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TRANSCRIPT
[00:00:00] Megan Brame: hey guys, welcome. First, hold on. Don’t freak out. This is handmade Brooklyn podcast. It’s me. Don’t freak out. Glad that you’re here. As you see, like I said, last week, changes were going to come. And here it is, talked about this on Periscope recently, which actually I’ve been, it took a bit of a hiatus with this because just so much stuff with closing my business, getting everything ready, launching perfect product copy, all of those things, you know, it was just like, “Oh, there’s one more thing I have to do and I want to do it.”
[00:00:36] So I slacked off, but I got back on last week because of VEDA, which is vlog every day in April. Yeah. I thought that that would be a really good motivator to get me back on Periscope. I’m not going to do weekends just because I need some time off you guys. I don’t think anybody wants to see me hung over anyways, so now I blog every day on Periscope and with that comes the change of the name of this podcast and the name of my business.
[00:01:07] But first, the most important part for you guys is the podcast. Um, you know, handmade Brooklyn is great, but it doesn’t really help you if you’re doing a search or even if you’ve known me, but you’re like, I dont care about Brooklyn, I live in Milwaukee, or, you know, whatever.
[00:01:25] So I wanted to change it, but I hate, I don’t hate, it’s not me to have something that’s like “lady boss or girl boss” or “babe” or things like that. It’s just, it’s not how I talk and it’s not how I think. So I couldn’t really have that. Also, like everybody does that, right? There’s so many boss babes, the bossy bosses, whatever.
[00:01:50] So I was trying to think like, well, what do I, what is my personality? What is my, how can I sell myself but still be surgical, I guess? And I was like, no. It’s then kind of direct, but in the most heartfelt way possible. So let’s cut to the chase. What are you here to do? You’re here to learn, not to do better in business and self-employment and entrepreneurship.
[00:02:19] So let’s just stop. Let’s just stop sucking at business. Here we are at stop sucking at business. And surprisingly, the domain was still available too. So stop suckingatbusiness.com is where this podcast is going to live. Now handmade Brooklyn, the entity, the umbrella is transitioning to, it’s transitioning over to my name, Megan Brame.
[00:02:45] meganbrame.com which is so weird. It’s so, it feels like gratutious or indulgent or I don’t know. It’s. Something I’m not used to. I’m used to hiding behind a brand name with when it came to my product based business or when it came to this, and so to have my name on all of the images and all of this stuff, it’s just like you’re to look at it.
[00:03:12] It’s like, you know when you write something over and over again, so it starts to look really weird. That’s what it feels like with putting my name and everything. We’re moving out of Brooklyn, as some of you guys know by the end of the year. And I do serve handmade businesses and I do serve product based businesses, but once again, it just didn’t really describe what I do.
[00:03:33] And not that my name describes what I do, but at least it’s more of, it makes more sense, I guess, especially if we leave Brooklyn and we’ll just keep it just you s o nobody else can have it. I don’t know, we’ll see. I’m going off on a tangent alright. This is awesome that I get to start this quote unquote new podcast, which is still old, but you know what I mean?
[00:03:59] This new phase of my podcast with somebody that is just, ah, so I was so excited that Tim Paige of Leadpages said he’d come on a podcast because I use leadpages and I love it, and it’s just so. Oh my God, it’s so easy. It’s easy, and it has grown my business so much. I used to, if you’ve ever been on my website, like 2010 2011 maybe, I don’t even think I had back then.
[00:04:34] So when I first started figuring out that I needed to grow a mailing list for this business, I put up a box on the sidebar of my blog and I put “sign up for my newsletter. Pretty please.”
[00:04:52] you won’t be shocked to know that nobody ever signed up, because who cares, right? Oh, it’s so funny to look back on, but I didn’t know. And, and with my product based business I didn’t know either. I, you know, I would go to shows, either craft shows or trade shows or okay. Trunk shows, events, whatever. And I’d bring like a little vertical notebook that people could leave their email address if they wanted to, but I never really pushed it.
[00:05:22] Well, to be honest, most of the time I didn’t really leave it out. Yeah, the space they look off or something, you know? So, um, I never really cultivated a mailing list and that is such a, looking back with that as such a black Mark on my business and my marketing efforts, because like I said before, I never really utilized the people that were on the mailing list.
[00:05:43] I would do things like let them know that there was a sale because I needed money and I never really grew it the right way. So this is definitely one of those learn from my mistakes things. And so that’s why I wanted to bring on somebody from Leadpages not to sell you Leadpages. It is a tool that you have to pay for.
