March 1, 2023 • 20 mins
Join Samantha Whisnant on her amazing journey of self-made success! This global entrepreneur shares how she has used systemization to help coaches scale their businesses all the way up to 7 figures.
Not only that, but these automation strategies provide the time and flexibility for a lifestyle most people can only dream about! Don't miss your chance - tune in now to get inspired by this savvy business woman's unique insights into automations and scaling quickly.
🎯 Book your FREE Podcast Strategy Call now at podvantage.ai/vip
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
welcome to the Seven FigureBuilder Show.
My name is Julie Barick, founderof Seven Figure Builder, where
we help high achieving businessowners save time in their
business every single week byimplementing marketing
automation to scale theirbusiness to seven figures and
beyond.
And I'm here today with myfriend Samantha.
How are you, Samantha?
Good.
I'm so excited to be here.
I'm thrilled to have you.
(00:20):
So for those that haven't hadthe pleasure of meeting you yet,
can you tell me a little bitabout what you do with your
business?
Absolutely.
So I'm a an online businessmanager for six and seven figure
coaches and online coursecreators and service providers.
And I just help them organizeand automate their business so
they can actually focus ongrowth and kind of, I handle the
business side of the businessand they get to be in their zone
(00:41):
of genius, whether that'scoaching or copywriting or,
whatever that is, that theylove.
Awesome.
So is that, what type ofservices do you help them with?
Is it more like on the projectmanagement side?
Is it with your clients?
Like what?
What do you help them with?
Yeah, so I have a few retainerclients that I help them more
with the day-to-day stuff.
And then the overall automationand streamlining of the
business.
(01:02):
And then I also have someone-off services that are more
built just for people who needjust like quick systems built
who don't ne necessarily needthat longer term support, maybe
they just need a DTO set up orthey are growing in their
business and they need thosefoundational systems set up.
But they, don't have that yet.
So I will work with them forabout 30 days, get everything
(01:23):
set up, and then usually theyare good to be on their own for
a few months or if they do havea team in place, I teach the
team how to use it.
Okay.
Very cool.
And do you have specific systemsor tools or things that you like
to go to, or what do you usuallyuse with them?
Yeah, I mostly focus on theclient experience, so really
(01:44):
streamlining like the clientonboarding experience and just
the overall client managementexperience, like what that you
have through your programs.
So with that, we use a lot oftools like Dodo or HoneyBook
along with Zapier.
And then we also use those toolsalong with Click Up or Asana on
the project management side aswell, just to make sure we're
really tracking everything so noone slips through the cracks.
(02:05):
That's one of my things is I.
Would never want someone to feellike they're just a number in a
program.
So we really want every clientwho works with any of my clients
to feel like they are reallysupported and they, have all of
their expectations are met, orthey have, my client has gone
above and beyond with, theirservices.
Totally.
That's awesome.
And I know you focus on helpingthem implement automation in
(02:27):
their business.
Something that's very near anddear to my heart is that high
touch customer experience.
So how do you encourage thatwith your client?
Yeah, I think just reallyimplementing a system that is as
automated as possible.
So a lot of it is not reliant onus but still has those
touchpoints.
So one of a really great clientex, a really great client
(02:50):
onboarding experience I builtrecently where.
It is for a group program.
And so with a group program,there is just a lot more
support.
And the, those, touchpoints.
So we do have it where theclient is just doing a checkout,
but then whenever they paythrough the checkout, then they,
they get a welcome email thatlays out all of the
expectations.
They automatically get the linkto join the Slack channel.
(03:13):
They automatically get access,to everything they needed
through Cajabi.
Because there is also coursematerials in the program.
So they feel on their end like,wow, I've already got so much
stuff immediately.
And there's not like thatawkward okay, I paid so what
now?
Now what?
Yeah, like now what?
Let me have some buyer's remorseand, think about it.
(03:34):
So we wanna give them as much aspossible and also just lay out
the expectations as quickly aspossible.
Okay, here's what you canexpect, join the Slack channel.
We'll be in touch with you assoon as possible.
And then we also have anautomation set up where when
someone joins, we get notifiedon our end.
And a task is set up for ourclient success manager and her
job is to go in and welcomeevery single person that joins
(03:55):
and message them directly andsay, Hey, thanks so much for
joining.
We're so excited to have youhere.
And we also even have, anautomation that is setting up a
Google Drive folder for thatperson with their name.
So the client success managercan go in, grab that folder and
give that to, and be like, Hey,here's your Google Drive folder.
It's already set up for you.
We have an automation that putsdocs that they need in there
(04:17):
already.
