Tracy Beavers: [00:00:00] if somebody hearts something or likes something, I'm gonna say, Christina, thank you so much for the love on my post. And then I'm gonna say, I help X do Y. So they can see, you know, I see that you do similar work. How could we support each other? Or if it's somebody that looks like they could be a potential client, I'm just gonna ask them about their business.
I'm just gonna be like, Hey, I see that you help authors finish their books. How long have you been doing that? And see where I can uncover some needs. Is there a person I could connect them with that they would be super appreciative of? Maybe they wanna be a client, maybe they don't.
But if I don't have the conversation and build a relationship, I'm never gonna know. And this is what made me successful in sales, and I'm sure it's what made you successful in sales too, in real estate because it's not about the sale. It's not about the transaction, it's about building the relationship with the other human being and forging that common ground where you can see where in my life or in my business would this person fit in?
Yeah, they may be a referral partner. They may wanna be a guest on my podcast. They may have a podcast for me. [00:01:00] I mean, we just never know. So regardless of platform, it's super important to not only pull people off through attraction marketing and get 'em onto your list, but also have those DM conversations where you can really forge a connection.
Intro: I am Christina Koki, your post of the Effortless Closing Podcast. Born and raised in Silicon Valley. Now bringing the wisdom, wit, and well-oiled business strategies from my new hometown just outside of Nashville, where the pace is slower, but the revenue still runs high. With over two decades building businesses, some wildly successful others can gloriously messy.
Every step has been fueled by a love of real strategy and real results. This isn't about side gigs, and it's definitely not about hustle culture. This is about optimization and building revenue, generating machines designed to make your life and your business feel effortless. After $92 million in sales of the last eight years while raising four [00:02:00] little ones and building it all as a.
Wholepreneur. I've created systems that scale and a business that supports my life, not steals from it. From summers in Europe to road trips across the United States, being present with my family is the greatest win. And everything I've learned to make that possible is now inside the effortless closing method.
The framework behind this podcast, and here's the best part, you can build the same kind of business, the kind that funds your lifestyle, honors your values, and. Feels like you. This show is for the woman who's already doing well, but is ready to simplify the work, amplify her income, and finally build a business that flows with her life.
Every episode brings sharp strategy, honest insights, and real world tools to help you grow your business and enjoy your life in the process. We don't just grow your business, we optimize it to feel effortless. This is the Effortless Closing podcast.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Welcome everybody. I have Tracy Beavers with me today, and [00:03:00] we are gonna talk about email list, list growth. We're gonna throw some Facebook in there and a whole lot of good stuff. Tracy, I'm so excited to have you here. Welcome. Tell us a little bit about what you do.
Tracy Beavers: So I am a business and sales coach.
I am also, I should back up and say I am a wife, mom to two young adults, a dog mom. I'm from Little Rock, Arkansas, and as a business and sales coach, my forte my absolute jam. I. Is helping online entrepreneurs, so coaches, course creators and consultants, ramp up their visibility in the online space to the point where their audience says, Christina, I see you everywhere, but you're not online 24 7.
It's just the strategies that I teach you that make you look like you are, and all of that visibility leading to your email list growth, and also to having authentic conversations in the dms. 'cause when we build those relationships, that's where the conversions start to happen.
Christina Kokologiannakis: And I love that. So let's start, I think with just the email list, we'll start there because I definitely wanna be getting to the point where we're seeing [00:04:00] everywhere, because I talk about that all the time, like how important that is.
But we'll start with the email list, because I'm gonna tell you. Like, I just had a conversation with my husband, which I was just laughing so hard afterwards. He is like, what? Email? Email's dead. Nobody checks emails. And I'm like, what are you talking about? like you're in the tech space at a, corporate job.
Yeah. It was like, no, no, no. You have no clue. So let's talk about emails. Tell us a little bit about why email is so important.
Tracy Beavers: It is more important than ever. I love that you had this conversation with your husband. Email is not dead. it's like people say Facebook groups are dead. They're not. It's the strategies people are using that are old and tired and aren't working anymore.
But our email lists are more important than ever. TikTok is a prime example. I pray that all the people making a lot of money on TikTok are actually building an email list, because when TikTok disappeared, my heart hurt because there were so many people making their livelihood. That was their full-time job.
And I literally worried about them. I was like, oh, [00:05:00] my stars, there goes their income if they don't have a way to reach their audience. And so even though I'm not on, I'm not really on TikTok. I have a TikTok channel and I tried to do it for a little bit and it wasn't my jam and I didn't like it, so I quit.
But Facebook is my total jam. so I'm on Facebook. LinkedIn is my secondary. Instagram is a distant third. But the reality is. I don't control any of those platforms. I don't own them. Nobody knows what the algorithm is doing from day to day. I don't even think the people that are in charge of the algorithm know what the algorithm's doing.
There's a thousand different versions of these social media platforms at any given time. At least I know that's true for Facebook. So your version of Facebook may be completely different than than mine, which you and I discussed makes absolute zero sense, but whatever. So there's so much unpredictability now, so, so people might be saying, well then why do we use social media at all?
Well, unfortunately we have to. We have to, if we are a smart business, every business, regardless of brick and mortar, product, service, whatever, if you're not online, you're missing out. Yeah. And so we've gotta be on the social media platforms, but we [00:06:00] have to control, try to get some more control over our business growth and our longevity.
And that's where the email list comes in, because the email list is actually one of the only things you own as an online business owner. And you've got all those people right there. Captured so that when Facebook and Instagram decide to get weird or go dark like they did two years ago. Mm-hmm. For 36 hours, that was interesting 'cause I'm in the Meta Leader Leaders Network and when the lights came back on and we were all back online, what really broke my heart was so many small business owners in that group.
Did not have an email list and they lost thousands of dollars versus our friend Amy Porterfield, who has an email list and she didn't sweat it. She sent a couple of emails about an offer she had and she made $14,000. And I was like, that's the person I wanna be. You know what I, I mean, I don't wanna be the $0 girl.
