In this episode I’m joined by Kelly Cookson from Cheer Up Marketing, marketing strategist, to talk about positive psycholgy (NOT toxic positivity) and lean marketing.
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Kelly Cookson
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Emma Cossey
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Podcast Transcript
Emma Cossey
Hello everyone, and welcome back to a joint episode. This week, I have a guest called Kelly Cookson on and I’m really excited about this one because Kelly’s going to talk about marketing, but also positive psychology and something called lean marketing. So, I think these are gonna be really interesting topics to dive into, especially as a freelancer. So first of all, Kelly is a marketing strategist and positive psychology coach. And Kelly, do you wanna tell us a little bit more about yourself?
Kelly Cookson
Sure. Thanks for having me by the way. I’m super excited to dive into marketing and pos psych as well. Two topics I’m very passionate about. So, I run my own business, it’s called Cheer Up Marketing and I am three and a half years into it now. So, I’ve been on a journey from sort of freelancing and then branching out into doing some online programmes and that kind of thing. But my background is a marketer by trade. So, I’ve clocked up 15 years now doing marketing. And prior to setting up my own business and going freelance, I was a marketing manager for a software company. So, I’ve actually got a degree in business and marketing and I experimented with loads of weird side hustles after having my daughter and thinking I want to make some cash on the side. And it wasn’t until I started actually side hustling as a marketer that I realised, oh, it’s actually quite easy to make money doing marketing, which is something I’m trained in who knew that that would be the thing to do.
So, I guess I probably side hustled for about it was nine months, I think, before I realised that I was making half of my corporate salary almost in my spare time, like my salary was pretty
lean, because I was working three days a week after coming back from mat leave. But I said to my husband, I reckon if I actually marketed myself and went all out with this business, I could at least make what I’m making in my corporate job. So, I took the leap and started this business in January 2020, which was perfect timing with a pandemic coming three months later. But I do feel very lucky because the clients that I had, and that I won, they all marketed their way through the pandemic. So, I actually didn’t lose any business, I gained business. But fast forward like two years, I went through all kinds of journey that most freelancers go through, realising I was vastly under charging, and I had the wrong clients. So basically started again six months in and broke up with 90% of my clients, niched into email marketing of all things. And then a couple years after that, it would have been summer last year 2022, I discovered positive psychology.
I always knew that I needed some kind of mindset support in my business, like, you know what it’s like when you work for yourself, it’s a roller coaster. So, I learned about positive psychology and decided that I wanted to bring that in just for myself, but also for my clients. Because by that point, my business had evolved into sort of mentoring people with their marketing strategy. And I’d find that a lot of solopreneurs women that I work with, like myself, I’d give them a marketing strategy and then they’d be this block, this mindset block. So, I thought, right, I need to do something about this, hence learning positive psychology. So, these days, I blend, smart marketing, lean marketing strategies, content marketing, and positive psychology. That’s me in a nutshell.
Emma Cossey
So, I definitely want to dig into the lean marketing and the marketing side. But first of all, I’d love to know a bit more about what positive psychology is.
Kelly Cookson
Yeah, okay. So, most of us are aware of traditional psychology. And actually, I did psychology at A level, and that’s all about dealing with mental disorders and things going wrong. So, we treat issues with psychology and there’s research in that. Positive psychology is actually about building on the good things in life and strengthening your mindset around living a fulfilled happy life. So, if you are interested in this at all I would start by looking up Professor Martin Seligman, who is like the founder of positive psychology, but what it’s not is about toxic positivity. So that’s sticking a smile on and pretending everything’s okay. It’s actually about building up your resilience and when things get tough, I always tie this back to entrepreneurship, so we’re all going to face challenges, but it’s about how you can then boost your positive emotions to help you balance out the negative. And something that I learned about pos pysch that really made me think, gosh, every entrepreneur needs this, is the research around this shows that 50% of how positive you feel is down to your genetics, only 10% of how positive you feel is down to your environment. So, there were some fascinating studies done on people living in abject poverty and some really less than ideal situations, and that didn’t actually influence their happiness and their well-being as much as you might think. So that leaves a huge 40% of how positive you feel within your control. So, I thought, right if there are interventions, I can exercise as tools and tricks that I can use to boost that 40% up when things get tough in life and business. Amazing.