So it's just really, doingeverything cleaning out all the
kinks and making it as easy aspossible for us to be able to do
our job and follow up with theclients and be in touch with the
clients, but also so the clientfeels wow, this was so easy and
there was, there's no wonderinglike, what's next?
Like I know exactly what to do.
I absolutely love that.
(04:38):
I totally love to geek out in mybusiness and have exactly what
you just said in place.
So it's oh, that's awesome.
Yeah.
I love it.
Like I am just like so proud ofmyself for setting up this
automation cuz I'm like, wow,this truly is like amazing.
Oh my God.
And it saves so much time, bothfor your clients, for you,
everybody.
(04:58):
Yeah.
It just makes things run so muchsmoother.
Yeah.
And it's also, I think, a mentalenergy thing because I know for
me, it's hard to be in meetingsand, really be present with your
clients whenever you're alsothinking about, maybe five
things you have to do Yeah,after the meeting, or, oh, I
forgot to send that contract,or, oh, I need to reach out to
this person.
Because you don't have thoseautomations in place.
(05:20):
So it's, I think it's also ahuge mental energy suck as well.
Totally.
Totally.
And then, you've got a newclient and they're already 15
steps ahead that you could justjump right in.
You don't have to do all thepaperwork behind the scenes.
It just works.
Yeah, exactly.
Like the system works so wellbecause then it's like my, all
my client has to do is get onthe kickoff call.
Like we even have a callscheduler sent out automatically
(05:41):
when someone joins.
And so really the Google Drivefolder's already created.
The worksheet that she's gonnafill out during the call is
already in the Google Drivefolder for her.
The call's already scheduled.
So it's really just the actual,she can focus on the actual,
one-on-one interaction and notscrambling behind the scenes of,
oh, I need to make a folder andI need to find that template.
(06:01):
And, and remember the processthat you have to go through too.
Yeah.
Yes, exactly.
Most clients I would think, orfrom my experience, are not that
organized.
And I think that one of thebenefits of automation is it
forces you to create thatprocess and to streamline that
process and to make things sothey really work well.
(06:22):
And then you can automate them,right?
But you have to have somethingto automate That works well
otherwise you're just creatingnoise and distraction in your
business.
So do you help your clients workout the kinks in that and map
out what's possible or how dothey come to that end product?
Yeah, definitely.
I think the first step before Ireally automate anything is.
(06:43):
Outlining the process andgetting super clear because
that's, like you said,automation doesn't really work
if you don't have a clearprocess in place because the
thing with automation is that ithas to be the same every time or
similar every single time.
Otherwise it breaks or,something gets sent out that's
not supposed to be sent out or,it's just, it's not gonna work
as you wanted to.
(07:04):
And that causes a lot offrustration.
Whenever I'm working with anyclient, even if it's just
developing like a contentautomation or a content creation
process, we sit down and we mapout.
Okay?
First step one, we're going torec like brainstorm ideas.
Step two is going to berecording the actual content.
Step three is gonna be editingstep four.
Writing captions and it bebrings a lot of clarity, I think
(07:26):
to clients' businesses as wellbecause so much of your business
just lives in your head.
And especially when you'reworking and you don't have a big
team or anything and you don'treally need to take those
processes out of your head.
And put them down anywhere.
But whenever you do startgrowing and you do start hiring
other people, it becomes reallyhard to hire people and work
with other people when thoseprocesses are still living in
(07:49):
your head and you can'tcommunicate those, effectively
to your team.
So that's always the first thingwe do is just outline.
Step by step exactly what wewant to happen.
We do like an ideal world anddream fairy land best case
scenario, and then we workbackwards from there.
And maybe not everything can betotally automated, but for the
most part we can automate a lotof things and it's a lot easier
(08:10):
working backwards than it istrying to, go forward and build
that way.
Totally.
And do you put in place like anytype of reporting for them so
they know what's happening?
It's, the magic behind thescenes give them?
Yeah, definitely.
We, I do like monthly metricsreporting and we just look at
all of the normal reportingstuff.
So opt-ins page views salescalls booked, whatever we're
(08:34):
really focusing on is, that'sgonna be the main thing that
we're looking at.
And then I think, It's reallyeasy to also, put that off of on
a team as well.
Whenever you're just monitoringemail metrics and you have
something with, sorry, lemmegather my thoughts.
That's fine.
Yeah.
With something like, when you'retracking email metrics or
(08:56):
something, it's very easy to geta really good process in place
of okay, here we're just lookingat the open rates, click through
rates.
If something's over a certainnumber, that's, great.
If something's under cert,certain number, we really wanna
be, make sure to tag that andflag that and look at why that's
happening.