I wanna be the one that no matter what these platform owners decide to do. I know I can sustain my business. I know I [00:07:00] still have a way to contact Christina and have a conversation with her.
Christina Kokologiannakis: And it's more like they're the tool. I think people forget. They're the tool. They're a tool. Yeah. Correct. And I just have.
A YouTube video that came out this morning about it, and it was like, it really talked about, wait a minute, are we stepping too far back from sales? Yes. And are we too busy with these tools and systems and things? Mm-hmm. And we're forgetting about making actual sales. Correct. And so, so many people are like, oh, you have to be on Instagram, TikTok, whatever it is.
And the funny thing is, I get so many of my clients who come in and they're like. Which one should I be on? Am I on all of them? Yeah. And I'm like, I'm not on all of them. Uhhuh. Like LinkedIn is one that I need to get on more and I know that, but like I'm just on Instagram, right? Facebook and my podcast.
And that's where I'm like, okay, I just need that to be enough. Yeah. And when they're good enough, I can expand out to LinkedIn. I can expand somewhere else. TikTok will never be my thing. Nope. Because I'm not that person. I'm I'm, I'm just not. I'm fun. People are like, you're funny. And I'm [00:08:00] like, I don't feel like I'm fine.
I'm kind of serious. So like, I'm like, I'm not gonna do that. But like Instagram works because it's more people who are, my kind of clients are on there and I like to showcase. A little bit more things, so that works. But, okay. So we have these platforms, which I call 'em like they're the breadcrumbs. Mm-hmm.
This is where you get the people in, you draw them to you. Yep. So how then if the email list is so important, how do we get people from moving from our social mm-hmm. Onto our email list? Or is it, there's some step that maybe I'm not thinking of. Where, hey, you do this and you get your list growing. Maybe you don't have to do as much here on the social.
So what are your thoughts? Yeah,
Tracy Beavers: no, that's a great question. And in my, I have an eight week group coaching program where I teach over 10 organic list growth strategies that get the visibility and the list growth and the leads happening automatically every day. I don't teach paid ads 'cause they were a fail for me.
Mm-hmm. I know they're a great thing for some people, but I, I'm not gonna touch 'em again. I just can't do it. And. Lead magnets are great. [00:09:00] So, but there's so many other things we can do to grow our email list. So, at a minimum, people do wanna have a couple of free lead magnets that are juicy, that are sexy, that are something their audience really wants.
And when we go on social media, whether we're going live or we're doing a reel, or we're making a post, whatever it is, we need to have a call to action that either it asks for engagement. To get the algorithm favor and your, your content being engaged upon, and that makes the algorithm happy or, and or list growth.
And so at a very basic level. If you've got an awesome free lead magnet, like one of mine that's really highly converting is the social media made easy guide it's a 30 minute exercise where you're gonna map out 90 days of social media content topics. And so I could go live, I could talk about that.
I could talk about how it saved my bacon when I was building this alongside my corporate job. And then I could give a call to action of, if you really wanna know more about this and you wanna do the exercise, go to [00:10:00] tracy beavers.com/social.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yep.
Tracy Beavers: So at a minimum, you wanna give a call to action that leads to your email list.
Now, that call to action, that doesn't have to necessarily be a freebie if you have other things in your pocket like I do, so like one of my favorite calls to action is my free Facebook group, and I teach Facebook groups as a business growth strategy. Facebook groups are not dead. People will say that to me all the time.
Like, no, they're not. No, they're not. It's just you don't know how to use the, the strategies to grow it. My Facebook group is my largest list growth strategy. My group grows and my list grows by hundreds of people every single month. 85 to 90% of those people I've never invited. I've never met. I, and I have to ask them, how did we connect?
Yeah. And so the so what, but by the way, I have the membership entry questions set up for the free group. That's how that grows my list. So a call to action when I go live could be, Hey, did you know I've got an awesome free group where you can promote your stuff anytime? It's called, be a confident Entrepreneur, entrepreneur, da, da, da, da.
And I tell 'em about it. They come to join my group. [00:11:00] They get on my email list. But, and then also you could use a podcast. A podcast is a great strategy. What you and I are doing right now, collaborating, networking, all that stuff that grows your list also. So there's lots of different ways to grow your list.
We just have to pick out the ones that feel authentic to you and make a plan to stay consistent with those strategies. Day in, day out, week in, week out. Whether we feel like it or not. Like the other day, I didn't feel like following up on podcasts that I had sent a guest pitch to. I didn't, didn't wanna do it, and I hold, I told myself, Tracy Beavers.
Stop it, you know? 'cause I was telling myself, oh, if they wanted me, they would've reached back. Right? Right. Yes. No, no. And I teach this, I teach a follow up strategy. Right. And I, so I was like, what would you say to your, say to yourself as a coach? And I'm like, I would tell myself to put my big girl pants on, hold my nose, and go follow up with those people.
So, you know, sometimes we have to do things that I don't always wanna create social media [00:12:00] content. I don't always wanna go live.
But I'm willing to do the things that need to be done to grow my business.
Christina Kokologiannakis: So what a lot of people don't understand
is the algorithms Yeah. They are hungry for consistency. Yes.
And so when, so like you look at my YouTube channel, I started being consistent about 25 weeks ago. Mm-hmm. And I kind of did some things in the past, and then I did really relate to what I was doing. So I, I took those, I just hid them and then I did some other things, but I was still figuring out my way and like what I really wanna talk about.
Yeah. So from 26 weeks ago, I had. When I first started this, I had 50 subscribers on YouTube. In 26 weeks, I'm up to 208 or nine. Right. Love it. Yes. And it's because I am consistently posting. Yes. Now, it's not just I'm consistently posting one a week. It's that I'm consistently posting on the same day and at the same time.
