How to make marketing easier by deeply understanding your audience with Emma-Louise Parkes

Tune in as we discuss how getting to know your audience on a deeper level can dramatically affect your business growth and make marketing much easier. We talk about the importance of market research, how to get people to participate, and our mutual dislike of bro-marketing and formulaic marketing strategies.

For the full show notes and access to resources mentioned in this episode visit https://www.easyscaling.com/blog/episode3

In today's episode, we’re talking with Emma-Louise Parkes, a self-confessed ambitious introvert, empath, and highly sensitive entrepreneur. We dive into all things marketing, the importance of market research and how to get people to participate, our mutual dislike of bro-marketing and formulaic marketing strategies, and how much easier marketing is when you have the right information from your audience.

Emma-Louise is an internationally recognized certified online business consultant and NLP master practitioner with accreditations in EFT/TFT. She’s also the host of the award winning podcast, The Ambitious Introvert®. Having built her six-figure brand in under three years without previous business experience, Emma-Louise is proof that when you take aligned action, you can scale your business with ease and speed.

Emma-Louise’s mission is to help her clients embrace their ambitious introvert nature, stay in their zone of genius, and impact more people with their profitable, sustainable businesses.

Topics Discussed:

• The lightbulb moment of discovering exactly what you’re meant to do
• Why audiences need to feel X, Y, & Z before they feel safe to invest in you
• Our mutual dislike of bro-marketing and formulaic marketing strategies
• The importance of market research for deeply understanding your audience
• How to conduct market research yourself (and how to get people to participate)
• A mindblowing discovery that one specific market research question can lead to
• Putting yourself in your clients’ shoes to design a safe and effective client journey
• Why free calls might not be working for you as a marketing strategy
• Not making meaning from how people engage or don’t engage in your content
• Taking in every little bit of feedback (even silence) to refine your marketing

Transcript

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Ep_3 - How to make marketing easier by deeply understanding your audience with Emma-Louise Parkes

Jordan: Alrighty today, we're gonna have a lot of fun talking about market research. We're gonna be talking about going really deep into understanding your audience and how that can make things more effortless and just make marketing easier, which is what we all want I think so my guest today is Emma Louise Parkes she's an online business coach and strategist for ambitious introverts empaths and HSPs Emma-Louise is also one of my amazing COO clients so I get to see all the fabulous things that she's doing behind the scenes in her business. Her mission is to help her clients embrace their ambitious introvert nature, stay in their zone of genius and impact more people with a profitable, sustainable business.

She is fabulous, and I hope you enjoy this conversation.

Welcome everyone. Welcome Emma Louise. I'm so excited to have you here. 

Emma-Louise: Thank you. I'm so excited to chat with you obviously, 

Jordan: obviously. Yeah, this is gonna be a lot of fun. So we were talking a little bit about diving into understanding your audience and scaling maybe in a, not so traditional way because of who your audience is and who you're serving.

So maybe first, before we dive into all of that, and we've got lots of fun things we wanna talk about, maybe you could give some context about what you do and who you serve. 

Emma-Louise: Absolutely. So I'm an online business coaching strategist, and I serve ambitious introverts, empaths, and highly sensitive entrepreneurs who are my mirror client, because that's who I was when I first came online.

So, that obviously has helped me have an understanding of my audience, but it means. You know, we have to be really cognizant that not only are the different biotypes in bio psychology, but people react differently to all kinds of things in marketing and you know, how safe they feel to invest in something and just how they react the way certain things are presented to them.

And it's not something that I realized early on in my own journey. I just knew that certain things almost really triggered me and other things made me feel really safe and comfortable to invest. And it wasn't until I got to the other side and tried different strategies and realized, you know, I really, my audience need to feel X, Y, and Z before they feel safe to invest in me.

So it's really been really beautiful because it's enabled me to go deeper into myself as well, and a deeper understanding of myself and the way I make choices and to be able to serve the community, which is. Over 5,000 ambitious introverts now in a way that feels good to them. 

Jordan: Yeah. Oh my gosh. I love this.

And what's what I think is so interesting and like nuance about what you just said is of course you're not using like these bro marketing tactics, but even some of the things that you would think would be really intimate and personal and not part of that, like bro marketing thing also didn't work for your audience.

And it like things that I wouldn't even have imagined, like we were talking about free calls. So maybe you can, we can start there. 

Emma-Louise: Absolutely. So one of the ways that I marketed when I first, so for context, I was a mindset coach previously, and I was working with entrepreneurs of all levels. And when I niched down to ambitious introverts, I went all in on business coaching.

So this was about two and a half years ago. And I started off using Facebook groups. I mean, I still use Facebook groups a lot to this day, but it was really great in those early days cuz I didn't have an audience of my own. So I. Piggyback of other people's audience, you know, practice writing content and getting visible in a way that felt good.

And one of the ways that my coach suggested in growing the practice was get people on free calls. She's like, oh, I did this. I have like 3 45 minute calls. And within three months I'd filled up my coaching practice and it was still working. She had a number of clients that this was still really working for.

So great, brilliant. You know, I love connect with people. I love connecting one on one. It's, you know, huge part of my business and no one was taking these calls and I kept putting these posts out week after week and no one was taking them. No one was like, nothing was happening. And I said, oh, what is it?

What am I doing wrong? And of course made it a whole story about me and what I was doing wrong. And she's like, no, these posts are great. Like, what you're offering is great. I think one of the things was like, an Instagram bio audit and, you know, so they were really valuable things for people who were, were new to business.

Just wasn't happening. Then finally, finally someone booked and then they canceled last minute. oh, then the next person booked and then they just didn't show up. And I was starting to feel so despondent. I was like, I just wanna get on calls with people. Then someone booked and showed up. It was like, hallelujah moment.

And the first thing she said was I almost didn't book this. And then when I did, I almost didn't turn up. It was like, oh my gosh. So like, this is so interesting. I said why? And she said, because I can't afford to work with you. I was like, but I'm not asking you to work with me. It's not a sales call.

