A full circle moment: being interviewed by a former client!  In my interview with The Wealthy Babe Podcast, Autumn Bensette and I chatted about claiming your expertise, 6 figure launches, and NLP!

Autumn Bensette (AB):  Today I am interviewing Jen Casey. For those that don’t know, Jen Casey is a business strategy coach. She’s a podcast host, a speaker, and master NLP practitioner with certifications in EFT, hypnosis, and time technique. After building her own health coaching, group fitness, and network marketing business, she identified gaps that prevented women from growing profitable businesses. Jen created her Pitch to Your Niche method. Through her courses and programs, she helps network marketers and health and fitness coaches think like top earners and market their message in a unique way to turn their Jen thank you so much for being here, I am so excited!

Jen Casey (JC): So am I!

AB: Roughly a year ago, I actually had a lot of transitions and shifts in my business from the health field into the life and business coaching field. What’s actually really really crazy (and why it’s a full circle moment) is that I made my very first big investment into my business. It’s so funny; now, looking back it doesn’t seem like that big of an investment!  But at the time, it was the very first “yes” that I said to myself when I had joined her program. At the time, she and a business partner created the Wellpreneur Business Academy, and it was an incredible program. It’s incredible to look back on the shifts and how far everything has come since that course. So, I have to give major credit to Jen for where I am right now and where this business has come!

JC: Oh my God. I’m so honored to even be part of your journey!  It’s just been so insane to see what you’ve created, especially in such a short amount of time. Your branding is beautiful and so on point. And I mean, from the second that you jumped in there, you just knew what you wanted to do. It was so friggin’ cool to see you just run.

AB: I was balls to the walls.  I just wanted to do the damn thing. But it’s so crazy: all of the fundamentals of my business were really created in that course and it’s what inspired my first group coaching program. It’s what inspired a lot of what I do in my business right now so it’s just it’s really fucking cool to now be sharing the space with you and to do this together!  It’s so fun!

JC: It’s amazing!

AB: Let’s jump right in.  The first thing that I ask all of the babes that I interview is: what are you celebrating right now?

JC:
Right now, I am celebrating finding harmony in my business.

For the first couple of years of my business and well into 2017, I wore hustle like a badge of honor. And I didn’t want to take it off, because for me, that was my identity. “Look what I can do. I can hustle harder than anyone else.”

Of course, as a manifestation works, I attracted a lot of people into my business who also have those same beliefs.

This year, I started working with my mentor James Wedmore, and one of the biggest things that he’s really taught me (I have to give credit where credit is due) is that you have to slow down in order to speed up.

This year was really about building a business for scalability and sustainability.
I have been building my team, so that I’m going to be able to have time off.  I don’t have to have my hands in everything or wear all of the hats.

I really wasn’t showing up as the business owner. I was showing up as a business operator. I was being and doing all the things: creating the graphics, answering the DMS, scheduling the content. This year, I started slowly outsourcing little things here and there; like, podcast editing.  All of a sudden: my creativity opened up, and I felt really so much more aligned in my business with my message. So, I’d say that’s the biggest thing that I’m celebrating right now. Full transparency, guys: this was a very up and down year emotionally.

It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been in business or what level you’re at.
Every single person is going through new evolution and change.
I think this year was really just about leaning into that and learning to enjoy this really uncomfortable leveling up.  I’m letting go of the control and trusting other people in my life and in my business to help support me to grow this thing. I can actually live and not be in on weekends worrying about answering DM’s and doing all that simple, small stuff.

AB: I love that, and I think that’s such an important thing to celebrate. That’s important for every entrepreneur to remember: you need to sometimes slow down to speed up.  I know that’s something that I did the same thing. It honestly was only until this past month that I hired a VA. She totally organized my e-mail, and I thought, “You’re a Godsend; why did I wait so long?!”  . So, I think this is a really important message for women. Sometimes they think that once they get to a certain level in their business, it’s smooth sailing. There are still things they are going to have to change and shift. I love that reminder you gave:

Just because you slow down doesn’t mean that your business is slowing down.

It doesn’t mean that the success is any different. It just means that you’re planning for a different skill or ability. Like you said, you want a business that is scalable and you want a business that’s sustainable. You don’t want to continually be running a business where every single month you’re reaching burnout and exhaustion.  I know it’s something you talk about a lot on your social media and with your man; being able to just combat the burnout aspects in your business.

