Franklin Taggart's Unconventional Life Blog

A few weeks ago I interviewed Michael Roderick, an impresario and media maker who I've grown to admire and appreciate. He sends out almost daily emails featuring his thinking on certain topics, and one of his recent messages really struck me. The title was Why a Lot of "Hits" Miss. While we creators like to think we're making something everyone in the world will need and appreciate, the decision is not ours to make. Micheal correctly points out that the market is the decider about what will gain widespread attention, acceptance, and acclaim.  His encouragement is for the creators to engage in the hard work of iteration instead of toiling to determine what the market wants and then create for that. Sadly, that formula rarely produces anything except what has already been popular. My encouragement is to pay more attention to your own resonance as a creator. Make the things that make you tingle, and then share them. I think the only aspect of the hitmaking process the cr...

Several years ago, I offered a workshop called Why People Don't Buy. I may resurrect it because I'm hearing that question quite a bit from some people I know. Some reasons are obvious - not the right time, not enough money, someone else sells it for less - but the reasons I really wanted to explore were the ones from people who had engaged with the message long enough to get to the point of sale but then bailed. Ten minutes isn't enough to give a comprehensive answer to the question, but I was able to pull a few of the top reasons people don't buy once they reach the sales page and share them here.  The biggest reason for a low number of purchases is that the page isn't reaching the right people. For many people, the front-end marketing was non-existent or thrown together as the last-minute detail they should have put more time and thought into. They skipped the SEO, didn't post on social, or didn't give people enough of a reason to go any further. Other rea...

One of the most popular episodes of Your Own Best Company in 2021 featured an energized and inspiring conversation with The Lead Boss, Cat Stancik. In this "Best Of" clip, Cat shares her social media content strategy, the 4 Ps: Popcorn Positioning Prospecting and Pitching Cat uses and recommends this conversational content framework as a part of her lead generation strategy that centers on building strong relationships and finding leads among the people you're already connected with. Find the entire episode here: https://youtu.be/BIYdUP2ZNlw To learn more about Cat, visit https://actionincubator.com #socialmedia #leadgeneration #contentstrategy 

Going through my email this morning, I was struck by how many I automatically deleted and the tone in many subject lines that led me to open the email and unsubscribe from their lists. After having a Gmail account for a couple of decades, I know I'm on every spammable list that has ever been made, but these emails were from lists I had once been interested in enough to subscribe to. Here are a few of the things I reacted to: ** Hyper-agitation of pain points. ** False urgency. ** FOMO ** Arrogance disguised as authority. ** The pretense of knowing what I need. Now I get that we've all learned how to attract and define our audience not only with the positive but also with the negative, but I noticed the trend was mainly to the negative and not being completely well(I've had a doozy of a cold), I internalized it more than I usually do. This marketing didn't feel good. I think there are better ways. Referenced in the video: Jess Kotzer - Check out her recent YouTube shorts...

Thanks for the positive feedback and the interest in What's Your Next Step? A Choose your Own Adventure Business Masterclass coming up this Thursday, August 25th, at 10 AM Mountain Time. I've featured interviews with the other six coaches on the program for the past week, and I have been asked to share what I'll be focusing on in the breakout session I'll be leading. When I was asked to identify the area I wanted to be my focus for the event, I came back to my favorite area of business - marketing. I've talked at length before about how much my views of marketing have changed. I used to loathe every minute I spent in marketing. It was difficult, exhausting, and not very fruitful. In order to get better at it, I didn't have to start thinking positively about the activities I didn't enjoy. That never worked! But I had to start evaluating how I was bringing my business and my clients together and let go of the things that didn't work. As I started to do tha...

▼Watch and Listen Below!▼ Back in February, I made a book recommendation video for a book I had just read called Quiet Marketing: A Calm, Minimal Approach to Business and Online Visibility for Highly Sensitive Solopreneurs (Amazon Associate link: https://amzn.to/3oMCxES ) This short book is packed with essential insights, principles, and practices for highly sensitive and intuitive people who have found their way into business ownership. I'm delighted today to introduce you to the author of Quiet Marketing, Danielle Gardner. In addition to being an author, Danielle is a business mentor and tiny course creator. Her work with clients is centered around taking a calm, minimal approach to business and online visibility that is especially suited to Highly Sensitive solopreneurs.   In today's conversation, we hear about: Dani's career evolution from leaving the perks and paychecks of the corporate world to pursuing work more aligned with her gifts. Creating your own definition of...

