TCC Podcast #234: Business Metamorphosis with Linda Perry

 

Full Transcript:

Rob: As a business owner, you get to decide how your business changes over time, whether it shrinks or grows, whether you add products or services, employees or not, it’s all up to you. I was trying to think of a metaphor for how this works, but the regular metaphors that we use for transformation, like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly, doesn’t really feel like a fit to me here because the process isn’t that straightforward and the results that you get, aren’t always beautiful. So maybe a better metaphor is playing with LEGO bricks, building one thing and then breaking off pieces to expand it here or there and changing it into something completely different. And oftentimes the colors don’t match and the shape isn’t perfect. And maybe this thing that you’ve built, isn’t even recognizable to anybody who didn’t see you build it or who you haven’t told the thing is.

And our guest for the 234th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is Think Tank alum, Linda Perry. She has dramatically reshaped and changed her copywriting business over the past year. A lot like playing with those LEGO bricks. And while the result is a better business, the process wasn’t easy. And in a moment she’s going to share exactly what that was like and where she’s ended up.

Kira: And clearly you have not played LEGO with me, Rob, because my colors do match. My shape is perfect. And the thing I build is always recognizable.

Rob: You didn’t grow up with the old sets where you only had…

Kira: I did.

Rob: …like 15 bricks of blue and 15 bricks of red. Yeah.

Kira: I did actually, and I feel like kids are missing out today because it’s like, you have your blueprint and you have to make the thing that you purchased and you can just be more creative. So yeah, we can talk about LEGOs. I’m glad you’re not talking about butterflies and caterpillars and LEGOs are way more fun. So thank you.

And before we hear what Linda has to say, this podcast episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Think Tank. The Think Tank is our private mastermind for copywriters and other marketers who want to challenge each other, create new revenue streams in their businesses, receive coaching from the two of us and ultimately grow to six figures or more depending on your unique goal and vision. up until last year, we only opened the Think Tank once a year, but today we invite a few new members each quarter. So if you’ve been looking for a mastermind to help you grow email, [email protected] to set up an interview.

Rob: Okay, let’s jump into our interview with Linda Perry and find out about what she’s been up to since we last interviewed her on the podcast more than a year ago—way back on episode 108.

Linda: I feel like everything has changed in my business since I was last on. To start with, I think my business back then was primarily copywriting, working with a series of clients, having a couple of retainer clients and really just diving back into the mindset space in this whole new way where I really got to own myself and be really much more of a version of myself in the mindset space than I’d ever been. And today I think I have one copy writing client left. I do teach some life coaches about how to build their business, but I have built up my mindset business and have really nailed down who I love working with. And it is really, yes, I work with a ton of copywriters, but I love identifying sort of the phases people are in, in their growth of their business.

So I typically like to work with people who are a little bit more established because they’re aware of their mindset and how it’s starting to be a problem in their business and how it’s holding them back. So I have really transformed my business to be one of working on mindset and helping people really get out of their own way so they can build this super intentional, happy business.

Kira: So was it difficult to let go of the client side and the client work? I’m asking that, knowing that it’s a difficult process for most of us and a lot of copywriters really struggle with that. Even if that’s the direction they ultimately want to go, there’s a lot of mindset trash around even making that decision to let go of a lot of client work. So how did you work through that.

Linda: Yeah. You you guys know me really well in the sense that I was somebody who was super attached to, well, I’ve got this coming in. I have obligations to this. I have to keep doing this. It’s bringing in a certain amount of money. All of that stuff was in the space and in this space was this idea of, I really like writing, right. And am I going to lose that by focusing on my business, in the mindset space, am I going to lose this opportunity? Am I going to become sort of dull even in my own writing? So I had a lot of those things come into play. And at the same time, I think I got super clear on what I wanted to do and the impact I wanted to make so that all of that noise was really clear to me that it was noise, that it was fears, that it was my own limiting beliefs that were standing in the way.

And then I could really start to anchor myself into something bigger and let it go. And I’ll be honest, I still love writing. I still love doing it. I do write for myself, it’s really enjoyable and fun and I don’t feel like I’ve lost anything. So yeah, it was a process though, for sure. It took a good six months to really let all that go.

