Episode 54: How We Create Profitable Digital Products With the Hike Design Formula

Monica Froese  00:04

You’re listening to the Empowered business podcast. I’m your host, Monica Froese, a mom of two and your secret weapon to creating a six figure digital product business. I’m on a mission to help 1000 Women make $100,000 a year. That’s right $100 million towards financial independence for women. As an online business expert, I am teaching you everything I know, right here week after week. So you can join us on the journey to $100 million dollars. Sound good, then let’s jump in. Welcome back to another episode of the Empowered Business Podcast. Today, we did something pretty cool. We are opening enrollment for the Empowered Business Lab. And if you’re new around here at the Empowered Business Lab, is our signature program on how to create and sell digital products. And this is our fourth time launching it. We launched it the first time last January. And it went super well. We’ve had over 400 students make their way through the program, we’ve seen so many amazing digital products being launched. And what makes this experience a little bit different is we decided to go back to how we ran what we called the founders round last January. So last January, we launched the program, and we call it the founders round, because we were essentially developing the program at the same time as people were going through it like the content was done. But we were fine tuning it with a live round, and we had 160 ish students go through that first round with us. It was three months long. And it really kept everyone on the same timeline. And the momentum in that group was the best we had seen all year. So after the January launch last year, we went into a six month model, which was more a pace yourself like do we do it yourself type pace. And that meant that everyone was sort of at a different place as they were going through the content plus, they could come in, during any month. So someone might have already been in the lab for three months, and then someone else joined three months later. So no one was really on the same path. But it was meant to be more of a self study course, with monthly q&a S, essentially. And I would address you know, whoever left left questions wherever they were in the program, I would address those in the monthly q&a as well, when we were deciding how we were going to launch the lab this January. So right now, we talked about what is the best student experience. And this is something I recommend that everyone does in their business, making sure that you’re constantly auditing how you’re getting people results, and making sure that you’re making tweaks that make sense. And one of the tweaks we decided to make is to go back to the founding members mentality and launch the lab for a three month cohort. So essentially, it’s open right now to enroll, it’s going to be open for another couple days. And then we’re going to close it down. And we’re going to spend the next three months guiding our students through the entire process of creating and launching their digital products. There’s a syllabus, and instead of just doing live q&a, where I’m where you pre submit questions, and I’m talking back at you through, like we do it on Facebook Live. Instead, we’re bringing everyone into a Zoom meeting room so that we can converse face to face, which makes a world of difference and really helps with a camaraderie of the other people that are going through the program with you. So I’m super excited about this, because I love working more intimately with people. And I just love seeing everyone have the same momentum to get their products out there and go change the lives of other people. So what I’m going to do for this episode is right now, if you’re listening to some real time, we’re actually in the middle of our fourth live training for this, which is called the Digital Product dash live. And we did this training three times in 2021. And what I did was I took a condensed audio version of the day one of the training where we discuss the hype design and the hype design is our formula for how to build and sell a digital product. And I so I took that recording and I edited it down so it made more sense for the podcast. And I’m going to play that for you so you get an idea of what the structure is that we teach in the lab and if it resonates with you and if creating digital products for your audience is something that you want to do. You should sign up and join us in this cohort of the lab which will start will kick off pretty much right now, and it runs through the end of April 2022. So I’m going to go ahead and play. It’s about a 20 minute recording. Again, I edited it. So it made sense for the podcast. So if it ends abruptly, it’s pretty much because it didn’t make sense to keep letting it play. And at the very end, I’ll come back and let you know how you can learn more about the lab and join us in the cohort that’s taking place. Right now. What exactly is a digital product, this is how I define it, I define a digital product as an asset you create once that you can sell over again, an asset in your business because it makes you money. And it’s highly profitable. Because the majority of the work for a digital product is done one time, or like in my case, with the budget spreadsheet, we created it literally out of a need to be able to pay our bills every month, back in the day when we were in corporate. So we spent, I don’t know, couple hours sitting on the couch, doing it out of like a desperate need, and now has made us hundreds of 1000s of dollars. Pretty good return on our investment, I would say and at the time, we didn’t know that. So here is the key, a digital product is the solution