And then on top of that, there’s some more research that has shown when you feel more positive and engaged, you can boost your productivity by 20 to 30%. So, I was thinking well, as someone who works part-time around their six year old and school hours, and everything that’s going on with school strikes and stuff, who doesn’t need to be 20 to 30% more productive at work. So that’s what really got me excited about feeling better, really connecting with the work that I’m doing and learning more about positive psychology to, you know, have a good life and also be mega productive at work.
Emma Cossey
That’s incredible, because I’m actually just learning. I don’t know if I’ve got the book here, I have, Positive Intelligence, I’ve just started reading the book by Shirzad Chamine, I can’t pronounce it. It is incredible the difference. And I suppose actually, if you’re learning this, did you start to learn this before COVID? Or after? Because I’d imagine.
Kelly Cookson
It was after. Yeah, so we started my business just before COVID. Like, I’ll be honest, I didn’t do any mindset work in my corporate life. Like, I think maybe we brought in disc assessments for senior management. But me being middle management, I didn’t get any of that. So, I didn’t actually know what mindset was really until I started my own business. And realise that when you’re sitting on your own, or trying to, you know, grow a business or figure out all the things that you have to really bolster yourself and, you know, really dig deep sometimes to feel that motivation to get up do the work, or, you know, you get things like impostor syndrome come up, or money mindset around pricing, or it’s a whole raft of things that come up. And it wasn’t until sort of six months in that I started to question, well, I’ve got all these clients, I’m not charging enough money. I don’t love this business that I’ve created. And it had the real potential to take over my life and not be the reason that started it, which was to spend more time with my daughter and take her to and from school and everything.
So that’s when I first started learning about what mindset is in terms of how we look at it as an entrepreneur. And then it wasn’t until probably the beginning of 2022, when I got some coaching and learned about positive psychology then. And I loved it because it’s so practical. And everything’s backed in science and research, there are studies you can read around like the practice of gratitude, for example, which is a really simple thing that everyone can do. List three things that you’re grateful for every day. And it’s been proven to lift people’s mood, people with acute depression have found that their symptoms have been alleviated from that simple practice of tapping into right, can I look around and think of three things, just three small things that I’m grateful for today. And it just like I said, it blew my mind that you could do these things, feel better, feel more engaged and motivated to show up online and be an entrepreneur and do all of the things. And I honestly credit the mindset journey that I’ve been on with a huge part of my success
So, I’ve built my business to a six-figure annual turnover, and I only work 20 hours a week, and it’s just me. I’ve got a VA and until very recently, I now have an Online Business Manager. So, I feel really proud that I’ve built that up. And a lot of that was mindset, I had to get that right to get that success.
Emma Cossey
Do you see any kind of common challenges people find with their mindset?
Kelly Cookson
Yeah, I think it’s the belief that they can actually do the thing. So, in positive psychology, we can map goals to hope. So, hope is a big theme in positive psychology, people who are high in hope, like I am actually. If you’re interested in finding out what character strengths you have, by the way, there’s a great free survey, you could take called the VIA character strengths survey, we could maybe share the link with your listeners. But one of the 24 character strengths that these psychologists have recognised, one of them is hope. So luckily for me, it’s in my top five. So I’m very high in hope. But we have to have hope for the future. And think about that as an entrepreneur or a freelancer, you have to believe that your business is going to take you somewhere and give you the thing that you want. Otherwise, why get out of bed every day and overcome the challenges that you’re going to have. So when we look at goal setting and positive psychology, there’s a tool called Hope mapping, which is really nice. So, you can take yourself from the goal, what is it that you want to achieve? And actually, I was listening to one of your podcasts this morning, Emma, where you talk about what obstacles might you need to overcome? In positive psychology, we use that in hope mapping. And you can also look at support systems. So, I think very often we set goals but we don’t look at who around us, including the people that we have at home friends and family can supporter us to get to our goal. So, I think that’s one of the things that I love sharing with my clients and I do regularly for my own goals is hope mapping. Where do I want to be? Why do I want to be there? So, we often get fixated on money as well. I think well, if I want to make £10,000 in my business in a month why? What do I actually want that money for? Connecting with a deeper kind of mission and purpose as well as really helped me to, yeah, move the business forward and do the do.