And also I guess if something'sabove, because if it's above,
then we wanna be doing more ofthat.
(09:16):
Definitely.
Totally.
But that's really something, ifyou can outline that process or
even film yourself, doing itwith Loom or a screen recording,
you can easily, put that projectonto a VA every month and they
can, do that for you and thenyou can just look at the final
numbers.
Absolutely.
Now, on a more personal note,where are you located?
I am living in Amsterdam rightnow.
(09:38):
Wow.
Very cool.
I'm originally from the States,but I moved here about six
months ago.
Okay, awesome.
So do you help clients overthere or in the states, or where
do your clients live?
Mostly.
Most of my clients live in theStates because I am from there
and I've lived there for solong.
I really enjoy working withpeople from the states or in
Canada.
(09:58):
That's also where I work with alot of people as well.
Yeah, the Dutch business lawsare a bit confusing here, so I
haven't really made it mymission to try to find a lot of
Dutch climbs yet.
Yeah, I'm sure that's quite anadjustment.
That's awesome though.
And how do you balance businessand family life, like just
juggling everything?
(10:19):
What does that look like foryou?
Yeah, I think the number onething is just I really try to
have super clear priorities.
I do travel a lot for work.
I was just in New York last weekand I'm actually going to Mexico
tomorrow.
And whenever you are travelingand working, it's so easy to
just get lost and everythingthat's going on because you're
out of your normal routine.
(10:39):
So when I'm home and I have mynormal routine, it's very easy
to.
Get a lot of work done.
Like I know my capacity for workat home, obviously that shrinks
whenever I'm traveling.
Or if I just have a busy week,if I have a really social week
and a lot going on.
So the number one thing I try todo is just have super clear
priorities of, these are thethree things I absolutely have
to get done this week.
Obviously my client work is oneof my higher priorities, right?
(11:03):
And then, what do I need to doto take care of myself, even if
that's just taking 30 minutes togo on a walk, every day to clear
my head.
Or.
Yeah, making sure I'm makingtime to spend time with my
partner or, spend time withfriends.
How am I working all of thoseinto my schedule?
I think working online andworking for yourself, it can be
hard because there is no end,right?
(11:25):
There's always this ever goingto-do list and never really
ends.
And so something, one of myfriends told me, A while ago was
to have it done.
So I love this advice because itreally helps me because I could
just go on and on, and if I'mhaving a really good day, I
could just tag, tag things on tomy to-do list.
Oh, I already finishedeverything I was supposed to do
today.
(11:46):
Now I'm gonna start doing allthis other stuff.
But then that kind of leads toburnout, right?
Because we're just.
End up overworking ourselves.
So one thing, one another tipthat she gave me was to, define
you're done at the beginning ofthe day.
These are the, five things Ineed to do today, three things I
need to do today, and afterthat, then the rest of the time
is for me and I'm going to, reada book or go hang out with my
(12:07):
partner or go walk aroundwhatever that looks like, I'm
just gonna get off my laptop.
Totally.
Yeah.
And I think that helps give asense of achievement versus just
overloading yourself like, oh,I'm more efficient than I
thought I was, and now I can bemore and more, more.
And you just, and then you don'tfinish that last task and you're
like, oh, I didn't do anythingfor you today.
Exactly.
I totally hear you.
(12:29):
So looking for the year ahead,what is the most life-changing
goal for you this coming year?
Oh, that's such a greatquestion.
The most life-changing goal forme.
I know it's hard to think cuz Ijust moved to Amsterdam last
year, so I'm like, that was solife-changing.
How do you wanna need that?
I know.
I'm like move somewhere else.
No.
I think this year I'm reallyfocusing on expanding my
(12:51):
business into more passiverevenue stream.
So I've been creating some miniproducts.
I wanna grow my team a bit.
I wanna, guess on more podcastsand, potentially do some
speaking things.
So I think really just expandingmy reach is my number one goal.
And that would definitely belife changing because obviously
with, a lot of pa with morepassive things it's not
(13:11):
necessarily less work, but it isless one-on-one work.
I've been doing one-on-one workfor over three years now, and I
do love working one-on-one withmy clients.
But it would be nice to have alittle bit of buffer on the
backend.
Yeah.
And passive income isincredible.
Yeah, I know.
It's can't argue.
Absolutely.
(13:32):
So how do you define successboth in your business, personal
life, like what does that looklike for you?
I think success to me is justbeing able to have the freedom
to pursue what I wanna pursue.
So personally and in business, Ithink I love my business because
it's given me a lot of freedomto.
Time freedom and locationfreedom.
(13:52):
Like I'm living in Amsterdam.
I don't have to live in theStates.
