“Know what your audience wants and what to give them and then just do it. MVP (Minimum Viable Product), rather than getting stuck in that perfectionism.”
Lyndal Harris | Podcast VA
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So you want to make money while you sleep, but what does that look like in reality?
How can an everyday human go from servicing customers one-to-one to creating one-to-many automated digital passive income products?
Today, we’re talking to a real-life ADPIPer, Lyndal Harris, about how she created her ADPIP empire, the challenges, the wins, and the lessons she has for you.
Tune in to learn:
- Why Lyndal is moving away from one-to-one and developing her ADPIPs in her podcasting business
- Which ADPIPs Lyndal has set up and how they lead into her funnel
- The pros and cons of launching a live course vs. an evergreen course.
- How often you should launch a live course per year
- How Lyndal’s fear of the ‘churn’ has held her back from launching a membership, and how to overcome it
- How Lyndal will position herself to help people past the pod-fade stage of their podcast
- Why imposter syndrome shouldn’t hold you back from making your thing, even if other people are already doing it
- How to push through and make a Minimal Viable Product (MVP)
- How podcasts raise awareness for your business and build relationships with your audience
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And thanks to Sarah Walkerden for the lovely book review:
“Honest, practical and actionable. Have really enjoyed this book due to it’s honest and actionable advice. It gives you a really thorough step-by-step roadmap on what it really takes to successfully build ‘passive’ income streams in your business. No fluff, no outlandish promises, just real, lived experience and guidance. Looking forward to implementing.”
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About Lyndal Harris
Lyndal Harris is a Podcast Mentor and Launch Strategist who helps people launch, grow and monetise their podcast. She founded Podcast VA in 2016, and grew that as a successful consulting agency producing podcasts for business owners, entrepreneurs and creatives. Over the past 9 years, Lyndal has worked with over 250 1:1 clients to launch their show, and through Podcast VA, published thousands of episodes and reached audiences of millions of people internationally.
Fun fact: Lyndal was supposed to be on Romper Room when she was little, but chickened out when she got there with all the cameras.
Connect with Lyndal Harris
- Lyndal Harris’s Website
- Australian Podcasters Collaborative
- Podcast VA on Facebook
- Podcast VA on Instagram
- Lyndal Harris on LinkedIn
Useful resources
Buy the book
Transcript
Kate Toon: So you want to make money while you sleep, but what does that look like in reality? How can an everyday human go from servicing customers one-to-one, to creating one to many automated digital passive income products? Well, today we’re talking to a real life ADPIPer, Lyndal Harris, about how she created her ADPIP empire, the challenges, the wins, and the lessons she has for you.
Kate Toon: Hello, my name is Kate Toon. I’m the founder of Stay Tooned, a busy business owner and a digital product passive income queen. And today I’m talking to Lyndal Harris. Hello Lyndal.
Lyndal Harris: Hello, Kate. How are you?
Kate Toon: I’m good. But this is the first podcast I’ve done in a very long time, so I’m very glad it’s with you, because you’re a lovely, gentle soul. I’ve known Lyndal for a very, very long time, and I know her as the podcast VA, one of my first kind of people I got to know in the podcast world. She’s got a Facebook group and various bits and bobs. We’re gonna talk through that in a minute. But if you don’t know Lyndal, let me tell you who she is. She is a podcast mentor and launch strategist who helps people grow, launch, grow, and monetize their podcast. She founded Podcast VA in 2016 and grew them as a successful consulting agency, producing podcasts for business owners, entrepreneurs, and creatives. Over the last nine years, Lyndal has worked with over 250 one to one clients, how exhausting, to launch their shows through Podcast VA, publish thousands of episodes, and reach audiences for millions of people internationally. Fun fact! Lyndal was supposed to be on Romper Room when she was little, but chickened out when she got there with all the cameras. What’s Romper Room? Is that an Australian thing?
Lyndal Harris: It is, it’s an Australian show that was around in the 70s and 80s for kids and it was so exciting to have been chosen.
Kate Toon: How old were you?
Lyndal Harris: And I turned up, oh about five. four or five, turned up, was really excited and all the lights and the cameras. And I was like, yeah, I’m not going in front of the camera. So I pretty much didn’t go on it.
Kate Toon: Well, that’s why you’re perfect for podcasting.