Tracy Beavers: Yeah.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Right. And now I'm running shorts. And I'm doing shorts now. I've only been doing that for two weeks, and they have gotten me a handful of [00:13:00] subscribers too. Love it. But they're on the same day, same time. I set them up and I run. So all these algorithms, everything, they want consistency. They wanna see you showing up.
And I'm gonna tell everybody who's listening the secret. And you know this, I mean, Tracy, we've been friends for so long. Yeah. But it's like we both know this. Right. If you're not showing up and you're not being consistent in your business, whatever it is. Mm-hmm. It doesn't work. And I have a quote from Russell Brunson on my wall where it's like, if you're consistent in, he says, one platform.
Like if you're consistent in one platform for one year. You'll never have to worry about money again. I agree so much and I, we look at it like if you're just consistent in your activities that move the needle forward every day for one year, you never have to worry about money. And that is so true.
Tracy Beavers: So I love this.
I totally agree. Totally. Because that's what I did when I was building this business alongside my full-time corporate job and busy kids and all that jazz. I couldn't be on all the platforms. There was no way. No. And so I chose Facebook because Instagram was weird to me. I, I hadn't been [00:14:00] on it. I didn't use it.
I didn't know how to use it. LinkedIn back then was different where you went to go get a job? Yes. It's not what it's now. Yes. So I started with Facebook, but he is absolutely right. I built a multi-six figure business on Facebook with all organic strategies. Yeah, you can do it. It can be done.
Christina Kokologiannakis: It works. And so let's talk a little bit about, like, we talked about ads and stuff.
Yeah. Because I do run ads, I find if I'm running ads to a lead magnet mm-hmm. They work exceptionally well. And my dollar per click is really low. Or the value, like the price per click is really low. So I like it. But I will tell you this, it's really easy to spend $3,000 in one week on ads. Right, right.
To get three, 400 people to fill up something. Yeah. And so I tell people I don't do it all the time anymore because it's a lot of money that goes out and I may not see the return for a year. Right. So. Ads are great, but I agree with you. It's not for everyone, and I don't think you should start in ads if you don't have something proven because you can spend a lot of money in ads [00:15:00] figuring it out, and you're looking at your bank account going, well, I just spent $25,000 and I have no money coming in.
So let's go a little bit deeper into the lead magnets, building out the list. We talked about the free Facebook group, right? Mm-hmm. And then, so you talked about, I, because I know I'm in your group but we talked about the questions. So how are you questions if you wanna share how are kind of set up to get people?
'cause I, I can hear my listeners saying, okay, I get that. But how do I Get people to sign up for my
list.
Tracy Beavers: For sure. Are you talking about the membership entry questions for a free Facebook group, that
Christina Kokologiannakis: one in other places, and how you're kind of sneaking it in because I, I know you, and I've been with you for a long time.
It's like, by the way, when, when you're looking at her stuff, it's not like, sign up here or sign up here. It's, it's nothing like that. It's, it's very soft. It's like, if you feel like you're ready here, or Hey, next step is. Sign up for my email list. It's never an in your face sales pitch of Come to my list, which people don't like anyways.
Right. So I want you to talk a little bit more about that. [00:16:00]
Tracy Beavers: Yeah, you betcha. So, free Facebook groups, they really make me happy. 'cause there's so much you can do with them. Yeah. Everybody's already on the platform regardless of how they feel about it. So, you can really build a community and that's what I did.
I couldn't find a group that I liked when I first started building this business and I was like, well, crap, I'll just build what I want. So I did. So when you come to my free group, be a confident entrepreneur. Facebook gives you three questions, so I teach my clients and students to maximize all three questions.
The first question is for list growth and the way you write that question, you can still be GDPR compliant in case you have audience members that are over in Germany, the uk, where they take that stuff really seriously. So the way I write it is it's, and I, and I don't remember off the top of my head, I'm just gonna wing it.
But it says something like, what email address did you use? To grab my social media guide to create 90 days of content topics in only 30 minutes. Didn't grab it. No worries. Put your email here and I'll send it to you. Unsubscribe anytime. Now my GDPR people said, you know what, I think I need to take that a step [00:17:00] further.
They wanna use question two to reiterate. When you gave me your email address, you agreed to be on my list. You can unsubscribe anytime, say yes, and we will send you the freebie. And that just sort of solidifies the fact that they said yes. And you can screenshot that and save it if you need to for compliant.
Yep.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yeah,
Tracy Beavers: but for me, 'cause I'm in the US I really don't worry about that too much. So that first question is for list growth. And the second question I use for promotion wherever we are in the promotional calendar. So I have that eight week group coaching program, business visibility made easy when we are in launch.
And I'm doing my live masterclasses. That second question is gonna say something like something about, would you like to come join the masterclass? Here's what it's about. Here's what's in it for you. So, I don't know, I can't remember exactly. Yeah. And then I, and then I say say, say yes and I'll send you the link.
So they'll say yes or no. When I, when I masterclasses are over, that changes to the doors to business visibility made easier or open, say yes and I'll send you information about it. When the cart closes, it changes [00:18:00] to wait list. Okay. So that's how I use that second question. And the third question we wanna use for market research, and this is what, this is so fun because first of all, I wanna make sure that people that are joining my group are actually online entrepreneurs.
'cause there's a lot of spammy people out there. There's a lot of people doing some stuff. I don't want 'em in my group. I mean, that sounds bad, but that's the way it is. It's true. Yeah. And so I'll say something like tell me about, you know, let's see. Tell us about your business, who you are, who you serve, and what's one thing you're working on in the next three to six months?
And I like to phrase it that way, rather than asking 'em, what's your biggest struggle? 'cause nobody wants to talk about their struggles. But if I say, what is on your, on your plate for the next three to six months, that tells me what they're interested in, which is also the, it could also be the struggle.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yeah.
Tracy Beavers: So that's how I use those membership entry questions. Now there are some people who will not answer them. And people ask me like, do they still get to come into your group? And it depends. The answer is, it depends if I can see when I'm hovering [00:19:00] over your, uh, request to join, I can see all the groups that you and I have in common.
