Why I Struggled for So Long to Make Sales

If your business isn’t making you the money you want, and you can’t seem to breakthrough, this could be the most important post you read this YEAR.

Before I did this whole million dollar (and growing!) biz thing, I struggled for years to make the sales I really wanted to, in the way I really wanted.

It turned out – as it so often does – that despite following everything I’d been taught about sales, and about online marketing, I wasn’t tapped in to the real reason people buy.

People don’t buy your stuff because of what you teach them, how great it (or you) looks on paper, because of all of the bonuses you included or because of what they GET.

You wanna know the real reason people buy?

Emotion, right? That’s what we’ve been told, anyway – people make decisions based on emotion so the more emotionally connected they are to what the offer is the greater the likelihood that they will buy.

But actually there’s more to it than that (isn’t there always!), and it’s something that I think will really hit home when you consider how you’re doing ‘selling’. I know it did for me!

So before we talk about the real reason people buy, let’s just define selling. Well … let ME define it for you! Hah. In terms of what I’m talking about with selling I’m NOT referring just to the buying of stuff in exchange for money. I’m talking also – and actually first and foremost – about the buying of YOU and what you stand for in exchange for loyalty, love, belief, etc.

Write this down: people have to buy YOU before they will buy your STUFF!

Now here is the big ‘problem’ with the way we so often put ourselves out there –

We give people the surface version of who we are

And what we believe

With a little bit of depth

But not too much

Because hey! It might scare them, and besides –

They just us to tell them how to DO stuff, right?

And so we talk about our accomplishments

And why we’re qualified

And all of the things we KNOW

And have achieved

And we forget

THAT PEOPLE BUY ON EMOTION

And it’s tough to really emotionally GIVE A FUCK about a person who is essentially a walking and talking “look at me” CV. No matter how pretty their sales page with all of its bullet points and bonuses!

To me this is just perfectly OBVIOUS now, and it’s a key reason I just let it all hang out and show EXACTLY who I am, how I think, what I stand for or don’t, the good, the bad, the ugly – it’s all out there. And as a result of that people either fucking LOVE me or they pretty much can’t stand me.

Good.

It’s deliberate as much as it is pure laziness in the sense that I got sick of having to try and put on a mask in order to show up in my own business.

I got sick of trying so hard.

I got sick of selling stuff I didn’t deeply care about to people I didn’t deeply LOVE.

And also: I got sick of the fact that no matter how polished, presented, and perfectly prepared I was in my business I wasn’t making the money OR the difference I wanted to be and every dollar I did make felt like I’d given blood for.

Have you ever felt frustrated at the fact that even though MAYBE business is starting to work or ‘getting there’ on the surface the truth is that YOU don’t really feel like you’re getting to do what you WANT to do (or, if we’re being honest, what you are CALLED to do) and you realise that in fact you’ve set your entire business up so as it depends on you showing up as some kind of dancing monkey who just gives the people what it (thinks) they want???

Yep … I MAY have experienced feeling this way in the past!

And before we even talk about how to get ’em to BUY (and I’m getting there, but you know how I roll when I write!), there is this:

For me, I always believed in having it all.

I believed I was born to make millions AND impact millions, and that I could DO IT ON THEIR TERMS.

So me as the dancing monkey fitness chick –

And then the dancing monkey business coach –

Who taught boring surface stuff that she herself didn’t truly care about or actuallly believe essential, because that’s what people BUY, right (right?!), who held back on saying what she really thought and believed about business and life, who felt sad that she couldn’t just be who she WANTED to be (primarily, for lack of a better umbrella term, a motivational writer and speaker), well THAT girl?

That girl was never going to be happy with the surface “shiny me” approach anyway.

And that girl?

That girl was never even going to be happy if it made her money!

Because that girl?

That girl has a fucking CALLING.

That girl was born for MORE.

That girl has beliefs that transcend freaking ONLINE MARKETING and teaching people how to DO shit online.

But that girl? Well. That girl – this girl! – can actually teach you some stuff about how to turbocharge your online sales.

But it’s not going to be like you thought it might have been! You can take your sales and marketing map or blueprint idea and tell it to go fuck itself!

Although here is a simple blueprint that works:

People, buy on emotion.

People, buy on connection.

People, oddly enough, connect BEST to other REAL PEOPLE.

A REAL person (although you wouldn’t know it by looking around the ‘net) is not one worrying about ‘presenting’ or ‘packacking’ or ‘positioning’ herself so that please, pretty please, please LIKE me!

A real person is, pretty much, a real person.

Who looks polished online IF THAT’S WHO SHE IS ANYWAY.

Who talks online in the same way she’d talk to her girlfriends.

Who shows UP online as herself – sometimes up, sometimes down, sometimes ranty, sometimes angry, sometimes sad. Not as a freaking stepfordpreneur who’s always having a great fucking day and sharing a wonderful transformative lesson with the underlying theme of BUY MY STUFF AND YOU TOO CAN BE HAPPY AND PERKY ALL THE TIME.

Not that I look around and judge much or anything smile emoticon

But really when I judge, it starts with me.