Lyndal Harris: Exactly.
Kate Toon: Although it’s so annoying when you do a podcast with someone and they’re like, I’m going to video this. And you’re like, seriously, I haven’t even put a bra on. Can you tell me that before? So first tip, if you have a podcast, warn your guests, if you’re going to take photos or use the video, you’ll be happy to know, Lyndal that I’m not using the video so you can pick your nose, you can do whatever you like.So let’s talk about, you know, your adventures. I’m not going to use these questions that we have prepared here because they’re not relevant at all. Let’s talk about your model. So at the moment, you know, 250 one to one clients sounds exhausting. Um, and so you’re working in an agency model. So it’s you and other people servicing clients one to one serial monogamous long term relationships with some short term jobs for others. How’s that working out for you?
Lyndal Harris: Ah, you hit it, you hit the nail on the head. It is tiring. So, uh, look, I’ve absolutely loved doing that for the last nine years. I scaled, I have a team and it’s been amazing, but it’s really interesting that we’re talking now because I am at that stage where I want to look at more ADPIPs and changing how I’m offering my services because the one to one launching model has been quite, uh, tiring, but you know, good and fun. But at the same time, there’s a lot more podcasting people around these days as well, and so it’s really about sort of taking the experience that I’ve gotten over the years and being able to do that for, you know, one to many environment.
Kate Toon: You’re right, you know, because when you started offering this, I don’t think there was anybody else offering that I knew of offering sort of podcast services. You know, Lyndal’s helped me with my podcast making sort of mp3. She’s also helped me do set up and all sorts of things. She’s about to help me get my podcast onto YouTube, which is rather exciting. That’s a new service that you’ve launched. Um, but yes, I think the thing with one to one is It’s, it’s exciting. It’s engrossing and you feel like you’re really doing work and getting money in exchange for at least satisfying. I think.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: I feel like it’s more satisfying and more real, but you’re constantly having to pitch for jobs and therefore worrying about your pricing, worrying about competitors. Am I going to put all this effort into winning this person and now they’ve gone with some bloody other person? And you’re constantly kind of doing a job invoicing, getting half of it. You’re in this cashflow chat. And obviously I’m sure you also have done a few of the first steps, which we talk about in the book, right? The three ADPIP steps.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: I know you have a few clients on retainer, so they’ve not, they’ve gone from being project based to being like regular clients. You’ve got a few like that. That’s great.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: Having those retainers.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And it’s interesting to see when I look at my business, it’s changed quite significantly over the last two to three years, AI, obviously software’s making the production side of things easier. So where, you know, six, seven years ago, I used to launch people and they would come on as retainer clients more so than they are now, where we do a lot of launching and they take it in-house to manage after that. So, yeah. Yeah, it it’s definitely changing.
Kate Toon: Yeah. So you’ve got retainer clients. I know you also do one-on-one coaching and training. So you teach people how to do the thing.
Lyndal Harris: Mm-hmm.
Kate Toon: Rather than just doing it for them. Um, and so. We talk about in the book how the rate for your training should be at least three times your rate for doing, because you can give an awful lot away in that hour. So you’ve done a couple of the step, the pre steps, which I think are really important. The reason why I think it’s really important to do retainers and coaching is retainers get you used to packaging your services up and putting a price on them. Often you can also get clients to pay up through the site, which means your site is ready with things like Stripe and payment mechanisms. Coaching teaches you how to teach. We’re not all natural teachers, but I definitely think it’s something that can be learned, you know, so you might think people might be thinking, I don’t want to be a coach. We’re all coaches. If you’ve ever explained anything to anybody, you know, you’re a coach, right?
Lyndal Harris: Yes. Yeah, exactly.
Kate Toon: So once you’ve done those two things, then you’re ready, you’ve got your done for you service and you’ve almost got done with you service and now we’re moving into DIY, but you’ve already had some forays into DIY. Talk to me about the ADPIPs you already have.
Lyndal Harris: So the ADPIPs that I have, I obviously have my lead magnet, which has, I’ve had for years now to get people into the funnel. And then I have a trip wire, which is the podcast launch checklist. And then I have my podcast launch success training. So I’ve often done the training as a live course, but I’ve moved it into evergreen and always sort of playing around with different ideas. I’ve got all these ideas for digital products and you know, different ADPIPs to introduce to, but it’s, it’s really about working out what does the audience want and what’s going to serve them best.