It's a, it's a free call. She's like, but I feel guilty. I feel really bad that, you know, you're giving me your time and, and I can't Do anything. I was like, okay. So that was the first thing that made me think, okay. There's people are not, not booking these because they don't think they're valuable or they don't wanna get on a call with me.

They're not booking them because there's this, they feel like there's this sense of obligation that they're gonna get on the call and be sold to, or they're gonna feel guilty about not being able to give, give something in advance. Does that make sense? Yeah, 

Jordan: for sure. I mean it, and the fact that even, even if they weren't afraid to be sold to just that like guilt and sensitivity around getting on the call and taking something from you and not being able to like reciprocate by working with you so interesting.

And thank goodness that person booked and showed up because can you imagine how many people in that same situation, cuz I, I mean, I think I would've done this too is make up this story. Well, no one wants my calls. No one values what I do. Like you start to tell this story about why all of these people are not booking and then even the people are booking, aren't showing up and gosh, that insight is just absolutely critical.

So what did you, what did you shift after that then? Well, 

Emma-Louise: the first thing we shifted was I still carried on promoting the free calls, but I made it very clear that they were not gonna be sold to on the call and that they'd actually be helping me out. With my market research. So straight away there was a shift there.

So smart. I think three people booked them the week after that. Oh my gosh. We also added in a thank you page. So after they'd scheduled and Abdo, it went to a thank you page on my website and, and we embedded a video so that they felt like they had a connection straight away. So I thank the booking, the call, and then this page was like really detailed, which is something else we can talk about.

Cause that is very good for me. And my audience is detail and it's like, you know, this is what's gonna happen. Lay it all out. So there's really this sense of safety. Like we'll get on the call. This will happen. We'll talk about this. This is what you'll walk away with. And to say, don't worry if you feel nervous beforehand, I know what it can be like getting on a call with a stranger.

If you're not used to it. All of those fears that they may have had just kind of alleviate them, hopefully, you know, at that point of booking so that they would feel excited and looking forward to it rather than I dread and turning up for this prepaid. 

Jordan: Right. Yeah. Yeah. I can see how that would be really intimidating.

So we're gonna talk about market research, cuz you mentioned that and I, I know you love market research and I wanna talk all about it, but this was a shift that you made prior to doing market research, right? Yeah. So how did you figure out, how did you figure out to make these changes? Is it, was it solely just like off of what would make you feel comfortable like with the detailed sales page?

How did you figure that out? 

Emma-Louise: So part of it was starting to realize what do I need to see? And you know, it was, it was very obvious after that. I was like, I don't jump on a bunch of free calls with people. Feels like a very extrovert thing to do. There's nothing wrong with it. It's great for building your network, but it's not something I do.

So I'm like, okay, so these people probably won't do it. This, this makes a lot of sense. And around the same time I ran a challenge and I had about 40 signups for the challenge. And I don't think anyone showed up live on any day. It was like five day challenge. Oh no. so this is going on at the same time.

And people were in the Facebook group, they joined, they were opening the emails. I could tell this, but they did not show up live to the challenge. Lu 

Jordan: they're Lu. 

Emma-Louise: It was honestly, I, I dug deep into my soul to get, if I hadn't already been coaching for about 12 years at this point, I think it would've been, it would've been easy to give up.

Right. Because I'd have been like, oh, this isn't working, but I knew I was a great coach. I was like, I, I just need to crack this. And. I did this challenge. And then two weeks later, people were emailing me and they were like, oh, thank you so much for that challenge. It was so helpful. And this is what I got from it.

And this is what I learned. And I started to realize there's the, the asynchronicity suit people better. They don't wanna turn up necessarily on a live video and participate. They wanna do it in their own time. And again, that was a light bulb moment. Cause I was like, that's how I. That's how I like to do things.

So part of it really was yeah. Bringing it back to myself and going, Hmm. How would I have felt in this situation, like two and a half years ago when I was brand new and also just testing little things. And I think as highly sensitive introverts, you know, we have that emotional intelligence and we can tell very quickly when something lands with people or when there's kind of tumbleweed mm-hmm

So I think it was bringing it back to that as well. And going just constant little readjustments, just noticing every little bit of feedback, even if that feedback was silenced to me, that was still 

Jordan: feedback. Yeah. Yeah. that definitely says something. And I, I think the thing that I love about this so much that makes me think about my journey is how difficult my first business was because I wasn't my client avatar and it felt like constant work and just.

Everything was, it was like a mystery, like everything I was trying and experimenting with, I was just like, totally throwing spaghetti at the wall because I had almost zero insight into what people really wanted and needed because I, I, in that business, I was serving high school students and parents of high school students, which at the time I was like, I think I was 23 or 22 when I started that business.

So it had been a while since I had been a high school student and I definitely was a parent of a high school student and I just had no understanding of my client avatar. And I think that's what made that business so difficult for me. And when I came to that realization, I was like, okay, well I'm never starting a business ever again, unless I am my client avatar.

Absolute game changer. And so I think if anyone is listening in and trying to figure out why things aren't working, maybe that's the thing. And maybe your, your audience is your client avatar, but you just haven't tapped into, well, what are the things that I would want and I would need, and I even still forget to do that sometimes as I serve clients like you, and then I go try to do the things that I do for myself.

And I'll have little light bulb moments like, oh, well we're doing it this way for my client, but I would prefer if we did it this way for me, which means probably I need to make a shift and do it differently for my clients. because they need the same things. but it's kind of hard to, to get that insight unless you're really.

spending time to kind of zoom out and think about it from that perspective, 

Emma-Louise: a hundred percent. I think the biggest thing that trips up all of my clients, I would say is writing content and marketing from themselves and not to their ideal client. And, you know, I think the ideal client, avatar exercises, service really well at the start of business.

But at this stage of people now, you know, where we looking to scale, it has to go a bit deeper and it's not only like, you know, who are they and how old are they? And you know, what coffee do they drink? And they do yoga and blah, blah, blah. But it's like, how do they buy? How are they consuming content?

