Last week, I sat down with my friend, colleague, and partner Brigitte Lyons. Brigitte is a PR & media strategist for micro businesses who believes in changing the face of the media today. I send every one of my clients to her for easy-to-execute tips at the least and personal service at the most.

Since Brigitte has teamed up with me to help teach the next two rounds of 10ThousandFeet, I wanted to introduce her to you a little more personally. So we sat down and had the kind of conversation (aided by some great questions from readers) we generally have over a couple glasses of wine.

It’s geeky. It’s fun. And, yes, it’s really real. You can watch the video above, or download an audio-only version below. And scroll down to catch highlights from the conversation.

Click here to download the audio-only version. (right-click then “save as”)

How does storytelling contribute to our bottom lines? (2:00)
“The stories we tell create the conditions our businesses are operating in.” — @brigittelyons http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.
“Storytelling in business goes well beyond marketing.” — @taragentile http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.

How do you launch a new product with energy & authenticity? (6:04)
“Allow yourself to nerd out about what makes you excited about your product.” — @brigittelyons http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.

Wherein I get vulnerable about telling stories about my clients (7:16)

How do you build a relationship with people when ultimately you have an agenda to sell them something? (10:00)
“Everyone wants you to express an interest in the things that they are passionate about.” — @brigittelyons http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.
“Just because you have something to gain in a relationship doesn’t mean you have an agenda.” — @taragentile http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.
“Trust yourself as a whole person to bring what is most valuable to every relationship.” — @taragentile http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.

What are your criteria for who you bring on to your team, who will be your mentors, and who you will partner with? (19:05)
“Vibe is so important.” — @brigittelyons http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.

What are the top 3 things you can do to promote a new offering? (23:29)
“Give people the opportunity to say ‘yes’ to you.” — @taragentile http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.
“Your inclination is ‘how can I help this person?’ not ‘how can I get out of this?’” — @brigittelyons http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.
“Don’t assume that because the sales opportunity is over, that all opportunities are over.” — @taragentile http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.
“Always assume people are interested.” — @brigittelyons http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.

What are our predictions for future online business trends? (32:31)
“Businesses are starting to reorganize themselves to create value instead of just making a splash on the online stage.” — @taragentile Tweet it.
“Online businesses are following the wider trend of being more intentional.” — @brigittelyons http://bit.ly/P7eOsb Tweet it.

Capitalism has been exploited for all sorts of purposes that are yucky. But capitalism itself–at its core–is a force for good. Capitalism is a source of prosperity for both the consumer and the producer.

Fundamentally, capitalism is beautiful.

In his new book, Conscious Capitalism, John Mackey describes how business is in large part responsible for much of the great strides we’ve made in the last 200 years. Despite many of the problems that rampant cronyism has created–even in the recent past and ongoing today–it’s the soul of business that keeps us moving forward as a society. You and I are not subsistence farmers under the thumb of a feudal lord. Nor are we forced to follow in the career steps of our parents or beholden to a system of guilds.

We’re self-determined.

To that end, it’s the fact that business is based on the “voluntary exchange of value” that gives business its moral footing.

Whether as a producer or as a consumer, no one is forced to do anything. While it’s true that others utilize manipulation, prey on fear, or exploit weakness, it’s still choice that reigns in business.

We live in an age of information parity, as Dan Pink writes in To Sell is Human. More than ever, consumers have choice and agency when determining what to buy.

But how do they choose?

It’s easy to believe that all your customers think about is how much less they have when they’re doing business with you. But that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Your customers are thinking about how much more they have.

That means the fundamental beauty of capitalism translates into a source of ease for you & your business.

Business-done-well results in two parties having more than they started with. Your customer values what you’ve delivered to her more than the money she spent on it. You value the financial gain more than the time or energy you spent delivering the product or service.

It’s a beautiful exchange. And completely voluntary. Ease-full.

“That’s great,” you say. “But how does this actually help me succeed?”

It gives you a new frame through which to view your business:

• What does my customer value more than money?
• What is she already looking for?
• What transaction would leave him feeling richer?

When you’re focused on that kind of value and communicating with your customer on her terms, you’re focused on the beauty of the exchange, the ease of the connection, the meaning of the transaction.

Amanda Farough, Founder & Creative Director of violetminded Media

I started working with Tara in the spring of 2012, right before I found out that I was pregnant with my second child. At the time, I was overworked, underpaid, and exhausted. I knew that something needed to change but I was too stuck in my own head to see what that was.

After several sessions alternating between angst and stuck-itude… I started to make Big Changes. I started to actually utilize my team, instead of whining about having to train them. I doubled my pricing (again) while communicating the value of my work in a much more effective (and enticing) way.

