← Strategy Hour | Online Marketing for Business Growth
Strategy Hour | Online Marketing for Business Growth
936: Your Math Teacher Lied: The Science of Business Growth (Test, Optimize, Repeat!) with Jess O’Connell
00:55:48
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- [00:00]
Jess O'Connell
Finding that thing is all an experiment, right? It's all just trying something new and looking at it and saying like, okay, is this what I wanted? Did this work? Is it getting me closer to what I want? And if not, what are the variables that I can change in order to try again?
- [00:20]
Abigail Pumphrey
Welcome to the Strategy Hour podcast brought to you by Boss Project. I'm your host, Abigail Pumphrey, and I'm dedicated to supporting online businesses. I don't believe in one right way to build a business. I'm here to help you build business your way. One that supports not only the life you have, but the life you want. I'm on a personal mission to help you become financially free. I'm taking all the lessons learned as I turned a layoff into a seven figure online business. I'm here to help you prioritize your.
- [00:49]
Co-host
Life every step of the way.
- [00:51]
Abigail Pumphrey
Whether you're creating your first digital product, growing an email list, or scaling an already profitable business. Settle in. It's time to talk strategy. If you ever thought, why isn't my business working? I did everything right. Then this episode is for you because today we're breaking down why A +B does not equal C in business. And how learning to think like a scientist will help you stop overthinking, start testing, and finally scale with confidence. I saw a post from Jess, the launch scientist over on Instagram, and I instantly knew I had to have her on the show so we could have this conversation. Her post was all about why your math teacher is the reason you're overthinking everything in your business. And it sparked so many thoughts and ideas for me that I knew I needed to discuss it with her. We've all been conditioned to think that business will inevitably follow a formula, but real success comes from experimentation, not perfection. You know how much I am a proponent of the experimental mindset. So today we have Jess O'Connell. She is a course creation and launch strategist who helps experts package their brilliance with binge worthy revenue generating courses. With a background in science and education, she approaches business like a seventh grade science experiment, minus the awkward group projects. She's here today to help you ditch that pass fail mindset and start making data driven decisions that will actually move the needle. Help me welcome Jess to the show. Hey, Jess.
- [02:30]
Co-host
Welcome to the show.
- [02:31]
Jess O'Connell
Hey. Thank you so much for having me. I am so excited to chat today.
- [02:35]
Co-host
I'm excited to have you and talk about looking at business in a little bit of a different way. But before we get into today's topic.
- [02:44]
Abigail Pumphrey
I'd love if you talk a little.
- [02:46]
Co-host
Bit about what your life has been like before the launch scientist and how you kind of got to where you are today.
- [02:54]
Jess O'Connell
I love this question because I feel like we all have a unique origin story and I love learning how everybody got into this industry because I even now, it's wild to me that people don't know that this is an industry and they still don't really understand it. But most people have interacted with the digital education space in some way without realizing it, especially with like TikTok and Instagram. And so I love putting it into that context. But I am OG like you, and I actually started online as a blogger back in 2010. I built a health and wellness blog up to on Blogger or Blogspot back in the day, up to a million monthly page views. I was featured on like the local news and I was working with brands before that was even a thing. Like back in 2010 I had like Instagram. When Instagram first came out, I blogged before Pinterest. Like it was the wild, wild west back then. And so I started there, like growing or talking about specific topics, educating my audience and building a community around a common goal. And then I just kind of parlayed that. I feel like our businesses are always just an evolution of us doing and finding and moving through the next thing. I started an accountability group which kind of was coaching, and I didn't realize it. And then I was selling my coaching groups through like five day mini challenges, not realizing I was launching. And so like, I just kind of. I feel like my business has developed kind of like in X Men, when Magneto walks across the vast and like the rocks come up to meet him. Like, I feel like that's how it's all unfolded. Back in 2019, I had so many people asking me, like, how are you making money with blogging without putting a ton of ads all over your page and adsense. And I was like, well, I have these accountability groups and I was working with a company called DietBet back in the day to like promote their things and I was making money from them. So I had these different income streams as an affiliate and as a quote, unquote coach. And I decided to put together this like five day challenge of how I was selling using five day challenges. I had no idea those were the words back then. But I ran it in a Facebook group, sold it, and that was my first course. And I actually turned that into a course that I scaled to a million dollars using ads. And I ultimately sold that course and like, brand to a competitor two years ago almost. And now, like, I. I help people do that. I help people create digital products and I help people sell it and kind of package their knowledge and expertise and. And yeah, that's kind of how I came into the launch. Scientist is like, really using that background in growing up in marketing, like, in this whole age. And I went to school to be a science teacher, and I have, like, a deep love for science. Like, not science in the way that it's like, inaccessible and not understandable, but science in the way that we learned it in seventh grade, where it was like, oh, this makes so much sense. And like, giving those principles to more complicated things and just kind of like putting things into that language that all of us remember from seventh grade science class. And really like making business as simple as that. And that's kind of how we got to here.
