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Strategy Hour | Online Marketing for Business Growth
989: This Simple Strategy Could Double Your Leads with Eleanor Beaton
00:49:05
In this episode, we unpack feminism, the pressure to be a provider, and why hyper-independence may not be the answer. We also dive into a simple but powerful round-table growth strategy that could double your leads organically.
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- [00:00]
Eleanor Beaton
And I did a $150,000 contract to take my six week program and put it into a six month program and take 15 people through it. Two sets of 15 people through it. And so I went from like fighting for my life to sell a $12,000 six week program or a $3,000 three month coaching program.
- [00:25]
Abigail Pumphrey
Welcome to the Strategy Hour podcast brought to you by Boss Project. I'm. 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 life every step of the way. Whether you're creating your first digital product, growing an email list, or scaling an already profitable business. Business settle in. It's time to talk strategy.
- [01:06]
Eleanor Beaton
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- [01:32]
Abigail Pumphrey
Wayfair Every style, every home. Okay, quick question. When was the last time your bookkeeping made you smile? Yeah, I didn't think so. That's why FreshBooks is giving you 70% off your first three months. Yep, I said 7. 0. Here's the catch. It is a super limited time deal. So if you've been waiting for a sign to finally ditch the spreadsheets and get back to doing more of what you love, this is it. Go grab 70% off for three whole months right now@bossproject.com freshbooks that's 70% off@bossproject.com freshbooks don't wait, because missing out on this one is going to hurt more than tax season. What if the fastest way to grow your business wasn't figuring it out alone, but leaning into collaboration? Today on the Strategy Hour, I'm joined by Eleanor Beaton, founder of Safi Media and host of the Woman Owned Podcast. She's trained tens of thousands of entrepreneurs, advised at Yale, and built A business that's changing the way women approach growth. In this conversation, we touch a little bit on feminism, the pressure to be a provider, and why hyper independence isn't the solution so many of us think it is. Then in the second half, we're going to break down her roundtable growth strategy, a simple but powerful approach that could dub double your leads organically. I hope you're ready, because we're about to go deep. Hey, Eleanor, welcome to the show.
- [03:08]
Eleanor Beaton
It's awesome to be here.
- [03:09]
Abigail Pumphrey
I'm excited to dig into today's topic, but selfishly, I have some questions I need answered before we talk about growing an email list. So I want to know more about you. You've trained over 25,000 female entrepreneurs from around the world. What lit the fire for you to focus so deeply on women scaling businesses?
- [03:31]
Eleanor Beaton
I was 14 years old. My mom is driving me to basketball practice, and she is very annoyed because she and my dad have had a disagreement about how to spend money. It might have been like, I can't remember the details. I think it might have been that she wanted to make an investment in something and he didn't want to do it. He was fundamentally more conservative than she was in terms of spending. And my mom, you know, a little bit of backstory. So my parents immigrated to Canada when I was little, and my dad, he was the breadwinner and provider in the family. He was an economics professor. And my mom, originally, when they met, she was a teacher. But because she was in a different country that had different sort of credentialing for teachers, her credentials weren't recognized and she would need to go back to school, which she ultimately did. But back then, they'd made the decision that she would stay at home to raise money, me and my siblings. And that was sort of the best division of labor and the thing that made the most sense for our family, which it did. However, in not actually being able to make money, she felt quite financially disempowered and that sometimes when it came down to making decisions around money because she didn't have her own source of income, she felt that there were certain things that she couldn't do, or if she had her own money, she would have made those decisions and she would have done things differently. This is the kind of conversation that happens every day around the world. But I really saw how if my mom had been able to have maybe a business or a side hustle, that would have given her the ability to make some of those investments and take some of those risks. And it just Lit a fire in me. Like, I can remember, because she turns to me in that moment and she says, eleanor, money is power. Always make your own. And that was like a really core memory for me. And so I think when I look back on my career, there's always just been this incredible sort of fire that is ignited when I think about financial empowerment, economic independence, financial autonomy. That has been sort of the undercurrent of my entire career. And now I get to do that with women entrepreneurs. And of course, we know women are starting businesses really, really quickly, but for everybody, the. The things that I. The sort of strategies that I share for women entrepreneurs will work for everyone.