Where are they really connected? And you know, who, who is making the decision about their purchasing, what's making them make the decision. What are they tied into? What are their values, all of those things. And I think that that just makes creating content so much easier. I'll say to my clients all the time, you're talking to other coaches or you're talking to other.

Healers your language that you're using is as an expert, which you are, but the person that needs your services could be intimidated by that because they don't know it when you go back and talk to them in their language and think about where they are. It all falls into place and makes so much more sense.

Jordan: Yeah. Oh my gosh. Okay. Let's talk about the market research. Okay. Because this is so, so fun. So, it's especially fun to, to talk to you about this because I've seen the results of a lot of your market research. Yeah. And it is unbelievably, insightful and helpful when making even tiny decisions about how you're messaging about your products, about anything.

So when did you start doing market research and, and why? 

Emma-Louise: The main reason was. Looking at content. I wanted to make sure, you know, I'm an introvert. I have limited energy. I don't love spending a ton of time online. I wanted to make sure the content that I was creating for people was really valuable, was stuff that they wanted and, and needed.

And so that was the first driver really to do market research. And so bringing everything back together, this was probably. This is about six months after the free call debacle. but I will say by this time I was fully booked one on one. I just filled my one on one. So as soon as people did start, it went very, very quickly.

So then I did this market research and I posted it. I talked about it on the podcast. I posted it in the Facebook groups on Instagram, emailed my list and put it in a membership that I was in as well for entrepreneurs. And she said, Hey, if anyone could fill this out, that would be, you know, I'd really appreciate it.

And someone is gonna be chosen for a free 45 minute call to say, thank you, 54 people filled it out. Whoa. Yeah. And I did not have a big audience at the time. It was well under a thousand. So I was really shocked and they filled it out with a lot of detail, which is my first clue that people in my audience like detail.

Jordan: Yeah. That's so interesting. And all you were offering was a random drawing of a free call. Was there anything else? 

Emma-Louise: Nope, that was it. That was the, that was the first round. so that was in early 20, 21? No, just a random, like one person will get a free call. I ended up doing about five because, oh, just so many.

I was like, I can't just pick one person yeah. So I ended up, I ended up drawing more. Oh, 

Jordan: that's cool. I love that. So did you have someone help you put that market research survey together or had you had experience with this? How, how did you go about like creating the market research itself? 

Emma-Louise: I wrote it myself because I just, it was very selfish.

I want to know what these people want. So I'm just gonna ask the questions. That are gonna serve me at this point. And funnily enough, I took a online business consultant certification just after that. And that was part of our homework was to do market research. Oh cool. And they had a bank of questions that they suggested.

And I actually think mine are quite different, but mine work for my audience. 

Jordan: Yeah. Yeah. And again, probably created it from like your own personal, like what are like, what are the things that you wanna know? How would you like things to be asked to you all of that? So I ju I don't know why, but for some reason conducting market research seems intimidating to me.

I don't know why. I don't know if it's like, I'm worried. I might ask the wrong questions or ask them incorrectly, or did it take up a ton of time? Like help me figure out why am I intimidated by this? 

Emma-Louise: I don't know. Did it take a ton of time? No, I, I like questions and surveys and tests, and to be fair, a lot of introverts do.

So it's probably a very good thing for me to do in my business. Mm-hmm but I quite enjoyed putting it together and I enjoyed maybe it's the coaching, me phrasing the questions in such a way that I didn't wanna lead anyone to an answer. I wanted to make sure that I was giving people complete openness.

cuz yeah, I didn't, I didn't want it just to be yes, no. Or, you know, choose a or B I wanted them to, I wanted to hear their language. I wanted to hear what they actually wanted. Not just, you know, me have these two ideas of what they might want and let them choose from it. Yeah. Fun. So I think I have might as accurate, but it didn't take too.

Emma-Louise: No, it didn't take too long. It probably writing natural questions probably took like half an hour. 

Jordan: Okay. All right. 

Emma-Louise: Super quick. Yeah, no, it was great. 

Jordan: Did you have any like qualifiers, like anything that you were saying, like, please fill this out. If you identify with this or did you try to exclude anyone?

Emma-Louise: No, I think I made clear who I work with and I think in the first question, I said, do you identify as an introvert? And they could choose introvert, empath, highly sensitive, all of the above, none of the above. funnily enough, no one put none. no one put none of the above, so. Okay. so that was actually really interesting because straight away, I think on that one, I saw that 46% of people responded highly sensitive, which was the same numbers responded introvert.

Hmm. Which I did not expect. So even on, even on question one, I was like, okay, this is, this is interesting. 

Jordan: Yeah. Okay. So this, this was a question I was going to ask at the beginning around pivoting. Because you mentioned you've been doing coaching for many, many, many, many years, but this particular model and structure is what, like maybe two years, two and a half now, two and a half years.

Okay. So when you first started, like how, how many pivots have you made? I think, I think people can sometimes be intimidated about pivoting and worried about pivoting. For many reasons. One maybe being that they're serving some subset of clients that they don't necessarily want to like let go of or alienate or something.

But can you talk a little bit about that journey to kind of discovering this, like how this business is structured and who you're serving. Mm, 

Emma-Louise: absolutely. So what I will say is when I first brought the business online, I was an LP practitioner and, and a life coach, and I was still in my full-time job.

That was something that I'd been doing on the side. It was like a passion project. I was like, I'm gonna take this full-time, I'm gonna take it online. And I Googled like, you know, can you be a coach online and found someone that was running and you know, this awful program, which looked amazing. So I joined it and to learn how to be a coach online and make like a million pounds a day.

And, and you know, I learned that I didn't wanna run a program like that. but I, I also learned that. Marketing when you don't have a niche is not very good. I also learned that I'm an overthinker and a perfectionist, and I couldn't decide on a niche mm-hmm . And so I went round like this for I'm not kidding in about 18 months round around in circles until it got to the point that I decided to leave my full-time job.

And I was like, okay, I need to get serious now. So any business that I'd had up until then was word of mouth referrals or people that were in this awful group that also needed support because they weren't getting support in the awful group. uh, so, so I was like, I, I really need an niche. I really need it.