[00:06:03] I think it’s maybe like 500 bucks a year maybe. I think it’s around that. It’s a little more now I can’t, but it is an investment. However, this episode isn’t about Leadpages per se. It’s about all the different ways you can grow your mailing list, and it does involve the things that lead pages does because that’s how I use it, and that’s how I want to teach you guys how to use it.
[00:06:27] You don’t have to go buy lead pages. You can do a lot of these things different ways, but some of the tools that they offer, like I completely dork out about and dork out about it in this episode with Tim, but he’s probably used to that. I do mention later on that he and I are going to host a webinar together.
[00:06:48] It’s totally my fault for dropping the ball on getting a date set. I’m going to do that and I will update my mailing list about it. So you can go and subscribe to a whole bunch of freebies anyways by going to ,meganbrame.com or you can just to stop suckingatbusiness.com it links you up right there too.
[00:07:10] So this interview, like I said, as with Tim Paige of lead pages, he is the face for all intents and purposes of Leadpages. He runs their podcast. He does webinars. He is just, he’s an awesome guy, and he is a New Yorker, so you know, they’re all amazing. I’m just so excited to have him on. And. I’m so excited.
[00:07:36] He’s going to do his own podcast after this. So stay tuned. Listen to Tim, learn how to develop your mailing list and how to start reaching people without offering discounts. Really, really good tips. So definitely listen to this. Let me know you guys think. But in the meantime, Tim Paige of lead pages, take it away.
[00:08:00] Okay. I am here with Tim Paige of lead pages. Tim, thanks so much for joining me today.
[00:08:04] Tim Paige: Oh, no problem. Thanks for having me here.
[00:08:06] Megan Brame: This is so exciting for me because I’m like I told you, so many of my listeners are product based businesses and myself. I started as a product based business and I wish I had known how awesome LeadPages was back then because it would have just been an amazing addition to my business, and so I’m excited to show others how it can work for them.
[00:08:27] Tim Paige: Yeah, me too. I love, um, you know, I got a chance to check out where you were doing and you know, I love, I love this, uh, this business, this industry. It’s so much fun. Um, especially, boy, anything comic book related that you create, send me a message and you will get all of my money. That tends to happen. It’s very dangerous.
[00:08:48] Megan Brame: Yeah. My husband and I have a closet here that was the comic closet for a long time, so I totally get that. So, um, can you tell my listeners what your backstory is and how what you do for lead pages.
[00:09:02] Tim Paige: Yeah. Sure. Well, I, I’m, I’m, I was a former touring musician, uh, for seven years. Toured all over the country playing music at every kind of venue you could imagine from hole in the wall, bars to South by Southwest and bamboozle and that kind of thing.
[00:09:15]Um, but what was interesting was while I was doing that, uh, when I came home, I had to find a way to, you know, eat. Um, so the one thing that I learned that was easy to get away from, uh, it was easy to leave and come back and always have work with sales. Yeah. You know, if you could sell something, you could always have a job.
[00:09:32] You could always have something to do that would put food on the table. And a lot of the times you could, in a short period of time, you could make as much as you would normally need a lot more time for. So I would, I got really good at sales, got really good at selling stuff, and once the band came to an end and I was getting ready to, um, at that point, getting ready to have a baby who we now have had, and he’s two and a half and he’s awesome.
[00:09:54]Um, but we were getting ready for that, and I was going, I can’t work these 18 hour days, six days a week, seven days a week. I can’t do it. So I started looking into marketing things online. I wanted to know how that worked and how these people that I was getting to know a little bit like, you know, Pat Flynn was working 40 hours a week or 30 hours a weekend, and doing it on his own time when he wanted to and crushing it.
[00:10:19]Uh, and I found that sales, psychology and marketing psychology were, uh, kind of in bed together. They’re almost, uh, almost identical. It was just one focused on a whole lot of people. The other one focused on just one person at a time. So, um. Well that got me to where I am now, which is I am the senior conversion educator at lead pages, which is a really cool job because it means I get to take all the stuff we learn and teach it to people who might not have otherwise been able to get access to that information.
[00:10:48] So I do webinars and I have our podcast and I speak all over the country. Um. And it’s all about helping businesses get really great results. Um, on a, on a fun side note, I’m also a professional voice actor, so I do some video games and TV promos and stuff like that, and that’s been a really cool way to get even better at the podcast and webinars and stuff like that.
