July 17, 2023 • 25 mins
Ready to stop with the endless social media posting? Or praying that clients find you?
Are you sick of suffering from social media malaise where you're exhausted from chasing traffic & growing followers?
What if you could opt out of that frenzy?
When it comes to building a standout business, most people think they need:
✅ A Perfect website
✅ A Large social media following
✅ Weekly emails
✅ Pretty graphics
✅ Perfect packages
This week's guest, Michelle Warner, believes that instead, you can get off the social media bandwagon by building real connections that lead to real clients and real revenue.
A system she's developed called Relationship Marketing
Michelle's on a mission to design tiny companies that are built to last.
Listen up, 'cause we're taking a deep dive into how you can shift from traffic marketing to relationship marketing.
Episode Resources
Connect with Michelle Warner
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If you're the best-kept secret in your industry, it's time to change that.
Because when you start showing up with clarity, confidence, and the right content—your ideal clients won't just notice you. They'll choose you.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
So when I am looking to go meet my potential clients,
I like to do something calledaudience borrowing.
What does that mean?
It means looking for otherfolks who I can collaborate with
, who are already talking to myaudience and we can provide a
win-win.
Right, I can come into theiraudience, provide some great
value and then I get introducedto their folks.
And so when I'm looking forthat, I need to be really clear
(00:23):
about who my ideal client isnumber one, so that I know where
they're hanging out.
But then I take it to the nextlevel and I actually create an
ideal connection avatar formyself.
I want to build relationshipswith the folks who have access
to my similar audience.
Right, we work with the samegroup of people, just in
different ways.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Welcome to the Standout Business Show.
I'm Brad Powell, and todaywe're asking this question can
you get fully booked withoutusing social media?
Just think about that for aminute.
If you're ready to stop withthis endless social media
posting and you're sittingaround hoping that clients are
(01:07):
going to find you after you'veposted forever in a day and
you're waiting on the phonegoing gosh, why aren't they
calling me?
Or if you're sick of living inthis sort of social media
malaise, where most people whoare participating in this game
are just exhausted becausethey've been chasing traffic and
(01:27):
trying to grow their followers.
Well, my guest today is reallyposing what if you could opt out
of all this frenzy?
So, like, here's the thing whenit comes to building a standout
business, most people arethinking that they need this
perfect website, they need alarge social media following,
(01:51):
they need to send weekly emails,they need all the pretty
graphics over everything, theyneed perfectly adorned videos.
And my guest, michelle Warner,she believes that, instead of
doing all of that, you can getoff the social media bandwagon
(02:11):
by building real connectionsthat lead to real clients and,
most importantly, real revenue,and she's developed a system
that she calls relationshipmarketing, and I'm here to tell
you that it's really distinctivefrom any other form of
relationship or referralnetworking that you have heard
(02:32):
of.
She has been on this mission todesign tiny companies that are
built to last.
So stay tuned, because we aregoing to take a deep dive into
how you can shift from trafficmarketing to relationship
marketing, and with that let'sstart the show.
(02:53):
Michelle Warner, welcome to theshow.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Oh, thank you so much for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Right, and I'm excited too because I'm going to
share that.
As we said in the green room, IFirst came across you because
you were being interviewed by,actually, a friend of mine, jay
Akanzo.
He published a podcast that youwere the keynote on and you
were talking all about yourrelationship marketing, and one
of the things that struck me is,first of all, it's just quite
(03:23):
different from a lot of thingsthat I've heard before, and you
shared a story of and like a lotof things, like you found this
way of being and this way ofevolving in terms of doing your
own marketing by solving yourown problem of struggling with
selling yourself to a group ofin this case it was non-profits.
(03:43):
So could you share thatparticular story of just a way
of sort of letting us into, like, your brain and how it works?
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Yeah, it was an interesting challenge I found
myself with.
About 2010 was the timelinehere, and my background at the
time had been very much indirect marketing email.