- [06:15]
Co-host
Well, what an incredible journey. And I've been doing this long enough to. When I hear people talking about the.
- [06:22]
Abigail Pumphrey
Road that got them here, I think.
- [06:25]
Co-host
It'S so easy to make smaller the things we're doing.
- [06:29]
Abigail Pumphrey
But just like, hearing you talk about.
- [06:30]
Co-host
It like, it's no big deal. It's like, no, you've done some really incredible things, like getting a. A million readers a month and growing, of course, to a million dollars. Like, these are big moments in business, and you get to be on the other side, a business owner that has all of this experience, regardless of if you're starting on a new adventure or building this new thing. You come in with all this background knowledge, which I think only further aids into this discussion around triggering what you're doing in experiment. But before we get to that, the reason I even had you on the show in the first place, I have seen your content off and on, and every single time I see it, I'm like, yes. I just, like, wanted, like, scream yes at the screen. And this particular post you put out, it did not get the traction it deserved. By the way. It specifically talked about not looking at your business like a math problem, and specifically how you're blaming the education system for what so often frustrates people in business. I'd love if you talk about that a little bit. How do you think our education system set us up to overthink everything?
- [07:45]
Jess O'Connell
Oh, my goodness. So I actually, I know that there's like, this new wave of neurodiversity that we're all going through right now, and I love it. And I was diagnosed with ADHD in 6th grade grade. So I was that 10 year old girl who couldn't sit still, who couldn't stop talking, who was taking apart all of her pens and like had all of the things in her desk. Like, I was a problem to have in class. I was not a pleasure to have in class. And so I have a different experience of the education system, I think, and all of the ways that the education system made me feel stupid, made me feel wrong. And so I really have the opportunity to look at those lessons at the same time where a lot of people are like, I love school. Like, school was great. I did the assignments and I took the tests and I, I did the things and I got the A's and like, school is really set up to create compliance more so than like free thinking and almost like punishes or like makes you feel bad about thinking a different way in general. But it was really funny because I, it's this funny dichotomy. I had a really hard time in school and I went to school to be a teacher. And one of my favorite things about learning how to be a teacher was learning how people learn. And I remember my favorite class that I ever took was like my sophomore year at 9 o'clock in the morning. I was taking like math theory and it was elementary level math, but we had to figure out other ways to solve it. And so rather than just being told, this is the equation, this is how this works. One plus two always equals three, period. Carte blanche, we had to prove it. We had to say, okay, so how else could you solve one plus two equals three? How else might somebody look at it? And it really took what I struggled with in school, which was like, well, why don't we do it this way? Or like, what if we look at it this way? And teachers looking that as like defiant and like, no, this is the answer. Sit down and shut up. It made that so much more interesting to me. And I could see different ways. And my brain loves looking at things in different ways. And now I understand that as an adult. And so I feel like school really set us up, or at least like K through 12 school, to believe that everything is as simple as A plus B equals C. 1 plus 2 equals 3. 3. That there is a concrete, if you do this and this, it will equal this. And so then we go through life and we start a business and you see this marketing and this messaging that's like, this is the proven system to six figure months. Or like, this is the proven system to create your thing. Like A plus B equals C and we want that like we are comfortable with that. Our brain is like, oh, my God, yes, there is a problem. I want C. I need A plus B to get to C. Like, that's the only way. But then what happens is that we buy the program, we implement the system, we do A and we do B, and we get elephants, and we're like, what? And I feel like this is especially true with marketing and business and all sorts of things in business, but when A plus B equals elephants, you really start to question you, right? Because they told you that A plus B equals C, and I did A, and I did B and it gave me elephants. And so obviously I'm the problem. And then we start to internalize. Like, but my teacher told me that A plus B equals C. Like, I know that this is how this works. This is the paradigm with which I have been taught that, like, somebody smarter than me tells me what to do, I do it, and I get an A. That is it. But business and marketing, and especially in this industry, that is so revolutionary and innovative and different and based on human emotion and, like, buying psychology and so many other factors. Like, there's literally not one thing I can think of in which A plus B would equal C in business. And so that's funny about that post is I actually. I made it on Instagram. I rarely, like, create carousels in the create part of Instagram. I don't even think I was in that. I was, like, on stories and then just saving them because I felt like. Like it was the kind of content that I had to share right then. I couldn't just keep sitting on it. I love those kinds of posts, and I've talked about this for years. Actually, I'm pretty sure I have an episode on my podcast from, like, 2020 or before, like, about this concept. But it really is such an important paradigm shift that when you feel like you've done A and B and you got elephants, that you are not the problem, and that elephants aren't even the problem. And realizing that you did A plus B and got elephants and that wasn't what you were looking for, maybe. So what can you change to get the outcome that you're looking for? There are variables that are able to be changed. There's, like, little levers that you can pull. But where most people stop is like, well, I did it. I did A, I did V. It gave me elephants. I'm the problem. And then they go look for somebody else to tell them, no, it is bananas plus peanut butter equals cookies. And it's like, oh, that's what I need. I just needed the different variables. But the problem isn't the variables or the outcome in general. It's this idea that A plus B or anything plus anything could equal this, like, constant, predictable outcome. And that's the idea that I want to shift in this industry in general.
