Beyond Business Podcast Ep 18

Written By Debbie Lee

Episode 18

Content that Connects with Caroline Leon

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EPISODE SUMMARY

Caroline Leon is a business coach who specializes in supporting service-based, online business owners - such as coaches, healers and teachers - to build and grow sustainable businesses. She supports business owners to do away with the gross and manipulative tactics so prevalent these days online and instead adopt ethical growth strategies that put people before profits. She firmly believes that when we change the way we do business, we change the world.

Content creation, and specifically long form written content, lies at the core of Caroline's marketing strategy. On the podcast episode we dive into:

  • Why create content for your business?

  • What are the benefits to both you as the content creator and your audience as the recipients?

  • What type of content should you focus on to create the biggest impact

  • How to develop an approach that gets the most eyes on your content

CONNECT WITH CAROLINE

If you enjoy this episode and would like to find out more about Caroline's approach to content as well as the practical tools she uses to support a consistent habit of content creation then check out her upcoming free workshop and course, or of course her own blog!

MORE WAYS TO GO BEYOND BUSINESS

Got a topic you’d like to request or a guest to recommend? Drop me an email

 

EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

00:03 - Debbie (Host)

Welcome to Beyond Business the podcast, the show for impact-driven ecopreneurs who want to be part of a bigger change and make a difference that reaches beyond your business alone. This week on the podcast, I'm delighted to welcome Caroline Leon. Caroline is a business coach who has been really influential in my own journey. She specialises in supporting service-based online business owners, such as coaches, healers and teachers, to build and grow sustainable businesses that move away from the manipulative tactics so prevalent these days online and to instead adopt ethical growth strategies that put people before profit. She firmly believes that when we change the way we do business, we change the world. Core to Caroline's marketing strategy is creating content that connects and really speaks to and serves your people well, and that's what we're diving into today. Enjoy Good morning, caroline. It is so wonderful to give you a very warm welcome to the Beyond Business podcast.

01:21

Thank you I wonder how you're arriving with us today. Very excited, yay, me too. Me too. I know you've been a long-awaited guest. Actually, on my podcast I've known for a long time that there is a multitude of topics that we could cover and today we're going to dive into content which I know is a real passion of yours and something that I have learned a lot about from you and your approach and how different it is to the mainstream approach to content creation and marketing in general. So I'm super excited to dive in and I know this will be of like really awesome value to people listening as well.

02:11 - Caroline (Guest)

Yay, I hope so.

02:15 - Debbie (Host)

And with that I just wanted to like mention upfront you have a course coming up shortly on this as well.

02:23 - Caroline (Guest)

Yes, content that Connects. It's a kind of live group program um uh, starting on the 30th of september awesome, awesome.

02:33 - Debbie (Host)

So, yeah, really, it feels like extra relevant to be talking about this at the minute. Um, so I wonder for people listening who haven't come across your work before, could you tell us a little bit more about how you got to do what you're doing now business coaching for conscious changemakers and it would be really interesting to know what part content has played in your journey up until this point.

03:04 - Caroline (Guest)

Yeah, yeah, great question. So well, gosh, it was a while ago the journey started. I used to have, you know, pretty standard buyer. I was a program project manager working in London when I decided I wanted to make a change and I got very into personal growth. I discovered blogs and you know, people like Benny Brown and I was kind of getting into blogs. I remember talking to friends and they're like what blogs? You know, it was just we're going back 20, 2009, you know, 2010, um, and after a lot of, you know, stress about it, I basically started a personal development blog, whereas blogging.

03:45

My journey to kind of quit the corporate life and, you know, start. Well, originally it was travel the world and then start my own business and become a coach, um, so, uh, I didn't realize it was the journey was going to be so long, so I was blogging for a few years and sort of procrastinating on, you know, and I did some coach training and but procrastinating on, actually, you know, biting the bullet on my business, as you know, probably many people can relate to um, and when I finally did, I hired my own business coach, um, he was incredible, um, I really, you know, went for it with, with the business. What I found was all the years of content. I'd built an audience. So I had at that point, you know, over a thousand followers on Facebook I think I even had a list of over a thousand people at that point, which seems, you know, kind of crazy to me now. I think it was easier back then to you know kind to get the numbers up and things like that. But it was just incredible to me that how many people knew about me, were warm to me, were engaged in my work. So when I finally did start telling people I'm coaching, you can actually hire me as your coach, it was relatively easy compared to many of my peers who I did coach training with and things like that. So I knew then that was a sign. Okay, content's a thing, you know. I then tried that was life coaching. So I had a life coach business for several years, realized that what I really love is business. You know I'd worked. I've been quite ambitious in my former career, I'd been involved in business for years. So it kind of made sense and my life coaching business worked.