Emma Cossey
I think one thing I see people do a lot is have that initial plan something out, get excited about it, get excited about the goal, but maintaining that positivity to reaching the goal, rather than just past the planning stage. Seems to be a common problem.
Kelly Cookson
Yeah, so something that I like to do is regularly check back in with a goal and the why. So again, thinking about, okay, you might have a monetary goal, that’s an easy one to set. Like, I want to bring in three clients this month, or quarter or whatever. Why, like, what does that actually mean for you, and it can be around job satisfaction as well, it doesn’t always need to be about the money, like, maybe you want to prove if you’re relatively new to business, I’m thinking like when a new client that’s really like fulfilling, and you’re going to do a great project that you’re going to enjoy.
I think for me as well, a lot of it comes back to what it affords our family, because I want to be able to have the quality time with my husband and my daughter. So that money that I make in my business, in the 20 hours a week that I work, that gives us you know, the funds to go off and have a holiday together or do things after school or days out and that kind of thing. So, I really get excited about what my business means for my lifestyle. Yeah, so connecting in with that as well is really important to keep you on track. And checking with your goals regularly would be my advice like daily, if you can. Open up that hope map or wherever you’re mapping out what you need to do and why.
Emma Cossey
This is definitely, I’m very on board with this. And it’s one of the things we do in goal setting in my membership. I suggest that people write down their goals every single day, not just embed it in your brain more, but yeah to re-live that excitement about it. It’s so easy to set the goal and forget it.
Kelly Cookson
Yeah, and we write them down or we just think about things even if you don’t write them down. But I love that. And I love journaling, which is also a key thing in positive psychology. So at bedtime every day, I’ll write down the three things that I’m grateful for. But before I do that, actually I write down three wins, which could be around, usually one of them’s about my business. So it might be I sent an email newsletter out today, or I won a new client or I made a sale. Or I really did a great job for that client. And we had great rapport and it was awesome. I normally put in a wellness goal as well. So the other thing that really motivates me around my business is that is lets me have time to go and do gym classes and sit in the sauna. So, I love the sauna. I’m like obsessed with it at the gym. So, if I can get in there in the middle of the day when he’s just retired people milling about, and I feel like I’ve made it in life. And so, a win for like wellness might be I swam today and had some time in the sauna. And then I normally put down a family win as well. So, you know, I read bedtime stories, or I took my daughter off to do rock climbing or something cool. And then write down the goals. I have these things, the gratitude, the wins. And remember, what is my goal for this month, and I’ll write that down just to connect with it again.
Emma Cossey
Love it. So one things you also mentioned earlier that I want to dive into is lean marketing.
So tell me a bit more, because I think it’s a term you came up with, or you’ve been using a lot in your business. So yeah, tell me a bit more about the story behind it.
Kelly Cookson
So, one of the problems that I see with most business owners, solopreneurs I think are most guilty of this. Is that they prioritise their clients all the time, and don’t get any marketing done. And I think this then leads to feast and famine where things are great, I’m fully booked, I haven’t got time for marketing, because I’m delivering for my clients, and then maybe a client project finishes, or you lose a client or whatever. And then you’re like, Oh My God, I need to market because I need, I’ve got a gap now and I need to fill that gap. So, this is very common and I think one of the things that puts people off doing their marketing is they’re coming at it from the wrong way. And they’re spending way too much time on the wrong things. So I have, from my like 15 years experience of doing marketing, I know what actually moves the needle in terms of growing an audience, getting them to connect with your message and then moving them along the buyers journey to actually become a client from a lead. And the short version of this is, it’s not necessarily posting on social media every single day and having that as your marketing strategy. I think we do need to be on social media. And I am there I have a Facebook group. I am also on Instagram and LinkedIn. But I have an email list and one of the biggest time drains that comes back to this idea of Lean marketing or being smart with your time, is to not start your marketing strategy with I need to write 30 posts for Instagram this month or wherever you’re online because that is one hell of a big job and I think it takes hours and hours to create all of that content. And you’re creating it for somebody else, not for yourself. So, Mark Zuckerberg basically.