- [13:42]
Co-host
I think it's such an important conversation to have because there's been this formulaic approach to getting certain results for a long time. And I do think it's confusing as an entrepreneur when you do see other people adopt the formula and they do get C, they do get the outcome that you were hoping for, and you're like, well, they did it and this other person did it and this other person did it, then I have to be the problem. And very rarely is that the case. I think it's important that we share that. The reality is everything works. Challenges work, webinars work, posting on social works, paid ads work, growing an email list works, SEO works. Like, all of these things work. You have to figure out the formula that applies best to you that you feel the most confident in and gets you the most traction. But we can't do that work for you. You have to be the one willing to slow down enough to experiment and listen and pay attention and implement new things as a result of what you're seeing out in the wild.
- [14:55]
Jess O'Connell
Well, and what's so funny about that is I do feel like we have both messages, and I can see how confusing it would be. I mean, I remember how confusing it was as a newer business owner. Okay, you have to tweak and test everything, but A plus B always equals C. And so I remember going into it before really adopting. What I have now is like, okay, I have to test everything. So I would throw everything at the wall to test it. And then I felt like I was just in spaghetti season, where I was like, I'm trying this and I'm trying this and I'm trying this. But, like, what does a test actually look like? And so after throwing a million things at the wall and being successful, I made a hundred thousand dollars my first year doing this. But I was exhausted and I was really tired of starting over. That was the first thing is I was like, seriously, I have rebuilt every single thing for this course and this launch and my marketing assets and my messaging from scratch 17 times. And it's really hard to tell when you start over every time what actually is working and what changes created the outcome that you got. So that's the first thing I want to introduce to this conversation. Is like, this idea that if you're starting over every time, you're not tweaking and testing, and you have no idea what's actually working. And this idea that throwing spaghetti at the wall is the same thing as testing, because it isn't. And no one really talks about this process of testing. What does that look like? And how do you get into testing mode? And so what really happened for me, and like I mentioned, I went to school to be a teacher. Didn't initially. I actually started going to school to be a journalist. And I fell into teaching after this little program that I put on at a local elementary school in my town. It was in a, like, poor community. And I remember when I was in elementary school, they gave us all books. I don't remember why, but we were in an underprivileged school, too. And I remember the act of, like, somebody giving me a book that had my name on it was, like, huge to me as a kid. I think it was in, like, third grade. I was a core memory. And so I wanted to replicate that with a local elementary school, and I did, and that made me want to be a teacher. So then I switched my major, decided to learn how to be a teacher and learn how to, like, develop curriculum and how people learn. That was really my focus. And science. So I wanted to teach middle school science, and I wanted to learn how people learn. And so that's what I learned in school. And I ultimately now use that information. But what I loved about science was that I feel like it was the only subject where I felt like failure was celebrated or failure was not even an option. It was just the.
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Co-host
It's just the result.
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Jess O'Connell
Yeah, exactly. It's just the result. Like, you're not. You're working toward failure. You have no. You're trying to answer a question. There's not necessarily a right answer. And so I started to get back to that. My roots. I had done all the mindset work, and I was like, ultimately, at the end of the day, I know. It's funny, there's this saying that I used to have behind me in my office that said, your success is inevitable, and I want to change it. I don't have anything behind me now. I want to have something that says, your failure is inevitable, because it is. And that's a good thing, because there's nothing that teaches you more than failure. And by failure, not that it's a personal, like, flaw, failure is just getting an unexpected outcome.
- [18:38]
Co-host
Yeah, totally.