- [06:04]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah. I mean, as they should. You know, we. I think there's so often things that we think will only work for one group of people, but usually there's some way to modify something or make a tweak and have it make sense. It's funny that you talk about providing, though, because I'm in the middle of reading a short book series that has really challenged me because much like you, I have been really focused on my own financial independence as a result of growing up with two parents on disability and watching them struggle and not wanting that for myself or my future children, feeling this deep need to be able to provide more. Well, this book series, it starts with a book called Keys to the Kingdom, followed by the Queen's Code. And it's really fascinating talking about kind of the historical significance of men going off to war and women, as a result, having to fill some of these roles in society to keep the world running. And then when men came back, like, ultimately, there was a power dynamic issue, and people struggled over who should be the leader of their household, who should be the financial provider in their household. And kind of talking about how those cultural changes impacted not only our kind of relational dynamics, but also just how we interact as a society. And the premise of the first book is it's about men not stopping development in adolescence. Essentially, they continue to go through these stages later on in life, but one of them being this essential need to provide and that often women are disempowering men and, like, taking that away from them. Anyway, it's an aside. I think it's worth the read.
- [08:16]
Eleanor Beaton
I've read them. I know exactly the works you're talking about. Oh, yeah. As soon as you were talking them about, I was like, I wonder if she's going to talk about the Queen's coat, which I actually think every person should read.
- [08:26]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah.
- [08:27]
Eleanor Beaton
Because I agree with you. I think they're fantastic books. And I absolutely think that I am a feminist for sure. And I think the feminist movement has been. Has a lot to answer for in terms of espousing and promoting the myth of the Lone Ranger woman, who is so bulletproof in her independence that she doesn't need anybody for anything, which I think is detrimental. I think it leads to a ton of burnout. And I think that it's really important when we look at. When we really understand at a fundamental level, level, what does it mean to be a good man and when we value that relationship. And I think that we always looked at being a good man as being a provider of money, and that was like, the fundamental way. And then as women started being able to provide money, the provider doesn't change, but it's the provider of what? The provider of stability, the provider of security, the provider of resources, the provider of. Like, there have been periods in my. Our marriage where I have generated much more income. But when you only look at it like that versus being aware of everything that my husband does provide for me, you know, and does provide in the household, I think that's. That's the key to be aware of just how important that is to a man's sense of himself. And just as to women, like, being. Having someone create a sense of safety that. Yes, of course, there's a part where we create safety within ourselves, but having relationships and having that primary relationship where they create a real sense of safety and stability and allowing ourselves to receive, that is so key. So, yeah, I. Oh, my gosh. That's a whole other conversation people should like, I'm into it too. It's powerful. It's challenging, especially for those of us who are incredibly independent. It's like, how do we reconcile our independence in a way that's productive and deeply and enriches relationships, especially like your major primary love relationship. It's something that I think we need to think more about and read books like this to reflect on where we. Where we. Where we stand on that.
- [10:55]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah, I. I think we can push a lot of people away in. In the process if. If we're not focused on that. I know I've been through periods of marriage where I was too intimately focused on what I wanted to do, what I wanted to accomplish that. I don't think I even really stopped to ask what my partner wanted.
- [11:14]
Eleanor Beaton
So 100%. I remember reading that book and I turned to him and I was like, I just want to thank you. I know I'm awesome, you know, and I know that you're not perfect, but when I look, I was like I'd made all the mistakes you talked about in the book.
- [11:29]
Abigail Pumphrey
Totally.
- [11:31]
Eleanor Beaton
It's like any this amazing guy is here.
- [11:35]
Abigail Pumphrey
Why are you still here, by the way?
- [11:36]
Eleanor Beaton
Yeah, I know. I take that as evidence of our own awesomeness. And also that can be true and we can still be grateful.
- [11:47]
Abigail Pumphrey
Oh, totally. I agree. Yes. I think there should be more focus on how to make those partnerships, something that allows us to be the best versions of ourselves. Because I think often we're compensating for things that, you know, they could provide for us and we're not letting them. But. Okay. Another topic still relevant to what we're talking about, but you have a really bold vision. Like you want to double the number of female founders scaling past $1 million by 2030, which is right around the corner. So why that milestone and why now?