05:27

So I transitioned to business coaching and, um, it was harder for me initially with content because it wasn't blogging about my journey. You know, I had to start creating content about business both, and I would say I struggled for a while, uh, to be consistent with it. Um, even though I knew it was important I might. I was building my business in other ways, through authentic outreach and other things and gift sessions and all the stuff you know I talk about a lot. Um, and then it was around 2018.

05:57

I was like, okay, probably a year into my this business, and I was like I've got to, I've got to do it.

06:04

You know, I've got to kind of really get to grips with the content piece and I did a 30 blog posts in 30 days personal challenge for me, no one else.

06:12

I invited people to come along if they wanted, but it was for me because I knew I needed to kind of just get over the hump of it. And I would say that changed everything for my business. You know, a year after that, um, because that got me back in to content. It also really helped me, you know, clarify my message, express my point of view, just so many benefits which we can dive into a bit more in this conversation. But um, yeah, um, I would say a year later I was starting to get the results of that, people saying they found me on Google, you know things happening, clients coming via my content and that's when it was like, okay, content is my top priority and it has been, for you know, ever since you know, and it's something that I teach a lot, I talk a lot about, I support clients with uh cause. I just see the value of it.

07:02 - Debbie (Host)

Mm. Awesome, I um I, because I just see the value of it. Awesome, I didn't realize before this that you started off with blogging. Actually, I didn't realize that that's where where your journey started, and so it sounds like for you, content has really been that red thread yeah that I hear people talk about. That sort of has has been with you the whole time as a kid.

07:26 - Caroline (Guest)

You know if people said to me when I was little, what do you want to be when you grow up? It was like an author. You know I was. I mean, you can see the books I'm obsessed with. So if I'm not writing, I'm reading. So I always smile now because I never became the author that I, you know, hope to be, but but I do have a manuscript somewhere drafted.

07:46

But writing is a huge part of my work. It's something I do regularly, so it makes me smile that actually that's been a red thread through my entire life and even my career. Before programme management I worked in communications and PR, so writing has been a thing. So it's a really lovely and fulfilling way to grow my business or has been for me because it's something that comes naturally to me, something that I enjoy, something that is a creative outlet as well, as I was going to say, as well as just a marketing thing, but instead of a marketing, because so many people are like, oh, marketing, and I'm like, oh, writing. So a big part of what I do is help people kind of make this shift from, you know, marketing being this, oh, this add-on that we don't want to do as part of our business. That feels like a drag to this creative practice that becomes a form of self-expression and that you know the added bonus is it helps people.

08:45 - Debbie (Host)

It, you know um, yeah, yeah, awesome. I really like that. So, yeah, I take from that that reframe of marketing being the thing that you do to people to like almost marketing being the thing that is going from the outside in, yeah, and reframing that to content where it really comes from the inside out and yeah.

09:12

I know so much of your approach is about saying it as being of service to people and being this generous gift that you want to to share with the world, which is really different. Like I, really I have found that such a nurturing and wholesome approach, or something compared to the general vibe that I get from mainstream marketing, which can feel icky and like uncomfortable, and something that I don't really want to be associated with as a business owner yeah, precisely, I mean one of the things that I, um, I see a lot of people carry.