JC: Yeah. And that is exactly it.  The way that I used to show up in my business was to grind it out and hustle. Work 16 hour days, and then burnout. I’d take a day off and then jump right back in. My health was not in a good place because of that. I was exhausted all the time. I definitely had a really horrendous adrenal fatigue. My moods would be up and down, just because I was exhausted.  I was working so hard. A mantra that I have adopted this year is: “The less I work, the more I make.” It’s been an interesting one to adopt. I spoke about burnout recently and I was actually hesitant to share that story.  I actually got successful and hit my numbers; six figures, multiple six figures, scaling up my business. I reached those places with burnout and with the hustle. But I was weary to share that, because I didn’t think that I had reached that level because I worked 16 hour days. I think I reached it in spite of the fact that I had no balance in my life.  

One of the biggest AHA moments for me was when I realized that the women who were interested in working with me were following me; especially when Instagram stories came out.
 People were getting an inside sneak peek into how I showed up in my life and business every day. Those women don’t want to work 16 hour days.
Nobody wants to do that! So I was like, not only do I need a better system for myself, but I need to find a better way to teach the women in my community to grow their businesses.  I’m not serving them by also having them burn out. That’s a pretty silly way to grow a business when it doesn’t have to be that way.

Plus, I’m helping my team.  Let’s say I am out to dinner and I’m getting messages from a team member about a graphic for my Pinterest board, and I’m looking at it and thinking, “Damn! That looks so good.  I couldn’t have created that myself!” and I’m sitting here out at dinner. They get to be part of my team. They’re excited to create graphics all day for companies that love business and manifestation and all these things that I care about. I don’t think that occurred to me when I was first hiring. I felt bad hiring people to do these little tasks. But actually, for these women, this was the job they’d been looking for. Not everybody is an entrepreneur, and not everybody wants their own business.

AB: Yeah!  You get to feed someone else’s dream a little bit and you’re able to support them doing what it is they want to do and what they love. There’s a couple things that you talked about there which I think are really important.  When talking about your niche, you know that the women who you want to work with are not women who want to work more to make more. We do this a lot, especially in network marketing. You think, “OK, well I’m going to do more and do more and more.  Then I’m going to tell my social media that they only just have to open up your phone a couple hours a day. You can work your own hours and you’re going to make six figures. I swear that’s all it takes!” So then, they get in the door, they’re added to 10 groups, and they are told, “You have to spend seven hours on your power hour.  It’s not actually an hour. You have to do all of these things if you want success.” So then they leave right away and they quit, and people are confused why. Well, because you’re not running your business in the way that they want to live their life and their business.
You can’t teach how to make more by doing less if you don’t know how to do that yourself first.
If you’re not doing that; if you’re just showing up and talking about it, well, that’s a big disconnect.
So, when you mentioned about doing it this way, what changed in your condition and in your thinking?  How did you allow yourself to step into this possibility of “do less make more”?

JC: One of the biggest things was joining a high level mastermind.  By really investing in that and getting around people who have businesses that are way more structured and way more profitable, I was inspired to have better systems in place. I could see the inner workings of what was working in their businesses. Not everything you see on social media is working. When you look at the outside of somebody’s house, we don’t know what’s really happening on the inside. They might have a white picket fence, but they could be in financial crisis on the inside.  

Being in the room with them made me really have to uplevel.  

It was really intimidating, but at the same time, that’s the room I want to be in.

I’m going to have the most growth and I have the most urgency to level up.

I want to provide value to that room as well.

So, what do I need to do, and how much faster do I need to get over my ass in order to be able to achieve that?

I also saw all of them talking about their teams that they have, and I started thinking, “Crap, I don’t think I’m going to be able to keep up with somebody who’s gotten that much help. I’m one person. They’ve got six core people.” How did they come out with so many juicy podcast episodes with such in-depth research on all these studies? Somebody else is doing that stuff. You might be sitting there comparing yourself, your business, your solo entrepreneur venture to someone else’s business that has years ahead of you and has a whole team of really well trained, really well polished people working behind it.
You can’t compete with that. You will not be able to keep up. There’s not enough hours in the day, even if you work 24/7. You would not be able to learn the amount of stuff that you need to learn or produce the amount of stuff to produce.  You can’t focus on serving your clients and showing up as the visionary in your business when when you’re trying to be that way.