[00:11:11] Megan Brame: That is so cool. And I especially love that you are also doing your, your own thing on the side too. Like, so many small business owners are, you know, they have the job that pays the bills, but then they also have the side things that are really their passions. So, um, and also you have a really great tattoo sleeve, by the way.
[00:11:30] Tim Paige: Thank you. Yeah, I’ve, I’ve got, I’ve got quite a few of them and I, you know, I will say this is, this is something funny, that weird about me. Um, my. Like, quote unquote day job is also my passion. I just have these two weird passions that, you know, it’s impossible to just pick one. So I had to do both. Um, it’s so, it’s so much fun to get, to help people with their business and help them.
[00:11:52] And I know you know this cause you’re doing it, but, you know, help people really have success with something that, uh, is their dream. Maybe it’s something they want to be full time at or they are full time at, but can’t figure out how to get to that next level. Uh, I get to do that every day, which is really cool.
[00:12:05] Megan Brame: I love that. So for my kind of industry where, you know, people are doing craft shows or they’re doing trade shows, um, they’re, they’re selling their physical products. Just in my own experience, I’ve noticed that people don’t really seem to know the value of a mailing list. And I know that that’s one of the big features of lead pages is they are there to help you grow your mailing list.
[00:12:27] So I know a lot of us would just kind of, you know, if we had the space on the table or the space in the booth, we’d put out a little notebook or something and, you know, just maybe collect them if they, if people put their email down, but there was no incentive or anything like that. And can you just kind of talk about it a little bit, um, why that’s a wrong way to look at it and why a mailing list is so valuable.
[00:12:47] Tim Paige: Of course. Yeah. Well, here’s the thing is that when we’re at a trade show or when we’ve got our website, or we’ve got whatever we’re doing, we put our stuff out there we are passively, or, I mean sometimes in some sense actively, but for the most part, kind of passively waiting for people to come to us.
[00:13:04] We’re hoping that they will come to us and make their way to our website and give us all of their money. But, uh, you know, having an email list, it means that we have the opportunity to go to them and say, Hey. Here’s some stuff you might like. By the way, I also have some really cool stuff for sale. Um, it, it makes a big difference in the way that we think about doing marketing.
[00:13:25]Uh, if I have an email list of people, I always have customers, uh, in, in one sense, ready and waiting to buy the stuff that I have to offer. And if they’re gonna, if they’re on my list. You know, I know that they’re interested in whatever it is that I have, whether they, that means that they were interested because I offered some freebie or because they wanted updates on deals or discounts, or the next time I’m going to be in their area with something cool.
[00:13:48]Um, it means that those people are interested. It’s, it’s my favorite type of people to talk to because I can go, Hey, here’s some stuff. Want to buy it. Uh, and obviously there’s a lot more sophistication to it than that, but that’s the, the most reductive way of saying it. You know, we’ve got an opportunity to reach out to your customers as opposed to desperately hoping and waiting that they’ll come to you.
[00:14:09] Megan Brame: So what do you think some good ways are to entice people to give them your to give your email address because that’s so, it’s become so sacred now because you’re just getting spammed and all of these things and everyone’s just buy, buy, buy. So what are some good ways to incentivize the process of trading email for something.
[00:14:29] Tim Paige: Yeah. Well, the first, the first step to all of it is to understand that, uh, your, your product. I, I, it doesn’t matter what you, what you offer, your product is there to do one of two things, maybe two, but one of two things. Uh, and that is to either. Uh, help them with a problem that they’re having some kind of problem, whatever that problem is, or to provide some, some feeling of, of excitement, happiness, or pleasure.
[00:14:54]Uh, so, you know, that could be a lot of things fall into those two categories. Right? But we need to understand that that’s why people are buying our stuff because they have a problem that they need help with, or that they have something that they enjoy. They want to feel good, they whatever.
[00:15:11] Megan Brame: Right. Right.
[00:15:11] Totally.
[00:15:12] Tim Paige: So in understanding that we then can think about the way that we’re doing our marketing, focused around whichever one of those that our product works on. If we’re solving a problem or working on a problem, then that even becomes easier because we can say, if somebody has that problem, maybe what are some other problems that they might also have?
[00:15:33] Are there other solutions to that problem that don’t take away from. What my product does that I could offer them, uh, whether it’s for free or not. Uh, I would encourage you to make it for free. So here’s an example. Let’s say that, um, let’s say that, that you sell, and this is one people will just want to punch me when I say this, but, um, let’s say that you sell like handmade furniture, right?
