Just The Tips, with James P. Friel and Dean Holland

Creating a successful business in the beauty space can be intimidating. With many powerful brands to contend with, how do you set yourself apart in the niche? Where do you even begin? Our guest star today happens to be none other than Dean’s better-half, Robyn Holland. She’s here to walk us through her greatest challenges and successes—and living proof that a small business can succeed against powerhouse brands.

Robyn originally attended beauty school intent on being a makeup artist. She realized that there wasn’t a lot of money in her field of choice and veered into telecommunications sales. After 10 years in sales as a top-performer, she quit and started her own business in the beauty industry, which is now exploding onto the scene. This episode of Just the Tips walks through her winding entrepreneurial journey, so don’t miss it!

• [1:40] Robyn Holland guest stars!
• [3:50] Where her focus is right now
• [6:25] Running an e-commerce business in the beauty space
• [17:00] Lessons she has learned along the way
• [22:40] Challenges to overcome to scale your business
• [27:10] Your business will never be problem-free
• [30:40] Don’t be afraid to change and adapt

When Robyn finally had enough of her poor treatment at her sales job, she decided it was time to move on. Dean, being the husband that he is, encouraged her to consider starting her own business. Because of her experience in the beauty industry it was a natural choice to settle on that niche. So she dove in and began building her business.

Everything she originally tried flopped completely.

Selling her product on eBay didn’t succeed. Marketing on Facebook was a dud. She even hired models for her product, and their videos never gained traction. But her first paid ad exploded. With over 600,000 views and climbing, it catapulted her sales. But she could never get her continuing ads to reach the same success. Keep listening as we talk about what she was doing wrong, how her expectations needed to change, and what she did.

Dean had helped Robyn build out this amazing studio with a green screen and all of the bells and whistles they could need for shooting ads. He even hired a videographer to help her produce high-quality videos. No matter what she did, the videos never found success. But they learned something important through this process.

People want a human connection that is real and raw and lets them see who you are.

After years of testing, their highest converting videos were of Robyn sitting at her vanity demonstrating the products—filming on her cell phone. The expensive highly produced ads made customers feel as if they were being sold to. Humans see through the fakeness. They desire connection. As an entrepreneur it is our job to recognize that!

Robyn’s product has taken off quickly in the last 6-8 weeks—so much so that they are completely out-of-stock. They’ve currently switched tactics from selling an in-stock product to allowing customers the option to pre-order. Here are a few tips she has to help you scale quickly (and avoid running out of stock):

1. Her product takes a while to produce, package, and ship to their warehouse. She recommends having at least a couple of different production channels so that running out-of-stock never happens.

2. To scale your business, you need to have a customer service and fulfillment team in place that doesn’t consist of just you. Your home can’t be a warehouse and distribution center forever!

3. Build a relationship with your customers. Create content that they’ll love. Offer them something of value that only you and your product can give. Interact with them on social media platforms.

While Robyn didn’t predict her spike in sales in the last few weeks, she now has a better idea of how to be prepared. Listen in as we chat about her experience.

Something that entrepreneurs don’t necessarily realize in the beginning is that your business will never be easy. Ideas will fail. Sales vary. Every problem creates a new challenge to overcome. Problems can be a good thing—especially when it’s because your product is selling so well that your stock plummeted overnight.

Just keep pushing forward.

Don’t be afraid to change and adapt as the market is changing. Robyn learned that you cannot be overly attached to anything, especially if it isn’t working. Sometimes, you will need to rebrand and start over—and that’s okay. Overcome worrying about people will think, ask for help when needed, and keep moving forward.

Networking is still one of the most powerful ways to grow your business, yet a lot of people go about it the wrong way, or try to skip it altogether. The problem with that is, one person, when it’s the right person, is all it takes to explode your business to the next level.

This week’s guest, Jake Kelfer, has made a wildly successful career working with major brands like Adidas and the Los Angeles Lakers. He’s also helped his clients use networking to achieve the results they want, whether it’s to get booked on more podcasts, bring in experts for a summit, or create partnerships to grow their business to the next level.

In today’s Internet-based world, it’s easier than ever to connect with people. Jake will show you how to use that to your advantage in a way other people appreciate instead of run from.