So, I changed after seeing the way that really, really high level, successful entrepreneurs are running their businesses.  A quote I’ve seen is, “What got you here won’t get you there.” That’s a big one for network marketing. Sure, you can send DM messages and you can do the hustle thing, and it might get you to six figures. But, it’s not going to get you pat that.  You’re going to be at six figures, but you’ll be burned out and missing your family. I know so many women that are in that grind.

You need better systems in place and you need those higher level strategies.

There was another shift, too.  Previously, I was running my business and doing a lot of live launching. I’d create this program that I would launch maybe 1 to 3 times a year.  It would be at very high stakes, because that’s a secure income for the next couple of months – very high stress. With my personality, I like precision and I like organization. That’s not to say that I can’t jump and take risks, because I take a whole lot of it. But, I also like to have some structure in place, because that’s where I can show up as my highest self. This year, I really shifted away from doing live launching. I haven’t been jumping on live video every single day like I was in 2017, because I have this whole infrastructure that’s now built on the back end of my business with automated funnels.

I have passive income coming in every single day, and I don’t have to stress out about when the next big launch is going to be.

I’m able to scale in that way.  

There’s so many ways that you can make money online, but I think the bottom line is: find the way to sell that aligns with you.

AB: That’s so important.  Proximity is power. Who you’re spending your time with, who you are around.  Are you with people who are either where you’re at or even a little bit further than where you are right now; where you want to be? I think that’s definitely changed the game of my business. I remember when entering WBA, I could see everything that you were doing right, and the amount of women that you had come into these programs. It was incredible. And then I remember thinking, I want to have the best freebies, and the best funnels, and I want to have all the great things right now.

But I think it’s important – like you said – not to compare your Chapter 1 to someone else’s Chapter Twelve.  You have to be patient. It takes years, but all of this stuff grows and it builds and it comes with time.
So, I work with a lot of women who are in a phase of trying to claim their expertise. They are trying to figure out how to step out in a very noisy saturated market. How do you help your clients to accomplish this?

JC: Well, the first thing that I always like to say to people is to take a look at the level of belief.

There is a belief that it is a saturated market. There are billions of people online. And especially for network marketers, a lot of times the people that are on their News Feed are all network marketers.  

They’re thinking, “Oh my God, there’s 40 million Beachbody coaches. There’s no customers that are out there. Everybody’s heard of this company.” That’s actually not the case!

If you’ve got a friend that’s not in this world of online marketing, when you look at their Facebook, it looks like a completely different platform. Like, my boyfriend is all musical theatre videos and political commentary.  

So, that’s a good reminder for everyone.  Even right now, I’m following a lot of peers who are business coaches or life coaches, and sometimes I’m like, “Oh my God, there’s so many of us.” But, in the grand scheme, there’s actually not.  We’re just in our bubble.

I encourage people to get outside the bubble a little bit.

If you’re a network marketer and those are the only people you follow, you can kindly unfollow some of those people so that you can have a moment to breathe.  You can really come out with your own content.

Your subconscious mind is influencing your ideas and the content that you produce.

So, if you’re following too many people who are also doing the same thing you’re doing, your content will be speaking to your peers instead of speaking to your ideal client.

Your peers are not the people that are going to be enrolling in your business.

So, how do people figure out their expertise?
One of my favorite things that I teach is figuring out your niche.  I even have a “Pitch to Your Niche” program. That’s the foundational piece that a lot of people are missing.

They’re afraid that they don’t have expertise. My answer to that is, “What makes somebody an expert?”

To be an “expert,” do you need to have a doctorate in something? Do you have to have 70 plus years of experience? Or is it possible that, if you’re a mom that just gave birth you know six months ago and who lost the postpartum weight… Can you help a mom in that same place, even though you’ve only done it six months ago? Of course!

Honestly, the fact that you have recent experience with that area is a benefit to you, because you know what’s working in the market today.

You can specifically recall the things that you had to go through to get from point A to point B.

Also, people are afraid to niche down. They don’t want to pick a specific sliver of people in the market to solve a really specific problem. Especially in network marketing; they believe their products can help everyone, so they stay general.

Niching down is perceived as going from having this huge ocean with a large net to having this really small pool with a smaller net. But, if you’re being general in your messaging with copy and paste posts, you’re not really speaking to anyone. Your post gets scrolled past.

When you understand your ideal client and your niche, you’re fishing with the right bait.

When you get really clear with your content, it’s like you have a dog whistle on social media that only your ideal client can hear.