to your customers. Number one problem. So I’m gonna say this a lot. A digital product is a solution to a problem. That’s what it is, period. Okay. Most of the products that you see online can fit into four main categories. And this is basically how we decided to teach at this point. We’ve got ebooks, digital templates, such as spreadsheets, like my family budget, spreadsheet, printables, which are very hot with certain niches. And then of course, we’ve all heard of it online digital courses. Now online digital courses can also be paired with like a group coaching element. But essentially, these are the four main categories you’ll see online when it comes to digital products. So now, I’m going to introduce you to today’s topic, which is your million dollar digital product formula, which I call the hype design. Okay, so the hype design, it’s a four step framework for building a profitable Digital Product Sales Machine. Now, a sales funnel, or a Sales Machine, which we are going to talk about, it’s really not, it sounds like the scary word, it’s really not, it’s really just a fancy word for talking about your customer journey. So think of it as a way for your ideal customer to get from point A to point B. Point A is they know nothing about you. And point B is they are paying you money, right? That’s what we want. So I broke this down into four sections. And this is how we’re going to follow the training. So help is the first thing help is find the problem. Innovate is build the solution, your digital product knowledge is educate people who need the solution. That’s where we sell, and then experiences provide the best customer experience, repeat customers. Okay, so we’re gonna talk about this in detail. Now, I decided, when I was coming up with how I was going to teach this, I decided I wanted to use the word hike to describe my method of talking about this, because going on a hike reminds me of an adventure that you have to work for. Because I’ve heard it too many times taught that if you build it, they will come and they’re all kind of lying to you. That’s not the way this works. It’s not as easy as creating a product and slapping it together on a sales page and just be like, here, I have this thing. I can’t tell you how many students I’ve had that tell me, I have a digital product. No one buys it. And I go to their website, and I can’t find it. It’s like, Well, how am I supposed to buy it, you’re not even telling me about it. There is an art to attracting the right people who need what you have to offer. And not only attracting the people who need it, but then you have to convince them that your solution will help them. So luckily, like design will help you iron out all of the important aspects of your customer journey before you even build the product. So we’ll be covering the help stage during our time together this week. This is where you find the problem that you want to solve with your digital product. So innovate is the key to creating your first profitable digital product, you want to find I’m gonna say this a lot to one problem to solve and you’re going to offer one solution. So this week, we will identify the type of digital product you should create for your audience. Now knowledge is when you go out and find someone who needs your solution. So you can educate that your solution is the best solution to their problem in a variety of different ways. But the two major ones I’ll be focusing on is one a very compelling freebie which I’m sure you’ve heard referred to as like an opt in a freebie. We’ll talk more about this. And then the second way is a value pack sales page that educates at the same time that is selling. Now the key here is that your end goal is to always provide one very strong call to action, which is to buy your product because I will say this again. You are not in business if you’re not making money. Okay? Money has to exchange hands here. And the last step is the experience you provide to your customer. This is the stage where you’re going to be nurturing your customer for a long lasting relationship and delivering value with the product that they bought. Okay, so let’s talk about this fancy sales funnel thing here. So a sales funnel is the selling mechanism for your digital product. And I want to just talk about the journey of what that means. So this is going to be so important for tomorrow when we go into our reverse engineering exercise. So this is why I just really want you to hear me here, a sales funnel is just a fancy word for the customer journey. When you think about acquiring a new customer in your business, it’s easiest to think of it in terms of a funnel, because the funnel is like an upside down triangle. And each step of the funnel, you lose people, because not everyone will take the next step in the funnel process. So this is why it’s super important to build an optimized customer journey for potential new customers. Here’s how it works, your customer has a problem, you have a solution to the problem. The customer seeks out the solution, you provide the solution with the intent of it leading to a sale, whether it’s a strategic free opt in or the product itself. And then once they’re in your wheelhouse in your business, you continually nurture them into more sales by providing value. Now, I have a real life example of this sales funnels are all around us, not just online. So I want to illustrate how a sales funnel works with the recent experience I had buying a bike. But the reason this is important to me is I walk around and see sales funnels everywhere I go. And I think people think what I do online is some like mysterious thing like I got my hair done today doesn’t look good. I really love my curls today. So I got my hair done today. And