09:51 - Caroline (Guest)

You know, when I people kind of start with me or come into my world, they have this idea of marketing being this, you know, a means to an end. It's you know, I've got to create content that gets the sale. I've got to create content that makes people want to work with me. But when we write or create from that place, it's oh, it's painful for our kind of people, conscious business owners, people who care, people are trying to make an impact. So I'm like, don't do that, you know, don't have that be the out. There's so many benefits to creating content beyond getting the sale and when you can create from a place that is more, you know, being of service. So, and I talk about being an extension of what you do, because a lot of people will say to me I don't, I don't want to market, I want to just do my thing. I'm a, you know, a healer or a teacher or practitioner or coach, I just want to do. I got into business because I want to do the thing that I want to do. I want to coach people. My response to that is what if your content could be an extension of what you do. So it's an intention I take into every piece that I create. When I sit down on a Monday morning to work on my newsletter which is my main form of content that I then later repurpose I say to myself you know, my intention is I want this piece of content to help people move into action. I want this piece of content to feel like they've just had a session with me and you know what it's like when you've had a good session with a coach. You're like fired up, you like do the thing that you've been procrastinating on and you're like, yes, I can do it and that's what I take into my writing. It's like I want my writing to feel like that. You know that's the intention. It's not.

11:36

I want people to hire me and sometimes there's even the advice of seeing out there in the mainstream, which is don't give too much away, don't give the answer, don't give the strategy, because then people won't hire you. And I think that's just terrible advice and the I found the more I give, the more helpful I try to be, the more I almost. It's almost like I want the content to eradicate the need to hire me. It it can't because it's content. Nothing can replace, you know, sitting one-to-one with you know, a coach. But that's the goal.

12:10

If this person never hires me, I want this piece of content to help them move forward. That's how I think of it. And in doing that, of course, what happens is people say you know, if I can get this from a piece of content, what would I get if I sat in a room with Caroline? What if I had an hour of her time and she was helping me adapt this strategy specifically to my, to my business? So it's done nothing but support my business growth in that way versus, you know, the the opposite, which some people might argue or worry about if they give too much away yeah, yeah, I've.

12:45 - Debbie (Host)

I've heard you, um, talk about that before like framing a blog post as almost like a mini coaching session, in a way, like you're gifting people this mini session with you and, um, yeah, you can really pack a lot of value into a blog post if you do it with that intent yeah, yeah.

13:08

I actually I really distinctly remember so we've worked together for several years now but I really distinctly remember the first time I came across your website and, of course, went and trolled your blogs and there was one that talked about this reframe of, rather than attracting your ideal client, focusing on building relationships with your ideal client. And for me that was such a game changer because previous to that I'd been in this place of I really questioning why things weren't working. You know, I was thinking I'm doing all the things and yet I'm not attracting my ideal client, like no one's just appearing out of the blue and I've heard that from so many people whereas your approach, I see, really goes into um, yeah, really focuses on that building relationships with people, and it starts even with the way that you write your blog posts yeah, completely.

14:14 - Caroline (Guest)

I mean, the two kind of main strategies that I teach are content, um, and content that connects, and, uh, what I call outreach, which is, you know, actively reaching out to people and making those connections and building those relationships. And sometimes people come to me it's like who do I do my outreach to? Well, if you're creating content regularly and people start to engage, and you know, often, you know, for years, my outreach was the people who were commenting on my content, you know, and sometimes people say to me oh, I, you know, I sent out a thing or I put a post on Facebook and only two people liked it. And I was like, who are those two people?

14:57 - Debbie (Host)

on Facebook and only two people liked it and I was like who are those two?

15:01 - Caroline (Guest)

people. Oh my gosh, only two people. It's like two people I can talk to yeah, two people who have taken the time to read my thing um so for me it's always been.

15:13

You know they go hand in hand. For me it's like the content is the conversation starter and when people respond, you know. So just to give a couple of examples, you know, I remember years ago, when we're growing our business, often it's like you know friends and family and the people we know, the few trusted people who love us. But you know, then we, as we grow, then it's like, oh, new people, these are people I don't recognize joining my list, um, and I was probably in that state and I remember, you know I was posting regularly on Facebook.

15:45

I'm not short pithy, you know. What I do is I repurpose my long form content. So what was a blog? Or a newsletter? I just shorten a little bit for Facebook. So it's, you know, it's meaty content, and I kept seeing the same name and it was a name that was new to me. I was like I don't know where this person has come from. It's like you know what. I'm just gonna send her a little note to thank her, to say thank you for you know, I just want you to know that I see you, I noticed that you've been liking my content. I want to thank you and as a thank you.