Rob: I want to actually talk more about the process and I actually think is longer than six months because I want to go back when you were thinking, “Hey, I want to continuing education for attorneys.” And then you were actually creating like a mindset course for another person, for a partner or a client. You’ve gone through a pretty massive evolution. And I just, I wonder if you could maybe talk through that a little bit before we get into where your business is today because I think the process of choosing a niche or leaning into a niche can be really uncomfortable sometimes. And I think you’ve done something more than just like choosing a copywriting niche. You’ve changed your business fundamentally and who you work with and what you do, but it’s very similar to that process of choosing a niche, talk about that. And going back even farther, the head trash, what was holding you back, why it was so hard to finally find the right path and also your willingness to try different things to get there.

Linda: Yeah. I mean, if I go back to that time, I mean, I love thinking back to those conversations where the three of us sat in. I was talking about the legal programs that I would create. The mindset around that was what is low hanging fruit, right? Where do I have contacts? What have I been good at? What do I understand so I should be doing this? And even though I understood how shoulds really get in the way, I had those shoulds coming up, because like everyone else, I did have those financial concerns and pressures. I still had, at the time my kids were in high school, I had a bunch of obligations that I wanted to fulfill. Money was an issue. And so I was always looking at what can I quickly do in this space to maybe become known, to make a decent amount of money. And that really got in the way of me being able to see what was I really passionate about? What did I really want to do?

And what I realized was that in the process of doing that, all I was doing was spinning and spinning and working hard. I mean, my biggest struggle all along has always been going into giant overwhelm. And I think a lot of people get there and they think, “How did this happen?” And I used to find myself in overwhelm every few months and go, “Wait a minute. How’d that happen again?” And it was really all my doing because I was so afraid that if I didn’t say yes to something, if I didn’t say yes to a client, if I didn’t say yes to the needs of other businesses, that somehow I would not succeed. And so that process was really little by little calling myself out and saying, “Okay, Linda, you’re just scared. You’re just scared that if you take this leap, there’s not going to be anything.” And in fact, maybe we think the niche that we go into, isn’t going to pay us what we’re doing now, right.

We give up the good for the great.And for me, there was a story going on like, well, mindset coaches don’t make what copywriters make. It was easier to make money as a copywriter. And it was really a story I was telling myself, and we all do that. Maybe it’s easier to take the client that’s paying right now, instead of going for the client that is really aligned with your vision. And I think, I will talk about this, but COVID was, I’d already given up most of my copywriting by the time COVID hit. And so it was after I had appeared at TCCIRL on stage with you guys. At that point, I’d already given up most of it, but COVID made such a huge difference in allowing me to see that what I was doing was just consistently doing and it wasn’t anchored in what I really wanted. And so I think when people are thinking about their niche, people are always like, “Well, should I do, should I do this? Should I do that?”

It’s really about where are you’re being guided and listening. Listen, if I was to go back to copywriting, it would be all emails, [inaudible 00:10:16] write them for myself now and they’re really fun.

Kira: You went to low hanging fruit versus your passion and for you, it was really more important to let go of the low hanging fruit and to figure out that passion and pursue it. But do you feel like in some cases for copywriters in a different stage in their business, maybe it makes sense to go after the low-hanging fruit and how should we think about that? Because maybe sometimes it is more important and the passion is less important then other times maybe the passion is more important. So is there a good way of thinking about that in our own businesses.

Linda: Here’s where I get to with that. I think there’s realistic things happening in people’s lives. You have mortgages, rent, food, whatever it is, a family to take care of. So it would be irresponsible for me to say that sometimes low hanging fruit is a bad idea. At the same time, what happens is, is when people do that, they say it’s temporary, but they’re taking no steps toward building the business they want. And so what happens is that they end up continuously chasing the low hanging fruit. Being disappointed in the fees that they’re getting paid, resenting their clients. And ultimately in this, I see all the time is resenting copywriting. They think I have to leave copywriting when the truth is, is that your business setup is flawed versus actually the copywriting itself. So while there is a necessity sometimes I often say, “Okay, if you were doing this, there has to be some ability to carve out time and work on your business.” At least the business that you promised yourself you would build. So I think that there are times, and at the same time, there does need to be a parallel path.