I work, four or five hours a dayinstead of eight.
I love that aspect of it, but Ifeel like building my own
business has also given me a lotof sense of resilience, where I
have a background inbiochemistry actually, so I knew
literally nothing about onlinebusiness or marketing at all
when I first started andlearning an entirely new skill
(14:16):
and building something.
Entirely from scratch.
I now feel like I could do that.
I get it again, because I'vedone it before, like it would
still be hard, but it would notbe as hard I don't think, as
doing it from zero.
So I think it's also the freedomto be able to, pursue other
things in life.
If I wanna go open up a bakeryin 10 years, i, I feel like I
(14:36):
could do that even though I haveno experience opening up a
bakery.
It doesn't necessarily scare meas much as it did.
Yeah.
It's incredible how much you canlearn and teach yourself.
I'm right there with you.
I actually, my original careerwas a, as a registered nurse, so
I did high-risk delivery.
So was in the healthcare field,transitioned over and I've
taught myself 95% of what I knowtoday.
(14:58):
So I'm like, it's crazy how muchyou can learn just online.
Like I've learned everythingthrough online courses and
YouTube and working with coachesand mentors, and it's truly
amazing and it's not somethingthat I ever really thought would
be possible for myself.
But now I can't see another way.
Absolutely.
And what do you what would yousay is your favorite lead
(15:20):
generation strategy?
Both either for yourself or yourclients?
What do you use?
I love being in the dns.
I like Instagram a lot.
I love getting people on myemail list as well.
I think having, I was definitelysome sort of freebie.
Email marketing is like one ofthe systems that I recommend
every single, client have forsure.
And having some sort of freebie.
(15:41):
So you can give value to yourclients, but I love connecting
with people in the dms.
Just like sliding up on storiesand really trying to just have
that natural connection and,normal talk, like normal talk
points.
I've met so many great peoplejust from this.
Even if we haven't ended upworking, haven't ended up
working together, it's, I'vestill met so many amazing people
and had so many greatconnections and, and sometimes
(16:03):
we do end up working together,which is amazing as well.
But, I think definitely rightnow the Instagram dms is where
it's at.
Awesome.
Awesome.
I love it.
So what can listeners expectfrom you next?
Definitely going on to thepassive income.
I wanna create some moreproducts.
I have a new mini masterclass.
(16:26):
Created.
So it's like a 30 minutemasterclass that talks about the
key systems to growing to sixfigures.
So I definitely wanna startpromoting that more.
And I'm really excited aboutthat.
And also, yeah, getting on somemore podcasts and just bringing
value to wherever I can.
I'm also a guest coach and a fewmasterminds, and I love doing
that just because I love gettingto meet people and, help them
(16:48):
guide them to what systems andtools and automations they can
use in their business.
So I would definitely wannacontinue doing more of that.
Awesome.
Awesome.
And if you had the attention ofthe whole world for five
minutes, what would you tellthem?
Ooh, oh my gosh, there's so manyoptions.
You can, no worries.
(17:09):
I think I would definitely tellpeople to.
Not be scared of failure ormistakes.
I would say, pursue what youwanna pursue and don't take the
(17:32):
fear of failing or just anymistakes that you make or
roadblocks along the way.
Personally, I think I did that alot when I first started out.
I really took.
Setbacks a bit personally, and Imade things mean things about
me.
When a client wasn't happy, itwas my fault and it was because
of, who I am as a person.
And that's just not true.
And I think when you can reallyremove yourself from your work,
(17:53):
you're gonna be able to achieveso much more because instead of
it being a setback or a mistake,it's actually, okay, I just need
to re, I just need to redirect.
I just need to look at this.
This isn't really working.
Okay, what can I do now?
And so just being able to gointo that problem solving mode
instead of, and maybe you justneed to cry it out for 30
minutes, cuz that definitelyhappens to me as well.
(18:14):
But after that, being able to gointo a problem solving mode and,
tackle things pretty as head onas possible.
I think we'll get you really farup personally and in business
with whatever you wanna do inlife.
I love it.
Yeah.
It's so easy to take thosesetbacks personally, when in
reality the key is just to learnfrom them and how can I either
not repeat this or what is thelesson out of this?
(18:35):
Or how do I need to pivot myjourney, whatever that journey
is, and then move forward fromthere.
But yeah, love it.
Definitely.
So where can listeners supportyou online?
Where can they find you?
You can find me on Instagram atSam West.
It's S A M W H I Z Z.
I'm on there pretty much everyday.
And yeah, if you wanna DM memasterclass, I can send you the
(18:57):
masterclass as well and you cancheck that out.
Sweet.