When you’re speaking to them and using their language, they perk right up. Then, you start getting those inbox messages that are like, “Girl, you get me. You are in my head today.” And that’s when you start really being able to step forward as an authority and a leader in your industry. Even if you’re a business coach, what type of business coach are you?  Do you work with network marketers or coaches? A business coach for a network marketer is going to be different than a business coach for jewelry designers on Etsy.

AB: 100%.

JC: A lot of people tell themselves that they have a hard time figuring it out.  That’s just a story. That’s a belief. If you didn’t believe that, what would you want it to be? Give yourself full permission to just explore what would be fun to you to build over the next 10 years.

AB: Yeah, this is super important. This definitely changed the game in my business. Again, coming from network marketing, I thought I had to talk to everybody and anybody to grow. But, I’ve never seen a bigger disconnect in my success. I know this is a really difficult thing for people to start doing; to figure out why they want to serve or who they want to serve.  But, you want it to feel like your courses and content are customized to those specific people. You want them to feel a certain way when they’re reading it. I think a lot of the time when we forget that, we’re just talking so vaguely and then we’re wondering why nobody is connecting to the content, Obviously, you’ve experienced that in your own business?

JC: Oh my gosh, of course. Even when I was in network marketing, I realized that I accidentally fell into a niche just by sharing my story.

Before I got clarity in my business, I was crushing it at sales, but I was just signing on anyone and everyone. Inside my online coaching groups, it was just a mishmash of people.  I had a girl in college who didn’t have a kitchen, so she needed a plan that she could follow while eating in the cafeteria. Meanwhile, I had a guy who was looking to bulk up and take more supplements without really following the workouts.  Then, I had a girl who was struggling with emotional eating.

They were all really cool people and I connected with them individually.
But, there was no cohesiveness of that tribe.
I always think about the movie Mean Girls when they walk into the cafeteria and each table is a defined clique. Your people want to feel like they’re at the right table. And it’s not about excluding anyone. You need to repel some people in order to have a profitable business. People get upset over this; they don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings and they don’t want anyone to disagree with them.

But, at the end of the day: a profitable business is one that repels people.

Look at Planet Fitness.  They’re a $4 to $5 billion company, and they’ve increased their profits  by 14%. But, they’ve freakin’ niched down! They repel people that they don’t want in their gym by having a “Lunk Alarm.”  They’re a judgment free zone, and they’re very aggressive about who they don’t want in there.

So, when you’re running challenge groups with Beachbody, Advocare, or Isagenix… I don’t care what company you’re with, but you have got to create your own personal brand outside of the products that you sell.  You really need to create that tribe.

AB: Definitely. I remember this conversation that I had right before I joined a course.  My mentor Derek asked, “Why don’t you believe in yourself enough to stand out from behind the company?” I genuinely did not know, but it was this massive fear of being seen for who I am. Here’s the thing: yes, it’s about being profitable. But, from a health perspective, I think you need to also realize that you have people’s health in your hands. You cannot physically serve everybody. You cannot help an emotional eater, a woman with postpartum depression, and a vegan all the same way. Especially if you’ve never walk to their shoes.  I look back and I think, “I can’t believe I tried to help them. I hope I didn’t make things worse for them.”

It’s not just about people’s feelings.  
It’s not just about earning money.
Their health, their happiness, and their success is in your hands.
You have to put them at the forefront of what it is that they need. And I think what makes you extremely successful is when you stop making it all about you.

JC:  I’m so glad you’re saying this, because I don’t think enough people talk about this.  
You can’t teach what you don’t know.

People really just want to help, but they need to consider: am I truly serving this person at the highest level? If you haven’t walked in their shoes, then you’re not.

AB: So important. And that’s coming from a space of abundance versus lack or scarcity.  It’s being able to say, “Okay, maybe this person is not the best fit for this, but I know that there is somebody coming my way that does need what I know.” It’s OK to say no. We don’t want to say no because it’s money and it’s sales. But, in the long run, if they’re not getting results, then are you feeling successful?

Anyway, we can talk about this on and on, so let’s pivot a little.  I’m curious as to how you used live video for growth. Especially last year, when you were doing all your course launches, but I know you still utilize so much right now. How has this been so incredibly important and effective in growing your business and creating success for you?