Rob: It’s funny that you’re saying that because we actually were just on Clubhouse earlier today talking about like, there’s times when you have to work on your business, and then there’s this hat that you have to put on this entrepreneur hat, where you’re thinking about the future. You’re thinking about the new things, the different things. And if you don’t have both of them, you can’t really live or create the business that you really want to long-term. And so yeah, I appreciate that. So, as you’ve gone through this transformation of your business, are there like two or three takeaways, big lessons that you’ve learned that you think, okay, this… Shorten my learning curve and share those big lessons with me. So I don’t have to go through this 18 month process that you’ve been through.

Linda: Yeah. There are a couple of things. One of the things that really occurred to me, particularly during the time of COVID where I actually fired a client in the middle of COVID, a retainer client. And I freed up time and I realized that vision is the number one, most important thing for your business because it anchors you, it anchors your choices. It helps you say no to things that don’t align. And when I talk about vision, I’m not talking about the let’s make $250,000 this year, because first of all, that’s not going to be that inspiring for most people, right? Yes, it’s inspiring to hopefully make that money. But what’s inspiring is, oh my gosh, I’m going to make this kind of an impact. I’m going to get to travel. For me, you guys know that I just spent a couple of weeks working out of Costa Rica.

That’s inspiring is to be able to work and live wherever I want. And so that vision and also understanding who I really want to work with in that vision, allows me to clearly say yes or no to somebody and to really focus what I’m doing in a day around it. So if something’s out of alignment, it needs to go. And so that’s one of the things. The other thing I would say, I have two other things I want to say about this. There’s, boundaries are key. I didn’t always understand the importance of this, but in that 18 months, what I started to do was little by little set boundaries so I could work on my business. First, it started to be, I’m going to take some time on Fridays. Then I decided no client calls Fridays. Then I decided no client calls until 10:00 AM. Then I decided no client calls on Mondays. And what that did was free me up to A, right when I wanted to, and to have that concentrated time and B, really take the time to work on my business.

So I didn’t feel so guilty, pressured, whatever it was. And I knew when I was going to be on calls. I understood what my schedule looked like.And setting those boundaries didn’t mean I lost money. In fact, nothing changed. And it just gave me more space to create and think. And the last thing I will say is, is overwhelm is a choice. And coming from me, that’s a really big thing to hear because I was in a constant state of falling almost into. That was my mindset trap, but it is a choice. And it’s one that if you understand your fears and your doubts, that you can stop it, you can see it coming a mile away so that the no becomes a lot easier. No, that doesn’t work for me because I know I’m going to work myself to death. And something is going to have to suffer. So those are the three really biggest takeaways that I have from this growth period. And that I think are really critical for every business owner.

Kira: Can we talk more about the vision and getting super clear on the vision. Because I think a lot of us are like, “Yes, I know it’s important, but I’m struggling to get a clear vision.” Because maybe it is stuck on the financial goal, or maybe it just seems too far out of reach, or it just isn’t clear enough. Is there an exercise we can do to create that vision?

Linda: Yeah. I mean, I had created a whole program around it, but it’s really about… Let me try to get a couple pieces out of it that’ll help people get going. And here’s the way I like to think about it, is we think of vision as a to-do list. The shoulds that we have, like, I need a website or I need to be communicating with my email list every week. That’s not a vision. What a vision really is, is that big picture. If you want to start somewhere, I want you to think about what would inspire you to get out of bed everyday and work on your business. Now, the first thing that will happen for most people is, Oh my God, I would love to work till three every day. And that’s it. How, how do I do it? And the number one thing I often say is, is you have to suspend your how first.

How, doesn’t have any place in vision. Because what it’ll do is it’ll kill your vision immediately. So really what vision is and the exercise you really need to go back to doing. There’s a couple of things here is, it says, one go back to, how did you play as a child? What did you do? What were the things that really lit you up? And I hate to do this, but every time we talk here, we’re talking Barbies, but I really go back to this childhood play and creative time and turning inward time for me and telling stories. And for me, that whole piece is what gave rise to needing to help people undercover, their voice, whether that’s coaching copywriting. And for me, that’s part of my vision. So it really anchored me into, okay, I want to work with people, right?