- [12:27]
Eleanor Beaton
When I think about the work that I've done with business owners and it's not simply like training and coaching, but we do so much data collection and we have for years, so really analyzing like hundreds of thousands of data points at this point that track everything and have looked at everything in terms of business size and team size and core challenges and strategies used and things that worked and didn't work and how they feel about xyz, what their profit margins are, how much they pay their team members, how much time they have. You know, so a lot of, a lot of data to kind of really start to get a picture of. Right. I should say through that we've begun to develop a very clear picture of sort of the phases of how businesses grow. And the majority of like service and knowledge based businesses, whether that's like an agency type of model or a coaching type of model or consulting type of model, they have very similar types of growth paths. You know, when you think about the kinds of challenges that they have and the different type of revenue levels that they have, you know, at different revenue levels. At a million dollars in revenue, it's. And honestly, you know, I think when you first start a business, like up to your first 300,000 is just so exciting. Yeah, right. It's just incredibly exciting. You're often growing through your organic network. There's a lot of what we call organic growth, which isn't just like organic marketing, but you're getting introduced to people, you're kind of doing the work. Things are happening. Are you working hard? Yes. But you don't. The real grind, and a very difficult grind is like from 300,000 to about a million and then there's. It's a whole other grind from a million to 3 million. And then 3 to 10 is exponentially easier, by the way. So a million is a very powerful benchmark because once you're able to take your business past that, are your problems over? No. But there's a certain degree of resilience in the business that provides a lot of freedom and structure for the founder. She's able to tap into, or they're able to tap into bigger supply chains. They have the resources to be able to hire team members that have a caliber and experience that they can be not just kind of doing tasks, but solving problems. So it's a really important developmental milestone in business. And that's. And there's not enough women who are there. Just about like the number that's thrown around is often 2%, but that actually includes all businesses also, like family type of businesses. When you look at businesses that are founded by women, it's much closer to about 1%. So that's a core metric that I would like to see moved because I see the impact like we know that when women, women will circulate 80 to 90% of their income back into their communities compared to 30 or 35% for men. This isn't a knock on guys, by the way. I think one of the things that this speaks to is wealth levels. So we want women to have more wealth levels so that they're retaining more and they're continuing to invest in their communities. So that's why that number is so key. And so there's a number like we part. We know that we need to do that. Like, we work with organizations, but we do a lot of work to try to get companies to tap into corporate supply chains, like corporate spend. It's a trillion dollar market. And one of the fastest way you can grow your business is by selling bigger deals to bigger customers, you know, just like it's an order of magnitude higher. So really preparing your business to be able to do that, I think is. Is one elegant move. Although that move won't be the right move for everybody.
- [16:23]
Abigail Pumphrey
Can you provide an example of what that might look like for someone who can't even quite fathom?
- [16:30]
Eleanor Beaton
Yeah, I'll give you a great example of this. So when I started my business originally, I was doing like, primarily like leadership coaching with women. And so I would sell. Back when I got started, I remember I was selling, my packages were $3,000 and it would be for like maybe, let's call it three months. So I'd sell a $3,000 coaching package for three months of coaching. I was doing it one on one. That was great. Then I, you know, created a program. That's what you're supposed to do. You know, you take your, you take what you do one on one, you start, take a piece of it, put it into a program. I did that and I was like fighting for my life to get every, to get like a cohort of 12 people to do this program. And then I was like, you know what, this is a good program. I believe in it. So I'm going to start seeing if I can sell this into an organization. And I did. And I did a $150,000 contract to take my six week program and put it into a six month program and take 15 people through it. Two sets of 15 people through it. And so I went from like fighting for my life to sell a $12,000 six week program or a $3,000 three month coaching program to selling 30 people going through a $150,000 program. So you can see like the math, really, maths now, it was the same intellectual property. It allowed me to, that $150,000 contract allowed me to hire my first full time executive assistant, which was a game changer. Also allowed me to hire my first contract coach who works with me to this day to help deliver and fulfill. So it's really about that. It's the, the larger cash infusions start to create financial Runway for a company where you can start making investments that really help you grow. So that's an example of what I mean by sort of corporate deals.
- [18:30]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah, no, I, I think that makes a ton of sense. And often people are so focused on, you know, just making enough to get by or to pay for their overhead in their life and, you know, a few of those personal goals. But it does make such a huge difference when a big check hits your bank account all at once. So even if they divide something like that up into quarterly payments, okay, well, that's still a huge chunk of change all at once. That really allows you to think differently about how you invest in your future and how you reinvest in the business but also seek growth. Because I don't know, sometimes those deals aren't so much about the money as they are about the change in confidence and your ability to go out and do it again. So.
