically duplicate myself or you know how do I make more money in the same number of hours that i’m working?
Jaeson: There’s something you said in your last at your last shift event and Diane puts on events that she calls shift or shift your business and one of the things that really kind of struck me between the eyes that she said was that at every level you have a new devil. So it’s interesting that as you’re shifting through these kind of levels there’s something there’s a new way that you need to think and it’s completely foreign to your mindset that you had in the previous level.
Diana: Exactly. So what the manager level you know you have to think let’s take delegating for instance, that is not something that a lot of entrepreneurs are good at because you know it was their baby they’ve created this thing and nobody can do it as well as they can. So these are new skills that they have to learn.
Jaeson: So, what’s that little thing to you tell people to help them to stop white knuckling their business and start sharing it with employees if that’s something they have some resistance to doing?
Dianne: I’m sorry. I’m don’t quite understand the question.
Jaeson: I would say if like I would have a let’s say I have a strong resistance to delegating in my business so I can shift into the next level. Well what might you tell someone?
Dianne: Well one of the things that you’re not really good at, what is and if you know I strongly believe that each of us has a gift a magic genius whatever people want to call it. And when we’re working outside the zone of genius or the zone of magic those are things that we’re not really good at and those are the things that we need to learn to delegate. So you know for instance you know I could do my own bookkeeping. I could do it. But it’s going to take me quite a bit more time, mental energy etc because it’s not my zone of genius. But I can hire a bookkeeper who can do it or you know I can hire a virtual assistant to do some admin and they can do in half the time what we could do something that’s not within our zone of genius. So focusing on what’s your true zone of genius or that true magic that you have really really helps people.
Jaeson: Okay. So a delegating we could tell say we could say liberates you to provide the highest level of value that you’re capable of delivering.
Dianne: Yep.
Jaeson: Yeah, okay. All right I can live with that. Carry on.
Diana: So we’ve talked about the glorified employee, we’ve talked about the manager and the next level up the thermometer so to speak or my grow meter is what I call CEO and CEO is really about being the visionary and what I mean by that is you spend more of your time working on your business rather than in your business. So again, a whole new level of skills to learn: team leadership, building a corporate culture, you know that type of thing is what a CEO does. And again, you know it’s a whole shift of tactics. It’s a whole shift of mindset. It’s a whole shift of the way you look at your business and very often when people’s businesses get to the CEO level they actually have to I could say change their business model or modify their business model. This might be where they start using some paid traffic. Maybe they’re actually you know have some sort of passive income, maybe this is where they’re rebranding that sort of thing.
Jaeson: So what why is that an imperative at that stage?
Diana: Well it’s because your business has grown to a whole different level. You know if you’re at the CEO stage in your business, you know you are you have a team first of all. So you have a team. Maybe you know I’ll speak to the coaching industry, so maybe you have a team of coaches, you have a VA, you maybe have an online manager, maybe you have a specialist who deals with your Facebook ads. And so you know here maybe you’re starting to look at a very different business model instead of this one. To one where you first started out or maybe even you know at the manager level you were doing group programs now you’re going to be doing online maybe digital programs that might provide you with some sort of passive income and maybe your one-on-one clients are just that super high level elite or maybe you don’t do any of them. Maybe you don’t do any of them. So your role certainly changes in your business.
Jaeson: So again a major change in the way that you think about doing papers. And is that as far as you can go? CEO?
Diana: Then you can get to what I call legacy level. And legacy level is just that maybe you’re thinking of leaving what is the legacy you want to leave in your business, maybe you’re thinking about an exit strategy or maybe you’re thinking about diversification. So again, thinking of a business coach that I know has this amazingly diverse business and
you know she started out as coaching and so she has numerous coaches that work for her so that’s one of her businesses but she also would do live events and so she created an event planning business. She did a lot of videos so she created a video production company. So she had diversified but all under the same umbrella.
Jaeson: Well then, I’m gonna stop you there because I think it’s really useful for us to kind of throw some light on that. The impulse of the employee level entrepreneur. I think is to do what I call what I affectionately refer to as cutting lawns for people. Where you basically are doing anything for a buck and it certainly looks you certainly look that way I mean you’re jumping from pillar to post but you’re saying that diversification is something you only do at the legacy level.