Mm-hmm. If I can see that you're coming to me from a group like Momentum or another free group that you and I are connected, and I can see that connection where I'm like, oh, okay. Christina is a course creator. We have this in common. This is Okay, I'll go ahead and let you in. Yeah. I'm gonna DM ev, I DM everybody that joins my group to open up the DM conversations and uncover needs that leads to sales.
Yep. But in the DM I'm gonna say, did we meet in the momentum group? Or how did we connect? And just open up that conversation and make sure that I know where you came from, because I'm confident with the content that I posted in that group. At some stage, you'll get on my list. But I'm not real worried about it.
Right. Then as long as I can see where you came from and that we've got that in common.
Christina Kokologiannakis: And I love that because again, it doesn't need to be salesy. I tell people all the time, yeah. Like, okay, I get sold to, I, I have to tell you, like people just DM me and like, oh, I'll help you do this, or, oh, will you buy this?
And I'm like, I don't know. You and I get text messages, I get [00:20:00] emails and I'm like, guys. This is like me literally standing on the street being like, yeah, I'll help you with your core stuff. Like Exactly. It's like, how do you know the person walking next to you, like is that person You don't.
Yeah. Yeah. And so I teach about finding your people and drawing them to you. Yes. So that you are getting people coming in already ready. Attraction marketing atra. Yep. And so, like in my other business, I just had two people call me out of the blue randomly and they were like, we wanna work with you.
And I'm like, awesome. Like how'd you find me? Like, like they were like, oh, someone so well told me about you. And we were like, we just have to work with you. I'm like, okay. And that's my other business. And even for what I do on the coaching side, I'm getting people all the time now who are just like, I love what you do.
Like they don't even like say what you do anymore. It's just like, I love what you do. Right. So I think we should transition into my favorite topic about being seen everywhere without having to be everywhere. Because I'm gonna tell you, it is taught out there in the world. That you have to [00:21:00] work, work, work, work harder, harder, harder, more leads, do more.
And then eventually you'll make some money. And I'm telling people, no, that is not the way it is. It's being very strategic on how you do it. It's making it perceived that you're everywhere. Yep. Having that perception is huge. So let's talk more about it.
Tracy Beavers: Yeah. And what's cool is my students tell me I'll never forget this, one of my students, Rita, is amazing.
And I'll never forget when she, said this on an alumni mastermind call, she said. I'm so glad I took your program because I'm working. I'm more visible. People are saying, Rita, I see you everywhere. And she goes, Tracy, I'm working less. And I was like, I love it so much. Makes you so happy. So yeah.
Like a foundational piece of this is the social media content. And back to what you were saying about the algorithm, the algorithm just wants you to be consistent and back to what Russell Brunson says. That is so true. Pick one platform, go all in on it. And let's maximize that before [00:22:00] you think about being on another platform.
So when people say they see me everywhere, it's pretty much because of Facebook, because I have the consistency of the content and I'm not killing myself to create it. Even before I had an assistant, building alongside my corporate job, there was only so much I could do in a week.
So I think I was going live once a week and I think I had two other pieces of content out there. it wasn't spectacular, I'll tell you that. But it was consistent week in, week out. And so then all of that driving to list growth, but then consistency being present. And for me, that's in Facebook groups.
That's in Facebook groups where my ideal clients are hanging out, where potential collaboration partners are hanging out. And I have people say to me, well that sounds like it takes all day. It does not take all day. Yeah. When you have your Facebook personal profile dialed in the way I teach, where it's very easy to see visibly who you are, who you serve, how you serve them, and to land on your email list, then when you go into groups where your ideal clients are hanging out, or your collaboration partners are hanging out, all you have to do is show up and [00:23:00] be of service.
You're not gonna promote anything. You are not gonna try to sell anybody anything. You're not even gonna DM anybody, you know, unless they've invited you to. I. And that's where the magic happens. You are visible in the group a few minutes a day, a few minutes every other day as you have time, and your name is going to start getting out there.
But it takes that consistency, it takes showing up, being of service, letting people say your name. It's no different than when we were networking in person. And you know this because of the real estate market, right? Yeah. Being in real estate. So when you're showing up at the chamber lunch, I.
Every time they have it with your real estate t-shirt or your name tag on that is how people start to see you all the time.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yeah.
Tracy Beavers: You know, then you show up at the rotary and you're there consistently. You're showing up. People are gonna remember you, you're being of service. It's no different in the online space.
We just have to find the pockets of communities where we can be a member and engage.
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Christina Kokologiannakis: I think it's such a good point because I [00:27:00] think a lot of people have forgotten this people first movement, right? Yeah. Yes. And so they have forgotten how to make those relationships, those connections.
Yeah. But online you have to make it feel like you're seen everywhere. Yeah. And the funny thing is, I'll get people who send me stuff and they're like, I love your content, and it's a name similar to mine. But it's not my name and it's not my content. And I'm like, oh, I love it, but it's not my content.
And they're like, oh. Because they see me in their brain. Yeah. They're like, they see me, they hear me. I have people who message me and they're like, I love your podcast. And they go, I listen to it all the time. And they're like, literally, your voice is in my head. Right. I know you're love too. It's so fun.
Right. And then like that's what you want them to do. I always say, you give so much and here's, here's a funny thing. My dad was literally like, why are you sharing exactly what you do? Why are you giving it all away? Like, that's so dumb. how are you gonna make money?
And I was like, dad, I was like, I love you and I know you're trying to protect me. But this is how you grow. Exactly. You give [00:28:00] it all away. And I give it away to people all the time. I'm like, I'm telling you what I do. I'm showing you what I do. Yeah. And then the secret sauce is when you come with me, that's where the magic happens.
Right, exactly.