[00:15:56] You make furniture, okay. Um, and it’s, you know, beautiful, amazing furniture. Well, one of the things that you could give away, uh, could be the. Uh, the, the plans, you can tell, I don’t know how to make anything. You know, the, the, the schematics, I’m going to go with that cause I read too many comic books. Um, you know, for how to make your furniture.
[00:16:16] And what, what’s amazing will happen. This is exactly, I can speak to this because I would be this guy. I would go and I would find your website however, and I would see the schematics for your furniture, and I would go, Ooh, I want to know how to build that. And I would download it. I would give you my email address.
[00:16:32] I would download it, I would look at it and go. Yeah. Right. I’m never going to be able to do that. Here’s my money and then I would buy the furniture from you, and I’m not alone. In fact, I am definitely in the majority. That’s what a lot of people do. And so, you know, a solution to the problem is showing them that, Hey, yes, you could do this if you really put your mind to it and have years of experience and et cetera, et cetera.
[00:16:57] So you’ve offered them that thing and then they see it and they go, yep, that’s not for me. I’m not going to be able to do that. I’d rather buy it from you.
[00:17:04] Megan Brame: I love that. Uh, when, uh, um, in, when I was doing skincare, you know, I had the sign up and get 15% off your first order, and that worked okay. But then I also had, I tried sign up, get 10 of formulas that you can just make yourself, you can just do it for free.
[00:17:18] And that had such a bigger conversion for me. Yes. It was amazing.
[00:17:23] Tim Paige: And people get so afraid that if they do that, then people aren’t going to buy their stuff. But you know, think about it. Think about how lazy we are really, honestly, you know, I could just be speaking for myself and everybody else’s man, this guy’s lazy.
[00:17:34] He doesn’t wanna do anything. But that’s, you know, that’s the harsh reality is that for the most part, we’re pretty lazy. We’d rather have somebody else do it or we try it. And it’s not the same. But the other thing too, to note about that is, you know, coupons are all fine and they’ll get you some customers and that kind of thing.
[00:17:50] But the problem with coupons is that they are assuming that somebody already wants what you’re selling. Right? I’m only going to get a coupon if I already think your product is the solution to my problem or is going to enhance something I care about. Um, I’m, you know, you’re not going, I’m not going to download a coupon for something that I don’t know if I even want it.
[00:18:10] Megan Brame: I love that.
[00:18:11] Tim Paige: So we need to remember that because again, you know, what you’re ending up doing then is you’re just basically taking money out of your pocket and maybe pushing a few people to buy that were like on the fence. We want to get people that don’t even know if they want our product. They just have that problem and we can say, Oh, you, you know, you wish that, I don’t know, whatever, whatever the problem is, you know, you wish that you had more energy.
[00:18:33] Well look, here are 10 super foods that you should eat that will give you more energy. And then they get that and Hey, guess what? Your product happens to have five of those 10 superfoods that they can then go. And you know, eat or whatever, and it just, it’s a natural progression from, I have a problem, Oh, here is one solution.
[00:18:51] Oh, here’s a better solution. I’m going to buy the better solution.
[00:18:53] Megan Brame: I love that. So you’re creating these, um, these value opt-ins and you’re driving people to your list to create value instead of offering discounts and all of those things. So how can you use lead pages in addition to like, how, how do you create these funnels.
[00:19:09] Tim Paige: Yeah, totally. Well, there’s, there’s a lot of things you can, a lot of ways that you can do it. And it all, all comes down to where the majority of our customers are. Like when people are finding you, where are they finding you? Is it from a podcast? Is it from a blog post? Is it just on your website? Is it at a trade shows, whatever.
[00:19:26] So all those things, it’s important to understand. Where are your customers are when they’re finding out about you, uh, knowing that will then determine the, the actual, you know, technical thing that you’re going to do to get them on your list. So if they’re finding you on a blog post, what I would encourage you to do is create what we call a content upgrade.
[00:19:44] And what that is, is, and this works for podcasts, a podcast episodes, YouTube videos. But what a content upgrade is, is it is a, uh, we call it a lead magnet or freebie. The thing you give away to get people to give you their email address. So you create one of those that is specific to the topic of the blog post.
[00:20:01] So if you sell a bunch of health related things and you have a blog post about superfoods within that blog post, you could say, now, if you want to eat these superfoods, I’ve created a guide that includes five recipes that include the superfoods in this blog post. Enter your email address and we’ll send you the recipes.