- [18:39]
Jess O'Connell
And when you start to realize, like, okay, I did this and the outcome that I got was unexpected. Then, cool. How did we get here? And what can I change to influence a different outcome? And so that was really when I started to release my attachment to the outcome of things and really acclimate myself to failure with this idea that, like, I'm likely not going to get the outcome that I want. I know I have to, like, have a predicted outcome, because that's how you make a plan and know where you're going. Like, you have to know where you're going, but know that you'll ultimately get either the outcome you were looking for or the lesson that you need in order to get that outcome. It's all valuable. And throwing it all in the trash after every single launch or every single test is not the way to learn from that. It's doing it and then analyzing the data. So setting the. Sharing the hypothesis, setting a hypothesis, asking the question, if I do this, I think this will be the outcome. And then running the experiment, I am going to do this and this for this amount of time with this anticipated outcome. And then at this time, I'm going to look at the data and remove my attachment from the outcome and see, okay, did this equal this? And if it didn't, then say, okay, what can I try next time? Do I try to change my messaging? Do I post more on social media? Where did certain things come up? And how can I redesign the experiment? Start not from scratch, but from the next point and do it again, and then analyze it and do it again. And that's how you grow, that's how you learn, and that's how you find, like, your proven formula. Because there are principles of marketing, right? There are things that we need. There are proven variables. We are all working within the same set of ingredients to bake these cookies that we call online business. It's all the same flour and sugar and butter and eggs and the oven, but the combination with which you put them together is what is different. And there are influencing factors. So this maybe helps with like. But why did Sally get that? There are factors outside of those variables that impact the outcome. Factors like your time availability, your capacity, your. Your energetics, and, like, the altitude. Right? I live in Colorado, so we have to add ingredients to our cookies or they're gonna be flat. But you could bake a cake from a box and get one outcome, and I could bake a cake from a box and get a different one because I live at a different altitude. And it even says it on the box. Like, if you're high altitude you have to add this. Most people don't. Cause we're lazy. But like we forget, right? We forget as business owners, we think that like, oh well, Jenny did it and she got that result. But Jenny has been in business for six years, has already solidified her 10k months. And that's why it's different. Like Jenny's audience is different or Jenny's like whatever is different. And so we forget that there's these outside variables that we're not in control of or that we don't necessarily see, like altitude that impact how the cookies or the cake or the launch or whatever turns out. Right. We have to realize that not everybody has the same ingredients.
- [22:16]
Co-host
Yeah, no, nobody does. I mean, even if we all are working within the same kind of kitchen setup with the same access, which P.S. we don't even all have the same access, which is a whole problem on its own. But all of those things you can't see often are the things that make some of the biggest difference. And that's why we end up judging why someone else is successful and we're not. Because we can't see those variables outside of the basic ingredients that are obvious. I am curious though, as much as I a hundred percent agree with everything you're saying so far. I know so many people get caught up on, even if they go in with a mindset, this is going to be an experiment. When they get to the point there's an outcome regardless of what it is, they tie the outcome to the, like their personal self worth or the quality or efficacy of their business, or they're making all of these interpretations that honestly have nothing to do with the outcome itself, but it really impacts the way in which they move forward. I'm curious for you, how were you able to remove yourself from the outcome so that you could look at it a bit more neutrally?
- [23:32]
Jess O'Connell
Yeah, I love this question because we are emotional beings and I think that our emotions. I had some, I was talking to somebody years and years ago. This just popped back in my head about emotions because they're hard sometimes, because they're persistent. And I have four kids and so I totally love this analogy. Emotions are like children and the more you ignore them, the louder they get and the more persistent and annoying they are. And if there's a kid like tugging at your leg and you're trying to ignore it, you're not ignoring it. Right. It's making you flustered and like it puts you in this energy. But like if you look at them and you're like, hey, Give me just a second. I love you. I will deal with you in a minute. I'm going to finish what I'm doing. But you're fine. Like, then you can kind of get a second. And so the way that I like to do this is looking at. Your emotions are just data. It's all just data. And oftentimes I see people, especially when they talk about, like, detaching from the outcome or removing your emotions. We're not robots. Like, they are there. So we need to look at that as data because your emotions are an indicator for sure about the other side of things. Like, the more energetic and like, I even enjoy that. Like, how did I feel about this? Is this going to work for me? Because when you completely bypass your emotions, that's when you end up. This is such a funny segue that I was not planning on telling the story, but it's one of the funniest, I think. Funny. You'll get it. But it is funny in that it doesn't seem like it is. But I'll get into the story and that'll make sense. I had an $80,000 flopped launch. And we were like, what? And I'm like, what? Like, what does that even mean? I had a launch that I was so set was going to be my. My six figure launch. And I put everything into it. I stayed up until 2:00 in the morning every single day. I was so attached to the outcome of this launch. I did all the Energetics. Literally. I hired a shaman. I'm not even joking you. I worked with a shaman ahead of this launch. I was doing all the things I had put so much pressure. This was the launch that was going to change my future, change my family's life. I had to do this. I had to nail it. This was the thing. My kids were pretty young at the time. I think they were like four and one and a half. It was like in 2019, I think. Or no, 2019 or 2020. And I remember sitting in the corner of my closet in the middle of a full blown mental breakdown after CART closed and I only made $80,000. Are you kidding me? And I was like, okay, something about this needs to change. I'm not going to bypass my emotions in that case. Right? Those emotions were telling me something and I was ignoring them the whole launch, right? I was ignoring all of the emotions because of course I was feeling not good enough and I was feeling like an imposter and I was feeling all of the things that come up because launching is like, there's a whole other topic. But, like, launching and business is not just a personal growth experience. So many people say that, but I have a good way of talking about that that we don't have to talk about. But it's a whole thing. It's very exposing. And so all of these emotions come up and if you completely bypass them, they're just going to keep coming up. Right? They're like the kids that you're trying to ignore.