And by this point I like got a lot of business experience online. I've you know, I, I could definitely tell you what didn't work. So I joined, I joined a beater group of a brand strategist. her name's Hillary Hartling, she's amazing. She's worked for Disney. So she's the queen of storytelling. And she ran this beta group.

It was her first time that she was offering a group. It was insane. It was like $400 or something for eight weeks. It was, it was just stupid. And we worked through everything as a group and it was like, who are the clients that you've loved working with? What do they have in common? you know, what really lit you up about them?

Who didn't you like working with? So, you know, my own internal market research and what became clear is the people I love to work with were ambitious. So that's, you know, they were the action takers. They were the people that would come to the call and then the next week they'd be like, yep, I've done everything.

What's next. Like, those are who I work best with. That's what we got by the way, like me. Yes. Super organized, super driven and just like, I'm gonna do it. So. Ambitious was never in doubt. It was always those people, but I couldn't quite get what the other part was. And I was going around with like, mm, they have to be like self-aware and interpersonal development and, or do they have to be spiritual?

Like what, what's the thing? And I couldn't quite get it. And it took me a few weeks and I remember the moment I was in my house and I just went, ah, it's introvert. And it made. So, and I was like, that's why I've St. Everything was like, it was like, everything fell into place. I was like, I don't have a terrible mindset.

I've just struggled because I've not been managing my energy. I've not been reg regulated my nervous system. You know, this coach had me out there in Facebook groups that I didn't feel comfortable. I didn't know what I was doing. And she had me DM in people, all this stuff. I was like, oh, none of that works because I'm an introvert.

Mm-hmm . And I remember getting on this call with the group and I was like, I've got it. It's ambitious introverts. And I think there were like 10 people in this group. And about six of them typed in the chat, they were like, that's me. I totally resonate with that if I saw it. Wow. 

Jordan: Yeah. Wow. Oh my gosh. Were you actively trying to figure that out when it came to you or had you just been so deep into trying to figure it out for like weeks.

You weren't even thinking about it and it popped into your head. I'm curious. Yeah, it was the 

Emma-Louise: moment that I wasn't thinking about it. I was cooking. It's always, when I'm out for a walk or cooking that I had my best idea. If I sat there with the notes, it wasn't coming. If I was cooking mm-hmm I just went oh, Duh and, and, and my body felt calm and everything in the world made sense.

And when I told like, you know, friends and stuff who were entrepreneurs, they were like, of course it's how did we not, how do we not see this? Yeah. It's so 

Jordan: obvious. Oh, I love it. Amazing. Okay. So, so was that moment about two and a half years ago? 

Emma-Louise: That was, yeah, that was just, just under two and a half years ago.

And I will say what you said about people, you know, with their audience and not wanting to alienate with their pivot. I just signed my first six month one-on-one client for mindset at this point. And she had just done her, my Briggs test for me. And she was 96% extroverted . So I literally was about to literally just sign this client and was about to change everything in my marketing and messaging to interact.

And so what did you do? 

Jordan: How did you handle that? 

I said to her, oh, look, I'm moving into more of a business coaching. So it's gonna be slightly different. She hadn't come to me from online. Anyway, she'd been she'd act. I'd actually been recommended to her in a Facebook group. And then we connected in DMS.

and she was like, oh, that's really great, blah, blah, blah. And then about halfway through, we realized that she was highly sensitive and she's resigned with me like three times. she's been a plant many times, so, oh my gosh. She's a highly sensitive extrovert. So it all made sense. 

Jordan: That's cool. So let's talk abouts resigning, cuz you have a 100% Resig rate is what you told me on your one on one, like your six.

Oh my one on 

Emma-Louise: one month. One on one. Yeah. 

Jordan: And, and so do you think that's because they're just such a perfect fit for what you have to provide? What do you think that's from? 

Emma-Louise: I think there's a couple of things I will say that I've trialed different. I've done three months, four months and six months. And. I think two of my four month people resigned, but a hundred percent of my six month.

And I think what it is. When we implement a new strategy, it can take about 90 days to kick in. And I think four months, wasn't quite long enough for people to have got everything in place and sat there and been held through that messy middle, you know, where you'd think it's not working, even though it is like me with free calls and then they'd be like, oh, and I think there's so much coach hop in that it's just so easy to go.

Well, I'll go work with that person, cuz they've got a 12 week program and they've promised, you know, 10 K months or whatever. But with the six months people have solidified things. They've gotten to see some results that started to kick in. And I just think you've got a much deeper relationship with a coach when you've been working with them for that long.

but I do think yet that having, knowing they're a great fit is a really big part of it. And it's the people that are like, oh, as soon as I read this or you know, I read this on your website or I heard you say this on the podcast and. Yeah. People are not gonna buy from you if they don't feel seen and understood and like, you know them, and that can be used in a yeah.

Emma-Louise: Manipulative pro markety way, like many people do, but also there's something very powerful about being able to, to, you know, say to people, I know what your problems are. I know why you're struggling and I know how to help you because I've been there myself. Mm-hmm 

Jordan: yeah. That's amazing. So let's talk a little bit more about understanding your audience.

So you've done the market research. What other, let's talk about that a little bit longer. So how do you actually use your market research? Because I, I think a lot of people go out, they do the market research and then it's like, okay, well now what . 

Emma-Louise: So the first, the first one that I did in, 20 21, 1 of the first things they did was start talking about sensitive introverts a lot more.

I realized that, you know, the same amount of my audience for identifying this highly sensitive. So that was something that, that we added in straight away. One of the things I asked was what people had been doing to grow their business. So I asked if they'd downloaded free resources, had they taken a course, had they listened to podcast?

Did they have a business plan? All of these kind of things. And I think 80 something percent of people had downloaded free resources and something like 3% of people had a business plan. So the data is, you know, it was quite juicy. You would've loved it. so I designed an intensive. I designed an intensive called the 90 minute business plan.

And we did their three month planning in a 90 minute call with I think, two weeks of Voxer afterwards or something. And I think in that first year, that product alone generated about 25,000 pounds in revenue. Wow. 