16:14

If there's any, you know, business struggle that you're dealing with, that I can support you with, let me know and I'll do any. I'll do what I can. You know that led to a gift session, a conversation, you know. So for me, content really, you know, leads to conversation. Now I say that knowing that there's probably a lot of people listening going, but I create content and no one responds, or it's like you talking to crickets and so there's. You know I can talk about. You know that as well. Um, because I know that that is an issue as the internet has got more and more busy and crowded. You know, back in in my day, creating content and getting a following for my blog, it didn't feel easy at the time but looking back I'm like gosh. That was a breeze compared to how difficult it is to get people's attention these days.

17:03 - Debbie (Host)

Yes, yes, yes, it would be great to to talk a bit more about that, because I think it's such a common, a common struggle and and just before we do I would like so.

17:13

We've covered a lot of the why behind why we would create content as a marketing, as like the core of our marketing strategy, and I think the other aspect of it that has been really beneficial to me is using it as a way to really flesh out my own thoughts and my own approach and my own point of view and perspective.

17:39

And I know that for many of the people I work with, they're very early on, you know, in the very early days of their business, and sometimes you know they don't have all, they don't have a three-step approach, or you know they don't have a framework to work with as such, and so often I encourage people to use content as as the starting point of that and at the same time, um, I think that in those early days again, putting and even just putting your first offer out there can be a really daunting task, and so I also encourage people to use content as like the step before that. So it's a bit kinder to your nervous system, in a way, to write a blog post and put it out there and use that as a bit of a testing ground to see how people respond and how it feels for you, and so I see content as not only being really beneficial to our audience, our community, but also to us as business owners as well absolutely.

18:49 - Caroline (Guest)

Yeah. I mean, when I talked about the 30-day blog post challenge that I did myself, that was, um, because I transitioned from life coaching to business coaching. I I didn't have the language I have now around ethical marketing and conscious business, but I knew it inside. It was that stage that you know. I meet people who are in that stage and it's like it's like it's on the tip of my tongue, it's inside me, but I just don't know how to talk about it. And often they do know how to talk about it in coaching. I'm like that's great. What you just said is perfect. They don't yet feel able to express it fully. Um, and what happened for me is doing that challenge. Um is I?

19:29

By the end of it, my, my, my message was clear. I felt clear, I felt fully expressed. You know things like I'd started to talk about conscious business and I realized that if somebody were to interview me on the topic or to, you know, ask me, what do you mean? I wasn't, I hadn't, you know, I didn't yet have the language.

19:49

And so one of the blog posts I wrote in that challenge was what is conscious business and why does it matter? And that was a game changer for me, and it was one of those things and I say this to my clients all the time I didn't know what I was going to end up writing when I put that question at the top of the page. I just knew I had to write it and it had to be today, because I was doing a blog post, a day challenge, you know, and so it flowed out of me. So for me, yes, content has been really beneficial in that, you know, kind of expressing my point of view and not just expressing it, understanding it, because I think a lot of people come in there they say I can't start creating content till I've clarified my message, or I can't start creating content till I'm really clear on my point of view and I'm like no, no, no, no, it's the other way around.

20:36 - Debbie (Host)

Yeah.

20:36 - Caroline (Guest)

Content will get you there. And I love what you said about, you know, using it as a way to kind of test an idea, because that's exactly what I have done in my own business and what I share with people. I've had times where I've written a post that's then become like a mini class, maybe for my group program. Then, you know, a year later or a few years later, few years later, I'm like okay, I'm going to develop this into a three-part workshop series, you know, and it just, and it grows and grows, and something that was just a block, started as a blog, ends up being a new income stream for me. Um, and so, yeah, we often try and skip straight to the successful, you know, workshop series or group program, whatever it may be, and it's like, no, no, it's so much easier, um and logical yeah start with content and test the idea and just see, um you know, and take it in steps.

21:32

um, yeah, and because you get those little bits of affirmation along the way, it's like, oh yes, people love the blog post, and then people love the mini class I did and then people love you know. So, yeah, yes.

21:43 - Debbie (Host)

And for you as well. You get to tell it's like is this genuinely something that I am passionate about and passionate enough about and believe in enough and have enough confidence in that I want to create this big offer around it? Yeah, absolutely that I want to create this big offer around it.

