Regenerative Business Podcast Series Ep 5
Episode 5
How to invite potential customers in
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EPISODE SUMMARY
Welcome to the Beyond Business Summer Podcast Series! This episode builds on our previous discussion about crafting offers with ease, and talks about shifting from a traditional selling mindset to a more natural approach of inviting people into your world. This change in perspective helps ease the nervous system and fosters a more authentic connection with your audience.
I also discuss the concept of exchange beyond just financial transactions. Often, the value of your offering might lie in something other than money, such as time, attention, or feedback. By thinking creatively about these exchanges, you can lower the stakes and make it easier for both you and your people to engage meaningfully. Whether it's sharing a blog post or sending personal invitations, I explore various ways to connect and provide value.
Join me to navigate these concepts and offer actionable tips to make your business journey feel more natural and sustainable.
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION
00:02 - Debbie (Host)
Hello and a very warm welcome to the Beyond Business Summer Podcast Series here. Over the course of six main episodes, we'll be challenging the mainstream approach to building a business online and instead creating a regenerative framework inspired by nature that takes your online business from sporadic action to sustainable results. If you would like to use the starter kit that goes along with the series, then head over to www.debbielee.co.uk/starter-kit and download your copy now. That way, you can work along with the episodes week by week and, at the end, have a one-page framework that gives your business the springboard that you need to take action in a way that feels good and gets results. This week we're following on from our topic last week, which was building an offer with ease, so if you haven't already listened to episode number four, then you might want to tune into that now, because it's very much linked to what we're going to delve into, explore more of today. In a nutshell, that episode was all about breaking your big grand offer down into the smallest possible form. That is probably even smaller than you might first imagine, so that it feels really easy to invite people into it, and it serves as a way for both you and them to get a taster of what it is that you're offering. And it also gives you an opportunity to flex your nervous system and practice this invitation and bringing people into your world, or inviting people in that little step closer to you.
02:03
And you'll notice that I've very deliberately used the terminology of inviting people in rather than selling, which I guess is how we typically think of this stage, because I think that when we think of it as selling, that's when, for many of us, our nervous system can go into overdrive. And particularly when you're a solopreneur and you're someone who is really led by purpose and your business is really more than just a business, it's an extension of you, then we can think of selling or offering as being interchangeable, as selling ourselves, and that feels icky and sticky and uncomfortable for many of us and that's, I think, totally natural. There's so many, I guess, mindset blocks and challenges that we can aim to get over, but at the end of the day, I do think that a certain, to a certain degree, that ickiness will always be there to some extent. So, like I said, I like to think of it as inviting people in and really taking that your relationship with them to like the next stage, if you like. Like any long-term relationship, there's going to be these moments of moving closer together and getting to know each other more. And, yeah, that's what you're doing you're inviting people to come that step closer in.
03:32
But I think the other reason that I tend not to use a selling is that because, in this traditional approach to building a business that we've referred to several times throughout the earlier episodes, I think that we see selling or making a sale as the end goal, and that's quite often linked to a financial exchange, whereas actually a financial sale is only one version of the exchange that can take place, and there are lots of reasons why exchanging your services or your product for money might not actually be at the top of your priority list. Maybe your business at this stage, maybe your business doesn't need to support you financially, but maybe there's something else apart from financial income that perhaps might actually be more valuable to you, or at least as valuable, so it can balance things out a little bit, and so I like to think of the exchange that can take place at this stage a little bit more creatively, like, come up with different versions of what that might look like and really yeah, really tune in to what it is that you want. You want from it. Um, most likely, at a minimum, you're inviting people to exchange their time and attention for something that you've created and in the hope that that thing well will provide them with value. So last episode we talked about the example of reading a blog post.
05:15
You're providing the insight, awareness, information and, in exchange, that person is gifting you their time and attention, and so, starting from a place like this, I think that the stakes feel a little bit lower, and it feels that way in your body too, and so it allows that creativity to flow. You can invite people in in lots of different ways, so you might even want to send this directly to people that you know might be interested or have opinions or have something to add or might find it useful. You can advertise it on your social media. You can send in a newsletter you can talk to to people about it. You can ask, you can ask your network to share it with people that they know.
06:07
I think when the the stakes are lowered, it allows that creativity and it allows us to get inventive and allows us to like go out there in ways that we might not when the stakes feel higher and, like I said, this is how those things become like your test ground, if you like, and allow you to get comfortable and get used to either get more comfortable or get used to the feeling of discomfort, in a way where you're easing out of your comfort zone. You're not blasting yourself so far outside your comfort zone that it's hard to come back. It allows you to gently expand your capacity. So that's for things that aren't like for sale. As such, the exchange is always going to be something other than money, um. But even if you do have a service or a product that you do ultimately want to sell in exchange for money, then maybe the first few times you offer it actually what you want is feedback. You want to offer this thing up and ask for feedback or a testimonial or something like that in exchange, and then start introducing a scale of pricing from there and again, this is taking those small steps of inviting people in.
07:34
I really like to come to business with this real sense of generosity and a service-based approach where the I don't know. I sort of think of my brand, if you like, as being the whole customer experience with me. It's how the person on the other end, feels when they're around me and feels when we're building that relationship and working together, and I love bringing a generous spirit into that and trusting that over time, these things will grow and develop in a way that feels good for both of us. So, like I said, the idea of inviting people in at this stage is really to get your nervous system on board and get used to receiving, which can be so like. It can be so emotive and so tricky for so many of us. So as you get your nervous system more on board, you can slowly begin to charge more and do so from a place of trust and dignity and knowing that you that belief in what you're offering, a belief in the value that it adds.
08:55
I would love to hear how, like what this brings up for you, what this episode evokes for you, and if this is maybe a shift or in mindset that's different from how you've approached this in the past, or, actually, if this is something that you've tried and tested and has already worked for you, please do reach out and let me know. And this is one part of a six part series, so if you haven't listened to the earlier episodes, please do go back and check those out, and next week will be all about closing the loop to grow our business in in cycles. So come join us then. I can't wait. It's a really cycles is something I love sharing about. Um, and finally, if you haven't got the starter kit that goes along with this series, then head over to www.debbielee.co.uk/starter-kit and download your copy now so that you can put all this together into a one page regenerative business framework. I look forward to speaking to you again next week. Bye for now, thank you.