Little things like that will give you clues. And so I think that going back to what did I dream about? What do I wake up at 3:00 AM not worrying about, but wanting. Those are really great places to start to look for your vision. And to be honest I often tell people is this to look beyond their limiting beliefs. If you haven’t, I can’t do this, or you find yourself saying, “I don’t have the time.” Or you find yourself saying, “But my kids need me to do this right now.” It’s a good place to just suspend that and free-write. If you could really build something so ideal, write it all down and there’s nobody watching. There’s no one watching and your vision comes from those pieces and you can kind of start to look at all of that and see what is it that I really want my business to look like.

Rob: So as I think about visioning is it possible to have a vision that’s too big? Let me give an example. I saw a copywriter recently, I think it was a copywriter. It might’ve been an influencer or whatever, but part of their vision was to influence a billion people to do this thing, whatever it was. And I remember thinking this, I mean, I’m letting the how get in the way here. I was like, “Wait a second, do you even have the platform?” So I’m curious, do you think those impossible goals, which we’ve talked about those before on the podcast and I’m in favor of them, but do you think that there are visions that are too big and then we should maybe back off a little bit and make it achievable in the short run on our way to the big thing, or can it literally be, I want to touch every person on the earth, before the end of my lifetime?

Linda: Such a broad question, first of all. And I did listen to that episode. That was a really good episode, actually, because I was so curious about that one. Here’s what I have to say about this. There’s a difference between vision and goals. So I’m glad you brought that up. Vision is the big picture, is that thing that lights you up. So if the idea of impacting 1 billion people lights you up every day and aligns you with making better choices for your business, then absolutely that’s your vision. The difference between a vision and a goal is, is the goals are the steps that you’re going to take to get there, visions change. Maybe that person goes, “Well, maybe I didn’t really want to influence a billion because the billion is really more about some unmet need.” And they realize that when they’re starting to actually do the thing. So maybe they change theirs and say that you know what maybe really all I wanted to impact was 500,000, whatever it is.

And maybe I didn’t even need a number on it. And that’s how the visions can change. The goals are those steps. Those have the actual steps that take you there. The things that I’m going to do each and every day, that’ll actually bring me closer to my vision. That’s where goals live. And they’re not very sexy sometimes, and they’re not always inspiring, but they are the things that you’re doing every single day. One of the reasons I always liked the book, The Slight Edge is he talks about the fact that every single day doing something is moving you closer to that vision. It’s moving you closer to the achievement of that. And when we’re not, we’re actually moving backward. So the whole idea for me is setting those goals, doesn’t have to be monumental. But it is what is it that I’m going to do to move toward that? And if I have giant limiting beliefs around whether I can get there, I’m going to tell you that the first place to go is dismantling those limiting beliefs.

Kira: Well, let’s talk about overwhelm because you mentioned overwhelm is a choice. I think that’s what you said. So if I’m listening and I’m like, “Okay, I get that it’s a choice. I choose to move away from overwhelm, but I still feel overwhelmed.” How do I start to break that down so I can prevent the overwhelm or at least work through it if it hits me and I wasn’t able to prevent it, I can make it go away quickly.

Linda: Yeah. I think there is a lot of shame around overwhelm, which you just sort of raised right there. And I think the first thing to know is that there is no shame around it. We all do it. There’s not one of us that hasn’t driven ourselves into the point of overwhelm. We said yes, to something, we committed to something and forgot that we actually had something on our list. That happens. What’s critical in those moments is to really go back and learn the lessons. How did I get here? We don’t examine, how did I get into overwhelm? I had to start to really look at what am I doing? Well, number one, I’m really bad at projecting how long something takes me, right. I’m really bad at that. Most people are. I now build in double the time because I’m really terrible about it. Right?

So if I’m in overwhelm, I start to wonder, okay, how did I get here? What do I need to do to shift out of it? So I had recently been looking at a launch that I have for program. And I was like, “I too close to the development of my lead magnet to the actual launch for me to feel comfortable.” And I know that if I leave this date because I could do all the things, I mean, I’m really good at getting stuff done. But if I do all the things, I’m going to put myself in this state of overwhelm and I’m going to be miserable. And everyone around me, who’s at home is going to be miserable. And so the whole point is, is that there are these green sort of yellow light, red light moments. And it’s recognizing those yellow light moments where something like that will come up and giving yourself permission to back out.