22:01

Yeah, absolutely so. You've sort of referenced blog posts and writing a few times, and I imagine that for many people, listening that might not be the first thing they think of when they think of content. I know that for many of us, when we talk about content, social media is often the first thing that springs to mind, and so I wonder if you could talk a bit more about that. And, yeah, balancing this, your longer form approach to writing, with other types of content.

22:38 - Caroline (Guest)

Yes, yeah, great question. So for me, as I mentioned earlier, I love writing, so it makes sense that I focus on long form. What I find is, you know, for all the reasons that we've just said, the benefits of writing longer form content for the business owner as well, as well as you know the audience for me, for example, with my audience, I'm a highly sensitive person who is introverted and loves writing. So for me, my idle people are similar. I mean, that's just the nature of you know these kinds of businesses. You know our ideal client is usually an earlier version of ourselves, or, you know, similar to us at least. So my people are more inclined to go deep on topics than to be sat skimming on social media. So that's been one of my the rationale behind me, creating longer form content. Um, I think what I say to people is and for some people, writing longer form content is just like oh gosh, that's my idea of hell. But for a lot of my people, the idea of hell is, you know, being on social media, having to do videos and meals and all of that stuff. So you know, first and foremost, I will always say to people where are your strengths, what do you love to do, because people will say to me things like should I be on Instagram or should I be on Facebook? And it's like which platform do you prefer to be on? You know, should I make videos or should I write articles, or which do you prefer? Because if you don't go with what you enjoy, if I had tried to force myself to make meals for the last you know seven, eight years years, instead of doing the thing that I love, it wouldn't have worked. I wouldn't have been consistent, consistent in it and, and you know, therefore, I just wouldn't have built the audience that I've managed to build, doing something that I can be consistent in. So that's the first thing I would say to people, but also for me as a business coach, and I think it's probably these days the case for most online businesses people expect to see you on social media. You know there is an expectation that you will have some sort of presence. Now, what I've done for myself because I don't really want to do social media in the way that maybe we're supposed to or we have to is I've made it work for me.

24:55

So I typically focus on long form. You know the main places that my content exists is, you know, newsletter. I have, you know, medium. I publish long form articles, my blog, and then I take that long form and I do make it a bit shorter. I mean so, let's say, if I have a 1200 word article, I might get it down to 800 for Facebook, and then I publish text posts. I don't even publish a picture, you know. I just publish because I want the words to speak for themselves. I want it.

25:28

You know I'm very focused on the value that's contained within the words. You know the strategy or the help or the guidance that I'm trying to give. I don't want to distract people with. You know the, the strategy or the help or the guidance that I'm trying to give. I don't want to distract people with, you know, cool pictures or linking to things. I'm very, you know so.

25:47

And then I use other social, like instagram, maybe linkedin and also facebook a bit, to point to that long form content.

25:52

So it's more that I use uh social to to either you either feature a shortened version of what I've already created long form or to point people back to that long form like hey, check out my new article on Medium and that kind of thing. That's what works for me it doesn't like I say it's not going to work for everyone, because some people love video. If you love it, I'm like, go for it. Really, that's amazing. But for people who don't which a lot of my people don't love social media um, I found a way to do it that just means I don't have to spend a lot of time there. I have a presence people can access. You know my business, but it's not the, it's not the prime way, and I did a. I did did a big review a few months ago of where all my clients have come from in the last few years. I can't remember how many years I went back since I'd started tracking it, basically whenever that was, and one person said Instagram.

26:55 - Debbie (Host)

Wow.

26:56 - Caroline (Guest)

Yeah, I had one person that said social media and everybody else said, you know, it's word of mouth, a former client, a colleague, or content. They found me on Google. They found you know, and what happens? And this is where I love content, especially longer form, you know, it doesn't even have to be longer form, but content that is off social media, because it's. It's rare that we will go into someone's instagram feed and scroll and scroll and scroll to read their. You know, social media is designed for you to be scrolling in the moment, you know, moving on, moving on.