I had managed large nonprofitemail lists 100,000 plus email
lists so I knew that massmarketing and all of a sudden I
was running a startup thatneeded to sell to very small
(04:13):
organizations local governmentsand nonprofits.
We were headquartered in Denverand I needed to sell into
cities around the US.
Well, as you can imagine, localgovernment leaders, local
nonprofit leaders are veryuninterested in jumping on a
large email list and so I didn'thave a skill set to reach them
and I was really struggling tomake the sales that we needed to
make for this startup.
(04:33):
And at the time I realized I wasjust coming out of business
school and I had taken a couplesemesters of coursework, kind of
unknowingly and almost by amistake, about how networks
operate and how your networksare structured, and I realized
that there was actually a way tothink about this to build the
relationships that I wanted tobuild strategically to get into
these conversations with folks.
(04:53):
So, instead of like thisconstant cold calling of some
woman from Denver trying toreach so-and-so in Philadelphia
and Boston and all these placeswhere they don't want to hear
from me.
I thought how can I build asystem and build some assets so
that I can build a relationshipfor them, get them to trust me,
before we start with the coldcalling and then move into an
actual sales conversation?
And listen, I was in a reallyfortunate position while I was
(05:16):
really struggling with sales.
I was in a fortunate positionthat I could book just about any
speaking slot I wanted withinthe niche that we were in, and
so I would do a lot of keynotes.
And instead of doing thosekeynotes, what I realized was
wait a minute.
I could start trading in thosekeynotes and instead ask for
panel discussions and host apanel discussion at some pretty
(05:36):
high profile events that thesefolks found valuable.
And so I started trading thosein, took the spotlight off of
myself and said hey, can yougive me a panel instead?
And then I reached out to thesesame people who won't give me
the time of day and insteadasked them would you like to
come on the panel?
Would you like to tell yourstory?
Right, I just spotlighted them,I built a relationship with
them, just forgot anything aboutselling.
(05:58):
And wouldn't you know it?
Right, they came, I gave them aplatform to share their stories
.
They had an opportunity toshare who and what they were,
and they trusted me and thensales flowed from there, and so
that really sparked the conceptin my mind that when you are
running particular types ofbusinesses that aren't
necessarily going to be a matchfor some mass marketing Listen,
(06:20):
some businesses are a greatmatch for mass marketing, and
I'm not going to argue withthose.
But when you're selling kind ofhigher ticket stuff to specific
niches you know, custom things,a lot of our service based
businesses, b2b businesses, alot of that stuff you have to
think about it in a differentway.
And so how can you find asystem, how can you find a
marketing that is going to workbeyond referrals?
(06:42):
What I see a lot of peopledoing is they get all the
referral business and then thatdries up, or you get nervous
that you're relying on referralsand so, yeah, kind of boomerang
all the way over to massmarketing again, and that tends
to not be the answer.
It's more, how can you buildsomething that looks like
referrals but something thatyou're in charge of?
And so that's what I think ofas relationship marketing.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I really like the partwhere you said you took the
spotlight off yourself, which isso counterintuitive from, like
all the noise we hear constantlyabout.
Oh no, you need to stand outand you need to be bigger than
life and you need to go out andbe everywhere, all over the
place, and I think I think thekey there for a lot of people.
(07:25):
You know this works extremelywell for people who are sort of
leaning towards the introvertedside of the spectrum, that there
are things that you'reintroducing with your work that
work extremely well for folkswho don't want to be like
exuberant and don't want to bein the spotlight all the time.
(07:45):
So let's explore that a littlebit.
Like what other aspects of yourstrategy seem to be super well
suited for the shy folks thatpeople are going?
Oh no, I want to stay in thebackground.
Speaker 1 (07:59):
Well, and I think, yes and right, it works really
well for the shy folks and italso works really well for folks
who are, frankly, like a bigpublic platform Isn't going to
get you anywhere.
If you're trying to sell intoC-suite executives and B2B, a
lot of times that's not going towork.
And so the same.
You know, to have a big publicplatform you need to have this
relationship.