There’s nobody who’s judging us. We have this, like the school teacher is still going to dock us a grade if we change something. And the truth is, is that we have the ability as entrepreneurs to write this playbook out, to actually decide how we’re going to do this. And overwhelm can sometimes happen. And sometimes things are out of your control. Maybe something happens in your family. Maybe something comes up. It is okay to take something else off your plate. Maybe the support you need at home. You ask people to participate. Maybe you need additional help in your business, whatever it is, it’s learning to back out of it and being okay and not shaming yourself for it because we all get there. It’s just something that happens. And it is something that we can choose to shift going forward.

Rob: So I want to ask about where your business is now, Linda, because we’ve talked about, you’ve transformed everything maybe some of that process, but you write copy for yourself. You mentioned you have one copywriting client left if I remember right. But what else are you doing? Tell us about what you’ve built and who you’re working with, what that transformation actually has resulted in.

Linda: Yeah. One of the things that I did in particularly in COVID is I really sat down and tried to identify what I had liked about my mindset work and what I still felt was missing. So what I built during the COVID period was this concept in this marriage of mindset meet strategy. And one of the things I had seen in my group mindset programs that was missing was putting this new mindset into action. So I would see it in my private coaching clients, where we would work and talk about how to move past their money mindset, or talk about pricing. And then they put it into play and then they’d have some reinforcement and some shifting on the subconscious level. So that they could actually build in new behaviors, new patterns. What was missing in my group program was inability to work on growing your business and dismantling your mindset.

So I built basically a group program that does exactly that. I worked with them live to dismantle their mindset blocks. Things like boundaries are talked about, responsibility, choices, all of the things that I know get in the way of building a real, intentional business. And at the same time I identified four areas of scaling. And so they’re working on those four areas, first visibility process, sales and execution. So they can see how real-time their mindset is actually getting in the way. So visibility, you tell yourself, you have to be on social media, but do you? So that they’re writing their own business playbook about what scaling looks like. So that’s really what’s shifted in my work is, is that I really focus on helping people put this into real time, almost like a laboratory so that they can actually get the results that they’re looking for.

And so I work with really, I call it growth stage entrepreneurs in that space, because what happens is that most people who recognize mindset as an issue have built their business and they can’t seem to get to the next level. They’re still taking some clients they shouldn’t. They’re making the money that they want, but they’re working really hard. And maybe they’re not getting the visibility that they want. There’s some place that they’re still falling short. And so what we’re doing is really helping them remove some of those obstacles and put into play those pieces that they’re missing and really seeing which pieces those are. And so that’s what’s really shifted in my business. That’s really what I love doing. And I’m spending most of my time with.

Kira: Can you talk us through that framework a little bit more if we’re a growth stage copywriter and we have plateaued and we’re stuck, what are some exercises we could do to get unstuck?

Linda: Sure, absolutely. So I want to sort of say there… I divide them into four stages. You have the frantic freelancer, that’s somebody who’s just starting out really taking what they can. Mindset isn’t so much in play, except for the, I’m new, the stories, around that. They’re scrappy and scrambling. The emerging business owner is starting to have a little more consistency. Mindset is starting to appear in pricing and all of that. The growth stage entrepreneur might see struggling around pricing. They might be struggling around visibility or some aspect. The intentional business owner is where we all want to be. It’s that, yes, we have mindset stuff’s still happening, but we know how to move through it. So here’s just a simple thing that we can do. And I shared this with your Think Tank recently. And we all have stories that we tell ourselves, we have stories around I’m bad at this, or I should be doing this. And those stories are the reasons we don’t execute. The stories are the reasons we don’t do something in our business.

And they often can even be excuses, right? Well, I hate… I’m an introvert, so I can’t do video, whatever the case may be. If you were at a place where you know that you need to be doing something for your business, but you can’t seem to bring yourself to it and you’re stuck, I always recommend this really simple exercise to get started. And it comes from my dear friend, Nancy Levin, and she basically said is what we have to start to do is separate fact from fiction. The stories we tell ourselves are based in our past pains, they’re based in past circumstances. There actually is no truth to most of our fears. They’re really rooted in something that’s maybe happened to us before. But most of our fears and doubts can’t tell us what will happen today in this moment or will happen tomorrow or in the future.