Jordan: Just a 90 minute call, just 

Emma-Louise: 90 minute call. 

Jordan: Was there something in the market research that helped you determine what, like how to structure that offer as a 90 minute call?

Emma-Louise: I think I'd asked something about what kind of support people liked. And I think a lot of people had said one on one. but then a lot of people were very early on in their business, so they weren't necessarily in a place to invest in, in full on one, on one. So I was looking at like, how can I make this a hybrid?

How can I make it a great space for them? Because they want one-on-one, it feels safer than being in a group, but that it's not a huge investment. It's, it's affordable and it's gonna give them something tangible to walk away with. one of the other things that came up, if I remember, cause this is about 18 months ago now was about people like selling intangible things, people talking about upleveling and you know, living your best life.

And, you know, as introverts people were just like, I'm really sick of all this like marketing talk. I just wanna know what I'm getting. So it's like, if I can make this really clear, you're getting a three month business. It's laid out on a Trello board week by week. And, you know, you can just delete the cards when you've done them.

And then by the end of the 12 weeks you have completed it, and this is what you have achieved. And that, I just think that really resonated, that really struck a chord with people. 

Jordan: Mm-hmm . Yeah. So why did you decide to redo the market research? Like, did you get to a certain point where you're like, okay, I need to know something else or cuz you've just recently done that.

So there was about what 18 months between each survey. 

Emma-Louise: It was probably about 15 actually, so yeah. so it's an annual thing. Now here at the ambitious introvert we love our market research. various things. My audience has grown. Quite considerably since then, I am serving people at a different level of business.

So, you know, majority of my one-on-one clients are at, or around the six figure, mark are about to be some, a multi six figure. I just wasn't working with those people at that time. And I just wanted to make sure, like, where are people what's happening? what, how are they enjoying consuming content now?

Because that's changed so much, even over the last year with the rise of, you know, reels and TikTok and things that, you know, people have seen a drop off in lives and masterclass attendances and things, because we've suddenly got all this access to video on social media. So people don't necessarily wanna turn up at a set time and watch a video, which is a shame, but yeah, that's the evolution.

So like, just to see all of these things, like, where are people, what are they doing? What are they enjoying? What do they need? What are their goals? and again, I think I got about 50 responses. This time, but I did offer them a product. I offered them a digital product to say, thank you. so it was something that I'd already got created and, you know, again, it's just that energy exchange.

It feels really fair, especially if people have completed it last year, they might think , I'm do it again for her. But I, I offered them my survey swipe file, which basically had all the questions to the, in the survey in as well. So it worked really well. 

Jordan: Yeah. So one of the things that I think was borderline mind boggling when we looked at your market research, like in case anybody doesn't know, I am a super duper nerd.

and so we looked at your market research and there was just some really juicy information in there. But you asked this great question about what phase of business people were in and it was like a multiple choice. So you, they kind of self-selected into these four different buckets. And when we split up that data by the bucket, it was crazy how different their responses were depending on what phase of business that they were in.

Jordan: And so what, what made you decide to even put that question on there? Cause I don't think people would even think to, to segment people that way. Uh, and you did it different on the first survey than you did in the second one, right? Yeah. 

Emma-Louise: In the first survey, I, I think I just left it blank and asked them to say.

Like how far along in business they were or something like that. But I wanted something a bit more quantifiable this time. So I think we had like, I'm brand new, just, just getting started. I've got some bits in place, but it's not kind of all moving together yet. and then there's the like, I'm ready to, I'm signing clients consistently and I'm ready to scale and I'm, I'm established, you know, I've been in business a while, so.

I just wanted to see where are they and who needs serving at particular parts of their business? I just launched my group for the first time this year, which is for brand new people. So, you know, I knew there was a market for that. I have a lot of correspondence, a lot of people respond to my emails or contact me from the podcast.

And that was always on the agenda because I wanted something to serve those people that maybe the one-on-one price point wasn't accessible for. Yeah. Which has been great. But then I was like, well, who else is there? What else do they need? What else can I, can I provide and, and share with them? So what I didn't expect. The data when we broke it down to be so mind boggling. What I thought was I would get an overview of how many brand new people were in my audience. How many establishment? I thought we were just gonna have a percentage, but when we broke it down and then looked into the answers by category, as you say, what people needed was so specific, like there were maybe questions that had nine or 10 responses from the, I knew people that they wanted that no one else in any other category had selected.

Like it was insane. 

Jordan: Yeah. Yeah. And it it's, again. This is so nerdy, but like you would've lost all of that context, just looking at the aggregate data, like yeah. The, the type of, the way that they like to consume content was different. The way that they wanted to work with you, whether that was like one-on-one or groups or something like that was different.

Uh, their language was different. I mean, it was literally all different depending on the group that they selected into. And like you said, you didn't go into it thinking, oh, I'm gonna get a bunch of like, really helpful information per individual group. It was just gonna be like, oh, this is about how much of my audience is new, or this is about how much my audience is established, but it was so much more helpful.

I was mind blown. 

Emma-Louise: I knew that you'd love it. it was the first thing. When we started working together, I was like, here you go. have some, have some data. 

Jordan: Yes. Uh, yes. I was sitting on my couch. I think drinking wine, watching TV, sifting through your data for funsies. I think I took a picture of it for Instagram.

I was like, this is what I'm choosing to do. Cuz I'm a business owner. I can work whenever I want 

Emma-Louise: nerding out on someone's data. Yes. And, and look, the great thing with it is like just the same way that I bought in that intensive from the first one, which was really popular and you know, gave people what they needed to.

You know, get there, get some success in business, which is what I'm here for this time. This, this data's allowing me to make decisions. You know, we're already thinking about some different ways that we can now take the brand and some different things that they can bring in to support people. For instance, a lot of the brand new people, one, one on one support.

So I'm like, right, how can we do that? How can we bring in something that supports these people at price point that's accessible to them because not getting that support could be the difference between them moving forward in their business. And. Yeah. If they are very introverted and shy, they just might not join a group.