JC: Live video is a game changer. In March of 2016, I had already missed the boat of jumping on Periscope and being an early settler there. I had dabbled with Periscope, but didn’t really feel like I had any home runs on that. At the time, I was a co-organizer of a Law of Attraction meetup group. I was the youngest person there; probably by about 20 to 30 years. A lot of them were trying to do life coaching, and I remember saying, “Live video is about to change the game on Facebook. You might not have a social media following right now, but you guys have got to get on this platform.”

My business absolutely transformed. I was able to show up and connect with people on such a high level, and so much faster than before.

I enjoy writing posts, but I’m not a blog writer. When I sit down to try to write e-mails to my list, it takes me SO much time. It’s embarrassing how much time it takes me.  I miss the energy of connecting with someone in conversation, and I try to do too many things when I write. I just know, for myself, that live video is where I can create the most impact and the most connection, because I have real conversations with people.

I’m interacting live with those people who are potentially going to invest with me.
I’m getting to answer their questions right then and there.

I don’t think my business would even be a tenth of what it is today. I actually don’t even want to think about what it would look like had live video never come along.

AB: I’m curious. So many women are scared shitless by live video, and I don’t blame them. When I first joined your course, and you had mentioned how great live video was, I was like peeing my pants when I first tried to go live.  But I did it, and then eventually it gets easier and easier and easier. But, what are the tips that you give to these women who are so scared to start but they know how important it is for their business?

JC: Well, I will say that when I did my first live video on Facebook, I did on my business page because I knew no one was watching. I did it on a Saturday night at 9:00.

I had a paper towels under my armpits, because the stress sweat was so real. I was oil blotting my face, and I reapplied my makeup about 15 times. It was the worst video ever. I had no idea what I was doing, and I was completely terrified. So trust me when I tell you: I get it. And even though I come from an acting background, I was scared to do it. Terrified. It’s a completely different skill set than probably anything you’ve ever done, so you’re not alone in the awkwardness feeling.

But, I think the first thing that freaks people out is that they don’t really have an audience yet on social media.

They are afraid to go live because they don’t want a random person from high school (who they didn’t really like) to watch the video. They don’t want their aunt and uncle to see the video. They’ve got all of these people who are not their ideal client that are following them on social media. They’re afraid to show up as this next-level version of themselves in front of them. So, if you’re that person and you want to ease into live video, I would say start by going live either on Instagram or inside of a Facebook group. So, if your network marketing company has a group of challengers or customers, start going live in there. You know who you’re speaking to when you’re on those videos.
Also, get clarity on your ideal client and who you’re specifically trying to serve with this video.  If not, you’ll be all over the place. Once you know your avatar and you know your niche, it’s going to be so much easier for you to get on video, because you know what problem you’re solving with that content.
Before I get on live video, I’ll ask myself, “Who am I specifically creating this video for?”
A lot of times, an idea will come to me from a question.  Like, “Oh, a student Amanda asked me this really great question the other day.” So, I’m going to imagine that I’m sitting there talking to her and just giving my response.

AB: Those are such golden freaking nuggets. So then, how do you take it to the next step where you are actually effectively selling through live video?

JC: Yes. So, in terms of a sales strategy through live video, I think it really comes down to knowing what your offer is and being really, really clear on what the transformation is.

I’ve seen people create videos on “my why for why I’m in this company.” That’s not about your client. That’s about you. Yes, they want to know what’s in it for THEM.
We are all incredibly selfish.
We’re scrolling social media and there’s an abundance of content. Content is a commodity, so unless it’s going to help me in some way, give me a quick win, give me something new, or entertain me… then I am onto the next. So, with a video called, “My Why,” I don’t know how that serves me.

A sales approach to live video is really about giving a ton of value.
What are the problems that I solve for my specific niche audience? What do they need to hear today? And then breadcrumbing to that offer.

This is a little more in depth for strategy, but if you know the biggest objections that you get for your offer are either time or money, here’s what I did.

I created a whole 5 Day Money Manifestation Challenge, or a How to Attract Your Ideal Client Challenge. It taught them to practice affirmations and form new beliefs.  So, by helping them change their belief systems, they see money in a different way. Because, it’s never really about money. So, if I can help shift the belief around how much money is accessible to you, like I have a phone right here in this drawer that I could probably go and sell on eBay for a few hundred bucks. Well, that’s money that I haven’t cashed in. I think a lot of people are sitting on items like that, that they could totally flip. So, those are some of the things I talk about in that challenge.