So a really good exercise to help calm that voice, to really get the space, I often talk about it’s that space between stimulus and response that Viktor Frankl had shared in his quote, that’s where your power is. To get that space, it’s time to separate fact from fiction. So using this simple prompt always helps. You start out with the story I tell myself is, free write it, just free write it. Especially if you find yourself in this frenzy, you find ourselves in like nervous, anxious, frenzies. Then the next line is the truth is. Now this seems really simple, but it is an objective truth. It’s like if Rob was looking at my business, [inaudible 00:31:11] he would have been like, “Linda, you really don’t want to work with lawyers on this project but you keep saying you do.”

But it’s an objective truth like today is Tuesday. And so the story I tell myself is blank. The truth is blank. This exercise will give you enough space to quiet the fear so you can actually do the thing that you want. And so it’s really a simple exercise, but it’s a start and we just want to create enough momentum, not the biggie execution thing, but littlie, some momentum to get you going.

Rob: So I know you like working with people in that space, what you said established, not beginner. Talk to us a little bit about that too, because it feels to me that beginners have a lot of mindset issues too, but there may be, there are reasons why they’re not dealing with them. Where the more established person that’s hit that, it’s gone past that frantic freelancer and its in this a higher stage. Why is that person more able to deal with mindset than the people in the earlier stages?

Linda: So it’s a good question. I do work with even early stage, but I usually suggest they start with a membership because it’s an easier place to get started. They don’t feel as overwhelmed or as committed. One of the things in the early stages of businesses, your finances are finite and are going to your skill building, to client acquisition and all that. So people are a little afraid to invest in mindset. I almost wished people would be more ready at that early stage so that as they’re growing and they have the tools to grow faster.

Rob: But it’s less tangible, right? Like it’s hard to see what is the outcome to invest in that thing.

Linda: It is less tangible because right now the only thing that matters is getting a client showing up, establishing authority, really building a business, because let’s be honest as entrepreneurs, especially in the copywriter world, this is sometimes a second career. There is a shift that’s happening and it feels really scary. So you’re just doing the things. And so it might be hard to recognize that it’s your fear that dictated who the client that you just took and it takes you months later to realize why you’re so miserable and resent them, right? Whereas in the growth stage or even in the emerging business owner stage what’s happening is, is they’re seeing patterns over and over. They’re seeing the same things happen. They have taken enough courses, they have the skills yet something is still holding them back. I always say, there’s a crowded ceiling, right? Before you bust through to that intentional level.

And the reason it gets so crowded is, is because A, change is scary and B, we get used to those patterns of, well… I should take that back. We finally start to get aware of those patterns of, Oh my God, I took the same client again, right? Or, Oh, my other was at copywriting emergency or they called me on Saturday. I can’t believe they called me on Saturday. But at that growth stage, you start to realize, Oh, maybe I actually have control over this. That maybe I can set a boundary. That maybe I actually put in my contract that I make them sign and put it in bold that I’m not available on weekends, right. It’s at that point that we have a little breathing room and can see, Oh my gosh, this is the thing that’s really standing in the way. And even me who does this, right, it took me a while to really realize, Oh, it really is me that’s putting me in overwhelm. It’s not anybody else.

Kira: So let’s break in here to dig into a little more of the details on a few things, Rob, what just blew your mind so far?

Rob: Blow my mind. That’s like a really high standard, but there are a couple of things that kind of jumped out to me as listening to Linda share the transformation that she’s been through and this idea of the things that we do, obligation versus desire and doing what we think we need to do versus what want to do. In fact, we just had a training in the underground that Lindsay Hotmire. Who’s also been on the podcast and spoke at TCCIRL. She talked a lot about the differences between shoulds and woulds. And Linda’s talking about the same thing. It’s like, there are all these things that we believe about what we should be doing in our business. And that comes from our past experiences. It comes from the people that we talk to who are constantly telling us what business should be, or we see other people who have built something and we think that’s the thing I want to build.