And we will have the linksbelow.
And thank you so much for beingon today.
Really appreciate it, Sam.
Yeah, thank you so much forhaving me.
Yeah, my pleasure.
And you can findme@sevenfigurebuilder.com and
I'll see you in the nextepisode.
welcome to the Seven FigureBuilder Show.
My name is Julie Barick, founderof Seven Figure Builder, where
we help high achieving businessowners save time in their
business every single week byimplementing marketing
automation to scale theirbusiness to seven figures and
beyond.
And I'm here today with myfriend Samantha.
How are you, Samantha?
Good.
I'm so excited to be here.
I'm thrilled to have you.
(00:20):
So for those that haven't hadthe pleasure of meeting you yet,
can you tell me a little bitabout what you do with your
business?
Absolutely.
So I'm a an online businessmanager for six and seven figure
coaches and online coursecreators and service providers.
And I just help them organizeand automate their business so
they can actually focus ongrowth and kind of, I handle the
business side of the businessand they get to be in their zone
(00:41):
of genius, whether that'scoaching or copywriting or,
whatever that is, that theylove.
Awesome.
So is that, what type ofservices do you help them with?
Is it more like on the projectmanagement side?
Is it with your clients?
Like what?
What do you help them with?
Yeah, so I have a few retainerclients that I help them more
with the day-to-day stuff.
And then the overall automationand streamlining of the
business.
(01:02):
And then I also have someone-off services that are more
built just for people who needjust like quick systems built
who don't ne necessarily needthat longer term support, maybe
they just need a DTO set up orthey are growing in their
business and they need thosefoundational systems set up.
But they, don't have that yet.
So I will work with them forabout 30 days, get everything
(01:23):
set up, and then usually theyare good to be on their own for
a few months or if they do havea team in place, I teach the
team how to use it.
Okay.
Very cool.
And do you have specific systemsor tools or things that you like
to go to, or what do you usuallyuse with them?
Yeah, I mostly focus on theclient experience, so really
(01:44):
streamlining like the clientonboarding experience and just
the overall client managementexperience, like what that you
have through your programs.
So with that, we use a lot oftools like Dodo or HoneyBook
along with Zapier.
And then we also use those toolsalong with Click Up or Asana on
the project management side aswell, just to make sure we're
really tracking everything so noone slips through the cracks.
(02:05):
That's one of my things is I.
Would never want someone to feellike they're just a number in a
program.
So we really want every clientwho works with any of my clients
to feel like they are reallysupported and they, have all of
their expectations are met, orthey have, my client has gone
above and beyond with, theirservices.
Totally.
That's awesome.
And I know you focus on helpingthem implement automation in
(02:27):
their business.
Something that's very near anddear to my heart is that high
touch customer experience.
So how do you encourage thatwith your client?
Yeah, I think just reallyimplementing a system that is as
automated as possible.
So a lot of it is not reliant onus but still has those
touchpoints.
So one of a really great clientex, a really great client
(02:50):
onboarding experience I builtrecently where.
It is for a group program.
And so with a group program,there is just a lot more
support.
And the, those, touchpoints.
So we do have it where theclient is just doing a checkout,
but then whenever they paythrough the checkout, then they,
they get a welcome email thatlays out all of the
expectations.
They automatically get the linkto join the Slack channel.
(03:13):
They automatically get access,to everything they needed
through Cajabi.
Because there is also coursematerials in the program.
So they feel on their end like,wow, I've already got so much
stuff immediately.
And there's not like thatawkward okay, I paid so what
now?
Now what?
Yeah, like now what?
Let me have some buyer's remorseand, think about it.
(03:34):
So we wanna give them as much aspossible and also just lay out
the expectations as quickly aspossible.
Okay, here's what you canexpect, join the Slack channel.
We'll be in touch with you assoon as possible.
And then we also have anautomation set up where when
someone joins, we get notifiedon our end.
And a task is set up for ourclient success manager and her
job is to go in and welcomeevery single person that joins
(03:55):
and message them directly andsay, Hey, thanks so much for
joining.
We're so excited to have youhere.
And we also even have, anautomation that is setting up a
Google Drive folder for thatperson with their name.
So the client success managercan go in, grab that folder and
give that to, and be like, Hey,here's your Google Drive folder.
It's already set up for you.
We have an automation that putsdocs that they need in there
(04:17):
already.
So it's just really, doingeverything cleaning out all the
kinks and making it as easy aspossible for us to be able to do
our job and follow up with theclients and be in touch with the
clients, but also so the clientfeels wow, this was so easy and
there was, there's no wonderinglike, what's next?
Like I know exactly what to do.
I absolutely love that.