Kate Toon: Yeah, it’s challenging, isn’t it? And it’s good to hear about your funnel there. So, you know, all the love, the terminology, I love that you’ve got it all down. You got the lead magnet, which is your lure, you know, gets people on top of funnel into your funnel. And then the tripwire, the purpose of which it sounds awful, tripwire, but make people trip into kind of getting their credit card out and paying you. Cause if someone’s paid through your site once, they’re much more likely to pay again. But also someone who isn’t willing to pay for your small products will never buy your big products. So it’s kind of cutting the wheat from the chaff, as my dad would say. And then you’ve got your course. And have you noticed, as I mean, I’m assuming you have, because we all noticed this, as soon as you move to Evergreen, their impetus goes and you barely sell any of them because, you know, they just sit on your site and you think, ‘Oh, it’ll be great, people just buy it’, but they don’t.
Lyndal Harris: Yes, yep.
Kate Toon: And people often move to evergreen because they get tired of launching. And I kind of think if you’re tired of launching, you’re tired of life.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: Because launching is an essential, essential part of it. You know, you can’t expect someone to invest five, six, seven, hundred dollars without some hoo ha. And also you take away the, um, urgency because it’s always there.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: I may do Lyndal’s course, but it’s always there. It’s the same price. It’s not going up. I’m just going to do it when I feel like it. So you never do it.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: So.
Lyndal Harris: And it’s one of those funny things, isn’t it? Because when I send, when I’ve done a discovery call with somebody, if they don’t want to work one to one, if my price is too high for that, then I think, Oh, well I’ll have the evergreen course for them to have that option-
Kate Toon: Yeah.
Lyndal Harris: If they want to learn how to do it, but they don’t want to wait for an intake. So it’s that mindset almost, isn’t it? Of working out. Do you have it as evergreen for that reason, or do you do it as launches and, and actually create that urgency? And I think probably the launching is obviously,
Kate Toon: I mean this is what we’re going to talk about today. And, you know, talking to you is like talking to my audience. And so my suggestion would be that like the taco advert, why not have both, right? Why not have a launched version? You know, I think the optimal amount of time for launching is three times a year. And I think, you know, end of Jan, June-ish. September-ish, are good, you know. You don’t want to hit Christmas. You don’t want to be school holidays and the financial year always has that impetus. And then have the evergreen for people who fall outside of that gap or who don’t want to do it. And obviously the coached version is a higher price point.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: So I always have both, you know, and even with my membership, which is launched three times a year, I have a backdoor. So if someone comes along and it’s three weeks and says, Oh, I want to join. I don’t say, well, because with the membership, it doesn’t matter how many people I take, you know, it’s not, and I’m not made no promises about exclusivity. I’ll just say, well, come, you can join now.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: You know. So launching can be tiring, but there is methodologies and we talk about that a little bit in the book, but I think it’s good to have both. But what are you thinking for your next ADPIPs? And, you know, I guess as well, like having done it for a while, that does get a bit of weariness. You know, like you get a bit, like I’m, you get a bit tired of your product that you’re selling. You’re like, I’m so sick of selling this thing.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: Is that where you are or are you ready, where are you at?
Lyndal Harris: Yeah. I’m at the point where I’m probably overthinking a little bit too much or I, what I am a little bit guilty of doing is going, I’m going to do this. And it’s going to be amazing. Cause it’s exactly, you know, there’s a gap in the market. And so I was thinking I would launch a membership.
Kate Toon: Yeah.
Lyndal Harris: For podcasters to grow and monetize. So not about the launching part. If they’ve launched, then it’s about podcasters wanting to grow and monetize. And I’ve put it all together. I was like, this is going to be fantastic. And then I thought about the churn and that actually, how am I going to retain people in there? And stop them from wanting to come in and sort of get their questions answered and then leave again. And so then I started to think, is that the best way? Would I be better to have a program on launching and monetizing, or should I have a digital product into, so I’ll potentially have a digital product, which, you know, the tripwire again, I guess, into, uh, growth and monetization then into whether it’s a program or a membership. So I’m still playing around with what, what’s best.