And so we have all these preconditions on what we should do and the obligations that we feel to getting that stuff done. But then what we really want and the things that we desire are oftentimes different and different in some good ways and some bad ways, different in ways that we can do less and and get more out of them. A lot like how Linda has in changing her expectations for her business and what she’s built, it’s been a lot of work, but the end result is just so much more fulfilling.

Kira: Yeah. I’m really glad that we were able to talk with Linda about the low hanging fruit and really like how that sometimes isn’t the best fruit for your own business. And so thinking through the different stages you’re in, in your business is so important. Because like Linda said, sometimes that low-hanging fruit is important when you have to pay your bills. And you’re just getting started as a copywriter. You want to do what’s easy and fast so that you can gain that traction. And then eventually you don’t have to worry about the low-hanging fruit. You can start reaching more and seeking that type of business and the types of clients that you really dream about. So I think it’s tricky because it’s easy to get stuck with a low hanging fruit, like you said, and all the shoulds of, I should be doing this because I’ve done it for a decade and I should work with these types of clients because I’ve worked with them in previous jobs.

And that’s important, but it’s also really important to know when you should leave the shoulds and transition to the new part of your business, where you’re actually creating something that you’re excited about and energized about, which is why we go into business for ourselves.

Rob: Yeah. I mean, the low hanging fruit is important. Like you said, at the very beginning, it’s the easy stuff, it gets you started. When you get stuck with the wrong clients and the wrong projects and wrong pricing, a lot of people then figure that copywriting isn’t for them. And they leave because they haven’t been able to figure out the right clients and the right projects and the right pricing and the things that they really want to do, the kinds of problems that they really can solve. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be six figures or seven figures, or all of those things that we use to describe success in the marketing world. But it does take time to figure it out and to really move forward.

Kira: Yes. And I liked that we started the conversation with Linda talking about her own struggle from transitioning, from primarily focused on client work, client services, copywriting projects, to moving into this business where she now has built her own platform and brand around mindset and has created several group programs and memberships. And that transition isn’t easy. We were lucky enough to work with Linda during that transition time. And before that transition time to kind of see the messier side and how all of that head trash can prevent us from shifting in our own business. This is something that happens and comes up a lot with copywriters who want to start the new business. And they’re really clear about it, but they feel tied to the client work because they feel like they can’t be a copywriter, or they’re going to be looked down upon if they’re not actively working with five or more clients at a time, or that they can’t hang out in the copywriter community and be a coach or a teacher, if they’re not aggressively pursuing the client worK.

And it’s just not true, but it’s something that we’ve seen repeatedly. And I know I’ve dealt with that too in the past. So it’s a struggle that definitely is out there for copywriters.

Rob: Yeah. Getting really clear on what that is that you want and what the business needs to do in order for you to get the things out of life and not just out of the business I think is really important. What else stood out to you?

Kira: Talking about overwhelm was huge because, just Linda saying overwhelm is a choice is a really powerful statement. Overwhelm it’s attached to running a business, especially if you’re a new business owner. For many copywriters, working with clients can be very overwhelming. And then as you grow and scale, there are new problems to solve, which can also be overwhelming. So because it’s something that we all deal with daily, weekly, that really stood out to me. And it’s something that I’ve learned to deal with a little bit better. I don’t think I personally feel as overwhelmed as I used to even a year ago. I feel like it does get easier to deal with overwhelm and clearly Linda has worked on it and it’s easier for her to manage it and to mitigate it and to prevent it from happening or at least to deal with it when it does happen. So I’m really glad that we were able to talk through that because this is just part of the game that we play. Overwhelm is a big part of that.

Rob: Yeah. Anytime you’re making a change in a business and you’re taking on new things, or you’re starting a really big project, obviously overwhelmed can become a part of that. And I think when Linda says overwhelm is a choice, it’s not necessarily the choice of taking on something that’s bigger than what we’ve done in the past, but it’s our reaction to that, right. And so for instance, we are just a week away from TCCIRL, that we’re putting on virtually the whole virtual side of it has added complexity that we haven’t dealt with before with a live event. And all of this stuff is in some ways overwhelming. And yet our approach to that, we can look at it and say, “Okay, this is also a learning experience. There’s things we can do with our team to make sure that other people are taking on different parts of this.”