Tune into this episode to discover exactly why your next level may be less about what’s next, and more about who’s next.

Plus get Jake’s framework for successfully networking with the right people for you and your business.

Without other people, you cannot have a business. People are who buy your products and services. People are who tell their family, friends, and peers about you. People are also who you learn from. It’s true, you can slowly and tediously make all your own mistakes; or, you can learn from people who’ve already made them, and get where you want to be faster. Networking is another way to avoid the slow path and get where you want to be sooner rather than later.

Successful networking is about connecting with the right people for YOU. Doing that means combining your style with the right intention for reaching out to a specific person. No matter what, you’ll face rejection, but when you combine your style and personality with intention, it saves you a ton of time and energy reaching out to the wrong people. You’ll also dramatically increase the likelihood of connecting with people who are a good fit for you.

No one appreciates a total stranger getting in touch only to say, “Hey, here’s what you can do for me!” When reaching out to people for the first time, don’t lead with offers and requests. Instead, play the long game by building the relationship. Care enough to get their name right. Study their profiles and content to find commonalities you can use to relate to them. Everyone wants to feel like they matter, and you can inspire that feeling by taking time to learn about them.

Just because someone doesn’t respond to your first contact attempt doesn’t mean they don’t want to connect. It could be they’re busy and they forgot. It could be they aren’t sure if you’re just another spammy drive-by, or if you’re someone who’s actually worth their time and energy. It could be a million other things. Instead of jumping ship if they don’t instantly reply, give them a little time, then follow up. Remember that the point isn’t to be a pest. It’s to open the door so they can take a step through it. Sometimes it takes more than one attempt before they’ll take that first step.

You don’t need a million followers to make a million dollars. You just need the right number of quality followers. It’s the same with networking. You don’t need to connect with everyone on the planet. You just need the right people. One right person will get you further than one hundred people who aren’t right. Sometimes it can take one hundred attempts to find the right people, so it’s important to keep reaching out. Just don’t get hung up on the numbers. Go for quality.

• One new connection can change your world [3:05]
• The reason for our success [8:55]
• Meeting the right people’s not about luck, it’s about this [14:30]
• How to reach out (and how not to) [18:15]
• Once you build the relationship, maintain it [32:45]
• You don’t need quantity when you’ve got quality [38:30]
• You can reach ANYBODY [44:00]

• Visit Jake Kelfer’s website: www.JakeKelfer.com
• Connect with Jake Kelfer on Instagram: @jakekelfer
• Jake Kelfer on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jakekelfer
• Jake Kelfer on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jakekelferjourney

Music for “Just The Tips” is titled, “Happy Happy Game Show” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

James P. Friel:

• CEO Quickstart: https://jamespfriel.com/ceo-quickstart/
• Facebook Group: https:/...

Most entrepreneurs salivate at the thought of high-ticket offers. Make more money working with fewer clients. A dream come true, right?

But what does it REALLY take to create a high-ticket offer people want enough to pay a high-ticket price?

That’s what Tyler Kemp, this week’s guest, is going to reveal.

Tyler’s helped build multiple 7-figure companies, and he brings years of experience with both low-ticket and high-ticket offers.

He figured out pretty quickly that low-ticket and high-ticket are two different animals that bring in two different types of customers, and require two different sets of systems to build and scale.

So, if you’d love to create a high-ticket offer for your business, but you:

1) Don’t know what to offer

2) Are uncomfortable at the thought of charging more money

3) Believe your customers won’t want it

...Then tune in to get the tactics and mindset you need to create and sell your high-ticket offer.

If you already have a high-ticket offer, you’ll want to hear Tyler’s secrets to making that offer even more desirable, so you can charge more AND sell more, while getting your clients the epic results they need from you.

Lead gen and high ticket sales. Acquiring more customers, one of the easiest ways is to raise the value of what you’re offering.