Kate Toon: It’s really interesting, isn’t it? Because I think, I think the monetization, anything that makes people money is always more exciting. People want to know how to do something, but they really, basic human desire is they want to be loved, they want to be safe and they want to have enough, you know, and that’s financial. So if you can, you know, play into the money thing and obviously legitimately back that up, you know, like it’s like with my SEO course, I could talk about ranking number one, but it’s not really about ranking number one. It’s about getting customers that give you loads of money, that’s the end result that people want. That’s the mechanism.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: So you always have to talk about the end result, not the mechanism. So I think that, you know, lots of people are intrigued by sponsorship and monetizing their podcasts, but would have no idea where. start. And there’s lots of different ways of doing it. You know, with my podcast, I, you know, didn’t do the per episode thing. I put together packages and that worked better for me. Let’s talk about memberships a little bit, because I think that is a legit concern. You know, I see a lot of people launch memberships and they kind of stall at 60 people. And I see a lot of people launch memberships and people leave after the first couple of months. So my advice with memberships is you have to make a year commitment.
Lyndal Harris: Yep.
Kate Toon: They can pay monthly, or they can pay annually. How they choose to pay is irrelevant to you. The commitment is a year, and that’s challenging, right? Because you’re like, who’s going to commit that upfront. But you, you know, even if you charge 47 a month and it was 497 a year, it’s probably less than your course.
Lyndal Harris: Yes, yeah.
Kate Toon: So in reality, it’s not about the money, you know, it’s about your level of confidence and showing the value and having a bit of a plan for the, You know.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: Like what are you going to take them through? And I don’t think the membership wouldn’t have to be just about monetization. It could be about all aspects of podcasting, how to get better guests, how to interview, bringing experts, blah, blah, blah. And the thing with Churn is some people join for a reason, some people join for a season, and some people join for a lifetime. And there is absolutely nothing you can do about that.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah
Kate Toon: You know, so in DMC, I mean, you’ve been in DMC since the start. You’re one of our experts, so you don’t actually pay. But if you weren’t paying, would you still be there? Maybe not. Maybe you’ve got everything you can get from that. You want to go off and explore someone else’s thing. We’ve just launched and I’ve had three people who were members who went and joined some other people’s memberships and have now come back.
Lyndal Harris: Oh wow.
Kate Toon: Which is no better compliment.
Lyndal Harris: Yes. Yeah, absolutely. That’s fantastic.
Kate Toon: But also, you know, I only have so much to teach, and at some point, maybe you’ve had enough of me. That’s why I bring in other experts, like your membership isn’t all about you, you know. So Churn is interesting, but Churn is very difficult to control. There is no loyalty, that’s something I’ve discovered, which sounds very cynical.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: But you know, if you take away worrying about Churn and you just say to yourself, well it’s a year, a year’s commitment, does that make the membership seem more appealing?
Lyndal Harris: It does actually. It really does. And I, and I have thought about experts. I’ve listed down who I could bring in for different topics.
Kate Toon: I could be one. Podcast SEO.
Lyndal Harris: I know, I know.
Kate Toon: There we go. So you’ve already got your first one.
Lyndal Harris: You’re on my list actually.
Kate Toon: Yeah?
Lyndal Harris: So yes, yeah, yeah, no, I do have a list of things.
Kate Toon: So you could have guests.
Lyndal Harris: Yes. And it was probably the 12 month thing. I hadn’t really thought about, but my target market is small business owners. That’s who I work with predominantly. And so if they do want to grow their show in a series about their podcast, I guess the 12 months isn’t, isn’t out of the question for them, so.
Kate Toon: I mean, when you think about the topics, like how to, you know, produce your podcast in half the time, that’s a massive thing, you know, how to get sponsorship, how to raise your profile, how to become a better interviewer, how to get on other people’s podcasts, how to use your podcast as leverage, you know.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: You’ve really got, you could pull 12 topics out of your bottom.
Lyndal Harris: Easily, easily, yes.
Kate Toon: And the other good thing about a membership is it becomes a repository for all your ideas. So, you know, you think of a new checklist or whatever, great, the members get it. You promote it outside of your membership, but you say it’s exclusive to the membership. So you may have noticed in DMC, you know, when it started, maybe there was 20 videos. Now there’s 300, Digital Marketing Collective, that’s my membership,by the way. Now there’s 300 videos.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: There are countless templates because I put everything into the membership.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: Which is rewarding the loyal people in my membership. But also making it more and more appealing rather than having itty bitty sales pages for this and this and this and this and this and this.