(04:38):
I totally love to geek out in mybusiness and have exactly what
you just said in place.
So it's oh, that's awesome.
Yeah.
I love it.
Like I am just like so proud ofmyself for setting up this
automation cuz I'm like, wow,this truly is like amazing.
Oh my God.
And it saves so much time, bothfor your clients, for you,
everybody.
(04:58):
Yeah.
It just makes things run so muchsmoother.
Yeah.
And it's also, I think, a mentalenergy thing because I know for
me, it's hard to be in meetingsand, really be present with your
clients whenever you're alsothinking about, maybe five
things you have to do Yeah,after the meeting, or, oh, I
forgot to send that contract,or, oh, I need to reach out to
this person.
Because you don't have thoseautomations in place.
(05:20):
So it's, I think it's also ahuge mental energy suck as well.
Totally.
Totally.
And then, you've got a newclient and they're already 15
steps ahead that you could justjump right in.
You don't have to do all thepaperwork behind the scenes.
It just works.
Yeah, exactly.
Like the system works so wellbecause then it's like my, all
my client has to do is get onthe kickoff call.
Like we even have a callscheduler sent out automatically
(05:41):
when someone joins.
And so really the Google Drivefolder's already created.
The worksheet that she's gonnafill out during the call is
already in the Google Drivefolder for her.
The call's already scheduled.
So it's really just the actual,she can focus on the actual,
one-on-one interaction and notscrambling behind the scenes of,
oh, I need to make a folder andI need to find that template.
(06:01):
And, and remember the processthat you have to go through too.
Yeah.
Yes, exactly.
Most clients I would think, orfrom my experience, are not that
organized.
And I think that one of thebenefits of automation is it
forces you to create thatprocess and to streamline that
process and to make things sothey really work well.
(06:22):
And then you can automate them,right?
But you have to have somethingto automate That works well
otherwise you're just creatingnoise and distraction in your
business.
So do you help your clients workout the kinks in that and map
out what's possible or how dothey come to that end product?
Yeah, definitely.
I think the first step before Ireally automate anything is.
(06:43):
Outlining the process andgetting super clear because
that's, like you said,automation doesn't really work
if you don't have a clearprocess in place because the
thing with automation is that ithas to be the same every time or
similar every single time.
Otherwise it breaks or,something gets sent out that's
not supposed to be sent out or,it's just, it's not gonna work
as you wanted to.
(07:04):
And that causes a lot offrustration.
Whenever I'm working with anyclient, even if it's just
developing like a contentautomation or a content creation
process, we sit down and we mapout.
Okay?
First step one, we're going torec like brainstorm ideas.
Step two is going to berecording the actual content.
Step three is gonna be editingstep four.
Writing captions and it bebrings a lot of clarity, I think
(07:26):
to clients' businesses as wellbecause so much of your business
just lives in your head.
And especially when you'reworking and you don't have a big
team or anything and you don'treally need to take those
processes out of your head.
And put them down anywhere.
But whenever you do startgrowing and you do start hiring
other people, it becomes reallyhard to hire people and work
with other people when thoseprocesses are still living in
(07:49):
your head and you can'tcommunicate those, effectively
to your team.
So that's always the first thingwe do is just outline.
Step by step exactly what wewant to happen.
We do like an ideal world anddream fairy land best case
scenario, and then we workbackwards from there.
And maybe not everything can betotally automated, but for the
most part we can automate a lotof things and it's a lot easier
(08:10):
working backwards than it istrying to, go forward and build
that way.
Totally.
And do you put in place like anytype of reporting for them so
they know what's happening?
It's, the magic behind thescenes give them?
Yeah, definitely.
We, I do like monthly metricsreporting and we just look at
all of the normal reportingstuff.
So opt-ins page views salescalls booked, whatever we're
(08:34):
really focusing on is, that'sgonna be the main thing that
we're looking at.
And then I think, It's reallyeasy to also, put that off of on
a team as well.
Whenever you're just monitoringemail metrics and you have
something with, sorry, lemmegather my thoughts.
That's fine.
Yeah.
With something like, when you'retracking email metrics or
(08:56):
something, it's very easy to geta really good process in place
of okay, here we're just lookingat the open rates, click through
rates.
If something's over a certainnumber, that's, great.
If something's under cert,certain number, we really wanna
be, make sure to tag that andflag that and look at why that's
happening.
And also I guess if something'sabove, because if it's above,
then we wanna be doing more ofthat.
(09:16):
Definitely.
Totally.
But that's really something, ifyou can outline that process or
even film yourself, doing itwith Loom or a screen recording,
you can easily, put that projectonto a VA every month and they
can, do that for you and thenyou can just look at the final
numbers.