Tara showed me that I didn’t have to compromise my core values in order to make serious bank; I could show up the way I’ve always shown up in business (with el-oh-vee-ee) but do it with a more discerning eye.

When Tara and I came to the end of our coaching sessions, I’ll admit that I got a bit panicky–what would I do without my heroine in shining business armour? But then she announced her mastermind group–10ThousandFeet–and I was absolutely ecstatic! Not only would I continue to glean the best bits of Tara’s knowledge (and there is a lot of it), I would be able to connect with many other like-minded small business owners and entrepreneurs.

Throughout my time at 10KFeet, the evolution of my business kept unfolding and changing at an incredible rate. What usually took me months was happening in the course of a few weeks. I was revamping systems, developing offers (and a new business), building my team, all while creating the most beautiful websites of my design career. Clarity of purpose will do that.

The clarity and depth offered in 10KFeet is something that I’ve yet to see anywhere else. Tara’s singular in her mastery of digital business and her leadership is something that I aspire to on a daily basis.

If you’re ready to make a Big Change in your business, 10KFeet will be everything that you hoped for and more. It was for me.

Megan Eckman from StudioMME

10ThousandFeet allowed me to take a big step back (or up) from my business and realize what my customers were silently demanding and what I could create with minimal effort.

It had been staring me in the face for months. People would comment on Facebook how much they loved my embroidery patterns and I thanked them. It wasn’t until Tara helped me look at the bigger picture that I realized how much they wanted these patterns, something that only I can offer them.

Almost immediately I knew I could create an embroidery-of-the-month club which would mean one email’s worth of work for me, monthly patterns for club members, and lots of income.

It took me half an hour to write a sign-up form and share it with my fans. The launch that followed two weeks later had the greatest conversion rate ever for my business! That month my total income outstripped my December sales from the year before and I had added over 50 new people to my mailing list. This success allowed me to make the move to working fully for myself starting August 1st! I hadn’t imagined working for myself for another year but thanks to 10ThousandFeet, I am nearing that special day.

Side note from Tara: This special day terrifies me. Megan also is my behind-the-scenes, lady-in-charge for my business and Kick Start Labs.

Thanks to the successful launch of my club, and Tara’s process, I now know how to get in touch with my customers and figure out what they want before they know they want it. I’m setting up steps now to make this club grow continually. The workload for me won’t change but my revenue will grow exponentially.

Being a part of the 10ThousandFeet mastermind has entirely changed the way I see, approach and operate my business.

By stepping out of the day to day ‘trenches’ to take a larger and more reflective view of the type of business I really want to run, (and the life I want to go with it), I have been able to make an accumulation of small changes with big impact.

One of these changes is getting the most deeply clear I’ve ever been about the exact client I want to work with. And I’ve done those ‘ideal client’ exercises before! I learned that to really thrive in my business I need to be attracting not just who I can work with, but who I want to work with, and have the courage to turn down people who are not fully in that want space for me. Getting clear about just this one thing has seen me change my web copy, blog topics, newsletter and general approach to client attraction.

The result?

…a deep and growing waiting list of women who before we even start to work together, I know are going to bring as much inspiration to me as I hopefully will to them, and at a higher rate too, that is seeing me work less for more.

I have solid and exciting plans that are going to see Beautiful You have a larger scale impact, touching the lives of thousands more women in the next 2-5 years. My business is dramatically moving away from the ‘time-for-money’ business model that has previously made me feel trapped and over-worked.

10ThousandFeet has allowed me to soar above my business with a bigger, bolder and more beautiful approach to the business and life I want to live. The view from above feels and is amazing and I don’t plan to come back down into those trenches ever again.

Julie Parker
Life and Business Coach
Beautiful You

You welcome everyone who might match your target market in at the opening of your sales funnel. That could be the home page of your website, an event, or the opt-in for your email list. Then you create filters through content and offers that narrows the scope of the customers you are dealing with at the core of your business.

That’s all solid advice.

And… I think there’s a better way. Our brains don’t do generalizations well. And generalizations are exactly what you need to conceive of the wide end of your funnel in the traditional approach.

When we generalize, we miss a lot of details. Those details are often the secret to unlocking a new level of creativity and effectiveness in product development, messaging, and sales.

To boot, your customers don’t want to align with generalizations. They want to feel like what your business has created was made especially for them. While mass solutions may have had traction in the industrial era, the social era demands a new level of attention to detail and specialization.

So how do you ensure that you capture those details?

In a traditional sales funnel, the details are all at the bottom. They’re processed later. And they’re rarely designed into the business as a whole.

What if you flipped it?

What if you started with the narrow end? What if you started with a single customer, user, client?