- [19:22]
Eleanor Beaton
Oh yeah, like it's such a, it's a real confidence booster. And nothing to me creates more confidence in a business owner than a cash reserve.
- [19:36]
Abigail Pumphrey
You know what I mean?
- [19:37]
Eleanor Beaton
Like, there's nothing I would trade. I mean, I am actually all about mindset coaching, but I mean, I would trade an hour with Tony Robbins over six months of cash reserves. You know what I mean? And I want both. I think both are like, massively valuable, by the way. But the reason I'm saying that is because I think a lot of times with entrepreneurs, we forget how challenging what we all do is. We are responsible for things like payroll, we are trying to deliver a service while we're also figuring out, hey, what's the next best way to get new customers to come into my business? Oh, and am I being a good boss? Am I thinking about people's career trajectories and doing a good job of setting a vision and all of this? And I think that it's impossible to overstate how cash flow crunches and cash flow challenges can really drain an entrepreneur of their energy. All of us have navigated them. We have the wherewithal to be able to hold it together for a certain amount of time. But ultimately, I think what's so important for us is that we really start to see stability in cash flow. And like, looking at that business model and looking at, I call them like deal velocity and deal durability. Like deal velocity, you want to have deals closing fairly regularly. Those big deals, they won't close as frequently and your close rates could be lower. But when you have at least some of them, they become like these big cash anchors throughout the year. And they're very powerful. We love them.
- [21:05]
Abigail Pumphrey
I love them too. I think how you ultimately show up and, and do that deal is a little dependent on the kind of business you're running. But they're definitely available to all sorts of different businesses. Like, I have a. A previous client who you would have thought that there was no way this was going to work out because she was running a bakery and Covid hit and then like people were obviously going nowhere. And she ended up creating these cookie decorating boxes, which sound menial and she could have sold them to her local customers for sure. What did she do? She went out and got Fortune 500 clients and did virtual networking events for their people who couldn't get together anymore because of the state of the world. And some of These deals were 30 and 40,000 at a time, which is just wild. She could teach it all virtually in an hour and some change. Obviously there was a lot more prep involved because you have to cook all those cookies and mail them to all these individual addresses and all of that. But just just to remind you that it doesn't really matter. You can't come at us with a particular kind of business and say, I can't do this. I'm like, maybe not in your current structure, but usually there's something that's not all that removed from what you're currently doing, but you just have to see it in a different way. I'm curious what you do think some of the biggest obstacles people are facing now, like what is preventing growth in today's world?
- [22:58]
Eleanor Beaton
I mean, so I think the number one challenge that I see for business owners is customer acquisition. It's like acquisition of customers is really challenging. How do you find consistent, durable ways to find customers in a way that's affordable without blowing your marketing budget? I think that continues to be really challenging and will continue to be really challenging. So I think that's like one part of it. I do think that for many business owners there is this sort of sense of fatigue. And I started seeing this like six months ago. But it's interesting, you know, because at a macro level, the global pandemic had a big impact on economic growth. Like the world was just kind of ticking along like we were doing great, you know, up to 2019. And then we have this dramatic global event that really impacts, you start to see like GDP and like everything just kind of went off a cliff everywhere. Like. Cause everything shuts down. But what we don't, I think what we don't talk about enough is there was a major knock on effect. So it impacted global supply chains, it impacted things like prices, it impacted all kinds of stuff. And we hadn't yet actually recovered. So no economy was back to like pre2019. And then we've got wars and we've got all these different, all these different global macro shocks that are actually impacting economic growth. They're impacting things like job creation. And as an individual business owner, you don't wake up in the morning thinking about these major trends that are happening globally. All you know is, ugh, things just kind of feel hard. People seem kind of price sensitive. That's, that's kind of stressful. And when I go to hire somebody, they want to be paid more than ever before because their grocery bills are higher. But I still have, you know, my, my customers are still price sensitive. So I think there's like this, you know, for many entrepreneurs, if you feel that you both, like you're hopeful because there's lots of possibility. And yet things also can feel sort of a little heavy. You're not crazy. Everybody is dealing with the fact that we didn't, our global economies didn't rebound. They haven't yet rebounded to pre Covid levels. It has been hard and it's been hard for quite a few years and we're just kind of feeling it. We're just kind of feeling it. So I actually think that that's something we almost never talk about. But when you look at the data, I think it helps us make sense of where we're at. Which of course means I think we're in the age for entrepreneurs of the great operator. Which I mean that it's no longer just about who has the most innovative marketing idea, who's able to build like the biggest social media following, who's able to be the IT brand of the month. I think it's also about, hey, who's going to be a really good business leader? Who's going to be able to really look at their costs, cut costs to improve profitability? Who's going to be able to build the strongest brand so you can so that you have the opportunity to charge high prices and boost in your profits? We all know that companies that are at the top of their niche get the lion's share of the profit. Who's going to be able to recruit the best team, who can drive the most value? So I do think we're in the age of the good operator where and to do that, to capture it, entrepreneurs really have to dig deep and stay very, very focused and disciplined and really lead.