You’re creating all of your content for his platforms, you’re putting all of that creative energy in there all of that time. And then, you know, if it’s Twitter, it disappears in the blink of an eye or Instagram, hangs around for a couple of days, or stories, delete in 24 hours, and then you’re on that treadmill again. So, I think my biggest takeaway to give you on this short episode, what your listeners can implement, is to flip this on its head. So always approach my marketing, and I recommend you try this if you’ve not done it before, with creating a long form piece of content first. So, you put all of your creative juice into that and think carefully about what it is you’re selling that particular month or quarter, work backwards from that goal. So, your marketing objective is to sell X amount of spaces in your one-to-one or if you have a group programme or a membership, what’s the goal for that? Working backwards in that thing, right, my ideal client for this sale this objective, what do they need to know and understand about this product, this offer, this service, the work that I do, for them to want to buy it. And then your content needs to educate them on that and move them along that buyers journey. So if you can, over the coming months, build up key pieces of long form content on your website. So, it might be a blog is an obvious one, podcasts are a great way to do this, maybe YouTube or like video content somewhere, then you build up this library of assets that are on your website for people to come and find you and understand why they should care about what it is that you do and work with you. Then you take that content and you chop it up. You can take one liners, paragraph here and there, or even give it to a VA or a copywriter to chop up for you and throw that at social media.
So honestly, just that simple shift has saved me hours of time of not going I need to write 30 Instagram posts, I’m going to do a blog, I’m going to do some guest expert podcast sessions like this one. And then I could chop all of that stuff up, give it to my VA, she schedules it on social media. Job done.
Emma Cossey
I love that because I’m a big fan of when you’re setting your goals, looking at where you want to be in 90 days and work back from there. But yeah, I’m a big fan of repurposing content, essentially. But you’re kind of bridging that gap beautifully between working out what you want to sell and then yeah, working backwards from that. I love that because it just makes it simpler because I think we all do, and funnily enough, just before this episode comes out, Viv’s episode comes out with Viv guy who we talked about not using social media. I think it was a similar message in that, be so much more purposeful in what you’re doing, rather than just throwing things at a wall and we’ll look at what sticks. This seems so much more intentional.
Kelly Cookson
Yeah, exactly. I think people get in this flap of oh, I need to be showing up, I need to be visible, which you absolutely do. But be intentional with it. And, you know, over time, it’s a long game, a lot of the time is marketing, especially when you think about organic traffic and your website, but building that library of content that’s going to be on there forever, you know, you can tweak it as your business evolves, or maybe your messaging changes slightly, but building your own house first, and then giving, not the leftovers, you know, like the little snippets and things to social media, just feels so much better. And think in terms of like your 90 day framework that you use. So, I always approach is every month I have one what I call a VIP topic. So right this month, I’m going to talk about well, lean marketing could be an example like how people are wasting their time or what they should be doing. You know, and that then moves people along the journey to wanting to work with me to get more support on that. So that might be like topic for month one in a particular quarter. Another topic might be around email marketing, because that’s also a great time saver, and you’re building an asset and an email list. But whatever it is, I’m thinking about the end thing that I’m going to sell. So, at the end of that 90 days, I want to have X amount of people in my online email marketing programme that I have, you know, so the messaging needs to fit to that. And I think you just feel so much more like less like you’re on that hamster wheel of content creation and more like I’m doing this for a reason, just a little bit more considered about what it is that your audience needs to know, to then want to buy from you.
Emma Cossey
No, I love that. That’s yeah, my brains working now with how to use that because that’s so useful. And I think as well, we are all so overwhelmed with other things and the time of recording Threads has just come out.
Kelly Cookson
I’m not on it.
Emma Cossey
I am on it, and I love it. But although the thing I am liking there is that people don’t seem to be using a strategy at the moment. They’re just enjoying sharing, so I probably won’t even use it for business. This can change in a month’s time. But anyway, I think social media can just be so dominating of your business. And I just love the idea of that job speaker. It just,
I’m not wording this very well. But basically, I love the fact that it becomes a functional part of your business rather than feeling like such a massive part. And yeah, social media talked about and we talked about podcasts and other things. Are there any other areas of marketing that should be sort of bought into that?