By beginning with a real person who has real needs that your skills, talents, and passion make you uniquely equipped to serve or create for, you don’t miss the details. You see her experience, you understand her process, you discover both acute and deep needs.

Once you’ve worked the narrow end of the funnel–by the way, funnel here is just a visual, I like to think of sales cycles more than funnels–by examining several individuals, ahem, individually, you can work to attract more clients just like them. Instead of needing to weed out the not-quite-right clients, you’re actively building a business based on the perfect individuals.

Of course, there will always be people who are interested in the value you offer who aren’t “just right,” but they won’t be your concern. You’ll be focused on the multitudes who found your business because you took the time to get the details right one person at a time.

Your business will be building towards scale based on specificity and precise service instead of just casting a wider net and hoping to get lucky.

What does this mean for you today?

You and your business have a treasure trove of information at your fingertips. The work you’ve been doing with individual clients and customers translates into a wealth of insight that can lead to identifying the products that truly scale.

This is exactly the process we undergo in The Customer Perspective Process. I’m leading a virtual boot camp May 20-23. Here’s what Amanda Blake, founder of embright, had to say about the last session:

“…blows the familiar ‘ideal customer’ approach out of the water. The CPP boot camp immediately revolutionized the way I approach product development, marketing, and even writing my book. It also makes me more of the kind of business owner I want to be: friendly, empathetic, and connected.”

The Customer Perspective Process boot camp is offered through Kick Start Labs, my microbusiness community & accelerator. Click here to learn more.

Knowing the difference–and when to use each–is key and your business requires both to truly thrive.

What is “buy in?”

“Buy in” is how you engage your clients around your vision and purpose. It gives them a big picture taste of the what’s-in-it-for-me and it often points to how they are connected to other customers and community members. “Buy in” excites, motivates, and catalyzes. It brings people together. It rallies a small army to work toward a single goal.

Narratives are the stories that infuse our life with meaning. The narrative of business matters greatly, not only to the business community, but to every human being alive.
– John Mackey, Conscious Capitalism

The “buy in” for your business creates meaning and ties a community together:

• What narrative gives your business meaning?
• What story will your customers want to buy into?
• What vision drives you as a creator and your customers as consumers?

“Buy in” gets people on board but it won’t get them to “buy now.”

What is “buy now?”

“Buy now” is a small step that brings your customers and stakeholders closer to making your vision–the “buy in”– reality. It’s a task to be completed, a milestone achieved, a question answered. It’s the job to be done and the result of it’s accomplishment. It’s concrete.

“Buy now” represents a marker on the journey between the present and the promised future. It delivers stick-to-your-ribs value to an acute need. It’s not “quick fix” but it’s not so big & dreamy that your customer can’t realize why she needs it now instead of later.

It’s the “buy now” that so often my clients get stuck on. In an effort to make their businesses appear as benevolent as possible, they spend all their time and energy–and their customers’ attention–on the “buy in.” That creates amazing amounts of goodwill, a chorus of well wishes, and many pats on the back but it doesn’t create much in the way of dollars and cents.

Your “buy now” must address a real & present need, desire, or question that your customers are already thinking about:

• What are your customers googling today?
• What do they discuss with colleagues or friends?
• What would they like to be easier, more convenient, less expensive, or more effective?

Use “buy in” when you’re gathering people to your movement or when you’re trying to get your base excited about an idea. You might do this in blog posts, videos, or emails between launches or at the beginning of a launch cycle when you’re actively trying to garner attention.

Use “buy now” when you’re writing sales copy or calls to action. Use it in content towards the end of a launch cycle to prove your product or service can deliver results. Use it as you develop new products & services.

Your business needs a healthy dose of both “buy now” and “buy in” to get the results you want: more impact and more sales. Click to tweet. But is it getting the most bang for it’s buck?

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Two opportunities to work with me coming up soon!

“…revolutionized the way I approach product development, marketing, and even writing my book.”

The Customer Perspective Process™ virtual boot camp is back. This Kick Start Labs program will give you a new foundation to rest your marketing, outreach, product development, and content strategy on. You’ll begin envisioning a whole new way to leverage your products and services. Click here to learn more.

“This process is changing my freaking life!”

10ThousandFeet–my mastermind & group coaching program–teaches you to rise out of the trenches of your business and take a bird’s eye view. You’ll leave the endless daily to do lists behind and start thinking strategically about how to make a bigger impact with your business for yourself, your customers, and your community. New this session is additional training from media strategist, Brigitte Lyons, on messaging, networking, and media relations. Click here to learn more.

But it’s not.

Here’s a customer survey primer to help you get the information you need to create offers that sell easily.