inevitably, I sat down in the chair. And she’s like, Oh, what are you getting your hair done for on a Tuesday morning at 9am? And I’m like, Oh, I’m filming videos. That’s all I say. And she’s like, for what I’m like, oh for my business. And she’s like, what kind of business do you have? And then it’s like, oh, how do I explain this? I haven’t even nailed my elevator pitch yet. Because it’s like, it’s such a foreign. I can’t just be like I create sales funnels for a living. Then they’re like, what’s the sales funnel? Well, sales funnels are everywhere. They’re even where I got my hair done. And I’ll, I can even tell you what, but anyways, the funnel, step one of the funnel is the problem. So this is, this is what happens. Our family likes to go on bike rides, except I, this old mom over here had a super uncomfortable mountain bike, I would be hunched over the handlebars, and my neck would ache and my butt would hurt for days. And so because I was so uncomfortable, I would say no to going on bike rides a lot. So I was telling a friend about this problem. And she suggested that I go to a local a local bike shop to see what what options they had to get a more comfortable bike because I don’t know, I wrote a mountain bike when I was 16. I didn’t know it wasn’t gonna work when I was 36 and had two kids. So step two of the funnel research back in the old days. Hopefully everyone remembers this, I would have taken out a handy phone book and started calling around to different bike shops. I did a quick Google search and found a bike shop right around the corner from my house. So Now step three of the sales funnel is the solution. At the bike shop, I start browsing the different bike options, and I landed on something called a gazelle bike. It seemed like it would solve all my complaints that I had with my current bike, but I wasn’t sure. So step four is education. A nice employee named Mike educates me on the features of the gazelle bike, I learned how the handlebars are to keep me upright when I ride and that the seats are way more comfortable than those mountain bike seats of my six my teenage years. And then because Mike was so nice and so knowledgeable, step five was the sale. He sold me with his expert knowledge of the different bike types. And now I’m a proud owner of a gazelle bike and plan to return soon to buy my daughter a bike as well. So the end result is this at each step of the process, I needed to be convinced to take the next step. My friend told me that there were better bike options. Google told me that there was a bike shop near my house, the bike shop had hundreds of bikes to choose from. Mike was knowledgeable and addressed all my concerns. I decided to buy a bike from Mike, Mike the bike, I decided to buy my bike from the local bike shop. Now in online marketing, the process of convincing someone to take an action is you’ll hear this a lot. It’s called the conversion. It’s sometimes what does that really mean? So we’ll talk about that a lot. So I want to define what is a conversion. So simply put a conversion is when you convince someone to take a specific action, otherwise known as a call to action. In other words, Mike’s goal was to convert me into a paying customer. The conversion in the story was making a sale. That’s the action that I took. So again, a sales funnel is the buying experience. They are every where you look and ideally a buyers experience does not end with the first time conversion. So Mike earned my business once. But I’m also planning on going back to buy another bike for my daughter, because she’s growing, right. So that’s what we do we buy their bikes for her. And he earned me as a loyal customer because he helped me so well the first time. So you can see how this is relatable to pretty much anything you want to sell, whether it’s online or in person. Now, this is the value of a repeat customer, I fly all the time. And this was the first time I actually got stuck without my luggage somewhere. So I’m wearing the same clothes, I had been boring for 24 hours, with basically no sleep. But let me explain why this is important. So the value of a repeat customer one time I was sitting in first class on a Delta flight, and I was thinking about all the prompts that delta gave me an upgrade that finally led me to the seat. So we had bought a first class seat, we had not bought a delta one seat, but because we got stuck, we ended up getting upgraded again to a delta one. But really, I thought this was so important to illustrate this concept of a repeat customer. So during the booking process, I was prompted to upgrade three times to first class. In the confirmation email, I was prompted to upgrade again, every time I logged into the app, I was prompted to upgrade. When checking in for the flight you can not always but a lot of times you’re prompted to upgrade COVID change some of this. But for the most part, you’re prompted to upgrade it all the time. Now that caused me to question why was delta so focused on filling up their first class cabin? Simple. Once you fly first class, it’s really hard to go back to economy. And they know that. So that led me to the next question, which was why do airlines offer loyalty programs? Another simple answer. Once you’ve earned status and perks with an airline, it’s hard to want to fly with another. And I can attest to that, because now I standardize on Delta and I get a lot of perks because I have status with them. repeat customers who are loyal to your brand, are part of building a sustainable business, which is why it’s so important. I haven’t even gotten to the punch line necessarily yet. But it is so important for you to understand that the first product you create isn’t going to be your last, the customer journey