- [27:16]
Co-host
Oh, for sure.
- [27:17]
Jess O'Connell
And so I realized, because I had been bypassing them, like, these emotions are demanding to be felt. Like, what is happening here? And so it really made me take them into account and realize, like, okay, why. Why does this feel like a failure? Why am I setting my yardstick? And I think my conversion rate was something crazy, like 7%. And so, like, it wasn't even a statistical probability that I was going to make $100,000. Like, it was already, already statistically improbable that I made 80. Right? Like, and I think that that's where we get caught up. We have unrealistic expectations and don't factor in statistical probability. And then we make it mean something about ourselves that, like, this miracle didn't happen and it causes that big downward spiral where if you look at your emotions as data and you say, okay, how did that make me feel? How did that feel doing it? Was it exhausting? Did I enjoy it? Was I lit up by it? Or was it awful? And like, how do I feel about this outcome? What am I making it mean about me? And what does it actually mean? And really, like, doing that work and looking at it just like you would analyze marketing data, like saying, okay, I got a 35% conversion rate on my opt in page and I want to get a 50%. It's not like, okay, well, I'm wrong. It's like, no, okay, I'm going to improve my headline, or I'm going to make this clearer, or I'm going to. Whatever you would change in order to increase your conversion rate, it's not personal. And neither is the data, or neither are your emotions. Your emotions are just an indicator. So factoring those in and saying like, okay, you could have a great. I mean, that was a great launch, but it made me feel like absolute garbage. Maybe it wasn't the right strategy, or maybe I was putting way too much pressure on it, which ultimately obviously I was. And how can I change that variable? How can I start to look at this with less pressure? That's a better question to ask. Like, how. What made me feel pressure. Well, I was up until 2 in the morning writing these emails. What if I wrote them before that? Okay, cool. That makes me feel better. And those are the kinds of variables that you can start to play with and tweak as you're going through to find the strategy that works best for you. And one of the things this is again, mildly off topic, but one of the things I love about your business and your story is that I feel like it's very similar to mine in that it unfolded like Magneto's steps as he took a step, the next step unfolded. And understanding that that's the natural progression of things like you need to take the step for the next thing to appear. And that's the energy of an experiment. It's saying, I'm going to take this step. I am not walking down a road that is fully defined. I am stepping and I'm trusting that like the next step will be there. But I also know that like I have to take the step in order for that step to appear. I have to, I guess, like have a little bit of faith that what I'm doing is working or will get me closer to that. And if it doesn't, if it ends up like taking me this direction, then stopping and saying like, okay, do I want to go that direction maybe? Or do I need to redirect? Okay, no, we want to get back this way.
- [30:50]
Abigail Pumphrey
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Co-host
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That's freshbooks.com get started today and thank yourself tomorrow. I think having a less defined destination made a really big difference for me. Like when I stopped being so concrete about what success would look like or what feeling good in my business would look like. And instead decided I will go in a direction in a general proximity towards what I think I want, knowing that what I think I want can change. And also the closer you get to it, the more you're like, oh, that's not what I thought it was. And you get to turn a little bit because similarly, I remember having a similar reaction to a launch where on paper it was the most successful launch we'd ever had. We did over $300,000 in sales and everyone was so proud of us and like we doubled our business in six weeks and blah blah blah blah blah. And it literally broke the entire business.
- [34:41]
Jess O'Connell
The whole thing.
- [34:42]
Abigail Pumphrey
Like the whole thing.
- [34:44]
Co-host
Like we didn't have enough support, we didn't have enough staff, we didn't have, we didn't have a way to sustain the same results because we used all of our warm leads, because we converted all of them in the first launch and energetically, it was the most exhausting, intensive process that was completely unmaintainable on a day to day basis. And I completely lost myself in it. And obviously it takes some perspective on that because it's very easy to get excited about the outcome in the moment and then step back and realize there is no way in hell I am doing this thing again. I literally cannot. And so as much as my business has been about hitting these milestones that I want to move towards, I also want to feel good. I also want to enjoy my life. I don't want to dread the next thing on my to do list. I want to be passionate about it. And I will say not everything in business feels good. Like sometimes, sometimes it is work, but what I know. But you do have the ability to like it.