Lyndal Harris: Yes. Yeah.
Kate Toon: And having 16 funnels as well. I see a lot of people who’ve got a funnel for this and a funnel for this.
Lyndal Harris: Oh my gosh. Yeah.
Kate Toon: You know, it becomes overwhelming.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: But the thing is you’ve got to go all in, you know, and memberships are there as hard work for four people as they are for 400,
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: But you’ll have four for a very long time. You have to love those people hard and people I think get to 40 or 50 people and it’s not growing because you go through that what I call the Kevin Bacon phase where you’ve used up all your immediate connections and your met and your buddies and the people you’ve worked with and now you are marketing to complete strangers that can, that’s a lull, you know,
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: So you have a false sense of security because you get 20 people because if you went out to all the people who you built podcasts for, you probably get 20 people like that. And then there’s a lull.
Lyndal Harris: Yes. Yeah.
Kate Toon: And most people can’t survive the lull and that’s where it falls down. And then they stop loving their membership. They feel it’s a drain and then people start to leave. So. It’s all about-
Lyndal Harris: Yes. Yeah. Well, I suppose they pick up on their energy, don’t they?
Kate Toon: You do.
Lyndal Harris: If you’re not loving it, then people are going to pick up on that. And then it’s not.
Kate Toon: They can tell. Or you know, your smile stops reaching your eyes and you’re not turning up as much and, and that’s why you need to think of it as a village exercise, you know, like even within the first couple of months, you’re going to see some people in the group who are active participants. Great, make them advocates, give them a role in the group, you know, like invite them to talk about their experience, reward them. Like you’ve got a podcast for your business. Only people who are in your membership get to be guests from now on.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: You know, stuff like that. I mean, you’ve seen me do it in DMC for years.
Lyndal Harris: I have, I have.
Kate Toon: It’s very doable.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: And it’s enjoyable because the membership becomes, it’s just one business rather than having 17 different things, you know.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah, I am excited about it when I think about it.
Kate Toon: You look excited.
Lyndal Harris: I know.
Kate Toon: Much more excited than when we started this call.
Lyndal Harris: It is really exciting because I’ve got it mapped out and I’ve got it all there and I know it’s not done. Like there’s no one here doing it in Australia. that I know of on a scale for small business owners for that growth and monetization side of things. And I really do want to take, there’s a lot of people that can help you with launching your podcast now. And whilst I still want to do that, I do want to sort of then take it to, okay, so you’ve got a podcast. How do you then grow that and monetize it?
Kate Toon: Yeah, because that’s the thing, right? What’s the statistic? Most podcasts have… you’ve told me this, I think they finish off after 10 episodes.
Lyndal Harris: Yes, after seven or eight?
Kate Toon: Seven or eight.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah, and they just have pod-fade and some of them don’t even get past the first three.
Kate Toon: Pod-fade? Is that what you call it?
Lyndal Harris: Pod-fade, that’s the term, yeah. But some people don’t even get past three or four episodes, which is crazy because, you know, you’ve, you’ve set up, you’ve learned how to actually get it out there. So it’s about really.
Kate Toon: All that effort. All that effort. So I think it’s a point of differentiation, but let’s talk about that whole competition piece, because, you know, you’ve sort of been watching from the sidelines as more and more people pop up. And, you know, this is my experience with the SEO, you know, when I started, there was no one. And now I’ve taught people who now have their own courses, teaching SEO. And it’s, it’s a weird period that I went through where I resented them, ridiculously. And I was like, what? You’ve taken what I’ve taught you and now you’re teaching others? That’s not fair.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: Like now you become like, as if, I mean, how ridiculous the whole point of teaching people is they go away and do it themselves. So that’s a bit of a transition and that belief that even though there are other people doing exactly what you do, they’re not you, they’re not you. And also just people buy more than one thing and people are going to like that person’s thing more than your thing because of the jumper they’re wearing. Do you know what I mean?