• The #1 barrier to making high ticket sales [8:25]
• Solve more problems to charge more money [16:00]
• Once isn’t enough [27:00]
• The perfect product-market fit takes time [33:00]
• What to do after creating your offer [39:15]

• It starts with your mindset. If your mind’s already made up that your customers would never go for a high-ticket offer, or you’re uncomfortable charging more money, you’ve shot yourself in the foot before even starting. With rare exception, most businesses have the makings of a high-ticket offer. But in order to see the possibilities, you’ve got to be open to them.
• Beware the low-ticket value trap. We all want to give our customers as much value as possible, including in our low-ticket offers. The problem is, there’s a limit to how much value you can realistically bring to that many people at once before it becomes unsustainable money-wise, and time-wise. High ticket offers set you free from those constraints. Your clients pay more, making it cost-effective and time-effective for you to provide them with more AND remain profitable.
• Solve more problems. A lot of offers solve only one or two problems around the same topic, but most people have way more than one or two. That means, the more solutions you can provide to these additional problems, the more money the right clients will pay you to get those problems taken care of. Becoming someone’s all-in-one solution is your highway to profitable high-ticket offers.

• https://www.leadroll.co/
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/tjkemp

Music for “Just The Tips” is titled, “Happy Happy Game Show” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

James P. Friel:

• CEO Quickstart: https://jamespfriel.com/ceo-quickstart/
• Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/hustledetox/
• Facebook Group (BulletProof Business): https://www.facebook.com/groups/1107362546297055/
• Site: www.jamespfriel.com
• Interested in being a guest on the show?

Dean Holland:

• Blog: www.DeanHolland.com
• FB Page: https://www.facebook.com/DeanHollandHQ
• Billion Dollar Project: https://www.facebook.com/groups/BillionDollarProject/

JTT Facebook Page - https://www.facebook.com/justthetipsshow/

Success in business comes to those who can identify and follow through on profitable opportunities. The people who struggle most are both the ones who wouldn’t know an opportunity if it punched them in the face, and the ones who see opportunities everywhere, but struggle to identify and act on the profitable ones. Either they freeze, or they go down so many rabbit holes, they never get traction.

Jeremy Parker, CEO and Co-Founder of promotional product website Swag.com, has been identifying and capitalizing on profitable opportunities for over a decade, including during the Great Recession back in 2007.

Even with the pandemic happening, and companies cutting back on promotional product purchases, Swag.com had its best three months EVER. And it’s all because Jeremy understands how to identify and follow through on profitable opportunities. Tune into this episode to learn from Jeremy how you can do the same, because this is a skill that can ensure you succeed no matter how bad things seem.

Originally Jeremy wanted to be a filmmaker. But after realizing how difficult it was to make a living doing that, and discovering he wasn’t all that passionate about it, Jeremy started a t-shirt business. It seemed like an easy way to begin. Turns out it wasn’t as easy as he thought, but still, Jeremy was enjoying some success. Then the Great Recession hit, and stores he’d built relationships with stopped buying what he was offering. Instead of folding, Jeremy asked, where’s the opportunity with this? One of his ideas--which he describes “as gimmicky” got noticed by Mark Cuban, which paved the way for the rise of swag.com.

The promotional industry is in shambles right now. Companies are letting people go instead of bringing them on, which means there’s far less need for branded company products. Yet Swag.com just enjoyed its best three months EVER. That is the power of identifying and following through with profitable opportunities. There are always problems that need solving, including some that are still coming down the pipeline. That is and always will be the case, no matter what’s going on in the world.

Marrying your ideas is one of the worst mistakes you can make. Remove your ego from the situation, because it’s not about you. It’s about what the market needs. You cannot make them need or want something they don’t need or want. Get your minimum viable product together and get it into the world quickly. See how the market responds, and adjust accordingly. If the minimum viable product doesn’t get traction, you’ve just saved yourself vast sums of time, money, and energy.

Where you start is rarely where you end up, which is why the most successful entrepreneurs in the world start fast. Another of the worst things you can do is drag out getting started. Whether you succeed or fail, you’ll learn from it. Very often, failing has more to teach us than success. No matter how good you are at identifying opportunities, you will not strike gold every single time. Get your ideas into the world quickly, get feedback, and learn and adapt. It may take several attempts to find your next (or first) big winner. But the only way you’ll ever find it is to just start.

Networking is a proven way to connect with the people and resources you need to grow your business. It’s also something people tend to overthink. Jeremy’s best advice to get the most out of your networking efforts is pretty simple: Put yourself out there. Get your lines in the water and see who bites. The first few people you meet may not be who you need, but they may be connected to the right people for you. Since you can’t know for sure, get as many lines in the water as you can. The more lines you have, the better your chances of getting the right bites.