- [35:57]
Abigail Pumphrey
Exactly.
- [35:58]
Co-host
You have the ability to be passionate about it and enjoy what that looks like.
- [36:04]
Jess O'Connell
Yes. It's funny, I. This is such a random lesson that I feel like is coming up a lot. I had a conversation with my son this morning. He is almost 11 and he was fighting with his 9 year old sister and she was saying that she's learning division in third grade and he's in fifth grade. And he's like, there's no way you're learning division. And I said, okay, why does that matter? Like, why are we fighting about this right now? Either you can choose to be happy or, or you can choose to be right. Like, or try to prove that you're right. She's never going to think you're right. There's some times in business where, like, it's worth the hard, it's worth the fight, it's worth pursuing that. And sometimes it's like, does this really matter or do I just want to be happy? I get to choose my battles. That was my whole lesson this morning over breakfast. I'm like, you got to pick your battles, man. This is one of those things that I don't think is worth fighting over. Is she learning division? Is she not? Who knows? Like, is she lying? Is she telling the truth? I don't know. But you don't have to fight with her about it. Like, you get to say that's cool and move on with your day. And that's how we get to be in business too. We get to decide like, huh, maybe that goal isn't actually what I wanted. Or like the reality of that isn't what I want. And that's okay. I either can choose to let that go, or if it is what you really want and it is a worthy Pursuit, then heck yeah. Fight work. Like, that's the work that's worth fighting for. And I think that finding that thing is all an experiment, right? It's all just trying something new and looking at it and saying like, okay, is this what I wanted? Did this work? Is it getting me closer to what I want? And if not, what are the variables that I can change in order to try again? And not changing too many variables because like I said, the whole throwing it out with the kitchen sink and we can dive into that, which is like a more practical, tangible lesson, I guess. Like, how do you do an experiment then? How do you figure out what levers need to be changed in the next time? How do you know what to keep and what not to do? You want me to move into that?
- [38:07]
Co-host
Yeah, I would love for you to break that down. I would love to talk about the tactical side of it because I think it's easy to talk about it in theory. And then you get in practice and you're like, wait, what?
- [38:19]
Jess O'Connell
Exactly. I, well, and I think we live in this shiny object world. Instagram is constantly changing. Everybody has like the next best strategy on Instagram, and I think in business in general, it's really hard to tune out the noise of like, what is working for everybody else. I have been going through this with myself or myself, because I am always watching other people launching and what they're doing and marketing and seeing trends and seeing what's working and seeing what people are saying is working versus what's actually working. And we all kind of take on, oh, I need to be on YouTube, I need to be using Manychat, I need to be running ads, I need to be doing this. And it can get really overwhelming in our minds and we have to ask like, okay, do I, what am I go like, what is my goal? What am I trying to do? And does that actually fit that lens? And so the first thing that I like to think of is what do I ultimately want? Like, what are my values and what do I want my life to look like? And this is what I come back to because I, I think it's the only thing that really matters. Like, my what I'd love to make million dollar or like $100,000 months. Sure, that sounds really cool, I guess. But would I also like to only work when my kids are at school? Take off the seemingly never ending days they don't have school randomly and be able to go to their soccer games and practices and all the things without worrying about work? Hell yeah. And so does that mean that what do I want, what do I value? And when you get clear on that, that becomes the lens with which you look through everything that you're considering, testing or adding to your business. Does this get me closer to the life that I'm trying to build? Does this fit within the commitments and the capacity that I have? And how do I then take on only worthy pursuits and experiments? First of all, the second thing is looking and like being intentional about not just throwing everything at the wall, but like intentionally sitting down and saying, I'm going to test this out and I'm going to follow through and then I'm going to analyze the results. And I can say that like, sometimes that doesn't happen. For example, I launched a YouTube channel back in January with two videos and I haven't updated it since. And I want to get back to that, but I didn't run it through the lens, right? I was like, oh, I have to get on YouTube right now. And then I was like, do I even want to get on YouTube? Does this really get me closer to what I'm working toward? And I didn't have that intentionality. I didn't set the experiment up. And that was a lesson for me. So first, looking at like, okay, does this give me what I actually want? Second, what are the parameters of this experiment? What is the outcome I'm hoping it will bring? So with me with YouTube, for example, it was lead generation, like organic lead generation, long term content strategy. I've had other things in the past. I've had a blog, I've had a podcast, have a blog, have a podcast. Do I really need a YouTube? Who knows? And so like, what is my goal? What are the steps I'm going to take to get there? So what's my hypothesis? I am going to start a YouTube channel, which is funny. Like, my hypothesis was to streamline my long form content. I was going to start with YouTube and trickle it down into podcasts and blogs. Seems like a worthy pursuit. I got out of the focus in that. And then what are the things that I need to do? What is the procedure to make this happen and what's the data that's going to tell me whether I did this or not? And oftentimes we don't have like a metric in mind to measure