[00:20:18] That’s a content upgrade because now I’m reading your post, I’m interested in super foods, and you’ve offered me a guide to super foods that enhances the value of the blog post.
[00:20:26] Megan Brame: Yup. That works so well too, because I think that a lot of people that have Shopifys or Etsys or things like that, they don’t really, they know that they need a blog and they’re not really sure what to do with the blog.
[00:20:35] So by creating these things are offering lead magnets. You’re, you’re making the blog work for you and you’re not spending a ridiculous amount of money. You know, all you’re doing is taking the time to create these extra value items for people that will end up being your customers.
[00:20:51] Tim Paige: Yeah, that’s, you know, the thing that a lot of people ask about, how do I get more traffic?
[00:20:55] How do we get more traffic? And I go, before you go looking for more traffic, are you blogging? No. Podcasting? No. Are you doing YouTube? No. What are you doing now? Well, I post on social media. Okay. Start creating content before you ever start sending Facebook ads and, and ad words, ads, and, and, you know, doing all these things, um, start creating content.
[00:21:18] You know, you have to have some reason for your brand to be something that people think of as, Oh, I have this problem, or I enjoy this thing. I’m going to go to them. I’ll give you a great example. Um, there is, uh, my absolute favorite, uh, superhero apparel company is called superhero stuff, superherostuff.com.
[00:21:37] And they, they are incredible. First off, they have amazing stuff anyway, but you know, they are on the cutting edge of what’s happening in the world of comics and comic movies and that kind of thing. So they’re always posting blog posts. They’re always posting that kind of thing.
[00:21:53] And everything they do is, is around their brand, even down to their customer service. So, uh, we had, um, I had an issue where I ordered something, it was the wrong size, uh, and it was completely my fault. I screwed up. And I, uh, I sent it back to them with a specific request for the same thing. And I kind of wrote it like a, almost like it was like a, a superhero note. Uh, and they responded, um, as if they were like the, the customer support rep responded as bat girl and said, any, you know, basically anytime you need help, just like the bat signal and we’ll be there.
[00:22:22] Right. And it was just, it was such a great experience, but it all tied into the brand and led me to then go back and read more blog posts. And in one of their blog posts, they asked me to subscribe, I subscribed, and I got on their list. It’s all about just really. Providing that value, and now I’m like their biggest evangelists and I hang out with a bunch of comic book nerds, so it becomes this thing where we don’t have a traffic problem.
[00:22:45] We really have a, are you the person that people would even want to go talk to in the first place in terms of your products and your brand and whatever you’re doing?
[00:22:54] Megan Brame: Totally. That makes complete sense.
[00:22:56] Tim Paige: I’m talking about ways to get people to the list. So that’s one way. Here’s another way. Um, if you’re at a trade show, let’s say, well, you have a sense of where you fit into that trade show and, and what people are there for and why you’re special.
[00:23:09] So what you can do then is, uh, on your trade show materials. You can use something that we call lead digits. It’s a lead pages feature, but it allows you to collect opt-ins via text message.
[00:23:21] Megan Brame: Can I tell you that? This is the reason that I wanted to bring you on because I was so when I found out about lead digits, I was like,
[00:23:28] oh my god, I love it.
[00:23:31] This, this is so smart
[00:23:33] Tim Paige: . Oh, it’s so, you know, lead digits is powerful because people walking around a trade show floor, for example. Do not want to go to a website address on their phone and then go there and find the place and then enter their information and click the button. And then, you know, it’s, it’s not like it’s that difficult with smartphones, but, uh, it’s still asking people to do a lot when they’re already most likely overwhelmed with a lot of choices.
[00:23:55] Megan Brame: Or can I tell you, and the trade shows I’ve been in, they’ve been in these convention centers with really crappy signals.
[00:24:00] Tim Paige: Really?
[00:24:01]
[00:24:01] Megan Brame: They’re awful. They’re in like these big metal concrete structures and nobody ever can get wifi. So, and also along those lines too, how many stacks of business cards are these people getting?
[00:24:13] You know? It’s just, you’re just going to be one in a pile of hundreds.
[00:24:17] Tim Paige: That’s exactly right. And I tell people when they give me a business card, this will get recycled. Exactly. It’s happening. I at least I’m honest about it and people just take it anyway. Okay, so, but what I encourage you to do instead is to use a lead digit.