I look at who I was for so long online –

And who I thought I had to be –

And what I was selling –

And why –

And I see: someone who didn’t believe in her ability to make it based purely off of who she WAS. Someone who tried to give the crowd what they want, because hey! Gotta get those coins chucked in the bucket at the end of the show.

Someone who pushed down –

Ignored –

Ran from –

Her purpose.

Which is to say ran from the stuff she actually gave a damn about, actually believed people deeply NEEDED, actually had pretty much achieved any of her own ‘success’ as a result of, and actually would make the greatest money AND the greatest difference by living in to!

Here’s something you BETTER write down:

You cannot create wealth from a place of the wrong service.

Aka: if you don’t do what you’re meant to do (and you might not fully know what you ARE meant to do but you sure as shit know when you’re doing what you’re NOT, even on some level, and what’s more the only TO know what you’re meant to do is to start doing SOMETHING that comes from within) you won’t make money.

Or a (true, the way you were born for) difference.

It won’t be easy.

Or fun.

And you will continue to feel frustrated, worried and also just SAD that this is how it has to be.

Ah … and here you thought we were just talking sales!

Except we are.

Of course.

Always.

Can I tell you a secret?

THIS IS NOT HOW IT HAS TO BE.

But let’s take the emotion out of it for a moment. Let’s play a little game of imagining it were all about the sale, and where it’s going to come from.

HOW CAN I GET THAT SALE?!

Let’s imagine all you wanted to do was follow a process so you could SELL shit.

Can I tell you a PROCESS gorgeous? lol .. process!

Here is the ‘process’:

A: People buy on emotion, we know that. So as fancy pants or chock full of STUFF as your sales page might be if people do not emotionally HAVE TO HAVE what’s on offer they will very practically NOT GET IT.

B: What you may not realise is that the emotional connection starts with how they feel about YOU and who you are, what you stand for, and what they see of THEMSELVES in you, before they can emotionally connect with your OFFER.

Word to the wise: It’s not about what you’re selling, it’s about YOU. Which is to say it IS about what you’re selling because you’re selling you!

C: The thing that will MOST cause people to TRULY emotionally connect with you?

Is not your shiny CV.

Or how much stuff you know.

Or how long you’ve been doing this.

Or even your testimonials.

Or your glowing silky locks and perfectly polished headshot.

Or what you’ve ‘achieved’.

Or all of the bullet points.
Or bonuses.

It is, quite simply, who you are as a person.

WRITE THIS DOWN:

People act when they are INSPIRED, not when they are swayed.

Boom.

Boom.

Fucking. BOOM.

‪#‎BOOM‬ just for emphasis!

So let me ask you something –

When it comes to how you SELL, what are you selling?

Take a look around sister, and I HOPE not at your own stuff but mayBE! –

Most people are selling look at me and how GOOD I am and how much STUFF I can give you and teach you. ALL THE STUFF SO MUCH STUFF LOOK WHAT GOOD STUFF!

Plus I look great in my headshots and my website is AWESOME so PLEASE LOVE ME AND BUY FROM ME!

Well … people might love you … if they got to see you … really … deeply … in all of your truth … with flaws … vulnerabilities … passion … the REAL stuff … whatever. it. actually. IS.

You want to build a TRIBE?

You want to be a LEADER?

You want people to want to follow you because it’s YOU?

You want to reach some level of FAME in what you do?

Make your FORTUNE?

Create TRUE freedom in the sense that you’re not only making the money and a difference but that you’re doing it by INSPIRING people with what you truly believe and KNOW they NEED in order to ACTUALLY succeed?

Who wouldn’t want all that?!

But apparently not many people do because instead of showing up and LEADING, instead of showing up and speaking the truth, instead of showing up and be REAL people are showing up as another entrepreneur in a box who can – yay! – teach others how to join them in the fucking box!

Isn’t it time to get out of the fucking box? Isn’t it?!

So I guess we brought the emotion back in after all. Whoops.

But let’s take it out just one more time, for a second. We’ll try!

Problem: “How do I make more sales”

Solution: Stop trying to sway or FORCE people and start thinking about how you can inspire them.

And the best way to inspire?

Be you.

Simply.

FULLY.

NO holds barred.

Share EXACTLY what you believe in and know matters because WHAT YOU BELIEVE DOES MATTER AND PEOPLE DO WANT AND NEED IT. People WANT real. They WANT clumsy. They WANT TRUE passion not manufactured passion. They want you to give a damn, and they will BUY from you when you give a damn and ultimately you cannot ever give a damn about stuff you don’t truly give a damn about!

I know. It is SHOCKING.

So what are you going to do about it then?

As you sit down, perhaps sometime soon (it should always be soon!) to work on your next offer, your next creation, your next thing that hopefully will work BIG time?

Are you going to pack it full of stuff – show all the stuff you know – heap ON the stuff so much that SURELY THEY WILL HAVE TO BUY BECAUSE LOOK AT ALL THE STUFF?

Or are you going to give the people what they ACTUALLY want and truly need?

Choice is yours gorgeous.

I know what got me to my million in $$ AND impact.

But the choice – and the journey of course – is yours.

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