And so when we're talking abouteither introverts who just have
(08:20):
a really tough time with thevisibility and, by the way,
that's me like I'm the first onehiding in the bathroom at any
kind of, you know, normalnetworking event, so if you're
that kind of introvert, or ifyou have the type of business
where people aren't just aren'tresponding to mass marketing,
thinking instead about how youcan hand a platform to them, how
you can kind of create aproject, do something that can
(08:42):
double as an excuse to meetfolks, while also, you know,
working with your marketing.
And that first example that Ishared frankly, all these
keynotes that I had, my audiencewasn't listening to those.
The folks listening to thatwere never going to be my buyers
because of how the company wasset up, and so I, the keynotes
were doing nothing for me, likeit was nice.
It built some nice visibilityand I see that all the time we
(09:04):
build this visibility that's notactually in front of your
buyers.
So the key is like thinkingthrough how are your buyers
actually responding to you, whatare they looking for?
And then giving yourself anexcuse to meet them in such a
way that it is relationshipbuilding first as opposed to
thinking sales first.
Right, and that does helpintroverts, because introverts
get really freaked out and again, I'm one of you by going into a
(09:27):
relationship immediatelythinking how am I going to close
this person, how am I going tobuild a relationship?
And if you can instead go intoit in like, how can I hand you
some value, and some real value,and just give you something and
make friends with you, then wecan take care of the rest later
on.
Because introverts tend to begood once the relationship is
established, they can have thoseconversations.
It's initially getting thatrelationship going and feeling
(09:50):
it loaded with the necessity ofa sale that freaks them out.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Yeah, I really appreciate this idea of not just
a relationship building, butit's so easy to be thinking
about instead of going out intothe world and reaching a large
number of people in whatever wayyou want to try and do.
That it's more of where can Ifind a version of a local cafe?
(10:15):
Yeah, and I can sit down withone person and have a meaningful
engagement with that person sothat we get to know each other
and we build trust with oneanother and that good things can
happen as a result of the factthat the relationship is there
and it's going to continue.
Yeah, and this is the kind ofthing like, even when I go to
(10:35):
really large conferences, thisis how, like, I can't handle
being in the like the chaoticnoise of, you know, with 500,000
people sort of all going allaround and I was going I'm the
guy who's always like standingin the middle of the crowd and
nobody's talking to me is likewhat, what am I doing wrong?
How come all these people caneasily talk with one another and
(10:57):
I'm just sitting here all bymyself?
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Oh, I'm the same way and I go into those conferences.
They're not bad things.
But I think they're bad thingsif you go and just assume you're
going to run into the magicalperson who's going to change
your life.
Right yeah.
Instead, I'm going to thoseevents saying like, oh, who's
speaking at this, who's doingthis?
And doing some research aheadof time and knowing that if I
meet one or two key people atthat event, my ROI is going to
be so much better than if I justcome home with a random stack
(11:21):
of business cards and I can'tremember who these people are.
And so it's all about puttingthat relationship first and
understanding that the game forthe if your business matches
with it the game is, you know,quality over quantity.
You need to meet the correctthree people, or 10 people, or
100 people, as opposed to themasses of thousands.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
Yeah, so to the point , how do you decide, like when
I'm, when I'm doing anything,how do I choose who are the
correct people like, what kindsof people should I be looking?
Speaker 1 (11:54):
for?
Yeah, great question.
So I think about this in termsof ideal connection avatars.
So when I am looking to go meetmy potential clients, I like to
do something called audienceborrowing.
What does that mean?
It means looking for otherfolks who I can collaborate with
, who are already talking to myaudience and we can provide a
win-win right.
I can come into their audience,provide some great value and
(12:16):
then I get introduced to theirfolks.
And so when I'm looking forthat, I need to be really clear
about who my ideal client is.
Number one, so that I knowwhere they're hanging out.
But then I take it to the nextlevel and I actually create an
ideal connection avatar formyself.
And so that means I am veryclear when someone reaches out
to me or when I'm reaching outto build relationships.