[00:24:30] And what that is, is basically you could say something along the lines of, you know, I actually like, let’s say you’re selling a, I dunno, supplements or something. Well, I actually created a guide to how to. Uh, combine supplements with super foods to have the most energy or something. Okay. Right. So I’m making that up, but let’s say that’s your guide.
[00:24:48] You could say, just text, just text a supplements to 33444, and I’ll actually send you that guide for free. And that way we can stay in touch and I can let you know, you know, when we’ve got new stuff coming out and suddenly that person is on your list and it’s just a really easy way to connect with people without asking them to do something crazy.
[00:25:05] And, uh, you can, you know, obviously you can give them a flyer or you can give them a, a whatever, or here’s another thing. You can ask them to text it, uh, to join the list and then give them something free right there at the event. Yeah, just text. Just text “event” to 33444. Show me that you did it.
[00:25:21] And I’ll give you this, you know, I’ll give you this free sample or I’ll give you a, you know, uh, one of our products for free or something.
[00:25:26]
[00:25:26] Megan Brame: I love that. And you can also use it, and you guys can test this out right now. Um, you can text handmade BK to 44222 and that sends you all of my info so that there’s my business card right there.
[00:25:38] Oh, perfect. Yeah. So you can see exactly how that works. It’s, it’s really simple and it’s, I think that some people get like a little like, are you going to text me in the middle of the night? No. Like nobody ever texts you ever again. You just, this just takes the middleman out. It takes the paper out. You have my info right in your inbox.
[00:25:55] I have your info. We have this relationship now and that’s why I love I, that’s why I was like I, everybody in the world needs to know what lead digits is because it’s
[00:26:03] Tim Paige: amazing.
[00:26:04] And check it out. Here’s, here’s the other thing. Growing your email list doesn’t have to only happen before you ever get a sale.
[00:26:13] Right? Because think about it, you know, a lot of us are selling, if you’re selling physical products, a lot of times people will or should buy more than one thing from you. Maybe they have to buy that first thing to find out if they actually love your stuff or not. But you know, once, once they buy your stuff, if you’re shipping it out to them or whatever, include a little flyer in there, 15% off your next order or whatever the thing is.
[00:26:36] I’m not a big fan of discounts, but I understand a lot of times it’s a good way to get repeat business. But yeah. You know, let’s just say that’s what you’re doing. 15% off your next order. Just text, you know, 15% off to 33444 or 44222 and include that as a little sticker on your packaging or included on the box, on the outside of the shipping box.
[00:26:56] Something along those lines. Because again, getting that person on your list means that they don’t buy your thing, put it to use, and then forget all about you. Yeah, we want to keep them coming back for more and for more and for more.
[00:27:08] Megan Brame: So I want to ask you. Lead digits is awesome. Obviously in lead boxes where we’re giving these contents deliveries on blogs and everything, but the core of lead pages is the lead page, right?
[00:27:20] And I feel like a lot of, uh, product based businesses get really intimidated by creating separate sales pages. And, um. You know where it’s not, it’s not a course, or it’s not a, it’s not a digital delivery. So can you talk about like what are some good things to think about when you’re creating a sales page for a physical product?
[00:27:39] Tim Paige: Yeah. The number one thing is just to keep in mind, uh, you know, what that person’s objections might be to buying your particular product. Um, you know, if you have a really high priced product, you can assume that there’s probably an objection in there somewhere. If it’s really low priced product, you can probably assume that people are wondering if it’s of good quality.
[00:28:00]Um, you know, and, and the only reason I bring those up is because those are two really quick and easy ones. You can figure out. Um, you know, if there are a lot of competitors that are very similar you have to show what differentiates you from them. Um, so when it comes to sales pages, the biggest thing I can tell you is test, test, test, test.
[00:28:19] See what works best for your audience. Lead pages makes it really easy if you’re using something else. There are lots of tools that can make it, uh, possible to test what works best for your audience. But you know, if you got a product that looks really nice, whether it’s the packaging or the product itself, looks really nice.
[00:28:35] Get a video up there. Show it off. Uh, get some pictures up there. Show off the beauty of your product. If it’s a visual thing, that’s going to help a lot. If it’s instead, not a visual thing, but something that helps somebody achieve a particular result show the before and after. Right? Remember again, it all comes down to the psychology, what somebody’s trying to accomplish
[00:29:00] with this thing. Are they trying to overcome a problem? Show them before and after. Get some testimonials on there that show what life was like before and what life was like after. I think that we tend to forget that the number one motivator of purchasing is emotion.