- [26:50]
Abigail Pumphrey
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- [28:04]
Eleanor Beaton
Zero sugar has great taste.
- [28:06]
Abigail Pumphrey
Zero bs and obviously zero sugar. For those with zero room in their calendar.
- [28:12]
Eleanor Beaton
Zero patience for slow walkers. Those who get zero hours of sleep.
- [28:17]
Abigail Pumphrey
On a Saturday night.
- [28:20]
Eleanor Beaton
Have zero filter.
- [28:21]
Abigail Pumphrey
Zero given and zero interest in grabbing a plain boring water. Grab a delicious vitamin water. Zero sugar Today.
- [28:32]
Eleanor Beaton
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- [28:58]
Abigail Pumphrey
I think so too. And I do think part of it comes back to you specifically saying that one of the challenges is around acquiring new customers. And I think in the past, people often looked at this very linearly, like, oh, I'll put out this opt in that like solves this problem. And a bunch of people are going to Google something and then find it and download it. And then I have a pipeline of people. And I know for some of you who started your business later, that sounds absolutely ridiculous, but there is a select few of us that lived in a period of time on the Internet where if you had a solution, it just worked. Your business just worked, people just bought. It was crazy. And I know many of us would love to go back to a time like that. Things felt a little simpler. But I do think it's important. If we're struggling to acquire clients, we have to be thinking innovatively about how we attract people and how we capture more leads. And so this is exactly why I wanted to bring you on the show, because I wanted to talk about your Roundtable growth strategy because I think it's practical and actionable and really aligns with what's going on in the world right now. So I'd love for you to kind of take us through the process of what does this even mean and what does it look like to implement it, to ultimately use this as a tool again and again for more lead generation.
- [30:31]
Eleanor Beaton
Oh my gosh. I'm all about roundtables. So roundtables are sort of based on this concept that conversations create. Conversations create a ton of value. So how do we leverage conversations as like a really strong marketing hook in our business. So I got this idea from a client actually who was doing it in a different way. So she was. Her name was Eva Genauda and she loved to host like anywhere from three to four people at a time. So she'd invite them. I think sometimes they'd even pay like not a ton, but maybe like 25 or $30. They'd show up and they'd network together and they would each have a give and an ask. And so she would just do one of these like every two weeks. And she had fun. She got to know great people. And I was like, that is such a great idea. My only challenge with it is that I'm not excited about doing it with three or four people and having that be the end of the impact. Like my approach. It's got to look different for me to want to do it. So I was like, what would happen if I got three to four people? And we came together and had a really juicy discussion around something that was super important or useful to a group of people and we all marketed it together. And so that's like how roundtables were born. So a roundtable is a 60 to 90 minute virtual event. You can host it on Zoom. You assemble three to five speakers to discuss a super juicy topic that your audience is very eager to learn more about. And then each of your speakers commits to promoting the roundtable to their audience. And the key is that you want to invite them to actually email. So yes, social media posts are great, but honestly email is the thing that drives the most growth. So the key to doing this I think is sort of twofold. One is that it elevates your brand position. So that was the thing that I really got like. So what I would do is I would reach out to one person who was like a good connection, like the highest, most influential person that I had in my network and I try to land them. And then I would reach out to two or three more people. Hey, so and so, you know me and so and so we're doing this thing. I. It's going to be awesome. I would love for you to be a part of it. This is going to be a super high value conversation. This panel is going to. There's going to be a ton of mutual benefit in terms of brand elevation. Are you in? You know, and the. And I just need you to. We all just need you to promote it once to your email list. Are you good? And I almost never had. I've done like 14 or 15 of these. I did a 14 to 15 of them in like an 18 to 24 month period and had very, very few no's. So that's like the round, that's the, that's the, the deal with round tables. And so I did a ton, I think it was. And the numbers are a little bit fuzzy to me. I know how much I made. So basically this like we traced in, I believe it was 18, 18 to 24 months. We traced $884,000 in sales to people who found us through, through roundtables. So that was like amazing. But it wasn't just that. Like it really gave me an opportunity to network. So every roundtable we did, I was networking with influential people who I hadn't met before. I got the opportunity to host them. They would then invite me on their stuff. So it's a really, really powerful way and I can certainly get into more granular detail about how. But that's kind of a start. What they are and how I got into them.