success. So without a clear metric, how do you even know if it worked? How do you know like what you're looking at if you're just like, okay, I'm going to start posting on YouTube. Well, how do you know that it's working. Is it views? Is it like list growth? Like what's the metric that's going to determine success? And so you set the experiment, you say, I'm going to do this for 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, whatever that looks like. Depending on the scope of the experiment. This is what I'm going to do, this is what I'm going to measure. And at the end I'm going to determine if it was successful or if it met the metric of success that I was looking for. And if not, then what did it tell me and what can I change? And that process just takes intentionality. But if you slow down, I like I am a fast paced person again, I have ADHD and I like to quickly execute things, but slowing down will always make you go faster. Slow down to go fast is like the number one piece of advice I could give anybody because then you know, you're not spending all this time like, okay, I threw up one or two YouTube videos and now I'm over on shorts and now I am trying to post Instagram reels, but oh no, Facebook is doing something with lives and I gotta jump on that and do this and that like following everything is gonna get you nowhere. But if you slow down and say, this is what I'm gonna try, this is what I'm gonna test. And so let's say I did that and I wasn't getting as many leads as I wanted, so how can I make my videos more lead focused? Well, that's probably my messaging and probably my calls to action. So I'm gonna shift those and then see what happens. Right. And it's this constant tweaking and it's not throwing things at the wall and it's incrementally better. You're just trying to get a little bit better each time and that's how you get to ultimately what you want. And it takes that time and intentionality to get there.
- [43:55]
Co-host
Yeah, I love that you started with setting all of this within your values because ultimately there's endless possibilities in terms of experiments you could run, but if it's not going to fit within your life, then it's pretty irrelevant. So I mean that all on its own is probably going to eliminate 99% of the possibilities. And then beyond that you have to decide like you're saying, what is the worthy pursuit based on your goals. And I think the part that I want to add to what you're saying is that when you go to run these experiments, you have to keep in mind that getting the result Varies. So like some experiments can be two days, but some experiments have to be six months to a year. And you have to decide are you willing to commit for that long to know the answer before you even know if it's worth it or not? Because YouTube, for example, is a long term strategy. It could take three to six months to see traction and then you really aren't going to know for sure for sure, for potentially even time beyond that, versus, there's some things you might do, sending emails to your email list that could give you results today. And so it depends on what your focus is and where you're trying to go with it. I know for me, the trouble I have is not necessarily deciding what the experiment will be or committing to it, but being in the middle of one and wanting to start the next thing or like having more than one going at the same time. How do you stay focused on what you feel like is worthwhile without getting distracted by all the I coulds or I should's.
- [45:49]
Jess O'Connell
I love this question. And I feel like it's such a good, like it's such a good reminder because we can do anything. Like you said, everything works. We just have to decide what we can do right now. And I say this all the time. You can do anything. You just can't do it all at the same time. You truly, like, don't have the, like, you can't because you don't have the capacity. You don't have the time. So you have to say, like, what season am I in? Am I in a season where like, I want to dedicate myself to a platform and build this new audience and like really make YouTube my thing? Then yes, then like that is the worthy pursuit. Or am I going into YouTube thinking that it'll be a quick cash strategy? Because everyone's saying YouTube is so great right now. So I need to know, like, what, what is my intention here? Am I going into YouTube to build a long term goal or am I going into it for. Because it seems like the next cool thing, right? And I think we often chase the next cool thing or like the thing that everybody is saying is working and then we end up going down the wrong direction and we're like, wait a second, I'm trying to get over here. Why am I way down here? Because you took a detour, you went down a side quest. It's time to like realign, like, okay, what do I want? And I think that the second thing for you, and this is a lesson that was. Helps me so much in launching especially and my clients so much. But it's okay to move the goal post. In fact, I think that you should intentionally move the goal post at a certain point because there are different factors. Right. Your goals and your goal posts have different meanings and they have different purposes at different times. Right. So like let's say in the context of a launch, at the beginning of the launch, when you're still building up your launch list and your audience, you're in promotion mode. You're in big vision, like big picture, big energy mode. That's when you set the bigger goal. That's when you set the stretch goal. Like, and that's an identity level goal. That's the, like, how am I going to show up? What version am I going to bring to this promotion? So when I set the $100,000 launch goal, that's what I was doing. I'm going to be the $100 launch version of me. I'm going to make $100,000 launch decisions. I'm going to think hundred thousand dollars launch thoughts. I'm going to play a bigger game. What I failed to do was that at the start of the launch, once like the, the beginning was over, I had my launch list. I knew exactly how many opt ins I had. I was going into the actual promotion of it. That's when you need to look at the data and move the goal post within the range of statistical probability.