And they could be, you know, that pool of people which breaks my heart, that just actually never get started because they don't have the right support. So already looking at that, we looked at the established people want a group. So again, it's like, right. Do I bring back the mastermind? When is that, you know, what type of level of people would it be for?

And it makes complete sense. Their business is established. They're really profitable. They're already able to scale, but what do they want? They want a support network. Yeah. They want a community. Yeah. 

Jordan: So something that you had mentioned when we were talking about having this conversation was around your client journey.

Mm-hmm so can you talk a little bit about that too? Because I think that's one of those things that gets mentioned, but I think sometimes we're like, what does that really even mean? tell us about it. 

Emma-Louise: So I'm gonna actually, I'm gonna turn that back on you first. What, what do you think it means? How do you see it?

so I think I could take it a couple of ways. It could either mean the journey that people go on when they either first hear about you or see some of your content to get them. Intrigued in actually working with you and then signing with you and becoming a client, or it could also be how do you support them as a client and then continue to support them after they've become a client?

Jordan: Is it a different program or like, and maybe it's all of that all together would be client journey. 

Emma-Louise: I kind of saw it like stuck together when you, when you said it. So, so yeah, I think it's understanding for me, like the second that I come across someone I'm in their world, I'm on a journey wherever I found them.

And you get an instant idea of someone, you know, how you feel, maybe you land on their Instagram or their website, or you hear them on a podcast or something, but there'll be that moment. There'll be that first moment that, you know, you enter someone's world and you then decide, do I wanna stay in this person's world or not?

So I think the first thing there is understanding my audience, who. Uh, in this kind of crazy online world, but they're seeking out just some quiet and some calm and, you know, to get some head space because it's all feeling a bit fraught for them. So I chose very neutral branding for that reason. I try to keep things quite simple, in terms of the website and, and the social media, because they don't wanna land on like another neon pink and gold brand.

There's lots of those. And there's lots of people that love those and it serves them really well, but not for my people. So it's thinking about those small nuances, those little touch points from, from the second someone comes like, how do they feel? Do they feel understood? Do they feel welcome? The next thing I learned is that my people are very detail oriented.

They like lots of detail for my one on one. I put together a, I think it was a nine page brochure. A couple of years ago. And, and it's said everything again, just creating that safety about this is what it looks like to work with me. I even took screenshots of like base camp to show like, this is the portal that we have, and this is how you can use it.

And this is why it's helpful and talked about all of the things that I do with people. And I still had someone reach out with a question after reading. I remember my coach saying someone had a question after reading cause I had gone to town. I'd literally thrown everything in there, but, yeah, they like a lot of detail.

My sales page for my group program, I think was 13 pages of a Google doc. And I think three of those were FAQs. Wow. Because people like to have the details. So. I give a lot of details. My website's very detailed 

Jordan: and this is all before they become clients. Because I think a lot of times we spend, we spend time putting this information together for people once they become clients.

But it's not usually public facing information. 

Emma-Louise: No, no, quite often not, but that's, that was a conscious decision of, let me give people everything there so they can consume it as they want. So for instance, I didn't have a sales page for my one on one for quite a long time. I just had a, the services brochure and people could opt in to download it.

And it was so they could read it in their own time. Mm-hmm I didn't want a sales page that felt I'm gonna say manipulative because, you know, I use marketing and sometimes people need to hear things to get them off the fence to make purchase, which I know is gonna be good for them, but I didn't want them to feel like, oh, I'm being taken through the, I wanted them to have all the information and it was like, download it, go away.

Read. You know, sit with it and, and see how it feels. And then if you're interested to book a call, come back to me. 

Jordan: Yeah. Yeah. And, and just as, as a reminder like this, this is for your specific audience, cuz I'm listening to you talk about this. I'm like, oh yeah, that's so interesting. And I feel like I like a lot of information for like certain types of purchases.

but my clients, at least for like the, the done for use side of what I do, don't like a lot of information. They just wanna know like what I do and that I'm gonna get it done and they don't need to worry about it, but they're not gonna read any of that stuff. And actually. They won't even do my surveys either.

Jordan: Like my own clients won't take my surveys because they're just too busy. Like that, that is my client avatar. Right? Like these are people who don't have time to do that at all. And so if you're listening to this, like you're talking about amazing things that work for your specific audience and potential clients that would not translate over to other audiences.

Emma-Louise: Not completely, not like my best friend in business is also a coach. She's a huge extrovert. Her brand is like the complete opposite mind. She has book a call link in her Instagram and people just book a call and get on a call with her. She'll be like, oh, three people have booked a call this week. Like that wouldn't happen with my audience.

So I need to give the information that would happen on the call or afterwards, beforehand to create that safety. She's like, oh, my people can't think of anything worse. And reading all of that. They just wanna get on a call and vibe . Yeah. So, but it's understanding your audience, that's all it's down to.

Jordan: Yeah. Yeah. And I think it could even vary within your audience sometimes for different offers. Like again, because you're serving ambitious introverts, but again, if you break it down into those different categories of people, like you have subsets, within your audience and for different offers, people may need more information or they may just be able to make a quick buying decision.

And so not thinking that it's just like this blanket thing that you could just, you know, we talk a lot, we we've, we've bonded over this, dislike of formulas and trends and things like that, you know? And so even within your own marketing, when you find something that works, it doesn't mean it's gonna work for every single thing.

Like you really have to be responding to the people that you're trying to serve. 

Emma-Louise: And I do have a client at the moment, a one-on-one client that started about a month ago and she heard me on someone else's podcast. And she, she just said that she knew she wanted to work with me. And she knew she filled out the wait list form.

And I sent her a link and said, Hey, do you wanna hop on a call? And she was like, yep. And on the call, she was just like, yep, I'm ready to go six months. And, and she finds it hard to imagine that people need. All of that information, but what I will say is she's more established in business. She's further along in her personal development journey, she's learned how to trust her gut.

She, you know, so she's like, no, I was, I was all in I'm going with it. People that are maybe a bit newer or they've been burnt by their investments in the past, or they've, you know, forgotten how to trust themselves. And they've been bowled over by some snazzy marketing. It makes more sense to give them that time and that, and that detail and let their nervous system recover.