A motivated, effective team can not only help you bring opportunities to life, they can help you identify more. And a team that believes in your company’s mission and vision is proven to perform better at even their day to day role. Reminding your team of your company’s mission is key to strong motivation, especially in tough times. Remember to stoke that fire.

• Successful, but not excited about it [5:50]
• What not to do when opportunity punches you in the face [10:45]
• Why adaptation is key to success [14:02]
• Your best shot at avoiding the duds [17:05]
• What to do if you struggle to see opportunities [24:30]
• Stop waiting for “that one big idea” [27:56]
• How to create relationships that create success [31:10]
• Motivating your team AND yourself [40:40]

• Swag.com

In just a few short years, Brandon and Kaelin Poulin took LadyBoss Weight Loss from a startup to a company with 350,000 customers. In 2019, LadyBoss, which helps women lose weight, transform their health, and love themselves, was named number 4 on the Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing privately-held companies in the United States.

Tune into this episode for a behind-the-scenes, comprehensive look at what it takes to grow and scale a successful company like LadyBoss - the strategies, the mindsets, the vision, the customer relationships, all of it - in a few years instead of a few decades.

Before they ever met, Brandon and Kaelin started in network marketing, and found their way into weight loss, health, and fitness. They learned succeeding in network marketing requires developing and maintaining relationships. It requires listening to people, and finding out what they really want. And it requires facing rejection, over and over and over. Network marketing also taught them about personal development, something they know is critical to both their early success and their ongoing success. Everything you do starts with you, and if you’re tripping over the same issues within yourself, it’ll trip up everything you try to do.

After five years with another company, Brandon and Kaelin were ready to start their own company. They were two months behind on rent, on their car payment - basically everything, and in danger of sinking even further. With their backs against the wall, they locked themselves away from the outside world for two months and worked around the clock to launch their company. It didn’t take fairy dust or unicorns - just the commitment to dig in and do it.

With the abundance of tools, trainings and strategies out there, Brandon and Kaelin often found themselves tempted by the shiny penny highway. Oh, another cool software! Oh, another marketing strategy to try! The barrage of things to try was constant. To avoid getting trapped on the shiny penny highway, Brandon and Kaelin always brought it back to what their customers and their company needed at that time. If what they were looking at didn’t fit with their vision, it wasn’t right for their business. It meant saying no to a lot of things. It also allowed them to simplify, while simultaneously (and quickly) growing their company and better serving their customers.

A lot of companies think being aloof with and too cool for their customers is the right way to be. Brandon and Kaelin see it differently. They know, from years of experience, how crucial the customer relationship is to their success. Rather than shut their customers out, they welcome communication with their customers. They’ll take customers by the hand, so to speak, and help them walk to that next level. It’s a powerful reminder that your customers are your best asset. Without them, you don’t have a business. Don’t shut them out.

Brandon and Kaelin point out something a lot of successful people come to realize: That once you get to a certain level, your success is all other people see. But they’ve been kicked in the teeth, made mistakes, and had to find different ways of doing things. And they know it’s likely to continue on that way, because that’s just the nature of business. The reason Brandon and Kaelin have been so successful isn’t because they haven’t faced challenges, it’s because they know they have the power, always, to overcome them. Believing and accepting that no matter what comes your way, you have the power to deal with it and find another way forward, is a must-have mindset for all business owners.

Outline of This Episode

• Backs against the wall [05:29]
• Trial by fire [12:40]
• Get off the shiny penny highway [20:56]
• Remember who you’re serving [29:36]
• Stop pushing your customers aside [34:01]
• The secret to aligning as a team [38:48]
• What to do when the hits keep coming [46:15]

• LadyBoss Weight Loss: https://ladyboss.com/
• https://www.instagram.com/ladyboss/
• https://www.facebook.com/LadyBossKaelin
• https://www.youtube.com/c/LadyBossWeightLoss

Music for “Just The Tips” is titled, “Happy Happy Game Show” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

James P. Friel:

• CEO Quickstart: https://jamespfriel.com/ceo-quickstart/
• Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/hustledetox/
• Fac...