- [34:15]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah, no, I think there's such an interesting topic because in the past, if we were to like look at marketing cycles and trends and what's been effective, things like virtual summits used to be a massively big deal. And they're a ton of work. Like months and months and months of work. And if you're great at it, you're going to get good results at least then. And now it feels so much like a gamble. Am I going to put this much effort in to have what versus something like this? I think you're getting a similar experience where people are being exposed to other experts, but it's a condensed timeline, both in prep, but also execution. And people are more likely to show up, I think, to something like this instead of like a straight webinar because you're not talking at them. They're. They can be part of the conversation and potentially even shape the way the conversation goes. So I totally get why they've been so effective for you. I am curious on structure. So you mentioned getting the first person interested. Was it a domino effect after that? Were you taking someone from the panel and kind of making them the lead guru for the next one and parlaying it or how was that going to keep that many happening in such a condensed period of time?
- [35:54]
Eleanor Beaton
Totally. I mean, that was the thing. So first of all, we did definitely get like a checklist. We had to be very tight and focused on execution to make sure that we could because that's a lot of people to move. So typically my job was to be working my network to get the invites out, to get the speakers. That was like the, my, the primary part of my job. And I knew just from the work that I've done in the past. So for instance, like if I were starting an investment fund where I wanted to go and invest in women owned businesses and have a fund to do that, you know, smart money always wants to be together. And so the first thing, or if you're building a condo, the first thing you have to do is like get your anchor tenant. You know, if I were building like an office building, you'd want that anchor tenant. Hey, we have this XYZ company, do you want to come? And I learned this that people, they want to be a part of something that's exciting and they are very interested who else is doing it. They don't want to be the first one in, you know. So that's why the structure would be that I would think about, I would think about somebody, I would sort of mentally go through my contacts and I would be like, who's a person that I just love that I have a ton of respect for. They are truly great in their field. And they have a late, they have a community and a list because I'm going to be promoting them to my community as well. And anybody on our roundtables would always get a pack of business from it because we have such a great sort of curated list. So yeah, you go out to the first person and you invite them. You say, I want to be part of something very cool. And so what really helped was having a great brand being known for the work that we do. And what I would say is, here's what's in it for you. So that was like a big part of it. I would be like, look, here's what's in it. I'd love for you to be a part of this. Here's what's in it for you. We have an amazing email list and community of people. We're going to be promoting the heck out of this to our partners on our social, our clients in the past, you know, our roundtable speakers always get a lot of business from it. I know. And then I would sort of use this because this is my thing. I'm a fantastic interviewer. I'm an award former award winning journalist. So when you come onto my roundtable, I am going to be able to really position your expertise. Like this is going to be a great discussion. But this is also an opportunity for you to showcase your wisdom in a really great way. So I think like I'm Just, you know, you just want whatever you have, you know, it could be, look, I want you to be a part of this. Let's say that you're a well connected person. You might say, I'd love for you to be a part of this roundtable. There's going to be such an amazing give back to our community because it's free for people too. And this would be a great opportunity to get to know you better. Because what struck me is I have an amazing network of people that I think should know you like these types. And I'd love to be able to get to know you better so that after this I can make some strategic introductions for you, you know, so, like really thinking like that, how do you get like your first couple of ballers and then you kind of leverage that, hey, listen, I'm going to be doing a thing with this person. These people are already in. Would you like to be a part of it? I think you'd be a great addition to our panel. So that sort of energy, I think, has been really helpful in getting a great mix. And so the speakers would be proud and excited to be featured alongside each other.
- [39:26]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah. What's your timeline? Like, how far in advance are you selecting speakers, doing outreach and then promoting in advance of it actually going live?