In fact, one of our team members just had a baby, which kind of threw a wrench into everything as well. And so it’s really about not just all of the stuff that happens, but our reaction to it and how we approach dealing with it that creates that overwhelm. And I think that’s a big part of what she’s saying too.

Kira: I was thinking about the same thing, just how we have the event and overwhelm has been triggered. I, especially on Friday when I was just thinking through last minute event logistics that we’re trying to work through overwhelm hit me really hard. I think I even sent a message to you Rob and I was like, “I’m freaking out, I’m freaking out here.” But the cool thing is you don’t have to sit in that overwhelm, especially as you start to figure out well, like how can I deal with this? And because I’ve dealt with it so much, I’ve learned part of it is sharing the overwhelm with people on your team, business partners, with your family too. And then also having that support has been really helpful for me to have that TCC team and have these key members who can help us and step in, has been really helpful with dealing with the overwhelm.

And then also just being able to kind of break down overwhelm and break it down into steps. So I can see my way through it, even if it’s a list of 20 different items, I can see how I can pull myself out of that overwhelm. So I don’t get stuck in it, like I used to.

Rob: Yeah. And I think of this too. There are a lot of times in our business where business is overwhelming. Like it is stressful and that’s just a natural part of business. In exercising and building muscles, you stress the muscle, you become fatigued, sometimes you may even take your muscles to muscle failure where you literally can’t do anything else. And it’s that process then that over the next little while, strengthens those muscles. So that the next time it happens, you’re stronger. You’re that much more capable of dealing with the stress. And it’s the exact same thing when it comes to things like being overwhelmed in business. There are some times when we are overwhelmed and you just have to power through it, but it makes you that much more capable the next time that you face down a situation that is overwhelming and it opens your eyes to possibilities.

So the first time it happens, maybe you don’t have a team. The next time it happens, you realize, Oh, if I bring in somebody to help for an hour or two a week, that may be just enough to overcome it. And you grow and your business grows along with you. And it’s all just part of the process of what we’re doing.

Kira: And Rob, anything else stand out to you from the conversation?

Rob: Yeah. One other thing, Linda mentioned a book that we’ve talked about several times on the podcast that is The Slight Edge. This idea I really gravitate to it and that’s these little tiny changes on a daily basis or on a weekly basis can have really big changes over time. Something like reading for 10 or 15 minutes every morning can have this massive learning impact over years, say two, five, 10 years. And so I just think, I like coming back to this idea because it’s something that I believe in very firmly. And I think it’s another way that not only to deal with overwhelm, but just to grow and to develop and to become more of whatever the thing is that we want to develop into, as a business person, as a partner, as a parent or whatever your role is in life. The Slight Edge is just a great construct for thinking about how are you going to grow in little ways that have big impact. Let’s go back to our interview with Linda and ask a question about Linda’s strategy for building her business.

Kira: I would like to kind of move away from mindset just for a little bit to talk about the business growth. And I think it’s really easy to look at what you’ve built and say how, or wonder how you’ve done it beyond the mindset work that you’ve done. And beyond even, well, actually, maybe we just beyond that piece of it, how have you built your business strategically so that you have this membership, you have these different programs you’ve already mentioned, you have your podcast. How have you approached it strategically? And let’s just start there. I have a bunch of questions about it, but for someone who might want to do something similar in a different space, maybe not mindset, but wants to go bigger and build this platform. What advice would you give them related to that?

Linda: Oh man. Sometimes I think, I ended up backing into my ascension model of programs, but what I will say is, is that I think working with people who are smarter than you, and who’ve done this and taking the pieces from them that really worked for your business helps. I can’t say enough about what I learned in Think Tank that really got me to understand, okay, these are the ways that I can create offerings for my audience. And that really was so foundational and so important for me to go to you guys had so many different trainings. Whereas I think me trying to do it on my own, I was so clueless.

And in the last year I invested… I’ve worked, I’ve talked about this on my own podcast. I’ve worked with Russell Laughlin who is really good at process. And I will tell you when I looked at my four stages of growth, I’m really good at being visible. I have no problem with that. I’m good at sales. I am good at execution. Where I s