Then when we led into the launch, we’re not coming into that objection anymore.

Because people have already been primed to have a different outlook on things, and it’s all for their empowerment.

It’s all for them to have more resources and be able to see what’s possible when they actually now have that money. Now they can invest and get to the goals that they’ve set for themselves.

AB: Yes.  You need that delicate dance between talking about you and sharing your story and being a relatable friend. However, when it’s coming to purchasing, they care about how it’s going to impact their life and how they’re going to reach his outcome on the other side of working with you. So, what do you feel was the key when it came to stretching into your six figure business? Do you feel like it was with strategy, or do you feel like it was energy or alignment? I know you’ve previously had successful seasons from both a burnout/hustle phase and now you’re doing the scalability phase. So now that you’ve been on both ends of the spectrum, what do you feel is really what gets you there?

JC: Alignment is the key to it all, and it really all comes down to mindset. There’s a million different strategies and tools that are out there. There’s more than one way to the waterfall.

I really just feel that if something doesn’t feel aligned to you, stop doing it and find another way.

I went to Business Mastery recently, and Tony Robbins said, “You always want to be building two businesses: the one you have now, and the one that you’re becoming.”
Maybe you don’t have an audience yet so you’re sending a million cold messages; it’s the only way you have an income.  You don’t have to send 100 messages a day. Send as many as you need to in order to keep the cash flow coming in, WHILE you’re building this new version of your business that maybe is a little more scalable.

If you’re not burnt out and you’re really enjoying your work, then I don’t think there’s anything that you need to change unless you are foreseeing problems coming.
Maybe now you have ten people on your team that are having one-on-one calls, but you want to grow the team to 100.  If you’re growing really quickly, then now would be the time to start putting other pieces in place. But, there’s no one right way to do it.  

As far as my business phases, there were lessons in both.
When I did live launches, social media was different.  Like, at that time when you were in my academy, live launches and live video were huge.  Now, everybody’s on there. So, unless you’ve been doing it consistently for months and months and months, it’s little bit harder to get people to watch your live videos. People are not really on Facebook as much anymore now. People are more on Instagram and listening to podcasts.

Social media has changed.
If you’re not willing to be adaptable and have that behavioral flexibility, you’re not going to win.

That speaks a lot to the network marketing ladies who are still doing strategies from 2015. You wouldn’t be using a phone from 2015, so why are you using a strategy from 2015? You can maximize your expertise, your gifts, and what you have to share to the world if you just dare to try something new.

AB: Yes, I made a post the other day because a couple women just keep sending these messages about posting about their products so they can hit a promotion. It just drives me right up the wall, because they’re using old tactics. Social media changes from month to month and year to year. Everything is always changing. You have to be adaptable. You have to be able to look at what’s working and what’s not. Be open to shifting things. Notice what feels good and what doesn’t.  Tap into that and trust your intuition.

I know that a really big passion of yours is NLP.  How can we help somebody who’s really stuck in fears of judgment, success, or failure? How can she rewire her thoughts and her beliefs a little bit?

JC: There’s a lot of fun processes that get into this, but the first question I ask is, “What specifically are you afraid of happening?”  A lot of times we have these blanket fears or things that we’ve told ourselves. It’s just kind of this looming thing in the background. But, once we unbox it and hold it in our hand, we realize that it’s not really a thing. We can use examples of “I’m afraid of being visible” or “I’m afraid of being an expert.”

As you start to dig, it gets a little bit more specific. Then we can consider the worst case scenario.  If you’re afraid of being visible, what do you think people are going to say? “Well, I think they’re going to tell me that I look stupid on video and that I should stop doing this.” Or, “They’re going to tell me I don’t deserve to be stepping forward.”

From there, perhaps you have to make a tactical move.  Maybe you have to let your family know that you’re going to unfriend them from social media, because you’re going to treat your social media platforms like a business now. And, if they want to connect with you on a personal level, they can text message you. That’s one way to solve fear.

Another question I ask is, “When did you decide that?”  

Some people make those assumptions after hearing their first “no.” But, when did you REALLY decide that?  When you were four years old and you raised a hand in class, and the teacher told you go to the principal’s office?  Then you decided it wasn’t safe to be seen or speak out?

As children, we’re like a walking subconscious mind; recording everything until 7 years old. So, we can go back to that early moment. Now, with our adult knowledge and perspectives, we are fully cognitively aware.