- [39:38]
Eleanor Beaton
Yeah. So I generally recommend that you choose a date that's five to seven weeks into the future. That's really key because then from there, you know, so. So first you choose the date and then you get. You think about a broad kind of topic and then you get your first speaker. And once that, once those things are in place, we're good, it's happening. And now you can really start to refine the topic even more, to really sort of refine it. So for instance, like I remember doing one, I noticed that people were super, super. There were a lot of people who were talking about being burnt out, but I was also like, okay, yes, and what's the alternative? You know, we can't just all go around talking about how burnt out we are all the time. So I sort of landed my first anchor speaker and then it was through sort of her and talking to her, I was like, okay, it's going to be called the Anti Hustle Manifesto. How pleasure, preparation, self love are the ultimate business plan. Right. So it's like, yeah, so five to seven weeks, once you get your speaker, then you like really create a juicy, exciting topic. And then from there it's things like, you know, starting to pull together a few simple tools to help your Guests promote, you are, you know, setting up a landing page, setting up some email reminders and that type of thing. This just kind of gives you time. And we generally found that promoting two weeks out worked best. More than that, it was kind of too long. Two weeks was really good. Our people, they're consultants, a lot of them, so they, they're in delivery. And so we had to give them enough time to be able to move a meeting so that they could attend it live as an example.
- [41:16]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah. Incredible. I, I love this. I think it's such a great opportunity. Makes me want to do one myself. But also I'm like, with what time I know.
- [41:27]
Eleanor Beaton
And I do have to say, like one more thing. So a lot of times we think about this as something that's going to work really well in like the quote unquote online world. And it does when, you know, if you have an email list and you've got other people. But it works really well. Like I have corporate people, nonprofit people who use it, and it works like gangbusters in those industries because it's so much newer. Like people are, you know, they're just so thrilled to be a part of it. So it really, you can use this. And in fact, if I were doing it in more of a corporate setting, I would call it a Fireside Chat. Right. Like, those types of things can be just incredibly powerful.
- [42:06]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah. And I think normally you see corporations wait for like that big conference to do something like that, but I think sprinkling these in throughout can be really cool. I ended up emceeing for a similar kind of Fireside Chat for Fiverr actually. And they brought on several of their top creators with the whole goal of kind of showing people what does it look like to, to build on this platform. Obviously their goal is to drive new customers, but because of the nature of how it was set up, they were also trying to tap into the audiences of the people in the roundtable. So ultimately, anyone can use this. And how you ultimately structure it and how much time and attention you put into promotion can vary greatly. But even on a smaller scale, like you're saying you had a client who did this with just a handful of people. Like, you weren't even necessarily trying to get people to attend. You were just trying to get the group of people together.
- [43:14]
Eleanor Beaton
Oh yeah, they are. And for many entrepreneurs, like, they're doing more account based marketing, so they're not like the big whales trying to like open up the gullet and get everybody and then like sort through who your right customers are a lot of people are doing more account based marketing. They're more like panthers, like they're hunting and tracking, you know. And in those cases, roundtables work exceptionally well because you invite your target clients to be speakers in your roundtable. That's such an elevated account based marketing play which I think for businesses who are much more targeted and surgical and who their, their clients and customers are. So they have the lists and now it's just about how do I go after them in a way, how do I add to like my cold call marketing.
- [44:01]
Abigail Pumphrey
With that in mind, I'm curious how you would continue to like take advantage of it post roundtable. Like you put it out there, you promoted it, you got the new people on your list and you said it resulted in $800,000 in new revenue, which is incredible. And I think a lot of people will do the initial lift and then they, their follow through is lacking. And so I'm curious what you feel like has been really critical for making those people feel welcome, onboarded and like aware of other ways you can serve them.