Kelly Cookson
Well, I think it’s worth coming back to email marketing, because that’s something that if you’re spending all your time on social media or creating all those posts, you might think I don’t have time to do a weekly email, you absolutely do. And you should. Luckily for me, with all my years of marketing experience, I knew from day one that I needed an email list for my business. But you know, I started from zero didn’t have any email subscribers, and it’s only been over time by, first of all, just getting that opt in on my website. So if you’re listening to this, you haven’t got an email list. Step one is to think about why somebody should sign up to your list. So, give them a reason. Don’t just ask someone to sign up to your like weekly newsletter like it’s got to be like mine, for example, would be sign up to my cheer list, because it’s cheer up marketing. And I’m going to send you advice around marketing strategy and whatever. Check out my website, cheerupmarketing.com, it’s on there. I can’t remember how I worded it. But there’s a reason you want to sign up. So at least get that on your footer and on your contact page. Start collecting emails, as you get like a trickle of people coming to your website, it might only be you like your Mum and your best mate or whoever is on there at first, but that’s fine. And then you want to get something like a lead magnet or an opt in freebie on there. So think, again, about your ideal client, what kinds of things are they Googling at the beginning of their journey and in the future, they’ll be ready to work with you. So kind of capture them in that initial stage. Get something up on your website, like a free guide or a training. And we’re going to share the links at the end. But on my website, there is a bunch of these. So if you looked at cheerupmarketing.com/free, I’ve got various masterclass recordings that are now opt in freebies, PDF guides, that kind of thing. So feel free to have a look there and get some inspiration.
But I think one of the timesavers as well as thinking about lean marketing, is when you build an email list and you send out regular emails, you’re reaching more of your audience than you would with the equivalent posts on social media. So just as an example, like a stats wise, I think around if you get around a 30 to 40%, open rate of your email list, which you should if you’ve got a relatively small but engaged list in the beginning, and you think about the reach on Instagram, I know that on a really good day, maybe 15% of my audience might see my stories, a lot of the time it’s like 6%, or you know, on your actual feed and the algorithm is very choosy, isn’t it? And you don’t always get that reach. So I think if you’re looking to save time, but still connect with your audience and make an impact, you’ve got to have an email list and get your message going on that. And I’m sure Viv was talking about that, because that’s one of her big things as well, isn’t it?
Emma Cossey
Yeah, definitely. And I think the big thing about email is be consistent. So yes, you were saying about the potential percentage of views and things of that on Instagram. And because threads has just come out my views on stories have just fallen through the floor.
Kelly Cookson
Interesting. Yeah.
Emma Cossey
Because a lot of people are moving or going to threads. I mean, it’s a novelty at the moment. So we’ll see what happenes. But it’s another split for people’s attention. Whereas your email is not sitting there competing with social media. Unless it’s things like, when Google changed, how you can view open rates, I can’t remember what it was, click rates, there’s not a lot that can change your open rates and your kind of your success on email. Other than for the better. So yeah, it’s definitely a much more consistent, better place then on social media.
Kelly Cookson
Yeah, exactly. And you can use the two together. So I will often maybe record a live on Instagram and save it to my grid. And then I’ve done an email in the last week. In fact, funnily enough the Instagram Live was like about why I’m not joining threads. And then I sent an email to my list that said there’s eight reasons I’m not joining threads, I’ve recorded a video. So you just kind of get that nice relationship working between your maybe showing up on video and spoken word and photos of you on social media. And then the email is more of the written word, although I do pop in some selfies and that kind of thing. So my subscribers know what I look like and connect with me that way. But you can use the two to drive traffic between like your Facebook group and your email list and vice versa. Yeah, so I think it’s like whenever I send out an email, I’ve built that list up conscientiously from day one. And I knew that when I sent go on that first email, and I waited till I had 30 people on my list like the grunt out of 30. I was like this is worth it. I was going to have to send an email every week. And that did feel me like someone who was then wearing all the hats of our business and juggling everything else, oh my god an email every week. But actually sticking to that content planning process and creating some long form content, which might be a blog. Also, my emails are longer than social media posts. So sometimes I’ll write quite an in-depth email and that then becomes social media copy and little snippets. But by creating that asset first, it’s paid off because most of my conversions to sales for my group programmes or when I have room for a one to one client that comes from email marketing. So I’ll put the call to action out everywhere. But it’s the emails that drives most traffic to my sales pages over social media. Because they don’t want you taking people off social media. That’s why your link clicks are lower there. So, you’ve really got to have that email list. Yeah, that’s one takeaway from this, it will be get an email list I think.