Diana: Right. Okay, you know I’ve come across a lot of people who are what they call themselves multi-preneur. For instance, you know several businesses and I say you know what? which business is it that is going to drive the most either profit. If that’s what you’re in the business for the most joy, the most impact, whatever it happens to be because you only have so much time energy and money. Which one of those is going to be your main focus and that’s what I tell them when they’re you know when they’re got all these businesses and they’re trying to bring it all together. And sometimes the businesses can come under one roof so to speak. But to try to build several businesses at once typically is going to just take you know longer than it would normally if you focused on one.
Jaeson: Right. And sorry, yes it’s just a different species of hustle that you’re talking about really when you’re juggling so many different things. So let’s say I’m all fired up about this ladder that you’ve laid out before me, this thermometer. So what’s my first step there as a glorified employee to find my magic and start climbing out of that?
Diana: Well as I say it’s kind of like um think of it this way um I said you know social media kind of makes us think that there’s all these things that we you know quotations air quotations should be doing. So I find that entrepreneurs are often very overwhelmed and so I say imagine walking up to a buffet but this buffet is not food it is entrepreneurial activities. And when you know your stage of business growth, you can go “huh I don’t need to do all those activities over there” and so you can actually walk up to the buffet and go. I only need to focus on this part of the buffet because when I start working with clients I actually give them a list literally a checklist of activities to work on depending on what stage of business growth they’re at and it makes it very clear. You know put these in place first they move on to the next phase. Put these in place and move on to the next phase. And this is how you build a strong foundation. It’s kind of like you know building a foundation for a house. If you don’t get the foundation square it’s pretty hard to put the roof on squared
Jaeson: And the temptation to jump to something else to diversify prematurely is huge when you don’t have that clarity. Right?
Diana: Yeah and entrepreneurs typically are a creative bunch. You know, entrepreneurs are creative by nature that’s why they’re entrepreneurs. Very often because they don’t fit into the you know square peg in a round hole or vice-versa in the corporate or whatever. And so sometimes it’s really hard to kind of rein them in or refocus them or recalibrate them into the direction and to stay not single-mindedly. But where can they help people the most.
Jaeson: Right and then using that to kind of amplify their effectiveness over time. Well that makes a lot of sense and of course it goes against our instincts because we especially at the beginning when you’re the chief cook and bottle washer and you’re basically cutting lawns you’re doing whatever you can. Actually I know a landscaper who has reached a high level of service in his business and he’s still literally cutting lawns. He’s only putting one lawn but he has a very good reason for it but the temptation is huge.
Diana: And you have to shift out of, the glorified entrepreneur is the state where you are doing it all. And then you move to the manager and it’s about it’s not about what you’re doing but about who you can get to do those things for you. And the further up you go up the grow meter again it’s more about not what to do but who can do the what, and it’s not you.
Jaeson: That’s a very different way of thinking about it. Yeah, okay so how do I find out what my super power is? So I can figure out what I’m supposed to be as opposed to not what I’m supposed to delegate?
Diana: So I have this thing that I call the so this is the other way that you can sort of simplify things. I call it your entrepreneurial DNA or your distinctive natural advantage. And this is something that I’ve kind of created and it your distinctive natural advantage is actually a combination of three things and one of them is what I call your acquired mastery. So over your lifetime in your personal life and in your business what have you experienced that can help you contribute to helping others. So for instance something might be let’s say somebody who’s learned has lost I don’t know a hundred pounds and they’ve figured out how to lose a hundred pounds and keep it off. So because they have you know walk the talk kind of thing. They’re able to share that with people so that’s something in your acquired mastery. Your demonstrated results are those results that your clients can actually attest to. So let’s do the weight loss person again and you know that weight loss person has figured out a system let’s say to lose weight and keep it off maybe that’s his thing and or her thing and so those are the demonstrated results. And then the effortless talents is, your effortless talent is that magic that you have that people look at you and go huh how did you do that? You made it look so simple right now.
Jaeson: Would it be fair that the effortless talent one is a tricky one to identify because it’s so natural to a person?
Diana: Exactly it’s um and it is the thing that most people not just entrepreneurs but everybody has this because it’s so simple to us. We undervalue it. We think it’s not worth the kind of money or intrinsic value that is actually out there. And you know you
just go “oh”. So I’ll tell you a story about a woman I met this was years ago in a networking and she this was when social media was just sort of starting. So I you know ten years ago I’ll say sure and she gave free classes to those people in our networking group about social media and I said “why are you doing this for free?” And she says “well because it’s so easy you know anybody can do it.” And I said “but we can’t”. She goes “but it so easy” and I went “no”. So you know eventually she turned that into a very profitable business but she didn’t see it as valuable.