that you’ll take your repeat customers on starts with an amazing sales funnel. A sales funnel is how you are going to attract these new customers to that’s that’s what it is. It’s taking someone who doesn’t know you, and convincing them to buy from you. But it doesn’t stop there. That’s the fourth layer of hype design is you’re not going to do this, like great. Thanks for paying me money, and then never talk to them again. Because that’s a waste. I’m getting ahead of myself cuz I have more of that later. But I get excited about this stuff. Okay, so let me show you what the hype design looks like with practical application. So the first step is help, we need to identify the problem your customers facing, so we can create the solution. Now, the easiest and free way to find the problem your ideal customer faces is by using a search engine. With search engines, users are often telling you exactly what they need. Because guess what they’re already searching for a solution. That’s what a search engine is, you go to a search engine with a problem looking for a solution. So before we turn to the to a search engine, let’s talk about what we already know about our ideal customer. If you’re ready to create a digital product, likely you have some idea of what problems your ideal customer faces, which I know is true because of today’s Facebook group thread. So let’s pretend you started a website all about bullet journaling, which this is really funny that I picked this example because I had like a thing for bullet journaling and never could get into it. So I’m not like a bullet journaling expert, but I like to pick things that I know just enough about us as examples. Because if I know too much, then sometimes I go in with preconceived notions. So I’m like kind of weird like that you think I would pick something I’m an expert in to teach on. But I’m not. Okay. So here’s the scenario. You are a master bullet journal or you are committed to documenting everything in your life in your what I hear is called a BuJo. Developing a system for using your bullet journal has saved you an immense amount of time and stress over the years. So naturally, you started a website to tell everyone how amazing bullet journaling it is and how it changed your life. Through your website. You’re providing inspiration to people who need a better way to manage their life. They’re looking for a more creative outlet, other than things like Google Calendar, except I’m, I’m a Google Calendar. There’s just one problem. How do you actually make money from all of these people who are clicking through to your site. So tomorrow, we’re going to walk through a process called reverse engineering, which will walk you through how to leverage the three largest search engines to narrow down the exact problem your customers are facing, and the best solution you can create to help them so we’ll start with Pinterest, which is a visual search platform Then we’ll use Google to identify the most pressing questions people are asking about your topic. And finally, we’ll use YouTube to identify what videos are being searched related to the problem that you want to solve. Now, this is the most important thing I will tell you, I will want you to remember this week, I say that a lot. So maybe I really want you to remember everything. But this is important. Your first digital product should focus on solving one problem by offering one solution. Do not try to boil the ocean with your first product. That’s a phrase I got for my mom, by the way, she always told me, Monica, you’re trying to do too much don’t be boiling the ocean. So now I teach this. The problem is when you put too much in, it overwhelms your potential customers. And you create doubt, instead of an easy yes. For your first product. Focus on getting that easy. Yes. And then as you will learn, you can create more complex solutions later on. Oftentimes, the search results that you’re going to go through tomorrow with reverse engineering will help guide you to the right type of product to create. So the right solution, you want to offer the right type of product. And you’ll see why tomorrow. Okay, so moving along, unlike design innovate is where you will build your solution. In other words, this is when you build the actual product that you’re going to sell. So one of the ways that you can sell your digital product is by offering a free product that addresses and solves a common pain point your audience is having. So in this example, for bullet journaling, new bullet Journalers often feel stuck on what they should put in their journal. So through reverse engineering, remember, I had a bullet journal or so I figured this all out by reverse engineering. So when I did reverse engineering, I discovered one of the best ways that I could attract people, to me to buy a bullet journaling guide was to give them a taste and how to solve one of their number one problems, which was 60 collection ideas for inside of your bullet journal. This would lead them then to the digital product that would sell which was bullet journaling one on one for busy moms. So my target audience was busy moms. We’re going to talk about this later. Pause Monica, I’m getting ahead of myself. We’ll talk about how I decided this later. So here are some examples of questions that you would ask yourself before building your digital product, your first digital product, what is one thing you can provide to help your ideal customer get to the next step of their journey? That’s it. Think about that. And I know I could go on forever about this. But I know it seems like you need to solve every problem related to your topic. But you don’t. You need to help them with the next step of their journey. What is the next step that your ideal