So yeah, absolutely. For different offers or, you know, different levels of business, there's definite nuances. 

Jordan: Yeah. And even just different, different points in time in your life. Because one of my coaches, I have followed her and been on her email list for probably like four years. And I think I bought like a $9 product from her, like years and years and years ago.

Right. And then I kind of just like, forgot that she existed and. I bought into her mastermind. The, it was the biggest investment I've ever made in my business from one email that she sent. I, I didn't, I don't think I even read the sales page. Like I was talking to a client of mine the other day, and we were trying to figure out how to structure her mastermind.

She was like, oh, I just wanna make sure, like, you know, what's included. I'm like, that's not at, at certain price points. That's not what people are looking at. Like, they, they wanna work with you because of who you are. And that was like the situation I read her email and I was like, yep, it's a, yes, everything.

She said, I don't care. What's included. I don't care what the price is. I filled out the application and within 24 hours I had paid, you know, it's just people at , just a point in time that can shift and. and I had been following her for years. It's I 

Emma-Louise: think. True. So that's so crazy.

It's so true. I put an email out about 18 months ago to say, I'm gonna be launching a mastermind and there's three spaces. If you're interested, hit reply. And 10 people applied, I ended up running two, two pods of it. and one of those people came because she had filled out the market research and won the call oh my God.

And then she ended up being in the mastermind and then that group asked if they could do another three months at the end of it and extend. So it, it was just the gift that kept on giving. But, the thing that came back from people, I didn't have a sales page. I had a Google doc with some really basic information and people said, oh no, I've been waiting for a chance to work with you.

And this is a price point that I can afford. 

Jordan: Mm. And what I hear when you, when you say that, because I know you're a perfectionist, I'm a perfectionist, probably people listening are perfectionist. Uh, there's a lot of us women out there are perfectionist. And, one thing that I feel like I have really done differently in this business is a lot of experimentation.

And we talked about this actually, when I was on your podcast, really experimenting with things and not waiting until I feel like I had figured out like the specific marketing language and like dialed in all of the details and built the sale sales page out really perfectly. And even just getting my very first client with this business.

I just threw together a PDF and sent it to somebody cuz I was like, oh, I could totally help them. Here's what I could do for you. And it took me like 15 minutes. I sent them the PDF they signed on as the client and like the rest is history. but not getting bogged down in those details and, and the perfectionism around like making it look a certain way.

Emma-Louise: it's the not going to woo on this, but it's the energy around it. I ran that mastermind because I'd gotten fully booked. Uh, one on one. I didn't wanna run a group. I, I just didn't feel like I got the capacity to start recording modules and, and things like that. So mastermind just made so much sense. I was a facilitator and my corporate job.

I knew how to do it. and something I did, which I'd never done before and I've never done since is I actually reached out to about four people that I thought would, I would love to have in it. I was like, these are the people that would be really great together. And I just voiced them. I was like, look, I'm putting together this mastermind.

It's gonna be a pod of three. I dunno if you're looking for support, but I think. You know, I would love to have you in it. And, I think one of them went on the wait list for the next one, cuz she just joined another mastermind. Another one of them had just made another investment, but she was, oh, thank you so much for thinking of me.

And one of 'em was like, do you know what? Yeah, this feels really good. She's like, I, I, I don't feel sold to, I'd been on her podcast. So she's like, yeah, I like your energy. I need some help in business. yeah, I'm I'm in and it, that didn't come from like, let me try and sell this or let me make like 20 K or something.

It came from like who would be really great in this? Let me think of like this amazing group of women that I could bring together. and that client has just resigned for her third, six months with me now after the mastermind , , that's amazing, but it was all about the energy from it. And even when I put that email out, I put the email out thinking, oh, there are people here that can really benefit from this.

Jordan: Yeah. It's I mean, I talk a lot about alignment and I think it, it goes alignment, energy. I mean, all of these things go together. And when you, when you find that, I mean, it just doesn't feel like selling, at least that's how I feel like I don't feel like I do a lot of selling. Like I talk a lot about what I do and I invite people to participate in it with me and, you know, tell them what I can help them with, but it doesn't feel like selling or like a grind like it has in other businesses.

Emma-Louise: What I will say for transparency is the earlier this year, I decided to run the mastermind again, but do it as a proper launch. And I did do the whole like sales page mapping, everything out. And, it, I lost the excitement for it because it felt like, oh, this is gotta be perfect. And all of these things.

And I was also, I got COVID, so I decided not to do a public launch with it. And I, I emailed it out to a few people on the wait list. And they were like, no, I wanna wait for one on one. Or one of them was like, no, I've just joined something else. And I had no motivation behind it. And I just decided to cancel that launch.

Mm-hmm I was like, I'm not gonna push it for the sake of it just didn't feel right. It was like chalk and cheese compared to the first one. I, I 

Jordan: love that you bring this up because again, this whole podcast is. Being transparent and talking about like, what's really happening behind the scenes. Uh, I did the same thing.

I did the same thing last December. I was like, oh, I'm gonna launch this mastermind. I was super excited about it. I started, I put the sales page together. I put it out there and then I was like, eh, I have no desire to talk about this. Like, what is that? It was so weird. And I, I, I think it's important. And I've talked about this before, too, to distinguish between.

Not being in alignment with something and it not being good timing, like what you're talking about and what I did last, uh, winter. And I canceled that, uh, launch versus like fear. So fast forward to a few months ago, I relaunched this mastermind because I was like, oh, this is the perfect time. I couldn't believe it.

We talk a lot about human design and you know, I'm a manifesting generator and I was just like, we're doing it. Like, this is the thing it's now it's happening. It's perfect. And, and so I did, and I had, I had a few days where I was like, eh, maybe I should cancel this. I had one person who had already purchased.

And I was like, oh, I don't know. I don't know. I think I, I don't know if it's gonna be good timing. Thank goodness I'm in a mastermind. And so I posted . I was. Maybe I should just cancel it. What do you think? And Sabrina, my coach was like, no, I think you just need to like do it. And I was like, okay, you're right.