Absolutely.
Now, on a more personal note,where are you located?
I am living in Amsterdam rightnow.
(09:38):
Wow.
Very cool.
I'm originally from the States,but I moved here about six
months ago.
Okay, awesome.
So do you help clients overthere or in the states, or where
do your clients live?
Mostly.
Most of my clients live in theStates because I am from there
and I've lived there for solong.
I really enjoy working withpeople from the states or in
Canada.
(09:58):
That's also where I work with alot of people as well.
Yeah, the Dutch business lawsare a bit confusing here, so I
haven't really made it mymission to try to find a lot of
Dutch climbs yet.
Yeah, I'm sure that's quite anadjustment.
That's awesome though.
And how do you balance businessand family life, like just
juggling everything?
(10:19):
What does that look like foryou?
Yeah, I think the number onething is just I really try to
have super clear priorities.
I do travel a lot for work.
I was just in New York last weekand I'm actually going to Mexico
tomorrow.
And whenever you are travelingand working, it's so easy to
just get lost and everythingthat's going on because you're
out of your normal routine.
(10:39):
So when I'm home and I have mynormal routine, it's very easy
to.
Get a lot of work done.
Like I know my capacity for workat home, obviously that shrinks
whenever I'm traveling.
Or if I just have a busy week,if I have a really social week
and a lot going on.
So the number one thing I try todo is just have super clear
priorities of, these are thethree things I absolutely have
to get done this week.
Obviously my client work is oneof my higher priorities, right?
(11:03):
And then, what do I need to doto take care of myself, even if
that's just taking 30 minutes togo on a walk, every day to clear
my head.
Or.
Yeah, making sure I'm makingtime to spend time with my
partner or, spend time withfriends.
How am I working all of thoseinto my schedule?
I think working online andworking for yourself, it can be
hard because there is no end,right?
(11:25):
There's always this ever goingto-do list and never really
ends.
And so something, one of myfriends told me, A while ago was
to have it done.
So I love this advice because itreally helps me because I could
just go on and on, and if I'mhaving a really good day, I
could just tag, tag things on tomy to-do list.
Oh, I already finishedeverything I was supposed to do
today.
(11:46):
Now I'm gonna start doing allthis other stuff.
But then that kind of leads toburnout, right?
Because we're just.
End up overworking ourselves.
So one thing, one another tipthat she gave me was to, define
you're done at the beginning ofthe day.
These are the, five things Ineed to do today, three things I
need to do today, and afterthat, then the rest of the time
is for me and I'm going to, reada book or go hang out with my
(12:07):
partner or go walk aroundwhatever that looks like, I'm
just gonna get off my laptop.
Totally.
Yeah.
And I think that helps give asense of achievement versus just
overloading yourself like, oh,I'm more efficient than I
thought I was, and now I can bemore and more, more.
And you just, and then you don'tfinish that last task and you're
like, oh, I didn't do anythingfor you today.
Exactly.
I totally hear you.
(12:29):
So looking for the year ahead,what is the most life-changing
goal for you this coming year?
Oh, that's such a greatquestion.
The most life-changing goal forme.
I know it's hard to think cuz Ijust moved to Amsterdam last
year, so I'm like, that was solife-changing.
How do you wanna need that?
I know.
I'm like move somewhere else.
No.
I think this year I'm reallyfocusing on expanding my
(12:51):
business into more passiverevenue stream.
So I've been creating some miniproducts.
I wanna grow my team a bit.
I wanna, guess on more podcastsand, potentially do some
speaking things.
So I think really just expandingmy reach is my number one goal.
And that would definitely belife changing because obviously
with, a lot of pa with morepassive things it's not
(13:11):
necessarily less work, but it isless one-on-one work.
I've been doing one-on-one workfor over three years now, and I
do love working one-on-one withmy clients.
But it would be nice to have alittle bit of buffer on the
backend.
Yeah.
And passive income isincredible.
Yeah, I know.
It's can't argue.
Absolutely.
(13:32):
So how do you define successboth in your business, personal
life, like what does that looklike for you?
I think success to me is justbeing able to have the freedom
to pursue what I wanna pursue.
So personally and in business, Ithink I love my business because
it's given me a lot of freedomto.
Time freedom and locationfreedom.
(13:52):
Like I'm living in Amsterdam.
I don't have to live in theStates.
I work, four or five hours a dayinstead of eight.
I love that aspect of it, but Ifeel like building my own
business has also given me a lotof sense of resilience, where I
have a background inbiochemistry actually, so I knew
literally nothing about onlinebusiness or marketing at all
when I first started andlearning an entirely new skill
(14:16):
and building something.