Jaeson: Reminds me of that old proverb of the man is walking along the river and looks down at the fish and says: “hey fellows how’s the water?” and the fish say: “what’s water?”
Diana: Yeah. Well your entrepreneurial DNA and you know I help people identify what that is. But it’s you know it’s basically around the strengths that you already have in your business. And I think sometimes, no I know a lot of the time that entrepreneurs again thinking that they should be doing this these things out there that you know “gurus” are talking about they forget about building a brand and a business around what you’re already good at instead of just adding more to your plate.
Jaeson: Do you suppose that there’s some resistance to doing what you’re good at because it feels like kind of a guilty almost a guilty pleasure if they can get on it comes easily. I enjoy it. Time seems to melt magically away while I’m doing it and everything seems effortless. It’s more of it this is what I do to recharge. Did you find that that’s typical?
Diana: Yeah. You know I can’t tell you time and time again entrepreneurs that I’ve worked with that you know they don’t recognize that within themselves and that you know this is the same with me and I remember a couple years ago I had a coach from down in the States and you know going back to my shift events she said: “well Diana you should be doing live coaching at your events” and I went “up on stage one by one and coach them right there and I said in front of a hundred other people?”. She goes “yeah you’re able to do it effortlessly” and I went like God you know. Right now the first time I did it I mean I just you know sweating bullets. You betcha. But now it has become one of the most popular segments of my events.
Jaeson: You know what it’s like watching a high-wire act actually for the audience because I was there at your last one and yeah and mean you didn’t seem like you were under any particular pressure or stress and neither did your either did your the object of the interview but it was exciting but kind of on the edge of our seats to see what is where this is gonna go.
Diana: Yeah and so I mean that’s just you know a quick example and so I do I work with people to help them figure this out their DNA. And you know its a little session I call discover your DNA and it’s really you know simple for me. I send them a workbook they fill out the you know answer the questions and then we spend some time on zoom and I have kind of four different I could say themes of DNA that I talked about and when you know your DNA theme it really helps you to focus on what you might be doing in your marketing. So an example would be a few years ago I learned that sort of my way my marketing language is what I would call teaching. And when I embraced that, things became so much easier. So you know I have you know three other themes that I focus around. And some people are great connectors, some people are great catalyst, some people are great you know to inspire people. But once they know that it really helps them as I say focus on how they do their marketing and not necessarily their marketing tactic or strategy that they take but how.
Jaeson: Okay. So it’s interesting at every stage of this system that you’ve developed there’s a clarification of strategy starting from you know the market and who you’re reaching out to and they’re specific value that you bring to that market. And then you boil it down to the natural personal style of communicating to that market so that you’re amplifying at every stage
Diana: Yeah and I think that is so key because I noticed in marketing a lot you know they talk about who is your you know who is your ideal client and who’s your avatar and you know certainly that is important but why aren’t we looking at ourselves first yeah what are we already good at.
Jaeson: And like re-starting kind of like we’re starting at the bottom of the hill all the time. Like and when we look at where we’re actually at we may go well why don’t I push the rock that’s like three feet from the top with our already rather than going down and pushing the one at the bottom of the hill.
Diana: Yeah you know it’s like pushing a snowball uphill. Really, let’s make it easy on ourselves and so I’ve shifted that whole thing about Mart and not that I’m saying that not having a client avatar is not important but it’s not the be-all end-all.
Jaeson: It’s just one leg of the stool. It sounds like. Okay so you mentioned something to me about that really kind of stuck out in my mind when we are having our kind of initial interview there before we got started. Now was mission critical function yeah tell me what that is.
Diana: Yeah I mean you know it’s fine that we have you know we get stuck in this state of hustle and then we need to figure out you know what stage our business growth is at and that helps us figuring out our DNA helps us but then there’s three what I call mission critical elements. And I think the first one is some sort of strategy some sort of roadmap because as you know from the sounds of it, those people in hustle they have no plan. They have no strategy. They have no overall you know. They’re just forgetting it well. So you do need a plan I call it a roadmap and I believe in 90-day strategies.