We can look at that moment and reflect on what was really happening in that situation. Maybe the teacher didn’t have her coffee that morning and she had a fight with her boyfriend. So, that’s why she was snapping. So, you start to look at it and have a new perspective.

The beauty is that you can change the decisions that you made in those pivotal moments.

AB: “When did you decide this?” That’s a really powerful.  I hope that you guys write that shit down. Tattoo it on you.  I’m not certified in NLP, but I’ve done a little research. But that “WHY” is something that I’m passion about. Why are you feeling the same way, and I keep digging deeper because I think it’s so important. I can’t help it. I just know that there is always a root of something a little bit deeper into when we’ve made this decision, why we act the way we act, or why we think the way we do. Why are we self-sabotaging?  I’m obsessed. We’ll have to do another episode on NLP.

But, you’re also a content master!  You’ve done a few freebies and challenges, but also courses I believe around actual content creation. So I’m curious, how do you create a lot of powerful content?  How do you continuously create content that never dies? What is a quick tip that you can give these women on how to do this?

JC: I mean, one of the biggest things for me is that I repurpose the heck out of everything that I do. So I do a live video, and that immediately gets turned into a podcast. Somebody else edits it and gets the show notes.  Another person makes a transcription of it and puts it into a blog post. Then, we tweak the video a little bit from the live, and it goes up on YouTube. Then the YouTube link is included in the blog. And now, we’re bringing the whole Pinterest strategy in and to actually start utilizing all these blog posts and getting people on them.

Repetition is is important.

People think they need to create new content all the time. You don’t.  You have new followers coming into your audience every single day. So, you want to be telling the same stories over and over again.

Seriously, last week I went through all of my posts from this past year. I copy and pasted them and prescheduled about 45 days’ worth of content just by tweaking things a little bit.

I went through my blog posts and found snippets, found new stories and rewrote them.

I’ve got my key buckets of content for creativity.

I talk a lot about mindset psychology, NLP, and manifestation; that’s one bucket. I talk a lot to network marketers and the specific strategies for that business model in another bucket.  I talk about overwhelm and burnout in another bucket. And, finally, I’m talking about business strategies and sales in the last bucket. I know that those are things that I’m always rotating through, depending on what I’m creating and what I’m launching.

So, the quick tips are: repurpose what you can, but do not try to do it yourself. Be okay with repetition, because that’s how you build your brand and your voice. Focusing on not trying to be all the things; just use your buckets of content.That’s gonna help me get a lot deeper in your content as well, instead of trying to cover all the things.

AB:  I also think that it’s important to repurpose. I think it’s important to utilize the same posts time and time again.  No matter how they find me, they’re getting that lesson and it’s saving me time and energy. It’s scalable.

JC: Exactly.

I don’t have time to sit and create a million new posts every month, and I don’t need to.

I’ve been creating content very consistently for many years and why would I not circle back to it?  I mean, if you’ve got great content, there’s no reason why you have to start from scratch every day.

AB: Yeah! I love this. You can use what you’re creating in so many avenues and save yourself so much time. I love this tip. I think this is so great that you mention this.

So, a lot of my clients right now are also in a season of networking or in a season of collaborating. They’re really finding strong business besties and people that they can connect with and scale with. So, what are some things that you feel are really powerful that you should do and some things that maybe are red flags?

JC: That’s such a good question. Yeah, networking is interesting. I knew when I was in network marketing, I didn’t really ever think about networking because it was all about who I would sign onto my team. That was what I was taught, and that was the mindset that was drilled.
Once I started my podcast, that was when things massively shifted. I started approaching people to be on my show. And then I realized that one of the biggest things for networking was actually having a podcast.

I will say the biggest thing that bothers me with networking is when people will send a message asking to “pick my brain.”

Listen, I’m all I’m down to get coffee and hang out, but what can you add to my life and my business?  All relationships have to be a two way street. If you want to work with me and you want to learn more about my business, then join my program and we can connect that way.

I think with podcasting or trading interviews on live video, that’s a great way to be able to give back to somebody.
You’re adding value to them by placing them in front of your audience and saying, “This person’s really awesome. You should listen to what they have to say.” That is giving them a little bit more exposure. Now, depending on who you are pitching, they may not need that exposure. But, there are people who are trying to be a New York Times Best-Selling author, and they will get in front of anyone and everyone. They will be on every single show. They don’t care, because they know that sometimes the people who have smaller audiences have more loyal audiences. So honestly, when people who I’m not super familiar with ask to bring me on, I do a little research to see if it aligns with my message. But also, I think it’s cool.  I’m getting to meet all these new people.