27:29

But if someone lands on your blog, they're gonna, they're gonna, binge your blog. That's what I found anyway. Yeah, you know, you said that at the beginning of the call. So, um, it means that even those word of mouth where somebody has put you know, uh, so-and-so recommended you, they'll have come then, um, and gone to my blog or signed up for my newsletter, and then the content has nurtured them. The content you know I talk about. You know, in, in, so in fast content we have to manipulate because you've got seconds, you know. And in long form content, you, you have an opportunity to nurture people, you know. So, if you're not going to manipulate people which of course you and I don't and our people typically don't want to then the only alternative is to nurture people.

28:13 - Debbie (Host)

I love it. I, I love that, yeah, yeah, that is the key really is.

28:17 - Caroline (Guest)

Yeah, yeah.

28:19 - Debbie (Host)

Yeah, and and finally, when you say about the talking about where that review of where all your clients came from, I think you actually wrote a blog post. I did. It's one that I would I'd really recommend it was. I remember it Well, actually it was really good and awesome. So what I'm taking from that is that you start with one central piece of long-form content, and for you that is is writing, and the alternatives to that might be a long-form video or or a podcast, even, um, so a long form of content, and then you take that and you repurpose it in several different ways, one of which being shortening that longer piece of writing into a social media post, and and that post points people back to the original, often points people back to the original no, no, I don't.

29:16 - Caroline (Guest)

Actually, if I, if I, if I repurpose the this you know the strategy or the, you know the content, it will just be pure content and it's like, oh, you know, people read it and they're like, oh, wow, you know. My hope is that then they, you know, either follow me on Facebook or they go to my website.

29:35

But then I do other bits of content which will just be, you know, maybe a story on Instagram that says check out my medium ah, yes, okay yeah, it's sort of what I call um, uh, like you know, promotional content or you know pointing, you know pointer content that points back to and then others, which is just this is pure content. This is just. They don't know. It's a shortened version of a previous newsletter and blog. You know, I mean the people who really follow me do, because I talk about it all the time, but yeah, so yeah, I love it I love it, so what?

30:12 - Debbie (Host)

what it strikes me is sort of circling back to what we talked about earlier and the struggles that many people find with getting their content visible, and so it sounds like in this way, the strategy that you use, or the approach that you use, is really helping to maximise that visibility and get that core piece of content in front of as many people as possible yeah and yeah, to me, I love that and I also love that like one again, something I've really learned from you is balancing having this balance of creative space, like space for creativity in my business, and then using structure and strategy and logic to like protect that creative space or support it in some way.

31:05

And I really like that as well, that because you're repurposing this core bit of content, like you can really take your time over it and pour a lot of love and attention and care into creating it yes, absolutely yeah, because what happens normally?

31:23 - Caroline (Guest)

I think, well, there's two things. First, the mainstream will tell you you've got to be posted on Instagram every day. You've got to be, you know, to get traction, which, for social media, often it's true. Um, you know, I have one client who's got 200,000, you know followers on Instagram and he's built that by consistently posting, you know, reels on his feed. So there's that message you've got to be creating new content all the time. And we think, well, it's got to be different pieces. If I've got to publish, you know, three times it's got to be different pieces. You know, three times it's got to be different pieces. And so, yeah, a big part of what I teach is is that just focus on one piece of content and then repurpose out.

32:06

You know, I talk about doing a month between each iteration. So if you create one long form piece of content, you know, for me it starts as a newsletter. You know, a month later it becomes a Medium article. A month after that it becomes a blog post, and then what you find is I'm publishing something every day that's different. So it looks like I've created five pieces of content, but it's not because it's the new piece of content for this week, on the Monday. On the Tuesday it's the Medium article I wrote wrote. You know, I repurposed that from a month ago. So there's a way I feel like I've, in some ways I've, hacked the system. There's a way to, you know, just focus on that one piece of content, because what typically happens that I see is people call their heart and soul.

32:54

My kind of people, your kind of people, you know they do take care, they want, they do take care, they want to create meaningful content. They don't want to add to the noise or the fluff on social media. So they do take time creating meaningful content. They put it out, typically to crickets, because it's just, you know, if you're not paying for ads or you're not, you know, promoting it, or you don't have a system of repurposing, it's hard to get views, people, you know, even if you've got 500 people following you on your Facebook page, a tiny fraction of those will actually even see it. They put it out. They feel deflated.