Entirely from scratch.
I now feel like I could do that.
I get it again, because I'vedone it before, like it would
still be hard, but it would notbe as hard I don't think, as
doing it from zero.
So I think it's also the freedomto be able to, pursue other
things in life.
If I wanna go open up a bakeryin 10 years, i, I feel like I
(14:36):
could do that even though I haveno experience opening up a
bakery.
It doesn't necessarily scare meas much as it did.
Yeah.
It's incredible how much you canlearn and teach yourself.
I'm right there with you.
I actually, my original careerwas a, as a registered nurse, so
I did high-risk delivery.
So was in the healthcare field,transitioned over and I've
taught myself 95% of what I knowtoday.
(14:58):
So I'm like, it's crazy how muchyou can learn just online.
Like I've learned everythingthrough online courses and
YouTube and working with coachesand mentors, and it's truly
amazing and it's not somethingthat I ever really thought would
be possible for myself.
But now I can't see another way.
Absolutely.
And what do you what would yousay is your favorite lead
(15:20):
generation strategy?
Both either for yourself or yourclients?
What do you use?
I love being in the dns.
I like Instagram a lot.
I love getting people on myemail list as well.
I think having, I was definitelysome sort of freebie.
Email marketing is like one ofthe systems that I recommend
every single, client have forsure.
And having some sort of freebie.
(15:41):
So you can give value to yourclients, but I love connecting
with people in the dms.
Just like sliding up on storiesand really trying to just have
that natural connection and,normal talk, like normal talk
points.
I've met so many great peoplejust from this.
Even if we haven't ended upworking, haven't ended up
working together, it's, I'vestill met so many amazing people
and had so many greatconnections and, and sometimes
(16:03):
we do end up working together,which is amazing as well.
But, I think definitely rightnow the Instagram dms is where
it's at.
Awesome.
Awesome.
I love it.
So what can listeners expectfrom you next?
Definitely going on to thepassive income.
I wanna create some moreproducts.
I have a new mini masterclass.
(16:26):
Created.
So it's like a 30 minutemasterclass that talks about the
key systems to growing to sixfigures.
So I definitely wanna startpromoting that more.
And I'm really excited aboutthat.
And also, yeah, getting on somemore podcasts and just bringing
value to wherever I can.
I'm also a guest coach and a fewmasterminds, and I love doing
that just because I love gettingto meet people and, help them
(16:48):
guide them to what systems andtools and automations they can
use in their business.
So I would definitely wannacontinue doing more of that.
Awesome.
Awesome.
And if you had the attention ofthe whole world for five
minutes, what would you tellthem?
Ooh, oh my gosh, there's so manyoptions.
You can, no worries.
(17:09):
I think I would definitely tellpeople to.
Not be scared of failure ormistakes.
I would say, pursue what youwanna pursue and don't take the
(17:32):
fear of failing or just anymistakes that you make or
roadblocks along the way.
Personally, I think I did that alot when I first started out.
I really took.
Setbacks a bit personally, and Imade things mean things about
me.
When a client wasn't happy, itwas my fault and it was because
of, who I am as a person.
And that's just not true.
And I think when you can reallyremove yourself from your work,
(17:53):
you're gonna be able to achieveso much more because instead of
it being a setback or a mistake,it's actually, okay, I just need
to re, I just need to redirect.
I just need to look at this.
This isn't really working.
Okay, what can I do now?
And so just being able to gointo that problem solving mode
instead of, and maybe you justneed to cry it out for 30
minutes, cuz that definitelyhappens to me as well.
(18:14):
But after that, being able to gointo a problem solving mode and,
tackle things pretty as head onas possible.
I think we'll get you really farup personally and in business
with whatever you wanna do inlife.
I love it.
Yeah.
It's so easy to take thosesetbacks personally, when in
reality the key is just to learnfrom them and how can I either
not repeat this or what is thelesson out of this?
(18:35):
Or how do I need to pivot myjourney, whatever that journey
is, and then move forward fromthere.
But yeah, love it.
Definitely.
So where can listeners supportyou online?
Where can they find you?
You can find me on Instagram atSam West.
It's S A M W H I Z Z.
I'm on there pretty much everyday.
And yeah, if you wanna DM memasterclass, I can send you the
(18:57):
masterclass as well and you cancheck that out.
Sweet.
And we will have the linksbelow.
And thank you so much for beingon today.
Really appreciate it, Sam.
Yeah, thank you so much forhaving me.
Yeah, my pleasure.
And you can findme@sevenfigurebuilder.com and
I'll see you in the nextepisode.
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