Emma Cossey
Yes, I think I’ve mentioned this in previous episodes, I really struggled to be consistent with mine for years. And then I started working with Jo, who has been working with me for eight years now. And I write the content in a Google Doc, she takes it and schedules it for me. So she makes the links. For me finishing is the hardest part. And I found this always with marketing and things like that. So if you are struggling, and you can find somebody that can finish stuff for you, that can make a big difference. I’m just sharing that in case people are like, Oh, I just can never get around to being consistent, get somebody that can finish it for you. And also that accountability to.
Kelly Cookson
Yeah, if you’re paying them, you want to send them the work. So this is the same with me and my VA like with the social media stuff, because I’m way less motivated to create content for that as for the reasons we’ve just talked about, but I know that she has that time in to create the images in Canva. And she does all of the scheduling. So it’s down to me to rip the bits of copy from the blog or the emails or whatever, and give them to her. Otherwise, she’s kind of twiddling our thumbs. And that’s not a good use of time, is it? So you’re absolutely right, if you can have somebody to do the bit that you don’t enjoy, and maybe it’s the copywriting, so you can hire somebody to take your other content like podcast content, or videos and create bitesize sound bites from that copy, from that content, sorry. So if that copywriting thing is the thing that’s stopping you from either doing the email or social media posts, outsource it. Like this is a whole thing about the Lean marketing idea. It’s tap into where your strengths are, like, I know, I’m a fast writer, I love writing, like copywriting is my jam. So, I can write an email in 10 minutes, and it’s a good one. I know if I have to go into Canva and try and make anything look half decent, it’s hours of time. I just hate it. So, my VA is tat, she’s great at that, I hired her for that reason. So together, we’re like the Dream Team. I’m copy, she’s pictures.Yeah, so stick to your strengths. And then that will make the marketing go quicker if you’re doing the bits that you’re good at.
Emma Cossey
I love it. Okay, so could you tell us a bit more about the services that you offer people?
Kelly Cookson
Sure. So, I am running various group programmes. So, this year has been interesting. I’ve tried loads of different things. It’s been very much of an experiment. And it’s very cool. If you want marketing strategy, then you come to me and I have a one-to-one offer, which is a limited number of clients. But we work together on working backwards from your goals, what is it you want to sell? What does the messaging need to be around. Who’s your ideal client and what kind of campaigns do you need to put out there to meet that objective. So, I do that one-to-one. And as I mentioned, the positive psychology thing that always comes into play with my clients, because whether or not you think you need it, when it comes to either getting some of the hard work done, or you come up against impostor syndrome, or there are going to be challenges. You need that mindset coaching as well. So, I tend to blend the two. I have the odd client that comes to me for just positive psychology. And that’s cool, we do a different thing like a six month together. So that’s kind of my top offer.
I also have a mastermind called the generator mastermind. So that is for people who are looking to go for this first six figure year. So, figuring out what their marketing strategy needs to be, there is pos pysch in there as well. And that’s a six month group as well. And I do an email marketing online programme. I also run occasional ad hoc sprints. So, if we’re trying to go together as a group to get some marketing campaigns live and launch some stuff, I do that. Yeah, I think that’s it in a nutshell. And I’m also creating some passive income products at the minute as well. So I’m very busy, but it’s all good. So yeah, there’s some online guides and things for sale on my website that will be coming very soon.
Emma Cossey
That’s a very big nutshell that everythings in.
Kelly Cookson
I know. I do it all in only 20 hours a week. It’s so, it’s like that, I think, because I know why I’m doing it. So I really have tapped into that energy of, this is exciting for me. It’s creating the lifestyle that I want. And like honestly, I don’t compromise on my wellness and the well-being cause I know how important that is. Like before coming to record this, I only started work at 20 past 11 today. So, I went to the gym first thing, even though I’ve got this massive list of things to do, but I know coming off the back of that something that makes me feel good. Although there wasn’t a time for the sauna today, sadly. That kind of pushes me to feel like I can work quicker, be more productive, show up with some energy on your podcast. You know, it’s really important. So, I think when you know what you’re going for in business and you carve out some time for yourself to work on that inner stuff or feel good then you can get way more done than you ever imagined. So you know, I don’t have any childcare or a nanny or it’s just me, my VA and now my online business manager.