33:28

It's like, oh my gosh, I put my heart and soul and then that's it. They never look at that piece of content again. It's just gone and so I'm all about. It's like squeezing every drop of goodness out of everything I create, to the point that it's not just. I repurpose one piece of content to the nth degree. I'll turn it into a workshop, I'll turn it into a you know, a class it's like, and then I'll. I've even got to the point in my business where I'm repurposing content a second time around because I wrote it four years ago so I can now people will have forgotten that piece of content. So, yeah, I think for me it's just the gift that keeps on giving. In many ways, I'm constantly thanking my former self.

34:15 - Debbie (Host)

But it becomes a real virtuous cycle then. In that way, it really like the benefits just add up and I find that, um, for me, being earlier on in my own journey than you like, even if I look at something I wrote a year ago, I'm like, oh wow, actually, you know, my, my, my views, and that have changed slightly, or I've got more to add to that, or I've got some practical, some more practical tips and tools that I can add into that bit, and it just keeps getting better, you know, yeah, um. So I wonder for anybody listening who would like to learn more about your approach and some of the things that we've talked about today, and maybe, in particular, like some of the practicalities of how you put it into action and where would you recommend that people go next? I know that you're. You've got several different places online, and it would also be great to hear a bit more about your upcoming workshop and course as well yeah, well, mean, I always recommend people go to my blog because it's full.

35:19 - Caroline (Guest)

I have, like I don't know, 200 plus articles on there. So there's a lot of info and I've written a lot about content. But, yes, I've got the program coming up, which is specifically what I wanted to create is something that is for writers, for people who like writing or even love writing, but they can't quite yet make it work for their business. You know, they may not be even consistent in writing for their business, but they know that's the format. They would much rather be writing articles than being on social media. So it's kind of designed because most of the content programs I see are like how to you know how to beat the algorithm, how to get you know consistent on so and I've also, over the years, whenever I've taught about content, it's like it could be writing or it could be this, and I've tried to accommodate other people's, you know, and it's like no, you know what I want to create, something just for the writers, for the people who actually want to create content. So that's that's coming up at the end of of this month. But then what I wanted to do to give people a flavor of the approach, because that program is a combination of let's work on the writing together and then let's implement my strategy, which is this kind of you know, we've touched on it today how to get it out and visible in the world, and that strategy piece, which, of course, in the week program, go into in depth. This is something I'm going to summarize in a workshop on Monday.

36:43

So, yeah, for me it's, you know, taking people through those three parts, which is create, repurpose and then promote. We didn't touch on it today, but also just spend it. You know ways to spend minimal amounts on ads to kind of just for Facebook and Instagram to get more visibility on the content. Because it's a fact these days, if you're not doing some sort of paid promotion on social, the reach you're going to get. Sometimes people feel so deflated, like it's their fault, the content's not good enough, and it's like, no, you pay to play, which people complain about. I'm like what we get with social media is phenomenal for free, and so for me it makes sense that I would pay. You know I spend about 100 euro a month, um, and that's. You know that's having put the budget up over the years. So it's not, it's not much to get that content visible. So yeah, so. So if people are interested in the approach um, the free workshop I'm offering would be a good place to awesome, a good springboard, a starting point, awesome, great.

37:50 - Debbie (Host)

Thank you, and I shall. I'll put the links to both of those and also to your blog in the show notes so that people can access them directly from there too. Awesome, well, thank you so much for well one your time, but more so, you're really generous. Sharing. It's such a I say it is such a trademark of yours this real generosity that you have and an openness to sharing your approach and your methodology and really being of service in the way that you teach others to do so. Thank you for that and bringing it all here. It's really very much appreciated oh, bless you, thank you.

38:31 - Caroline (Guest)

Thank you for having me. I've been waiting for the call. I'm delighted to be here.

38:36 - Debbie (Host)

All right. Thank you, Caroline Bye. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Beyond Business. If you've loved what you've heard, I would be incredibly grateful if you could rate and review the podcast so that together we can create a global ecosystem of changemakers pioneering business that will force for good. Until then, I look forward to speaking to you in the next episode.

Debbie Lee
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