- [44:40]
Eleanor Beaton
So I have found that there are a lot of small businesses, particularly those who operate in the online space and or have even if their business isn't an online business, but they practice a lot of online marketing. They're really over indexed to inbound marketing, meaning they do these things and then they're like, and now I'm hoping that my digital funnels are going to do all of the hard work. And it's like, hey, 2018 is calling. It wants its growth strategy back immediately. Like that's what we have noticed is that now we only work with women owned businesses. And so I don't know that this is true across the board, but it is definitely and definitively true inside women owned businesses that one of the most underdeveloped functions in the business is the sales function. So yes, have great nurture sequences. Yes. But also have you called every single person who showed up for your roundtable? Like have you actually given them a call? What a concept. So I would say I think everybody should have like a little post it note somewhere in their office that says dfd, Dial for dollars. Dial for dollars. And so it was just really like having an actual sales function where we would talk to people. Hey, it was great to see you on the roundtable. I'd love to send you the recording. And by the way, while we're chatting, tell me a little bit about your business. What's going on? So some people might be like about to have a Heart attack. Like, I could never do that. You don't have to do it all at once. But I would also like the coaching question for you that I would ask you would be like, what do you hate so much about money? So, yeah, it's not, it's not that I think, you know, I have just, I got advice early on, which was somebody could tell that I felt very uncomfortable about outreach. And he was like, you know, Eleanor, your embarrassability is your biggest enemy right now. You don't want to be embarrassed, you don't want to hear, no, you don't want to. And so I used to do virtual summits and I'm telling you right now, you know how like in virtual summits then you like people, if they wanted the recording, they could pay for it. I remember I had like a virtual summit back in the day. They had like 1500 people signed up for the free version and 125 people bought the paid. And I called one afternoon, I called every single person who paid and I got a bunch of clients out of it. So it really sort of started that discipline of dialing for dollars. I guarantee you, like 2% of the people who hear this are actually going to do it and they're going to be so thankful.
- [47:32]
Abigail Pumphrey
Yeah, I think how you ultimately go about sales is dependent on who you're talking to. But in terms of like speed to sale and amount of income, I mean, she's not wrong, even if she even makes me uncomfortable saying that. And I know that, but, you know, a step down approach might be that you collected their Instagram handle as part of the intake process and then you go, DM all of those people and then start conversations. That tends to be a much slower grind. Like you're going to be maintaining a bunch of conversations that are moving very slowly, but it is possible. And ultimately being on your email list, you do have the ability to not just nurture, but continue to sell those people into whatever is next. And I think if you do so eloquently, like at the end, last five minutes of the roundtable, making sure you're really making it clear how you can help them and like what's next steps for working with you, you'll have already planted that seed that's going to make that ask feel a lot easier.
- [48:46]
Eleanor Beaton
Oh yeah, 100%. Yes, agreed.
- [48:49]
Abigail Pumphrey
Well, thank you so much for being here today. I would love if you could just share with people where they can find you online, how they can learn more from you, point them in the right direction.
- [48:59]
Eleanor Beaton
Oh, this was such a fun conversation. So I recommend that you connect with me on LinkedIn or Instagram. Those are the only two places where I really spend any time from a social perspective. So if you connect with the leanorebeaton E L E A N O R Beaton B E A T O N Eleanor Beaton. Just connect with me. Introduce yourself on LinkedIn or Instagram, tell me where you found me. And if you just send me the word. By the way, Round tables. My. Hopefully my pet robot is behaving and she will. I have a full guide on doing round tables and so my robot can send it to you and. And kind of send you. It's a. It's a really good PDF that kind of takes what we talked about here and gets into more detail.
- [49:39]
Abigail Pumphrey
Amazing. Well, thank you so much for your time and your inspiration and also making me want to like stop and go listen to the rest of my book.
- [49:50]
Eleanor Beaton
Right.
- [49:51]
Abigail Pumphrey
I know.
- [49:51]
Eleanor Beaton
Oh my gosh.
- [49:52]
Abigail Pumphrey
It's so good.
- [49:53]
Eleanor Beaton
So good.
- [49:53]
Abigail Pumphrey
I feel like we're gonna have to have a follow up conversation on just that because 100 there's so much to say. Anyway, this has been excellent. Thank you for your time and until.
- [50:03]
Eleanor Beaton
Next time, I appreciate you.
- [50:07]
Abigail Pumphrey
Hey, a few quick favors before you leave. I'd love if you'd share today's episode, send it to a friend who needs to hear it and post on social. You can show us where you're listening from, your favorite takeaway, or why someone else should listen. Be sure to tag me, Abigail says and ossproject so we can share it. Okay. Second favor, to get podcast updates and all the behind the scenes news from Boss Project. I'd love if you'd join my VIP. 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 if you'd leave a rating and review. It not only helps more listeners find the show, but allows us to bring on quality sponsors so we can keep bringing you this valuable content for free. Thanks so much for listening. Until next time.