Emma Cossey
Just out of curiosity, obviously, you’ve got a lot of products there. How do you do your marketing when you are juggling so many things that you offer?
Kelly Cookson
So I definitely utilise that plan that I’ve just mentioned around, it goes out on email, I try and create the long form content first, and then I divvy it up and give it to my team now. So with my VA, taking care of scheduling, the social media stuff, like that’s hours of stuff off my plate, but I’m always working backwards in terms of like the dates in my calendar, and we’re coming up to summer holidays at the time of recording this, and I don’t really do any client work in August. And I’ve minimal time to do like, back end of the business stuff. So I always think to September as well, what am I actually selling in September, so that’s going to be the mastermind, like finally enrolling the last few people for that. So I got to work backwards from that and think, Okay, what moving parts do I need to hit the numbers on there? So it’s actually going to be a masterclass. I’m going to need emails to promote that masterclass. I know what my numbers are in terms of people, I want to get on it for that launch and what the conversion is. So I work on the email content. And then I will break that down and give it to various people like my VA to do the social media stuff. But I’m focusing always on that key message like, what is the one big thing that my ideal client for this thing that I’m selling needs to understand? And how can I hit them with it in as many different ways as possible? So a masterclass, email campaign, social media stuff, talking about it on podcasts doing guest expert trainings, that kind of thing? Does that answer the question?
Emma Cossey
Yeah, because I’m juggling quite a few different things and I’m a big fan of Elizabeth Goddard’s approach as well, where she’s got lots of different things. And I know, some people are stressing that, you know, just have a couple of core offers. But actually, for others, it works better to have lots of different ones. So it’s just really interesting to hear how you juggle that.
Kelly Cookson
Yeah, I definitely don’t have as many as Elizabeth. And it really is a new addition this year, because I have the budget now to get this online business manager. So she has been building out programmes and the funnels in the back end, and I use Karcher so that again, investing in her like she’s waiting for me to send her stuff. So that really has helped me to move projects forward that I’ve procrastinated on, or you know, just left because to be honest, they weren’t like the key revenue generating tasks in my business. That’s always been the one-to-one has been my main money spinner. And the way that I’ve liked to work with clients, so really throwing in these more group programmes, and passive income is an experiment for me. But I’ve needed that extra team support to get those things live. But yeah, I think it’s always been helpful for me just to have those core things.
But I’m excited to try new stuff. And ultimately, if I can scale my business, like we all want to stop trading time for money, right, like, well, I think most of us do. I don’t know if you’re freelancing listeners want to like invest in group programmes, or print memberships and stuff. But I always believe it’s if you can get your house in order in terms of your core offers, and that they sell really well, focus on that, bring in that consistent money, and then you can look at experimenting with adding other things into the mix.
Emma Cossey
Perfect. Thank you. Final question, where can we find you?
Kelly Cookson
So I’m on Instagram @cheerupmarketing. I’m on LinkedIn, Kelly Cookson. I am also on Facebook under the same name. And I have a free Facebook group, which at the moment is focused on email marketing. So it’s called ‘From spam to wham’ an email marketing community so you can come over there if you want to learn more about that. And I’ve mentioned it already, but my website is cheerupmarketing.com. And if you go to /free, you’ll see all my freebies on there. And I’ve got a new guide, which is doing really well which talks to a lot of the things we’ve been talking about in this podcast. So it’s called ‘10 hacks to fast track your business growth’. It’s a PDF, and I’ve done a little video walkthrough for you. So it just talks more in more depth about saving hours of time with your marketing strategy, how you can live more, who doesn’t want to live more. And if you’re feeling stuck in your business and your marketing, there’s some really practical things that you can start implementing straight away. So I’d have a look at that which is also on cheerupmarketing.com/free.
Emma Cossey
That sounds very up the freelance lifestyler kind of audience system. Thank you so much for coming on. I’m feeling very curious now. I’m gonna have to go have a look at my marketing now and check that it’s all lean. So thank you so much, really good tips there and have a lovely week everyone.
Kelly Cookson
Thank you for having me.