customer needs to take on the journey that you want to take them on? Another way we could say this is what is one step I can help people to take to resolve their biggest frustration. And this is another one that resonates a lot that we talk to our students about, think back on your own journey and ask yourself, what is one thing that would have changed everything for you create that, like if you could go back and become an expert on your topic again? What do you wish you could have bought to make your life easier? Create that, okay, knowledge is where you go out and educate your ideal customer selling, this is where we sell. So you will do this through the free opt in you create and very detailed sales pages. Through this process, you will be educating people who need your solution. So here are some questions you could ask yourself about the best way for your solution. So the best way for your digital product to be consumed. Okay, what can you create that will make your solution a no brainer to your ideal customer? Like when they see that offer? They’re like, Oh, I obviously need this, it has to be a no brainer, your first product that you create has to be just a no brainer or like that easy. Yes, I was talking about what do they need to hear from you to know that you understand their problem. So when I mentioned that sales pages are not just about selling, they’re also about educating. That’s your opportunity that they need to understand that you get their problem. If there’s a disconnect, that it’s not immediately clear, when you’re selling to them that you understand their frustration, you’re going to lose them. Then the third thing is what do they need to be convinced that you are knowledgeable, knowledgeable enough to provide a good solution to them? So here’s the thing. I mean, you know, there are some topics that might require actual credentials and stuff. But generally speaking, people want to make sure they want to have the feeling that they can trust that you know what the heck you’re talking about, right? So that’s another thing through the selling process that you’re going to be educating them on. So there are several ways that your sales page can be educational and inspirational all at the same time. This is like taking the best of both worlds between a sales page and an educational blog post. So we use things like testimonials video, walk throughs, high quality photos, all these sorts of different creatives, I guess you could call them to take our customers on a journey through the sales page. And it’s not about being salesy. It’s about educating. Also, let me tell you this, because it’s a pet peeve of mine, selling is not bad. Selling is the only way you can be in business, whether you are selling a click from your website, display ads, which everyone knows, I don’t like an affiliate product or your services, business requires money exchanging hands. So you are doing your potential customer a favor by offering them a solution to their problem. Oh, mind blown. When you’re selling, you’re doing them a favor, you’re solving a problem for them, they should be thanking you. Plus, if they want your solution, they can say no, no one’s making them buy it. Everyone has the ability to say yes or no, selling is not bad. Selling is why you have a business. Okay, so if you have any reservations about selling, we’re going to squash them this week. Okay, the last step of like design is the experience you provide to your customer. So the sales process does not end when someone takes the action that you’ve asked them to take, they paid you money doesn’t end there. Once you bring someone into your business, it’s important to have a plan in place to nurture them. So what is the next step of your customer journey? What is the next solution that they’ll need from you? And What other problems do they face that you can help them with? So this example, this picture is showing what we call a product ascension ladder. So in this example, you bring someone in by offering them something for free, that is directly related to your main product. But you don’t stop there. Do you only want someone to buy from you once? Or do you want them to be a repeat customer? What about being a repeat customer every month. So in this example, after you attract them through your main sales funnel, that means sales funnel being an opt in to that first product, you would then nurture them into the back end paid membership, which we call an upsell. And we call it the BuJo boss’s membership, we made this up, we don’t actually sell this by the way, I was just illustrating a product suite for you. But here’s an example of a product ascension ladder that we used in our own business for our for Pinterest products, there was a logical order that people would move through our products, which kept them engaged with our brand and create it repeat and loyal customers. In fact, because people trusted me to buy all four Pinterest courses, they also trusted me to continue on this journey with me when I pivoted away from Pinterest, trust and loyalty is huge in online business. And rule number one you will learn in business school is that it is cheaper to sell to an existing customer than to acquire a new customer. So like, why would you not create more solutions to your customers problems, when you know it’s going to cost you more money to go acquire a new customer? If you have current customers, right? It’s kind of like a no brainer. It actually is kind of like business one on one. So this is why a product ascension ladder is so important to growing a profitable digital product business. Okay, so email is part of your customer experience cannot be overlooked. The fact of the matter is, and I I cannot be the only one that gets