[00:29:19] Megan Brame: Yeah. Number
[00:29:20] Tim Paige: one motivator, and I don’t care what it is that you’re selling, but that is always the case.
[00:29:24] That’s not to, that’s not to say that you can just appeal all the way to somebody’s emotion and their logic goes completely out the window. But it’s the biggest thing. It’s the biggest factor. So you know, if, if somebody is. You know, if, if you sell a, I’m just going to say as an example, like some kind of exercise thing, um, uh, an exercise machine or something.
[00:29:44]Um, you know, what are they looking to do while they’re looking to get in shape? They’re looking to feel better. So show them some testimonials of people that got in shape that feel better. Make them real, make them honest. Don’t, don’t lie. Don’t come up with some crazy thing, but make them real and, and let them see the struggles that these people no longer have as a result of it.
[00:30:04]Um. And, and not just, Oh look, they were, you know, big. And now they’re not so big, but the real emotional feeling of what’s happening. Let them experience that so that then they can go, they can put themselves in their shoes and go, Oh yeah, yeah. If I could experience that, that would be big for me. And then.
[00:30:23] You sh you show them the factual stuff, the stuff that is going to appeal to their logic. You know, well, if I had to go to a gym, I would have to spend this, or I would go to a trainer. I’d have to spend this, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So whatever your thing is that you’re selling, um, it really needs to appeal to the emotion of what they’re looking for.
[00:30:40] Megan Brame: And do you think that’s why, um, sales pages are more of a good thing to use rather than just putting it on Etsy?
[00:30:50] Tim Paige: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, at sea is great, but at the end of the day, you really need to, to appeal to people’s emotion and, and, um, I buy a ton of stuff on Etsy, but even then, um, it’s usually because I went, Oh, I wish I had this, and then I searched for it on Etsy and get it right.
[00:31:06]Um, that’s the, the beauty of Etsy is that it has built in. Uh, SEO value because Etsy sites rank, uh, better oftentimes, and that people use it as a search engine. Oftentimes. So that’s the benefit. But that’s not to say like, I don’t want to rely on somebody else’s platform from my business. Uh, that’s why you don’t just for your whole business, you don’t just have a Facebook page and that’s your whole business.
[00:31:29]Um, you really need to have your own platform, your own place that you’re getting business. Um, so that you can make it how you want so that you can provide the experience that you want and you’re not confined to what Etsy says you can do, or Shopify or whatever.
[00:31:42] Megan Brame: And I love also that. You, you can have both.
[00:31:45] You can have Etsy, you can have sales pages on your blog. And you know, it’s, it’s just multiple funnels to get there. And I think that also, especially when you’re doing things like pre launches or pre-selling, you just can’t do it on Etsy. You know, you just can’t do, you can’t put a collection on Shopify and say, coming soon and then expect sales, like you have to tell them why.
[00:32:07] You know what I mean?
[00:32:08] Tim Paige: Yes. Yeah. It’s all about showing them what they’re going to get out of buying your stuff, you know? Um, in sometimes, look, I realized that a lot of times, especially when we’re creators and our products means something to me or to us, and we’re like attached to it. It can be really difficult to go look from the outside and say.
[00:32:26] What’s, what’s the goal that somebody is looking to accomplish with that? That can be really difficult. I get it. You know, I even think about, um, like with, I talk about this a lot because this is the stuff I spend all my money on. Anything comic book related, right? Those Funko pops. Are you serious? But I buy a ton of them.
[00:32:43] I just, it’s ridiculous. It’s an addiction. But when I buy them, it’s like that feeling of, Oh, I’m adding to my collection and soon it will be complete and I can then go complete the next one. And so it’s like, I’ve got all the series of Deadpool now I need the series of X-men. It’s like, what are you trying to accomplish?
[00:33:00] For me, it’s like that, that sense of completeness, not completeness as a person, but completeness of that set that I have. And then I feel. Uh, proud, right? I’m proud. I have this cool thing that I can show off. People come over go, yeah, you want to see my Deadpool collection? They’re like, who’s Deadpool? Well, not anymore.
[00:33:14] But you know, it’s, it’s that, it’s that thing that’s the emotion, that pride, right? So let’s speak to that. And that’s why they made them collectibles, because otherwise they’re just stupid. Bobbleheads with X-Men faces, right? But there are these cool collectible things and you want to have the whole thing.