You may have heard the old sales trope about people don't buy the drill; they buy the hole. I take that even further and suggest that people buy the enhancement to their life from the painting hung on the hook held by the screw in the wall that was put into the hole drilled by the drill. For the creators I work with who struggle with their pricing, I like to say that your price isn't for the object; it's for the desired experience. People buy things because of the experience of life they desire. And often, they're inspired to buy when certain experiences are suggested. When I learned this for myself, playing gigs became less an exchange of attention for money, and they became a more holistic offer - the music was a part of the enhanced experience of being together and enjoying an evening out. As I started to approach gigs that way, I started to make more money both in the pay for the gig and in tips. Tips skyrocketed. This doesn't just apply in artistic circumstance...

I have an artist friend who had a realization in one of my workshops that many people she had known for years had no idea she was an artist. For reasons unknown, she never revealed her creative work to people, even those in some of her closest circles. And her chief concern about being an artist was that people weren't buying her art. People won't buy what they don't know about. Another friend has been working with a lot of anxiety and persistence on clarifying the niche for his business and in doing so, his business has come to a standstill. He's so concerned about getting his niche right that he's become isolated and is not reaching anyone. I'm not here to diss ideal client avatar niching exercises. They can be truly helpful, but I am concerned if your stuckness on the exercise is keeping you from meeting people and having conversations that could lead to business opportunities. I'll be offering a new version of an old workshop on Monday afternoon called C...

A lost afternoon at a trout pond with a five-year-old is the inspiration for today's Coffee Break. If we're making money by selling anything, one of the questions we have to ask is whether there is a demand for it. I work with some artists who don't believe there is a demand for things like art, but I challenge them to find a building in the world that doesn't have some kind of creative something somewhere. That said, if what we offer isn't selling, we need to look at a couple of options. Are we fishing in the right pond? Have the fish already been fed? Do we just need to come back tomorrow? Is there anything you can do to stimulate the appetite? The conditions have to be right for the sale to go through. If the horse is full, the carrot won't work. Enough metaphors for now. Go make something and then sell it. #creativebusiness #selling #marketing 

In the couple of days since I released the Elevator Pitches That Don't Suck Course, I've had a few messages from people who talked about the difficulty they experience knowing what to say when they're asked to talk about themselves, even in a simple introduction. I know how that feels. In this Coffee Break, I have some reflections and insights to share and a couple of suggestions that people in this situation may find helpful. Just know that it is a common problem, and even people who appear to talk about themselves easily sometimes have had a hard road getting to that point. I think the best news in relation to your elevator pitch is that you are probably the last thing you should be talking about when you're meeting new people. The story they're really interested in is theirs! This is the last time I'll be mentioning the Boost Your Business Bundle, and it's only available until tomorrow, so take this last chance and at least sign up for the free Standard B...

I feel lucky to have gotten this far and to have only a few regrets. I don't want to dwell on it, but there is a link between one of my top regrets and the course I just launched. If I could go back and do one thing differently, I would choose to have been more assertive in creating opportunities and inviting people to join me. I had a habit of waiting to be invited to join people, so I was left out of many things I would have loved to join. My passivity was the thing that led to my exclusion. What does that have to do with elevator pitches? As it turns out, quite a bit. If you listen to the way many people introduce themselves to a new group, you might be surprised to find their introductions are passive, and they don't offer an invitation for the next step in a relationship. In my own case, changing my elevator pitch to a more assertive style of creating an appealing invitation and telling people how to accept it was the turning point in my feelings of confidence and success ...

If you're experiencing lack or scarcity in your business or work, one suggestion I have is to watch how isolated you are. One thing that a business, like we humans, needs is connection. We're designed to thrive in groups of all sizes and shapes. And we're also given a natural process to recover from trauma and pain that often includes periods of isolation. In this Coffee Break, I'm thinking about the important distinction between isolation and solitude. Both have their place, but they're often confused. I heard Barbara Sher give a TEDx talk in which she said that isolation is the real opportunity killer, not attitude, and I think there is something to that. If you're too isolated as you're starting and growing your business, you're going to have more struggles than those who are more well connected and active within the communities they serve. Before you take a marketing or sales class, first reach out to the people who need what you have. Those connecti...

In yesterday's coffee break, I asked what role you want to be remembered for. Today, I build on the same questions, but I want to know which specialty you want people to associate with you and how do you communicate it? Part of your business niche or audience identity comes from knowing your own specialty and being able to articulate it in a way that people will remember and understand.  Your specialty is one aspect of your business or craft that needs to stand out from among all the others like you. It differentiates you from them. It also helps potential customers make decisions about working with you or buying your products and services. Take some time and write about your specialty in as much detail as you can. This will help you communicate it more clearly when you're asked about what you do.  #positioning #h2hmarketing #specialization

Today on the Coffee Break I'm thinking about how people tend to only create one association in their minds for each other. People tend to think of me in one of a few roles, but never all three. A common challenge for people in new roles or organizations is helping people see and remember them in a new way.  In marketing, a lot of importance is put on positioning your business as the one to remember in your area of service. Are you helping people create this association with you in their minds?  #positioning #customerperception #h2hmarketing