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: You think it’s about, you know, your lack of experience, or you’re not clever enough, or you’re not funny enough, or you’re not young enough, or you’re not sexy enough. And then when you really ask them, they’re like, I don’t know, like one time she wore this jumper and I just thought, you’re like fuck. Bloody hell. I’ve been agonizing about my pricing strategy.
Lyndal Harris: Exactly. I’ve just had this big mindset thing going on. And it was really just about the jumper.
Kate Toon: The jumper, totally. And you know, also obviously having my membership for so long, my previous one was for nine years. I would see people leaving my membership and then joining other copywriting people’s membership and I’d think, oh, they hate me and they like them. But it wasn’t that, they just wanted different perspectives. Or I’d see people in my membership and in two or three other people’s. And I felt like they were kind of cheating on me. Of course they’re not. You know what I mean?
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: Because you’re allowed to be in more than one thing. You know, people in DMC, I know some of them are in three or four other memberships. Obviously, mine’s the best, I’m just saying,
Lyndal Harris: Yeah, absolutely.
Kate Toon: You know, you just, it’s, there is, you don’t have only one book on your bookshelf.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: You know, that’s the thing. And, uh, so I think there’s room in us, so, you know, obviously that you’ve got this path forward or whatever. You should sign up for the next Six Figures While You Sleep Program. It’s launching in January, everybody. It’s a seven month program that takes you from zero to whatever. There’s my pitch. But, it really is as well about getting out of your own way.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: I’d say 90 percent of the reason why we don’t do these things is nothing to do with the ability or the skills or even the time. We may make time a thing, but it’s not really, because you always find time for stuff you want to do. It’s the mindset thing, so, you know.
Lyndal Harris: So much.
Kate Toon: What is holding, other than the competition and not being quite sure how to, you know, the churn, which I think we’ve resolved the churn issue.
Lyndal Harris: Yes. Yeah, we have. Absolutely.
Kate Toon: Is there anything else holding you back from doing this?
Lyndal Harris: Uh, look, absolutely, I have mindset issues to work through. Interestingly enough, I remember when I launched my podcast, there were a handful of other Australian based people who launched their podcast around the same time. And I remember that for me was, you know, the imposter syndrome was kicking in the mindset, all the same stuff that comes to doing the ADPIPs and the membership and everything now.
Kate Toon. Yep, yeah.
Lyndal Harris: And I remember launch, at one point, I thought, Oh, I just won’t worry. There’s enough for other people to listen to. And I thought, no, I’ve got to, I’ve got to do this. Cause I’ve got to walk in the footsteps of my clients and really understand that journey for them. And when I did launch, I can remember just amazing feedback. And I can remember one person in particular saying, we wanted to hear you. We didn’t actually, you know, I know there were other podcasts out there. And if you were thinking about that, but we wanted to hear your perspective of it. And so I try to remind myself of that when it comes to the mindset stuff, because I do get caught in, you know, looking at what other people do and I I tend to sort of not be on social media as much. I’ve been very lucky in that. I always say lucky, but I’ve, I’ve often worked-
Kate Toon: Word of mouth.
Lyndal Harris: Worked at the word of mouth and building relationships behind the scenes. And so my online presence isn’t as much as some people’s. And when I look at them, I do have that, uh, that comparisonitis.
Kate Toon: Yeah.
Lyndal Harris: I should be online more, I should be doing that. And I think, when you have stuff going on in your personal life, which I know you know about, and I know for me, I have times when it’s been mum’s health or, you know, Simon passing away or whatever, and then my emotional brain kicks in, and I’m too much in that emotional brain. And I had someone explain it to me beautifully is like, you can have all of these plans to move your business forward and do things but if you’re sitting in the emotional brain, then you can’t activate that prefrontal cortex to actually do the things that you want to do in your business. So where I sort of kicked myself for a long time thinking, I should be here, or I should be there –
Kate Toon: Yeah.
Lyndal Harris: Really recognizing, Oh, okay, actually. Yeah, I’m trying to, I’m solo parenting teenagers. I do have a slightly different family arrangement to a lot of people, I guess. But everyone’s got their stuff. It’s not that, but for me, just being kind to myself.
Kate Toon: So important.
Lyndal Harris: Instead of beating myself up.