- [48:41]
Co-host
Yeah.
- [48:41]
Jess O'Connell
For, for real though.
- [48:43]
Co-host
Because when you were saying seven and a half percent converted, I'm like, you should have been so excited.
- [48:50]
Jess O'Connell
I know. I'm thrilled when 3% convert. Exactly. And so that was what I missed, and that's what so many people miss, is that you are still looking at the end from the first set goal. The first goal is an identity goal. It's an energetic goal. It's. This is how I'm going to show up for this goal then. Okay, we did that. I wanted to get a thousand people opted in. I got 300. So however many people buy, I'm not gonna divide that by a thousand. That's not the real number, it's 300. And so if I'm still trying to have a six figure launch with like a five figure launch list, like we need to readjust and that comes down to like expectations. Because expectations are ultimately what's ruling every emotion that we have. Like our emotions are almost purely based on expectations, like what we expect. If it's different than our expectations, then that's when our emotions get out. So you need to realign your expectations. What is within the realm of statistical probability and wrap your head around that, expect that. So had I looked at that, I would have said, okay, I have a list of this many people. Statistical probability is going to put me in a 50-70k launch range. That's amazing. And when I hit that, had I changed my expectations, had I moved the goalpost, I would have been like, oh my God, we did it. We hit 50. Can we hit 60? Can we hit 70? And when I hit 80, it would have been like, oh my God, like, we blew this out of the water. And that would have been completely different. And the only thing would have been shifting my expectations at the start of launch, moving the goal post back into the range of statistical probability. And that even if you take nothing else from this podcast, if that's all you take, is like realigning your launch goals with your launch reality on day one will completely change your energy and your attachment to your goals. And it will rewire your nervous system for success. Because if you are setting these crazy goals and then there's no statistical probability in which you could actually hit them, you are writing or you're wiring your nervous system for failure. So of course business is going to feel hard. Like, it feels like nothing works. But did it not work? Or were you measuring it wrong? Like, were you looking at it the wrong way?
- [51:23]
Co-host
Yeah, the measuring stick in which you judge your outcomes is so important. And what that looks like over time is going to have to change. And the season of life you're in, it also needs to change. And when unexpected things happen come up, it will have to shift and vary. Honestly, I could continue talking about this for the next three hours, but for the sake of not taking everybody's entire day, I just want to thank you for diving into this topic with me. I hope that business owners can go away from this and shift from that. I failed to. What did I learn? And really start to approach all of these decisions with a little bit more separation from the outcome and even if that's not possible in the beginning, start to see those emotions as data. And I love today. So thank you for being here. How can people connect with you and learn more from you online?
- [52:22]
Jess O'Connell
Thank you so much for having me. This is one of my favorite conversations to have and is really such a paradigm shift, I think, for people. And so I would love to keep having the conversation. Come hang out with me on Instagram at the launch Scientist. I have a podcast that I sporadically update in this season of my life that's called the Science of online business, but I'm working on getting back into more consistent episodes with that.
- [52:49]
Co-host
Yeah, well, if you guys are listening today and you got a big takeaway, I'd love if you'd screenshot today's episode, share it over on Instagram Stories, Tag me and Jess on Instagram. Let us know what resonated with you. We'd both love to hear from you. I cannot wait to see all the experiments you guys run and how you approach business going into the future. So thank you guys for listening and until next time, hey, a few quick.
- [53:17]
Abigail Pumphrey
Favors before you leave. I'd love if you'd share today's episodes, send it to a friend who needs.
- [53:22]
Co-host
To hear it and post on social. You can show us where you're listening.
- [53:25]
Abigail Pumphrey
From, your favorite takeaway or why someone else should listen. Be sure to tag me, Abigail says.
- [53:31]
Co-host
And bossproject so we can share it.
- [53:33]
Abigail Pumphrey
Okay. Second favor, to get podcast updates and all the behind the scenes news from.
- [53:38]
Co-host
Boss Project, I'd love if you'd join my VIP list.
- [53:41]
Abigail Pumphrey
Just head to bossproject.com signup to make sure I have all your contact details. Really love this show. It would mean so much to me.
- [53:49]
Co-host
If you'd leave a rating and review.
- [53:51]
Abigail Pumphrey
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- [53:54]
Co-host
On quality sponsors so we can keep.
- [53:56]
Abigail Pumphrey
Bringing you this valuable content for free.
- [53:58]
Co-host
Thanks so much for listening. Until next time.