Tracy Beavers: Yeah. And
Christina Kokologiannakis: so we just have to be there. We have to give good content. Mm-hmm. And we have to make sure we're showing up. So, let's talk a little bit about, can I , do a little bit of LinkedIn with you because I Yeah. I'm curious to kind of see how are you using, because Okay.
LinkedIn, I have a huge following, but that was for my corporate days, a long time ago. Yeah. And back then with LinkedIn, it was really just finding a job. People were just posting, I got a new job, I'm doing this, I'm doing that. Mm-hmm. But I've been hearing the rumbles that LinkedIn has changed. People are using it more.
I think Amy's talking about it too. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So like, what are you doing with LinkedIn?
Tracy Beavers: Yeah, that's a great question. And, and listen, disclaimer, I am not a LinkedIn expert, like I am a Facebook expert. But I'm learning, and you're correct, LinkedIn has changed. When I started this business seven years ago, was a place to go get recruited.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Mm-hmm. You know,
Tracy Beavers: like, you know, if you even stuck your toe over there, [00:29:00] somebody was sending you a dm, one of you to come interview. Yep. And so last summer was when we decided to get serious about LinkedIn because one of my students, Beverly Smith came into my program. And she is on LinkedIn and she should be because she's a career coach.
Mm-hmm. And that's where her ideal clients are. Now, they're also on Facebook, but Facebook is her secondary. LinkedIn is her primary. But she took every strategy I teach and she went over to LinkedIn and she rocked the house. And by the time week six of our program came along, she had people buying her highest ticket item.
And I was like, okay, Beverly Smith, you gotta inform all of us how to use LinkedIn. So we did some training with her last summer about how to max out your profile. And I still will say you have to have it lead to your email list in some way. Mm-hmm. That's the benefit of it. Yeah. In the featured section, you wanna take advantage of that.
That's where you can, , pin a post, kinda like you can do on your Facebook. Mm-hmm. Personal profile in your Facebook business page to something that leads to your email list as well. On LinkedIn, the content is a little bit different, and this is what I'm learning. Like [00:30:00] for example, you can go look at some of my posts on LinkedIn.
One of the things that people do on LinkedIn that I think is really cool, and I, maybe I should start doing it on Facebook, I don't know, but after you have the regular post, there's like a little dot, dot, dot, dot, dot line, and then underneath that is a short bio. Hi, I am Tracy Beavers. I do X, Y, and Z. I help X do Y so they can Z.
Mm-hmm. So on every post that little bio is there. Hmm. And I'm thinking, well, that's kind of smart. Maybe I should do that on Facebook. I don't know, maybe I should start a trend on Facebook. You should. So there, so you definitely wanna do that. And then my understanding of the content is you wanna be more positioning yourself more as a thought leader.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Mm-hmm.
Tracy Beavers: Bringing education and bringing knowledge. Having it go to your email list, but not as much as I do on Facebook. So I'm trying to rework my content a little bit. But what we literally, what we do, whatever you see on in Instagram this week. Yeah, we're putting on LinkedIn next week. Okay. I mean, we're just.
Repurposing the content. So whatever you put on one platform
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yeah.
Tracy Beavers: You know, until you learn [00:31:00] LinkedIn and, and what posts resonate and all that jazz, I would just repurpose your content, put it out there. And you'll wanna do like LinkedIn newsletters, which is basically like a blog my assistant takes the blogs that we've had from the past.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Mm-hmm.
Tracy Beavers: And she asks, , AI to rewrite it and do a LinkedIn newsletter format, and then we make a graphic and we go repurpose it over there. , But then , this is the same regardless of platform, relationship, building and connections. Yes. So wherever you are, whether it's Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, wherever, when somebody likes hearts, comments, that is to me an invitation for me to go to the dms.
Send you a connect request or a friend request and then say, Christina, thank you so much for commenting on my post. I help XD, Y so they can ZI see that you kind of do the same work. Wonder if we could connect to support each other and collaborate. Because a collaboration, you're not gonna buy anything from me.
But this , collaboration we're doing right now is gonna grow both of our audiences because , I'm talking to your audience right [00:32:00] now but I'm gonna showcase this episode when it comes out. Yeah. And so I'm gonna share it with my audience. That DM conversation could lead to any number of places in your business.
So that's why it's important to have them. And if somebody hearts something or likes something, I'm gonna say, Christina, thank you so much for the love on my post. And then I'm gonna say, I help X do Y. So they can see, you know, I see that you do similar work. How could we support each other? Or if it's somebody that looks like they could be a potential client, I'm just gonna ask them about their business.
Yeah. I'm just gonna be like, Hey, I see that you help authors finish their books. How long have you been doing that? And see where I can uncover some needs. Is there a person I could connect them with that they would be super appreciative of? Maybe they wanna be a client, maybe they don't.
But if I don't have the conversation and build a relationship, I'm never gonna know. And this is what made me successful in sales, and I'm sure it's what made you successful in sales too, in real estate because it's not about the sale. It's not about the transaction, it's about building the [00:33:00] relationship with the other human being and forging that common ground where you can see where in my life or in my business would this person fit in?
Yeah, they may be a referral partner. They may wanna be a, a guest on my podcast. They may have a podcast for me. I mean, we just never know. So regardless of platform, it's super important to not only pull people off through attraction marketing and get 'em onto your list, but also have those DM conversations where you can really forge a connection.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yeah. And it's like, you know, all of them have it. I mean, Instagram has the dms. Yep. Even now, YouTube, you know, people are doing comments and they have the community on YouTube. Like everyone's realizing these platforms are like. We wanna build a community. Yes. We need the people to stay on the platform.
Right? Yeah. Yeah. And so I know that is really, really important. Let's talk a little bit about team, because, and be honest, like we're, we're gonna open up the hood, we're gonna look at it all because the listeners, like, I want my listeners to understand, like, I don't have a huge team. Right. E even in my coaching [00:34:00] business is like exploding, right?