Kate Toon: I mean, this year, every single thing I planned for the entire year, apart from publishing the book, went down the toilet. You know, I had a lot of things. Speaker gigs all over the world. I planned to go away on a retreat to learn how to be a better speaker. I had, you know, products I was going to launch, things I was going to do. None of them have happened, but I feel like there’s always enough time. Like this has been in my anus horribles.
But I do agree that when you’re in that emotional state, it’s hard to be creative. It’s hard to be positive. It’s hard to sit down and go, Hey, let’s do this thing. But the, we just have to, you know, there’s different ways of doing things. And I talk about this in my productivity book and the other book, you know, the chip away, most people do the chip away. And I find for me, the chip away doesn’t work like, Oh, I’ll just do 20 minutes on it each day. And then months from now I’ve done frick-all because 20 minutes isn’t going to get anything done. So instead I give myself a sprint.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: I say for two weeks, I will go so hard at this to the exclusion of all else, I’ll bugger off clients, maybe I’ll get up a bit earlier, maybe the kids will have to get take away for two weeks, they can survive, and I’m going to go hard on this and by the end of it, I will have something and whatever I have, I will put that live.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: And that for me works well cos I’m better at hell for leather.
Lyndal Harris: See, MVP.
Kate Toon: Yes. Minimum viable product.
Lyndal Harris: Love it.
Kate Toon: Go for it. So I think that might be-
Lyndal Harris: Yes. Especially when you get stuck in perfectionism.
Kate Toon: Well this is it. And you’ve been, not to be rude, but dicking about for a bit for various reasons.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: And so you need to have a full on frenzy because you know exactly what you want to do.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: And if you just sat down and said for the next two weeks, this is my number one priority. It beats the gym. It beats everything. Just for two weeks. Obviously, all that can come back, you can get an awful lot done.
Lyndal: Yes.
Kate Toon: Um, you can have something ready.
Lyndal Harris: I have been listening to your, I mean, obviously I read your other book too, that talks about the sprints and the chip away. And it’s so true. It’s just, I love the idea of sprints because that’s how I work best.
Kate Toon: There’s an end date.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: I think you can do anything if you know it’s going to end. You know, like the worst thing is when like you’re waiting, what was I waiting for the other day? I was waiting for something and I didn’t have battery on my phone, which obviously is absolute torture. So I had to sit with my own thoughts. There’s nothing worse in the world, but I had no, I was waiting for the doctor. That was it. I had no idea when it was going to end, wherever someone said, you’re going to sit here for 45 minutes. I could have coped with that, right? It’s the non. So if you, you know, you can suffer anything for a short amount of time. And if you set a deadline, even if you say, I’m going to do a four day sprint, fantastic. That’s it.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: Cause you know, it’s going to end. Then you go back to your normal life. The other, the final part of that chip sprint is kind of flop, or what I call a fallow period where you deliberately don’t let yourself do anything on it. You don’t allow yourself to think about it. As soon as it pops into your brain, you say, no, I’m not thinking about it. I’m not going to write anything down. I’m not doing anything for three months. Yeah. And then at the end of that three months, you’ll either be desperate to do it or the passion will have died.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: And both the good results.
Lyndal Harris: Instead of it being a shiny object.
Kate Toon: Yeah:
Lyndal Harris: Cause I’m totally that person that goes, Oh, I should do it. Oh, that’s a great idea. I’m going to, shiny objects everywhere. And then I get so overwhelmed with, which one?
Kate Toon: Which one shall I do? Well, I think we’ve decided.
Lyndal Harris: Which one’s the right one?
Kate Toon: It’s going to be a 12 month membership for people who’ve maybe had their podcast for more than three months, but you know, and they’re looking at ways to improve production speed, become a better host, get better guests, make more money and make the whole thing easier. But also work out how to make it make more money for their business. You know, as I said, I don’t know if I already said this or I said it before, my podcast ,the Recipe for SEO Success, is the biggest driver to selling my course.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: And when I sell my course, which is now $3,000 in the whole time I’ve had it seven years, I’ve had four sales calls, four people who’ve rung me up wanting to ask me questions.
Lyndal Harris: Wow.
Kate Toon: Before I bought it because they’ve listened to me for months.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: And either I’ve lost them in that process that actually bloody annoying, or I’ve won them over. There’s no two ways. So the podcast, you either love the host or you hate them.