a million spam calls and a million text messages. Nobody really wants marketing text messages, you know what kind of text messages people want. They want the ones where your deliveries on the way. Or the orthodontist is like press one to confirm. I’m like, Oh, right. I should take her to that orthodontist appointment. Thank you for letting me know. But I don’t want sales emails in my text messages. That’s not really a thing yet. So where are we sold to? How do we communicate with the brands that we want to buy from? It’s really still email. I’m not saying that won’t change. But I’ve been doing this for a long time. And it’s still email. So this is how you’re going to keep in touch with your customers, nurture your customers and move them through your products, paying you more money. So you want to think through what are the best ways to keep communicating with your customers because you can layer on top of this. Like, for example, we have a decent Instagram presence now in terms of I talk to people on the Instagram DMS, like all day long. Well, maybe that’s not totally true. Sometimes I take a break. But the fact of the matter is there are other avenues to supplement your email. It could be a Facebook group, but that’s up for you. You have to decide that as part of the process of how you’re going to keep your customers engaged. So let’s just bring it all together, of what the heck design boils down to. So it’s these four core pillars. What is the problem? What is your solution, your digital product? What value are you providing to show that your solution is what they need? And how are you providing an amazing customer experience? So I’m going to use the bullet journaling example to break down what this looks like. So, first question is, what is the problem? Well, it’s a lack of, and I’m speaking as if this was my niche. Okay? My the current problem that my customers face is that they have a lack of a creative outlet in everyday life. They hate boring paper planners, me notebooks and Google calendars. They may have even heard of bullet journaling, but it feels super overwhelming to get started and follow all of the rules, because there actually are a lot of rules in bullet journaling. After all, they wanted to create an outlet, not another set of rules. So you can see how that is like a rubbing point that I was discovering when I reverse engineered. So what is your solution? Combining productivity with creative expression and bullet journal, by providing a structured blueprint for getting started? It takes the overwhelm out of getting started by giving easy and actionable tips while still honoring individual creativity, because that was the thing. There are so many rules, how can I be creative? So it was like this balance? If I was going to create a solution, the balance had to be? How can I teach people to be creative, while still operating under a certain set of rules? Okay, so then what value are you providing to show that your solution is what they need? Opt in freebies, for brainstorming, storming bullet journaling ideas, which was really 60 collection ideas, I showed you a paid Beginner’s Guide for getting started, which is the balance between how to follow the rules, but have creative expression as well. And then we also came up with a paid bonus pack of enhancements. And that’s what we call an order bump. But we’re not there yet. So I’m not going to go too deep into that yet. But the last question is, how are you providing an amazing customer experience. So we would do that through things like follow up emails that provide straight value, affiliate opportunities for products that have helped make my bullet journaling experience amazing, we would reoffer the bullet journaling one on one, if they didn’t bite the first time, we would upsell them into the bullet journaling membership. And then we would constantly be thinking of new ways to serve them along our product ladder. So essentially, those are the that’s the illustration you’re looking at, of how you move from the problem all the way through selling. So we have search engines, we find the problem, then we create the digital product, which is the solution, then we go and sell the digital product. And then we keep creating more solutions to additional problems and we nurture our customers continually. This process really doesn’t end essentially. Okay, there you have it. That is the life design. In a nutshell, that is the framework for how we teach the Empowered Business Lab, how we teach you how to create, sell and launch your very own digital products. And like I mentioned at the beginning of the show, the Empowered Business Lab is open for enrollment just for a few days, you can head on over to empowered business.co forward slash Lab to learn more and sign up. And of course, we’re going to leave that link inside of the show notes. Just know this. If you’ve ever thought that you wanted to create your own digital products, whether you have an audience or not yet, this is the perfect opportunity to do it, we likely will only run this live twice a year. And the next round won’t be till August at this point. So if you are interested, we’d love to have you inside the lab. And if you have any questions, you’ll notice that there’s a chat button at the bottom right of the screen. When you go to empowered business.co forward slash Lab. Please feel free to chat with us you’ll get either myself or Hayley or Katie and we will answer any questions you have about the Lab. We’d be happy to do that. And if you’re an Instagram type person, you can also DMS over on Instagram. Our handle is at Monica dot Froese. I hope to see you inside of the Empowered Business Lab. I’d love to work with you over the next three months. Until next week.