And I did and I filled it. Actually, I filled it to, to more, I wanted five and I have seven women in there and it, it, it was a perfect example of what I talk about when I'm saying, okay, is it fear or is it misalignment? Because they feel so similar. 

Emma-Louise: So similar. I, I really had to think like, you know, I wanted five people in that mastermind three would've been great.

And my friend was saying to me, she's like, oh my God, you've easily got three people in your audience that you like, this is just a no brainer. Like get on stories and talk about it. Do live in your group, just like, and I. I just don't actually wanna do it. Right. And, and that was the thing because LA the time before I wanted to run it so badly, I wanted to hold that space and, and it, it just flowed and this time I was like, not the right time.

Yeah. 

Jordan: Yeah. I love it. sometimes you just gotta say no. Exactly, 

Emma-Louise: exactly. And that's the whole point, right? Like we can map these things out and obviously you and I map things out in advance for, for my business. And, you know, there's one thing now that we're discussing and I'm like, oh, we aren't, we, I just need to, you know, look, look at the year planner and consult with my energy and stuff, but you can map something up, but if it gets to it and you'll so out of alignment, it doesn't feel good.

You don't have to do it just cuz it's in plan. 

Jordan: Yeah. Yeah, totally, totally. And it's just tapping into figure. Hmm, am I just scared? Cause especially with groups, I mean, groups can be terrifying for people to launch because there's this like automatic, you know, requirement for a certain number of people to be in it, for it to feel like a success.

And that, that can definitely be intimidating. But, I think it's easier when it, when you're launching something that's not a group to be able to tap into, is this fear or is this misalignment, but that, that fear of like the expectation of getting a certain amount of people in can be. Uh, it can bring on a lot of fear.

Emma-Louise: well, I did my first proper, proper launch. I'm gonna say it still wasn't proper. Cause it wasn't public launch, but of my group. And that was when I had COVID also. So I had COVID twice this year and, and when we started the ladies in it, they were like, cuz they said up to 10, that was my thing. There would be like a maximum of 10 people.

And they were like, oh, you know, there's not 10 people. Are you disappointed that it's a smaller group? I was like, no, because I think energetically really that's all that I could probably hold space for right now. Mm-hmm because you know, I have long C and I, I truly believe what's meant to be is, is gonna be so the beauty of that is it's the first time ever in this group, but I've got to go so deep with them and I've got.

get to know them and get the feedback. And, you know, I worked with an instructional designer to map the group out, but I've still made tweaks and changes along the way. I didn't sit down and record like four months worth of modules. I'm doing it week to week because I'm like, where are they? Where are they at?

What do they need? Is it too soon for this? Do they need more information on this? So, you know, if that had been a group of 10 people, I wouldn't have had the time and, and just the space in my brain, I don't think to do that. So, again, having a smaller launch or a smaller group or something isn't bad, it just gives you more, more market 

Jordan: research.

It really does so much more flexibility. And I think it's even more valuable for the people who are in it too. and like you said, people in, in your audience don't really like big groups. So that wouldn't have worked for them anyway. no, 

Emma-Louise: they, they like it as it is. Yeah. So it, you know, and it's all a learning experience.

so, you know, for me going forwards, when I run groups, do we do smaller pods of five? Yeah, probably. And then do we, do we add pods along the way? people like to bond and gel, they, you know, so would I run something evergreen? Probably not. It's probably gonna be launches where people are together from, from day one and they can bond as a group.

you know, other people run evergreen program where people dip in and out and it works really well for them, but for my people, probably not, it could be quite intimidating if they come into something where people are already established, mm-hmm that dynamic's already there. Whereas I think everyone coming in on a level foot in, on, on day one feels good to them.

Emma-Louise: So again, like none of anything I've said is right or wrong, it might not work for anyone listening's audience. It could work perfectly for them, but it's just the more you work with people, the more you. Research your audience, the more, you know, the more you, we just experience business as a whole, you're able to bring those things and, and find what really works best for them.

Jordan: Yeah, absolutely. And it's going back to that discussion. We were having about pivoting it's and experimenting. It's not like, it's not like, Ooh, should I? It's it's really more. You should always be. Doing that like that, that's how you're going to better serve your audience and your clients is if you're constantly refining how you're doing things, how you're talking about things.

Like, when I think about this, when I think about copy all of the time, like, I, I can't now copy on, on the first, the first go, like it's impossible. And I have like certain things that I've put in, in place for myself to help me facilitate that process as quickly as possible, because I know it's gonna take me many, many revisions and they need to kind of be public.

Like I, I have to kind of test it before I even know if I like it or not. And so that type of refining around anything in your business, I think is so, so important. All right. Well, what else? I mean, I think we've covered like pretty much everything that we can talk 

Emma-Louise: we definitely covered the market research 

Jordan: for sure.

We did. We did. This has been so fun. Is there, I mean, we will put information in the show notes about how people can find you and everything that you're up to, but is there anything else you wanna leave people with around this market research or understanding your a. 

Emma-Louise: If you are a bit newer to business, I would say, just talk to people, just take any opportunity to talk to people.

Some of my clients are often like, oh, well, I don't wanna open up my calendar calls in case people aren't ready to invest. And I'm like, but it's gold. When you talk to someone that still needs your services. So just take that opportunity to talk to people. And if you are further along, just think about people in your network.

You know, a lot of my ideal clients are also podcast guests. So I'm having a conversation with them for my podcast. I'm interviewing them, but I'm still learning about them. I'm still learning about their journey, what they've enjoyed, what they haven't, what's gone well for them, what hasn't. So it's really, it's not always about, you know, sending out a type form and getting people to fill it in.

It's that active listening. And there are people around you at every level of business that will either have been your ideal client at one point, or they are your ideal client now. So, you know, keep your eyes and ears open and you'll learn more than you. You could think. Ugh, 

Jordan: fabulous. This is even got my wheels turning about things.

I know I need to refine and optimize in what I'm doing. So thank you so so much. This was so fun. 

Emma-Louise: You are welcome.