Jaeson: And does it have to be perfect?
Diana: No. Done is better than none.
Jaeson: Okay I’m glad I’m glad we could maybe touch on that because I that in one of the ways that we talk ourselves into inactivity is thinking until this is ironclad I am NOT shooting I’m not shooting for the moon until I’m sure the ship is in good shape. But it doesn’t work that way.
Diana: Yeah, no it’s really funny because I just did a Facebook live on that this morning you know what can we stop doing in our businesses and you know perfectionism appears in many different ways. And you know perfectionism could be yeah we want it perfect we want our 90-day plan perfect but it’s just like your site. Is your website ever finished? No. Because it’s never perfect it’s always in a dynamic state and business must be dynamic it must be changing and evolving. And so that’s why I say a 90 day plan is good. Certainly an overall view of what you want to accomplish. Even a you know where do you want to take your business in three to five years.
Jaeson: Right so Maxwell Maltz in his book: Psycho Cybernetics. I don’t know if you’ve had a chance to read that before. He wrote that in the 50s but he talked about our minds being these teleological devices and an example of a teleological device is a heat-seeking missile. So it has a it has a target but it doesn’t have a very straight trajectory. So that’s I think that’s really super important for people to kind of think about when you’re talking about strategy. Strategy is about a worthy target it’s not about a straight trajectory.
[ctt template=”8″ link=”Apa6d” via=”no” ]Strategy is about a worthy target it’s not about a straight trajectory. -Diana Lidstone[/ctt]
Diana: Yeah. So you know a strategy can start with what is the overall vision or what is your definition of success. What do you want your business to look like when it’s successful. And then you know what kind of reverse engineer and I say to a 90 day strategy so mission. Critical element number one is you know that 90 days strategy mission. Critical element number two is a marketing mix so a mix of marketing methods or tactics but that are in alignment with your stage of business growth. That are in alignment with your distinctive natural advantage and that support your 90-day plan.
Jaeson: Okay, so we look at your stage of business and for instance if you’re an employee there’ll be a different marketing mix than if you’re a manager or CEO or legacy.
Diana: I typically say that if you know at the glorified employee stage networking whether it’s online or whether it’s offline is probably the strongest element for most people.
Jaeson: I really I really really love that Diane. And you made that a point that like riveted me to the floor when you said that because when you’re starting out you don’t have a lot of bullets, you don’t have a lot of resources. So you can’t afford to be spraying them all over Christendom. You need to be a sniper first and that comes down to taking the individual interest and that’s you can afford to do and chances are if you’re in sales or you’re an entrepreneur that’s kind of where your communication superpower likely is or needs to be developed.
Diana: Yeah and networking is a great place to you know if you’re at the glorified employer level it’s a great place to validate or research your marketing message so what you’re saying about you and your business it’s also a great place to test to see whether whatever it is that you’re selling you’re compelling offer is you know are there any bites out there. Instead of you know creating it and and not knowing whether the market is going to buy it.
Jaeson: Right and when you’re doing belly-to-belly interaction with real live people with actual wallets you get a really clear picture of what arouses their interest and what the real problems are. Yeah I can see that and yeah only then it’s kill.
Diana: Yeah if it’s you know face to face you know whether they raise their eyebrows whether their eyes glaze over whether they’re leaning in literally and saying you know oh that’s interesting tell me more networking is really really important. I believe you know when you go up to the the manager level and you’re talking about leveraging I believe that speaking is very is a very effective use of your time.
Jaeson: Why is that why?
Diana: Why is that? Because as opposed to networking where your shaking hands 101. Speaking, and I mean speaking to get clients versus speaking to get compliments there’s a big difference. Speaking leverages your time you are positioned as an authority by literally the fact that you’re at the front of the room or on a stage and yeah I think it’s it’s a very very very effective marketing tactic or strategy.
Jaeson: And you teach your clients how to develop kind of a keynote discourse that is designed to get more clients?
Diana: I do have a program actually that I’ve just recently launched that will be teaching what we call a signature talk. So it’s a talk that you can do within you know seven minutes or an hour the same topic. And the benefit of having a signature talk is that people actually get to know you for that topic and certainly start building your reputation around that.
Jaeson: And so what’s the benefit of them attaching you to one particular topic?