Lyndal Harris: Yes. It’s that relationship building without having to do the one on one calls. It’s amazing.
Kate Toon: Yeah, exactly. So the trust and the relationship is built without you even knowing it. And sometimes people are coming across out of the blue and they haven’t done my lead magnet and they haven’t done my tripwire. I’ve never heard of them. With my new program for the book, three of the people who came in, I’ve never heard of.
Lyndal Harris: Yeah.
Kate Toon: That’s a $6000 commitment,
Lyndal Harris: Yeah
Kate Toon: Upfront, you know, so it’s the power of podcasts is huge, but I think people think of it as a fun little marketing thing or a way to build their profile is not, it’s a way to make money. Make money, if you do it right. And that’s what you’re gonna teach people.
Lyndal Harris: I speak to a lot of podcasters who don’t have that strategy of how it’s actually going to work for your business.
Kate Toon: Yeah.
Lyndal Harris: To build your business.
Kate Toon: Yeah.
Lyndal Harris: It’ll be sort of the brand awareness tool, but it’s not actually working to get the audience off the airwaves and into your email list and then into your funnel and becoming clients.
Kate Toon: That’s it.
Lyndal Harris: So many people.
Kate Toon: It’s not as direct like, you know, I think there’s, there’s been studies showing, you know, that a number of people actually click on links in your iTunes profile. This is minimal. Do you know what I mean? It’s not about that. It’s about raising, it is about raising that awareness, building that relationship, and then backing that up with a social media marketing presence. So that then you, it’s like when you, you know, you see a yellow car and then suddenly you see yellow cars everywhere.
Lyndal Harris: Yes.
Kate Toon: People sort of say to me, I listened to one podcast by you and suddenly you were everywhere, because we all know the algorithms are listening to us. When we’re asleep. So play that to your advantage, right?
Lyndal Harris: Absolutely.
Kate Toon: And they’ve just listened to a pod and then, wow, there you are. And there’s your free thing. And oh, there’s a group and oh your brand. Wow. I’m now in your world. This is amazing. I think that’s what you can really offer. So we look forward to seeing your new membership launching in January, Lyndal.
Lyndal Harris: No pressure.
Kate Toon: I’ll get Lyndal back on the podcast to see how she’s going in a couple of months. Lyndal is a member of the Digital Marketing Collective. She is our podcast expert there. She has her own group. What’s your group called, Lindal?
Lyndal Harris: The Australian Podcasters Collaborative.
Kate Toon: Fantastic. That’s her free group. Her paid group will be coming soon. I will link to that in the show notes. Any, you know, I know that you sort of feel like you’re at the beginning of this in some degree, but you’re not really. Any words of advice for somebody who’s literally done nothing, from your experience so far?
Lyndal Harris: I would say two, and it’s from my own experience. One is know what your audience want and what to give them instead of thinking that you know, and then just do it. MVP, like we were saying, rather than getting stuck in that perfectionism, I’ve got to get it a hundred percent right. Just work out what will serve your audience and, and just do it.
Kate Toon: And she will be playing that message back to herself.
Lyndal Harris: I know. I’ve said it out publicly now.
Kate Toon: You’ve said it out loud now. It’s going out on the podcast. Lyndal, it’s been amazing to talk to you. Thank you so much for coming on the show.
Lyndal Harris: Thank you so much for having me.
Kate Toon: So thanks, Lyndal Harris, and thanks to Sarah Walkerden for her lovely book review she said about Six Figures While You Sleep, “This is an honest, practical and actionable book. I’ve really enjoyed this book due to its honest and actionable advice. It gives you a really thorough step by step roadmap on what it takes to successfully build passive income streams in your business.
No fluff, no outlandish promises, just real lived experience and guidance. I’m looking forward to implementing.” Thank you very much, Sarah. If you want to buy a copy of the book, you can grab it on my website or on Amazon. Also, thanks for listening to the show. Hopefully I’m going to be a bit more regular moving forward.
If you’ve enjoyed it, please leave a rating or review on iTunes or wherever you heard it. And don’t forget to check out the show notes on my website, katetoon.com, where you can buy a copy of the book, as I said. And finally, you can join my Facebook group, uh, The Misfit Entrepreneurs to meet lots of other busy business owning people for tips and advice. Thanks for listening.
