Creating a Successful Online Course or Business with Amy Porterfield

KEY TAKEAWAYS COVERED IN THE PODCASTStarting an online business or creating a course must be done in baby steps. Don’t just take a jump.Make short-term goals. In this business, you must be able to pivot and make changes on the fly to keep your business relevant. Start with six-month goals and work up from there as you get more comfortable.Creating a course is stressful for a short amount of time, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Find the light and stay motivated. Keep a project plan with a tool like Asana so you can keep track of your tasks and progress.When you reach a goal, celebrate! It’s important for you and your team (if you have one) to celebrate those milestones.To start, get in the trenches and learn all you can about your target customer. Create surveys to discover what people need.Take some time to understand your promise. What is your promise, and can you really deliver it to your customer? If so, this is where your course is born.If you’re just getting started, try to create the course first and then market it. Creation and promotion are two separate beasts.Keep your course simple at first and get fancy later. Your customer will care more about the content and knowledge than they will about whether you’re using fancy video all the time. You’ll never get to where you want to go if you don’t start.THE ONE THING YOU NEED TO REMEMBER ABOVE ALL ELSE…Don’t compare yourself to the big shots in the industry. Everyone started somewhere; you have to start somewhere, too. Just get started! Remember, however, that while you can use what others are doing as inspiration, that isn’t where you start. Learn from them—take their courses, listen to their podcasts, read their blogs. But then start from scratch on your own. You can do this!HIGHLIGHTS YOU SIMPLY CAN'T MISSHow Amy transitioned from being a good employee to being her own boss – 09:03Amy’s vision for her business, and how things changed – 12:45How to stay motivated when creating a course – 17:33The key to completing your course – 19:11It’s important to show your team how instrumental they are – 22:39Amy’s tips for creating your own online course – 25:23The comparison game and how it can affect you – 29:22Consistency matters, no matter the size of your audience – 30:20What’s next for Amy – 33:16LINKS TO RESOURCES MENTIONED IN TODAY'S EPISODEAmy’s course on courses: Courses That ConvertAmy’s website Amy’s social mediaFacebookInstagramAsanaTranscript below Hello and welcome to Episode 29 of the Social Media Marketing Made Simple Podcast and I'm your host, Teresa Heath-Wareing. Welcome back for another amazing week of the podcast. I think I'm still riding high on Pat's interview last week. It really was a bit of a dream come true for me, I have to say.And this week is exactly the same. You know when you start a new project and you sit down and you think, "Okay, who do we want on the project? What do we want to achieve?" And you dream bigger than you ever think you can dream. You sit there and go, "Oh, imagine if we got that person. Imagine if they would come on the podcast".Well, that's what my team and I did a few months ago when we were trying to think who would we want to interview. And we had a list of people that were, kind of like, mega stars in my world. And they were, kind of, the people that you would love to get on the podcast, but you knew that they were busy and they have lots of engagements and they, maybe, aren't as easy to get on.And Pat was one of those people. So, to have him on for week one was, kind of, crazy dream come true. And this week, it is exactly the same. This week I have the absolute pleasure of welcoming Amy Porterfield. You heard right. Amy Porterfield on my podcast. Honestly, this really is like a dream come true. I've been a fan of Amy's for longer than I can tell you. She was, probably, one of the first people that I really started to follow and get into and I feel like I have learned so much from her.I have her Courses That Convert, which is a online course that she offers, along with another two online courses. One about list-building, so building your email list. And the other one is about Webinars That Convert. So, if you're using webinars to sell to your audience, then she has got a great course to explain every single step on how you do that.And, like I said, I have just been the biggest fan for as long as I can remember. I've seen Amy speak twice at Social Media Marketing World. And I reached out to Amy, oh, quite some time back now and connected with her over social media. We chatted a bit. Then, when I was in the States back in June, I asked if we could go for a coffee and she really kindly said, "Yes," which was amazing.We had a lot of things in common and we had a mutual friend, which helped, obviously. And we went for coffee and we talked nonstop for two hours. And she'd said to me, "I've got an hour," which I was like, "Yeah, that's great". And we sat there for two hours and we literally didn't stop talking the entire time.So, both of us are stepmoms to sons who are very similar ages. So, we had a big chat about that. We both have dogs and, even though I've said before, I'm not a huge fan of my dog, he's more my husband's dog when he needs anything doing, we had a good chat about that. We have really similar husbands. My husband's in the Forces. Amy's husband is a fireman. They're both super-supportive of what we do and it just was the nicest coffee ever.And Amy really kindly offered to come on the podcast, which, in my head, I'd kind of thought, "Okay, if this goes well and Amy and I get on as well as I think we will, then maybe when I get back to the UK I will email her and say, 'Is there any chance?'"And I didn't even have to. We were talking about the podcasts ... Obviously, she has one ... and she literally said, "Well, who'd you want to be on there?" And I said, "I've got this list," but I hadn't asked anybody yet, because I was nervous in case they said, "No".And she was like, "Well, if I'm on your list, I'd love to come on the podcast". And, honestly, inside, I was squealing like a child. I was so excited. So, we got it planned and we did the call and it was awesome. What I love about it is Amy shares, not only how she got to be the success that she is today, and she's a phenomenal success, but she tells you about her baby steps of coming out of a job with Tony Robbins, no less.So, she originally worked for Harley-Davidson® Motorcycles and then went to work with Peak Performance Coach Tony Robbins, where she oversaw the content development team and collaborated on ground-breaking online marketing campaigns.So, she talks through how she moved away from a full-time job with someone as awesome as Tony to then starting her own business and also how her business has changed over time. She also tells me how she keeps motivated while putting together her online courses, which, if you haven't ever bought one of Amy's online courses, oh, my word. They are massive. And I just can't even start to think about how you stay motivated to complete all that content.We also talked about how you can start your own online business and if you're thinking of starting a course, what steps Amy recommends that you take, in order to get started.So, I am really excited about this one, as you can imagine. And, if you do know me, you know Amy is huge in my world. So, I am over the moon to be able to introduce to you the amazing Amy Porterfield.Amy, thank you so much for being a guest on my podcast. I am so excited to have you here.I love that I get to do this. Every time you and I talk it's like girlfriends are just chatting about everything. Work and life and all the good stuff in between-Love it.So, I think this is going to be a lot of fun.Oh, I'm really excited about it. You are only my second interview-Oh, my goodness.So, my last one was with Pat. He is just a consummate professional, isn't he?Right.He's amazing. So, that was awesome. But, I feel like I'm getting all the best people to start. So, it's just fantastic.Well, I thank you for having me. I'm honoured to be the second.Thank you. So, obviously, I have followed you for ages. I've been very lucky to see you talk live. I'm a student in Courses That Convert and I follow your content. I love what you do. And also, your story, I feel like, if I was to think of my future forward, of how I want my story to pan out, is your story. So, I would love it, for my audience that may not have come across you, although I've talked about you a fair bit, I would love it if you could just explain how you, kind of, got to where you are now.Great. Okay. So, I started my marketing career with Harley-Davidson® Motorcycles, but it was at a local level, so it was in the States and I ... I say, "in the States," because you're not in the States, but it was in California. And I worked for Harley for a few years and that's where I learned marketing.So, when you work for a company where people tattoo their logo on their...