AB: So, how do you decipher this? This is something that comes up all the time. How do you spot someone who would not be a mutually beneficial relationship? How can you tell the difference other than maybe trusting your gut?

JC: Well, I think just kind of what you said with reading energy.  Someone with a “pick your brain” energy, to me, reads very amateur.  That’s a red flag to me if a person is super new and they don’t realize that’s not the most effective way to approach somebody.

What are some better ways to approach networking?  
For me, I’ll look at who somebody is following. I’ll see what type of content they’ve put out.  This one guy recently tagged me in something and proposed randomly listening to an episode of my podcast from almost a year ago.

He commented, “I loved this episode and here are all of the really specific things that I got out of it. I would absolutely love to connect with you.”
That really resonated with me. I feel like it’s really aligned with my audience and it wasn’t in a direct message. It was tagged publicly on Instagram. I thought that was pretty cool, because that gives credibility to the other person; he was willing to give me some public praise. I looked at this person’s stuff, and he had awesome videos and really quality content. I wrote back to him, and I said, “Dude, your content is awesome. I love your message. I love what you’re about.” He inbox messaged me with so much gratitude; he had been listening to my podcast for weeks.  So, he is somebody that I will totally go and connect with.

He had done his research. He was actually listening to the show. He is building up his own thing, and we don’t necessarily have the same audience, but he’s definitely at a certain level in his business of professionalism.

Doing your research and giving honest praise gets 100% attention, whether your audience is 10 or 10K people.

AB: So, let’s go back to Penny Pick-Your-Brainer… what do you do with her?  Do you ignore the message, or do you offer a consultation? Do you offer up your program? What’s that next step?

JC: It depends on the intention of the “picking your brain.”  Sometimes, people will say, “I really loved your podcast. I can’t afford your program yet, but I listened to this episode…” I may give them a free piece of content that they can go to and redirect them; just to warm them up and get them to know me a little bit more.

I don’t assume that everybody who listens to one podcast is the right fit for a program.

Then perhaps I’ll get somebody who just wants to come on my podcast.  But, they have no following, and they’re not being clear on the value they can add. Sometimes, I don’t have time to write back. As my business is growing, I do get a lot of emails with people pitching me; not just for the podcast but for random things.. Like, “You want me to promote your skin care line for free on my podcast?  I don’t know who you are. I don’t know anything about you.”

I have to protect my audience.

I used to feel like I had to respond to every person, but listen: this is a cutthroat world. People don’t have time to sit and babysit every single e-mail. If you’re not willing to put in the work and actually give me a good pitch, then it doesn’t warrant a response.

Another quick thing for networking: if you know someone that can make a connection for you, it makes it a lot more legit.

AB: Yeah.  You only have so much time and space. You have to have boundaries. You have to understand that you do have permission to say no. You don’t have to respond to everything; you can say yes to the things you want as your business scales.

JC: Yes.  And another thing, if you’re pitching: don’t make people work super hard to find out who you are. Give people specific podcast episodes.  

A great pitch example is, “Hey, I’d love to be on your show.  Here’s what I do and what I talk about.  Here are some example episodes that I could cover for your audience.  Here’s an example of a live video that recently spoke to one of those.”

I don’t bring anybody on unless I’ve heard a podcast episode of theirs, I know them personally, or I’ve seen a live video.

AB: 100 percent. I love this. I just want to know, if there’s any last piece of advice that you have for entrepreneurs who are just like you?  They’re daydreaming while they’re bartending; they have a vision of what they want to do. Do you have any last piece of advice for them?

JC: If you feel it in your gut, it’s there for a reason. Don’t allow anybody to talk you out of anything if you know this is what you were meant to do. You might not have the whole vision clearly painted yet, but just start taking inspired action. That’s all you need to do.

AB: Last question: What does being a wealthy babe mean to you?

JC: For me: 
Wealth means having abundance in every area of life, from the inside out!

AB: Beautifully said.  So now, where can all of our listeners find you and connect with you further?

JC: You can find me on my website: HeyJenCasey.com.  I’m also @heyjencasey on all social media platforms.  I’m also the host of The Inner Boss Podcast.