First, remember that there are two distinct perspectives that make a business successful: the business’ perspective and the customer’s perspective. When creating a survey, you want to detach yourself as much as possible from your business’ perspective. Your ultimate goal is to gather the customer perspective information you need to leverage your business perspective.

1) Ask questions that allow you to understand your customers’ experiences.

From your customer’s perspective, your products and services simply don’t factor. They have a full range of experiences, desires, and frustrations on a daily basis that probably don’t seem related to you or your business at all. Always phrase your questions in terms of their experience and seek, through gathering answers, to learn more about it.

2) Seek to prove a hypothesis.

If you’ve been in business any length of time, you know a lot more about your customers than you think. It’s trapped in your brain as social information–for instance, you’d use it if you were having a glass of wine together at the bar–and, when you unlock it, you might discover some surprising things that lead to a bold hypothesis. When you’ve got that hypothesis, use a survey to discover if you’re right and to learn more about your big idea.

3) Provide a control question.

Unless you’re super selective about who you’re surveying, you need a control question. A filter question is one that will allow you to separate your Most Valued Customers from those more on the periphery of your business. I try to select a piece of information I know about my best customers and use it as a control. Then when I sort the information I receive, I can look specifically at the group that answered the control question positively.

Surveying your customers is a powerful tool, but it’s not a cure all. A survey won’t get you the information you need to create a produce with stick-to-your-ribs value but it can provide context and nuance to your understanding of your customers’ experiences, desires, and questions.

And that’s valuable.

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Free Business Support Call Just For Coaches!

Coaches: Join me for a telejam with Kate Swoboda, founder of Your Courageous Life and creator of The Coaching Blueprint, for real-time business support. We’ll be talking “coach speak,” discovering stick-to-your-ribs value, and digital strategy. Free. Click here to register.

There’s a bit of a misunderstanding about the promise of the You Economy.

It’s not all about you: your self-worth, your passion, your personal brand.

It’s about your power to create and offer something of lasting value. It’s about your ability to contribute to things that are bigger than yourself. It’s about your access to the machinations of commerce.

My friend Amanda Steinberg, who is also the founder & CEO of the financial education company you simply must subscribe to, wrote recently of the proliferation of personal brands in the wake of the solo entrepreneurship craze.

She describes it–and I squealed when I read this–as a “torrent of social media one-upmanship.” It’s a race for the funkiest website, the hippest photos, the most profound tweets, the cleverest pins, the most raw Facebook updates.

Stand out, or stand down.

And she’s right. It’s a mess.

The You Economy doesn’t promise that you can get paid to be you. It doesn’t guarantee that you can make money & follow your passion.

The You Economy promises that you have the chance to create something that makes others lives meaningfully better.

You can harness your passion, your personality, your pizzazz to realize that imperative but those things are no substitute for stick-to-your-ribs value.

If you’ve found yourself in the one-upmanship game of personal branding or the race to social media stardom, it doesn’t mean your business is doomed. But it does mean you need to stop–today–and evaluate the value your business is creating.

Escape “digiphoria; the cold, joyless comfort of softly glowing screens.”

Venture into the pursuit of something real.

Click to tweet!

What are you pursuing? What keeps you up at night? How does that drive you to serve? To create? To question?

The You Economy has asked you to show up. Not just as you are, but in pursuit of the solution to a problem, the answer to a question, the fulfillment of a desire.

Will you rise to the occasion?

Despite the lasting effects of the recession, despite crippling college loan debt, despite the stubborn unemployment rate, there has never–ever–been a period of history where you have more control over your work and the way you get paid for it.

If you’re reading this, you’re probably a part of the ever-growing movement of entrepreneurs and freelancers that are making up the global economy in larger & larger shares. But there are plenty of others joining small teams of motivated doers, organizing to create something new & meaningful and then disbanding to look for the next opportunity. Still more people are writing their own job descriptions and determining their own expectations at growing companies.

This rapidly evolving economic environment, this strange new world of work & creative energy, requires unprecedented agency to get ahead, to make an impact.

The You Economy is self-determined.

Are you? Click to tweet!

Success in business today is not predetermined by a particular set of preconditions. It’s not contrived from a particular set of tactics or forged from a website with graphics and layout just so.

Only you can determine the course by which your business succeeds. Only you can determine the best way to merge your ideas with your customers’ perspective to find the winning combination of service and profit.

This is your chance to shine, to decide. Don’t lend your light to others you believe know better than you. Learn, grow, collaborate–but don’t lose track of your own ability to create a path that allows your business to make its greatest impact.

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Ready to realize your own dreams? Ready to forge a self-determined future that includes a business with a big impact & a life of meaning?

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