Even in the real estate side, I have nobody, I'm, I'm a solo person and I make a high six figure income off of 15 hours, well, less than 15 hours a week now. Nice. Just in the real estate side. Now on the coaching side, I'm doing phenomenal and I have a really small team compared to what most people have. So talk about that because I think in their mind right now they're thinking.
Okay, Tracy, this is great, but like I, I'm an only person and like, well, I have personally, I have four kids and my listeners know that. Yeah. So it's like I have four kids. I'm running all the stuff. I'm still with them. I don't have a nanny or a house manager or any of that stuff. So how do you get it all done?
So, Tracy, tell us how your life kind of works and what it looks like
?: with your team.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Sure.
Tracy Beavers: I'd love to, and here's what I want 'em to know. I was a solopreneur for several years building alongside my corporate job when I was finally able to exit that job and be fully intentional on building the online business in my second full year of business by myself with a small list [00:35:00] and a small social media following, I'm, I busted through six figures.
That's
?: awesome.
Tracy Beavers: So you do not have to have a big anything. You don't have to have a big team. You don't have to have a big email list. You don't have to have a big Instagram following. All of that's just vanity. Yeah. So my team is lean 'cause I'm, I'm watching my profit margin just like everybody else.
But I do invest in things that are gonna save me time, which saves me money and saves my energy. So like, one of the first people I hired was an assistant to help me with my social media content. 'cause I have my free Facebook group. And then when I am in my eight week group coaching program, we have a student only, private student, only Facebook group.
And then after the eight weeks, they can go into the Alumni Mastermind. We have a private FA, alum only Facebook group for that. So she helps me manage all that content. Plus she helps make sure that I am still showing up on Instagram and LinkedIn with content. If I didn't have her, I probably wouldn't be there because it, Facebook would just be it.
So she helps me with all that stuff [00:36:00] and every now and then she'll write an email that I needed her to write. She also follows up with guests that have been on my show or gone live with me. You know, a lot of admin stuff. And so then my pod, this is really fun. My podcast manager is my son Jack. Ah, I love it.
Yeah, he's, I roped him in last summer. It was kind of funny. He's just turned 22, so bless his heart when he thought he went to college, he thought he was gonna leave his mom behind. Well, no, I am in his ears as he is editing the podcast. And it's really fun. Sometimes I'll start off and go, hi Jack.
Mom loves you. And he's like, stop doing that. I have to edit it out.
?: I
Tracy Beavers: love it. Anyway, that's been really fun. And you know, I do pay him, but it's not a lot because it's like I'm already paying a cell phone bill. Yeah. I'm already paying for some of his college stuff. I'm putting money into his college fund, so he has it and then I'll throw him, you know, a co a hundred bucks or so on top of that.
Yeah.
?: Yeah.
Tracy Beavers: But he's getting a really great skillset and he's actually started to work for other podcasters, which is exciting. See, that's awesome. I love that. Yeah, it's very fun. And then I have a podcast launch, not a podcast launch, a project launch [00:37:00] manager, uh, Shannon Gaither. I don't know if you know her from Momentum.
She's a Kajabi expert. She's been my Kajabi person for a few years, and when I'm in launch, she takes all the stuff and plugs it all into Kajabi. The live masterclass promos, the, the project broadcast, the A event, the crap that I cannot stand to do.
Christina Kokologiannakis: It's so mu It's so much stuff. It is so much stuff. I have such Oh, much
Tracy Beavers: it's, oh my God, it's so much stuff.
So each launch she's, you know, I pay her to do that. Yeah. And then I recently hired a gal and I'm not really sure yet what to call her. Okay. I keep, like, I'm calling her an integrator or a strategist or an operations manager. But basically she's a high level person that's looking at all the facets of my business.
Mm-hmm. And helping me discern. What to keep, what to change. Pockets of opportunity that I can't see.
?: Yeah.
Tracy Beavers: She's not like a coach. She's more like, she's like, she's looking at my p and l right now. She's like,
Christina Kokologiannakis: it's like, it's like an integrator. I, I feel like that would be more integrated. 'cause you're the visionary.
And I'm the visionary too. And my problem is [00:38:00] we have the big vision. We can see so much. The hard part is breaking it down to see the little things. Yeah. And sometimes we miss that. Yeah. And so having a person, and I think of them an is as an integrator because they take our vision. Yeah. And they go through everything and make it work.
And that's what I love one a while ago, but they left me, so I'm like, I need to hire a new one. But I just, I don't wanna deal with it right now, but I eventually will get back. 'cause they're critical.
Tracy Beavers: They are. I, I just, that's exactly what she's doing. I like, I have two fresh ideas that I wanna execute on this summer, but I don't want to do the execution myself.
I basically wanna hand the idea to somebody and go, Hey, here's my big idea. Can you go like, here's the ingredients for the casserole. Can you go make the casserole? You know, or here's the recipe or here's the idea. Go to the
Christina Kokologiannakis: store and buy the stuff. Well, people think these, okay, so people think like the Amy Porterfield, the Colin boy.
They think all these people are sitting here doing this. They are not. They're the visionaries, right? They're thinking of things and then they have those integrators [00:39:00] who are, are kind of watching everybody on top, or they manage all the other people. It depends how they set it up. But they're the ones who go in and say, this is how we're gonna do all this.
This is their idea. This is what we have to do to make it happen. Here's how we're gonna do it. And then the visionary is just running the parts that they need to do. Right, exactly. Because if Exactly, you were running every single part, and I know I have people on here who are, you only have so much time and you burn out quick, right?
So it's like how can we be mean and lean about it? And so like for a lot of my listeners, if they already have the va, maybe the next step, like for me. I had to help, but I was doing all my podcast edits on my own. I was doing my YouTube edits on my own. Oh my gosh. And I was writing my own scripts and I was like, holy cow.
Everything. Yes. And my husband literally was like, I don't care if you make $7 million a year. I want my wife back. He's like my fifth child. 'cause my children want me all day long. And then when the children are in bed, my husband wants my attention, he wants to talk to me, he wants to do stuff.