[00:33:31] And. Um, it’s like, it was the same thing with beanie babies, right? Stupid little beanbag. But people went nuts over them cause they wanted the collection. They showed them off. They had that prior year’s Maya cool ones. So, um, I, I know that seems like a tangent, but it’s just, it’s important to understand, again, that emotion and it’s hard to convey that in.
[00:33:50] And Etsy posts, right, or an ad and not a post, but an Etsy store. It’s hard.
[00:33:53] Megan Brame: Yeah, absolutely. And just my aunt was one of those fanatics. She had like the hallmark store in her Plaza on speed dial and she’d call them every once in a week. I don’t know. Whenever they were like, what are they coming in? So I totally you to create that kind of urgency and sense of, you know, need it now.
[00:34:14] I needed it yesterday. When are they coming in? Like, you just can’t do that. I mean. Good imagery is always positive, but you just can’t do that without conveying some kind of emotion and showing people why and answering their objections. And. If you can’t do that person to person face to face, then that’s why you need sales pages in addition to a shopping cart or things like that.
[00:34:36] Tim Paige: Exactly. Cool.
[00:34:37] Megan Brame: Well, I know that your time is short. You’ve got to go take over the world and do some more webinars, which I’m excited we’re going to partner up for a webinar in summer, so I’m excited to see how that goes. Where can people find you.
[00:34:52] Tim Paige: Yeah. Uh, if you would like to actually attend that webinar, that’ll be a good one.
[00:34:56] If you want to follow me on Twitter, I’ll be, uh, I’m on Twitter at Tim the page. And, um, yeah, the other thing is obviously, check out leadpages.net head over there and, uh, and see what we’ve got going on. That would be the best
[00:35:08] Megan Brame: place to go. And if people have comic book related items, should they tweet you the Etsy
[00:35:13] Tim Paige: link.
[00:35:14] Oh yeah. Get ’em get ’em out to me at Tim the page also, when is this going live?
[00:35:20] Megan Brame: This will be live probably by the end of April.
[00:35:24] Tim Paige: Okay. By then, I might have finally gotten my crap together. I’m starting a comic book based podcast. If you’re into it, join me. That’s a, that’s an exclusive, not told anybody about that.
[00:35:35] So, um, yeah, so you know, check that out if you’re into comic books and then make me buy all your stuff so I can talk about it on my show.
[00:35:43] Megan Brame: Thanks so much for joining me. I really appreciate it.
[00:35:45] Tim Paige: My pleasure.
[00:35:47] Megan Brame: Amazing. Right? Amazing. I, like I said before, didn’t want to bring Tim on to sell you lead pages. He doesn’t even even need act that way.
[00:35:57] I was born that way, but I didn’t want this to be about Leadpages I wanted this to be stop messing around, grow your mailing list, and if you want to see the example that I talked about with lead digits with uh, creating a digital business card you can just put in handmadeBK, it’s all one word, and text it to 44222, that’ll send you over my business card.
[00:36:25] And it’s just amazing. And I really wish I had had that at trade shows because how many business cards have you gotten in your time in your lifetime, and how many have you actually looked at? I had a stack in like this clear Mason jar that I would keep. I was like, Oh, I might like a hoarder. Like I might need these someday.
[00:36:45] I never looked at them guys. I never, they were years, years that I had them and I never looked at them. So that’s one of the biggest selling points for me was lead digits. And I don’t know if there’s a free way to do that out there. There might be, yeah, if they just make it easy. So check them out@leadpages.net if you’re into it, you can go through my affiliate link, Meganbrame.com/leadpages to check it out.
[00:37:11] Okay. In the meantime, start thinking about how to grow your mailing list and start thinking about the different ways that you can offer value. I have a freebie that you can download. It’s 52 ideas, so it’s a year’s worth of newsletter ideas that aren’t about coupons, and you can get that by texting, newsletterideas, all one word,to 44222.
[00:37:37] Okay, that’s awesome. You can use your phone. The future is now people, and like I said, not going to text you in the middle of the night. I never see your number. It’s not, and not like, Hey,what’s going on? Wanna go get a beer? No, don’t worry. Never going to text you, but you can email me if you want to get a beer.
[00:37:54] No, I’ll stop rambling. I’ll get out of your hair. Thank you so much for joining me at stop sucking at business. Formerly Handmade Brooklyn. Hope you love it. Let’s talk to you guys next week.