I'm feeling energized and optimistic going into 2022. One new commitment is to upload a coffee break vidpod every day this year. They'll be short videos on a variety of topics and points of view. I'm also reintroducing my monthly workshop series after a five-year hiatus. The first workshop will be live on Zoom on Saturday, January 8th, 2022 on Zoom. We'll be learning how to play along with social media algorithms to build better relationships, reach more people, and get better results from our social media activity. Visit the workshop page on my website for more info. If you can't attend the live workshops, the recordings from each will be posted at my school the day after the live events. Enrollment will be opening very soon... https://www.franklintaggart.com/p/workshops.html #podcast #workshop #socialmediaalgorithm

▼▼▼Watch and Listen Below▼▼▼ Since 2008, Adil Amarsi has helped clients generate over $821 Million in sales directly from his copywriting. Add to that the amount his consulting clients, copywriting mentees, and students have generated and the total is $1.2 Billion. He’s written advertising copy for top marketing agencies in the UK and US, high-performing ads for Tony Robbins, and campaigns that have added millions to his clients’ bottom lines.  He has also developed a copywriting structure called the StorySelling Matrix that incorporates strong brand identity with a message balanced between emotion and logic, finishing with a Call-To-Action that builds anticipation. To learn more about the StorySelling Matrix, access your download here: https://greatestcopywriteralive.com   Now as a mentor to other copywriters and business owners, Adil teamed up with Shiv Shetti  to form the CMMP: The Copywriting Mastery Mentoring Program. Their purpose with this program is to help mentee...

▼▼▼Watch and Listen Below!▼▼▼ Writing for advertising and marketing looks like it should be simple - use words that can be understood by a 10-year-old, keep your sentences short, and lots of exclamation points – what could be so hard about that? But the truth is that even accomplished writers struggle to find the right words, flow,  and structure to promote their books, their products, and their businesses effectively. It turns out that copywriting is a field with many specialties and specific disciplines that you didn’t learn in high school English class.   In this episode, marketing consultant and copywriter Breanna Gunn helps us to understand more about copywriting, some of the specialties within the field, and why we will want to enlist the help of a professional when it’s time to promote what we offer. We’ll hear about the differences between copywriting and other forms of communication. We’ll learn where to find the right copywriters we need. And we’ll explore the...

  ▼▼▼Watch and Listen Below!▼▼▼ The need for business owners to consistently create marketing and sales content that stands out in an increasingly noisy marketplace reaching the right people with the right message at the right time. Cynthia Trevino teaches life coaches, creatives, and consultants how to get their amazing knowledge out of their heads and onto paper, so they can show up online and share...consistently!  She is a writer who’s been blogging since she had to explain what a blog was,  she’s published a book, and is a master * content re-purposer * She’s 100% a late bloomer, waiting to become an entrepreneur till she was over 50 and after a massive corporate downsizing. She says, “ I'm a master at brainstorming...it's one of few valuable lessons I learned "in corporate.“  Cynthia serves solopreneurs who want to show up online, having their messages and content ready to share so they can start relationships with their audiences of future clients, customers, ...

▼▼▼Watch and Listen Below!▼▼▼ Are you ready to toss out complicated overly automated tech and funnels that are expensive and time-consuming to build, never work as well as people told you they would, and honestly make you want to tear your hair out?   My guest in this episode is Cat Stancik, The Lead Boss.  She's going to share a simple and strategic approach to consistently fill your pipeline with highly qualified leads that are ready to buy, so you can hit your revenue targets predictably and spend your time the way you want. Known as the Lead Boss, Cat works with time-crunched Experts and Entrepreneurs, who want to multiply their 6 figures over and over again to scale past 7 and beyond. To download Cat's three-part training, including her one-hour-a-day lead gen strategy, social media swipe file, and close script, visit https://fullybooked.ceo !

Video and Audio below ↓↓↓ Marketing and selling can both be intimidating activities to new business owners, but they are the lifeblood of your business. Alison Proffit is a Soulful Sales & Profitability Success Coach, helping small businesses approach their sales and pricing strategies from the heart instead of just the head. She’ll work with you on mindset, clarifying offers, up-leveling prices, and how to confidently sell through the art of connection with the support of customized scripting work and role-playing sales conversations. Selling becomes less stressful and abundantly more fun when working with Proffit Coach! Alison attempted to start her own coaching business 4 times. The key word there was "attempted". Each of these attempts failed. Primarily because of a lack of knowledge of what it meant to be a good salesperson. Having worked in the HR field for 15 years and receiving coaching certification, the business ideas were good ones, and the services that she of...