He wants to like just be [00:40:00] with me. And it was like every day, all day I was trying to do it. And so when I hired someone to edit all that stuff for me mm-hmm. That was like, it just took so much time off my plate. I'm like, that was amazing. Yeah. I was like the best hire that I had and I totally, I didn't need a ton of other help.
Right. Yeah. And so I'm working on a new hire where they're gonna come in on my business with a lot of the email stuff, which we're gonna talk about in a minute. Yeah. Because I want to really get my email list honed in and working. Yeah. So let's talk about email. So. Okay. All right. So email is one of those nasty beasts because just because you have people on your email doesn't mean they're opening it doesn't mean they're seeing it.
Yeah. Right. So we have open rates, we have all sorts of stuff going on. Something I'm looking to do in my business is taking my email list. Segregating it more. Yes. Taking the people who are opening my emails and doing special emails just to them more. Mm-hmm. Then taking the people who aren't opening the emails and [00:41:00] saying a special like email series to them saying, Hey, why are you not opening it?
Do you like this content instead? And then I'm also going to be running my list through some of these checkers. Mm-hmm. Where they're gonna see, do I have a lot of spammy emails? Yeah. Do I have any traps in my emails? All that good stuff. Right. So let's talk about that more.
Tracy Beavers: Okay. So I'm, but I, I will throw out, I'm not an email expert, but I know enough to be dangerous.
Yes.
Christina Kokologiannakis: And I love it. That's, that's where we all are, right?
Tracy Beavers: Yeah. And so, yeah, you totally wanna, uh, scrub the list. You wanna keep it healthy. If people, so I think it surprises people to learn that my list hovers between thirty five hundred and forty five hundred at any given time, and I have a, an over six figure a year business.
Yeah. You can do that if you have a good quality list. Yes. And so when people are emailing, they think, they think they've like it, they think they've gotta write it Like the church bulletin.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yeah.
Tracy Beavers: And I'm like, no, that's boring. It's gross. Nobody wants [00:42:00] that. Yeah. They want you. And so I, I like to remind my students that I want you to write the email to that one person like we are in the coffee shop.
So that you feel like when you own it, open it. I am talking to you. And sharing a little bit about my personality, a little bit about my personal life. Not everything. Nobody needs to know all the stuff. And then finding fun ways to get them to reply back. That's where your email deliverability is gonna go up.
Also, your open rates will go up because people will be curious to see what you're gonna say next. Yeah, so I've been playing around a lot with that this year and it's been really fun finding unique ways to get people to reply back. That's been really great. But yeah. Just keep the list clean. You don't want people in there that are, are not opening.
You don't want bot accounts. That's yes. Not cool. Yeah. Are you
Christina Kokologiannakis: doing anything fun? So like, I listen to a lot of people and like, again, I'm not an email expert, but I know a lot of stuff. It's just having time to execute it all. Just like the hardest part. So are you [00:43:00] taking and are you looking? 'cause the whole thing, the way I see it in my brain is like, okay.
You get the, the Instagram, you get the social media. That's your breadcrumbs. That's getting people to see you, to know you. Then you can invite them to your list. You get them on your list. It's like, okay, well you have 'em on your list. So I just emailing them once a day. Am I just, you know, what am I sending content wise?
Yeah. Yeah. It's, you're in that app, right? Yeah. Yeah. Why don't we do that real quick? Go ahead and answer that one. Yeah, yeah,
Tracy Beavers: for sure. So I am all about ease and repurposing. Yeah. So, one of the strategies I teach is to create one regular piece of weekly content. And everything else you need for the week is born off of that.
So mine is my live script. I write that. Then AI helps me write some social media posts based on that, that I can use my email to my list. Based on that, yes, because I did not, when I first started this, you've heard me say this five times already on this podcast, I did not have a lot of time and I had to be fast about what I was doing, and so when I first started emailing my list, it was on Tuesday and it was, Hey, Christina, I'm sitting here in my mismatched pajamas, [00:44:00] drinking my coffee, listening to the birds chirp, trying to get ready for this.
Freaking corporate job that drives me crazy. But I wanted to email you really fast and tell you, this is what I'm gonna talk about on Thursday when I go live. I'm gonna give you X, Y, Z, and here's the link to join me, and I sure hope to see you. That's all I had time for, but what was I gonna say?
Live. I crafted an email about it, and I still use that to this day. Now, I've added a Thursday email that goes out about. 30 minutes before I go live and it's like, come join me in 28 minutes. Here's what I'm gonna talk about. Here's the link to join me live. And then I'll email you on Friday and say, did you miss the yesterday's live training where I gave you all the golden nuggets about how you can make a million dollars on Facebook?
I'm, I'm just kidding. That's not an actual topic. Yeah. But it gets people's attention. Yeah. And then I'll say, if you missed it, here's the replay pa my replay page from my website that's got. All the last few weeks replays on it, binge to your heart's content, and then I figure out a great way to get 'em to reply back and that's how I build the relationships.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yeah. Do you just do, are you just doing one? I just make [00:45:00] it easy. Yeah. Are you just doing one, so I know we're doing two emails, but are you just doing an email about the lives? Are you doing emails about your podcasts? Are you doing other emails or is it really just Sometimes. Okay.
Tracy Beavers: Sometimes, but the, the, the base format is the Tuesday.
Here's what I'm gonna talk about. But also the PS and the PPS are part of the most read parts of the email, the subject line, the Ps and the PPS. So in the PS is where I might promote something, okay? So that I don't have to send out a standalone email about the promotion, or I might feature my podcast.
In the PS or my YouTube channel. But sometimes I do send out a separate email. So like if I have agreed to be in an affiliate promotion mm-hmm. And agreed to send out a couple of emails, obviously I need to send those out solo and I'll do those usually on a Sunday or a Monday. So, 'cause I don't wanna hit people's inbox every day.