Diana: Well that’s how you build a reputation.
Jaeson: Okay, all right so it is part of your personal branding.
Diana: Right, yes. That wouldn’t have to be known for solving a problem. People only open their wallets when they’re in enough “pain” just get that pain solved and our job is to solve the problem. What one problem is it that you will be solving for instance. So that’s let’s go back to these mission-critical thing, so the first one was some sort of strategic roadmap, the second one was a marketing mix that supports the strategic roadmap and the third is what I call a primary differentiator.
Jaeson: Okay, so what is that exactly?
Diana: Well, a primary differentiator is very closely linked to your entrepreneurial DNA but it is that thing that you do that makes you different than everybody else. And so you know I could call myself a business coach and I could say I am a business coach. I am a financial planner. I am a real estate agent whatever. It happens to be and when you say things like that those are what I call the three deadly words when you say: “I am a”
you’re putting yourself in a box with all the other business coaches, financial planners whatever it happens to be. And today because of the internet, we serve people around the world, we just don’t serve people geographically. And so there’s a lot of
noise in the marketplace. So how do we stand out above the noise? What is it that is going to make us different from other people?
Jaeson: That’s why we call this The Zero Noise podcast. That’s what we’re about.
Diana: Yeah, because there is so much noise out there so each business has to have a well they used to call them unique selling proposition and part of what it is um but what you know what are you going to do “why should I buy from you” It’s basically the question that your clients are asking.
Jaeson: As a footnote that’s the U in the USP we’ve been thinking about this lately and when you have a relationship with someone else the U is literally a y-o-u. They go to do business with my you see this all the time people say “well I’m gonna get my cousin to do it because I know him” and so that’s like with the relationship but the primary differentiator solves the problem of no relationship because of your distinctness.
Diana: Yeah and because of your distinctness you get known for being very distinct and you build a reputation and a brand and this should be you know all part of the lock stock and barrel kind of look feel relationship building and everything. Sowhat is it that makes your business unique or different than others.
Jaeson: So how do I pick my distinction because especially at the beginning when I have been delivering value to say a bunch of people in a bunch of different ways how do you pick the thing that’s going to make the biggest difference to your potential audience as you grow?
Diana: Well that’s a good question because a lot of clients come to me then you know they’re at that stage and you know I would walk them through certainly a number of questions but a couple of questions might be so let’s look at your most profitable clients. What was unique about them and what was it that you taught them or gave them that got them the results that they actually wanted? And we can start on analyzing your the work that you’ve done and so it’s you know what is certainly because business is all about profit let’s not forget that but profitable what gives you the most joy. You know what comes easily to you.
Jaeson: For instance area of it’s an area of attention that they gets overlooked that joy thing because that’s a it translates into energy which can be reinvested doesn’t it?
Diana: Sure. Sure. Like you know I always until a while ago I was thought my ideal client was solopreneurs okay and that’s what I’ve always worked with and that’s because I have always been a solopreneur. And I help people get clear on their message I help people get you know attract and convert more of their ideal clients and then not too long ago a company a woman came to me and she had met me at one of my events and I did not know this but she had a four and a half million dollar business. That they had no marketing plan, they had no clear message and they had no sales strategy. Yeah, so that’s the stuff that comes easily to me and I you know at first I went whole I don’t know if I could do this but it’s the same you know whether I’m serving solopreneurs or this you know million multi-million dollar company.
Jaeson: There seems to be some physics to this I think it’s one of the things that people believe when they when they deal with well I mean I do some marketing consulting myself and when people are talking about their marketing they think it’s a swamp. This is crazy undifferentiated pile of possibility and there is really no clear way of doing it but there’s there are some physics to this, isn’t there?
Diana: So tell me tell me more what you’re thinking along that line.
Jaeson: Well perhaps there’s so much going on in their work or their business and so many things they can think about that to narrow it down to one key group for instance right like give it there maybe that 20 percent of their their potential customers are you know women between 45 and 65 and they live in the greater Kingston area and they have you know 2.5 children. go ahead.
Diana: Yeah and this is what I find. This is why I say don’t focus on a client avatar because people think that the client avatar is all about these demographic like age and where they live and all those types of things right it’s not. It is about the problem that they have hmm you know what is the problem that they have?