But yeah, that's my basic format is
Christina Kokologiannakis: Tuesday, Thursday, Friday. I love that. Like, you know, right now I'm doing too. I do. Monday and Wednesday, well, it's sometimes they come up Thursday. [00:46:00] Right. You know, depending on the team and stuff. Yeah. Right. And how we're gonna get out. But I kind of am like, people open 'em, but they don't always click to them.
They're not always like, you know, moving. 'cause it's like, Hey, I have my podcast episode. Come out, come listen to it. Hey, I have my YouTube. Come listen to it. And I'm like. I wonder if that's getting old. Like they already subscribe. They already know it's coming, so I wanna change it up. I know Amy's changed it up and so I'm like, do I wanna do it?
And then there's this other guy I listen to and he's all about email and he's like, oh, I send an email every day. But it depends what list you're on. Like if you're on all my list, I send it every day. And he has a list about so many things that I'm thinking. To me that's a lot like i's on. It's exhausting.
It's exhausting. I'm on someone's list right now and he sends me one. I think every other day. And I was like, Adam, I love you. I know Adam very well. Like I love you too. But I was like, my email so full, I'm like, it's too much. And I do love his emails and I keep 'em because the way he writes 'em, he's so good.
He iss at a really, really, really famous marketer. And so [00:47:00] like the way he writes his emails, I'm like, they're so good. But it's a lot. So how do we strike that balance? A lot of like the right, right amount of email because email does work, but I feel like. Email's, one of those things, they can get really oversaturated and it's very, very easy nowadays when someone's getting annoyed with so much email to be like, unsubscribe.
And then you can't get
Tracy Beavers: them back. Yeah, sure. Right. Or they report you to spam. That's fine. Yeah. Yeah. So, so I wanna, I wanna go back for a sec to your question about if you're giving them a link to the podcast and the click through rates, so I know people get all hung up about click through rate. My click through rate has been crap.
It just has, but I think it's because in large part, I don't really give them something to click on. Yeah. Like sometimes I do, I get great clickthrough rates during my promotion period where we're come to the live masterclass, check out BVME, you know, all that stuff. My clickthrough rates go go crazy then, which I guess is good 'cause I'm in launch, but I don't really, this sounds terrible.
I'm, I don't know, people will argue with me, come at me. It's okay. I don't worry about the click through rate. [00:48:00] I'm looking at the open rate to make sure the average stays about the same. Okay. Because it's pro, it might be my fault that I didn't give 'em anything exciting to click on. What I'm trying to do now more than click through rate is reply backs.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Mm.
Tracy Beavers: And so what
you could, you, what you could do is you could say in the ps, did you know that I have a, did you know, uh, let's see. Did you know my latest YouTube video talks about. How you can make a million dollars on Facebook in 30 days. I don't know. I'm just saying something like that, that would grab their attention and you could say, reply back the word million dollars and I'll make sure you get it.
They might reply back and that's really fun. And then that way you've got that reply, your email deliverability.
It
makes the email deliverability Gods happy.
Christina Kokologiannakis: Yes.
Tracy Beavers: And
then you get to have a conversation with that person. Hey Christina, I'm so excited you wanted to have this video here. Let me go grab it.
Here's the link. By the way, the last time we chatted, you said you, you, your daughter was graduating, or I, whatever. If you've, if you've got a conversation opener, is the conversation going again, just like you would in the dms? [00:49:00]
Christina Kokologiannakis: So this one guy I follow what he does. It's really crazy. He's like, I write this email.
It's all about my content and everything, but at the bottom he's like, I love reality tv. Yes. So I like put a thing on reality TV and I talk about like the most random thing he goes, but people will reply back to me about it and they'll literally wanna talk to me and they like, wanna know about stuff.
And so like that's kind of his cool thing. So I'm like, okay, I gotta think about how can I get people more engaged? 'cause emails are great. We're reading the emails, we see 'em, we're like, okay. And we're not always in launch mode. We don't always wanna be, you don't wanna be pitching all the time. Bye bye bye.
'cause people don't wanna see that. Mm-hmm. That's a cool thought too, right? Something fun as the PS of like, Hey, like, like you said, you're, I think you said you had a dog, right? Yeah. And you like, you put down and be like, Hey, my dog. You know? I don't know. Is Roy a dog name? It came to me, but Roy, it's like Roy is running around like doing this today.
Wonder what trouble Roy is gonna get into. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like those are fun things. They're cool little hooks. I think what's happening in our [00:50:00] industry is people are forgetting to be human. Mm-hmm. They're forgetting to show the side of them. That they should, like, I try really hard and show my listeners that I'm not perfect.
Mm-hmm. I struggle. And so that we need to like, make sure that we show who we are. So, yeah. I know we're wrapping this up. Let me ask, how can people find you and what do you have coming up where you could possibly help them?
Tracy Beavers: Yeah, thanks so much for asking. So a great place to find me is on my podcast, is called Create Online Business Success.
And if you love the audio, DM me and let me know. 'cause I always like to share that with Jack. He gets really excited when people say the podcast Sounds good. And then also my free Facebook group is a great place to connect with me. We have over 3,800 online entrepreneurs. You can promote your stuff anytime.
Believe it or not, it's. Not a spam fest, and you can also get help with stuff. If you're stuck on something, there's a member in there, I guarantee you that can help you. It's called be a Confident Entrepreneur, get visible, grow your email list and your income. [00:51:00]
Christina Kokologiannakis: Awesome, and we'll put all the links to everything below so everybody can grab it in the show notes, so don't worry about that.
Tracy, thank you so much for joining me today and talking about all things email and social media, and even throwing in the LinkedIn. I love that so much. Thank you again. I can't wait to have you on again, so we can talk more about all the new stuff and the changes. I hope you all enjoyed this podcast today, and as always, make sure to subscribe and leave me a comment or rate this podcast because it does help the show.
Thank you everyone. We'll see you on the next episode.