Jaeson: We really get stuck in that – because that’s right that’s model that’s sold to us by the PPC companies isn’t it put us all on these neat little boxes and then we sit there with this devastated look on our faces while the money flies out of our wallets wondering why it didn’t
Diana: Yeah right and it’s really hard sometimes. So I was having this conversation with my speaking coach and I actually used him his growth of his business as part of my when I was creating these models if you will and he said well I don’t solve just one problem and I said to him now let’s just go back when you first started out. You were at
this stage know the glorified employee you were doing all this stuff you were all over here or teaching webinars and you were teaching this and you were teaching that you didn’t get any traction right he goes yeah right and I said but then you focused on helping people speak from the stage yeah and I said then you started getting some
traction and he went yes and then he developed his own models and he talked about reputation. Building your reputation and how you can stand out and be a category of one. And I thought when you focused on being that category of one and teaching that one thing your business exploded. He had right.
Jaeson: Yeah because we kind of think we have to stay in the swamp right instead of like walking over a nice dry boardwalk that takes us to the other side with next-to-no effort. So that’s the primary differentiator.
Diana: Yeah is to get yourself out there and differentiate yourself from you know everybody else in your in your field. I did a the last time. I did shift in Ottawa which was a couple weeks ago I did a second day which was a VIP day and we talked about people’s websites and you know I said I’m not a website designer but I see so many people building websites that are just not doing the jobs that they should and doing the job that they should is you know being that silent salesperson for them. And you know they just one of the exercises that we did was I had them go and look at three of their competition and what was the message when you looked at their website. And then how does your website compare what is the clear message it’s coming across. And there was some big “aha no kidding”
Jaeson: Yeah I remember when we started specifying a specialization in the law firm field there was almost a sense of overwhelming relief from people who were colleagues of mine because they always wanted to refer people but it was a bit defeating trying to try to define us and they desperately wanted to say oh he’s a person who does X Y Zed before because you need that otherwise it’s just too abstract to even talk about.
Diana: Exactly yeah and like you said people can’t refer you so it makes it very difficult and you know it’s very counterintuitive to pick a niche and to be very specific, be very different
Jaeson: So and would you sing but it is that when you’ve when you become the say web designer who does websites for law firms that doesn’t really in no one’s mind does that limit you to that kind of work they think well if he can do that surely he can do my hog farm in Prescott or whatever.
Diana: And as I said it doesn’t mean that you won’t do these other things. It just means that your marketing talks about that specific thing right? Well that’s really powerful that’s great how are we doing for time here arrived. I’m in Diana?
Diana: I think we’re pushing 50 minutes
Jaeson: Yeah I think so I wanted to put another nickel in if I don’t have I don’t wrap this up okay go well I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity to finally talk to you in this on our podcast and talking about your process and particularly the properly diversified marketing mix and the primary differentiator that is something so important we’re trying to get that message across to our clients as well there’s so much value that’s trapped in
the realization of those two ideas. So thank you so much. How can people get a hold of you if they’re interested in getting some clarity on moving through these stages that you mentioned in the Gro meter.
Diana: uh so there’s a couple of ways probably the best way is my website so Dianaleadstone.com and if they’re interested in having a conversation, the best thing to do is Dianaleadstone.com/apply and there’s a short little questionnaire that just gathers some basic information at before we have a chat and just save some time. And if people want to know what their next best step in their marketing is I have a very short quiz on my website so again Dianaleadstone.com/quiz and that’s what’s your next best step in your marketing.
Jaeson: Great great I will check that out myself right after we get off this call. Well thank you very much once again have a fantastic afternoon and I strongly suggest that if any of our listeners has an opportunity to attend one of Diana’s shift events you see a day-long event Diana?
Diana: On that note we are doing a mini version of shift the marketing event June 7th in the Kingston area Roche donate. So what I mean by mini is that it’s limited to I believe 12 spots and the information again is on my website under the events tab so yeah great that’ll be fun.
Jaeson: Diana’s book is also published on Amazon and available on Kindle and probably a physical version as well. Correct? I read it myself it’s quite good okay well thanks again and have a great afternoon and thank you.
This has been the zero noise marketing podcast connecting with your ideal prospects in an authentic way does not have to be a complicated process. Visit us at zeronoisemarketing.com to learn more about making zero noise marketing strategy an important part of your business success. I’m Jason Tanner thanks for tuning in.