Number one I'm not generallyreaching out to people who I
(12:38):
expect to be my clients, becauseclients come and go.
Let's face it, they're notforever.
But relationships with peoplewho always are collecting have
an audience of my clients, thoserelationships can be forever.
So that's who I want to buildrelationships with.
I want to build relationshipswith the folks who have access
to my, my similar audience,right, not in competitive ways.
I don't want to steal yourclients, but where we do the
(13:01):
same work for the, we do work.
We work with the same group ofpeople, just in different ways,
and so there's actually avatarsyou can build for that you can
say, hey, who are the types ofpeople, the types of roles, who
are likely, who have likelyalready collected my audience,
and how can we collaboratetogether?
And that's who I'm looking tomeet.
And when you get really clear onthat, guess what number one
(13:22):
random coffee chats go away.
Right, that's one of the firstthings people say to me is oh, I
don't have time to do 14 coffeechats every week, and I was
like I don't either, like Idon't want to spend my days on
zoom.
I definitely don't want to dothat.
But when you're clear about whoyou're connecting with, it is
really easy to have a fewproductive coffee chats that
help you get to know the rightpeople, where you can set up
(13:43):
really dynamic and excitingcollaborations.
Whether it be a podcastinterview or a speaking of some
kind, or I do like a lot oftraining within paid communities
.
I come in and be a guestteacher all of that sort of
thing can get you in front ofyour ideal clients in a really
effective way.
That actually ends up lookinglike a referral with those high
conversion rates.
Because you spend so muchquality time with these folks,
(14:04):
they just trust you right awayand the sale can move along at a
really rapid clip.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah, I love that, and when you're coming up with
these different characteristicsof like who's my, you're like
for me, I might be going.
Well, I'm looking for people whohave a podcast like mine that
is aimed at you know, businesspeople or something sort of the
same kind of people that my showis aimed at and, as one example
, or I might be looking forpeople who, like you say, have
(14:33):
some kind of group or groupprogram or some kind of thing,
and they'd like me to come inand talk to them about what I do
, which is, you know, video,marketing and so on, when I'm,
you know, when I'm reaching outto them and one of the things
that I do, which is how I usethis show like a show is great
for relationship building withall the guests like why else?
(14:54):
Why, what else are you doing ifyou're not doing that?
Speaker 1 (14:57):
I always tell clients like, yeah, if you already have
a platform, if you have a show,please, 50% of the guests at
least that you invite on shouldbe people who meet that ideal
connection avatar, because whoknows where you can take it.
That's such a great way tostart a relationship.
Now.
You're not randomly emailingpeople and saying, hey, could we
chat for a minute?
Right.
You're saying, hey, I wouldlove to offer you my platform.
(15:17):
This is the equivalent of whatI was doing when I got those
panels instead of the keynotes,right.
It's the equivalent of nothaving a solo podcast, but
instead saying, hey, who do Ineed to meet?
How can I bring them into thefold, give them a platform and,
by doing so, build a greatrelationship in trust, because
I've centered them.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah, for me, I found it's been a very easy ask for a
lot of people who I would liketo meet.
You know and or I hear aboutthem in one way or another and I
go, oh, they're doing somethingreally interesting, I want to
learn more about that and I cansay, well, instead of like a
random whatever on some platform, saying, hey, I saw you're
doing cool stuff, could we do avideo chat or could we have a
(15:56):
zoom call?
People are going, no, thanks,but come on, my show is a very
easy thing and what you weredoing with.
By the way, I can book you intothis being a keynote panel this
conference.
Would you like to come?
And then who's gonna say no tothat?
So, in your world, in terms ofother clients that you're
(16:16):
working with, what are the otherkinds of assets that people are
you know utilizing in this way,so that when they're doing an
outreach, they can say somethinglike, oh, I have this thing
that I would like you to becomeand be part of.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Yeah, there's so many different things.
Maybe you have a group programor a mastermind or a training of
some sort.
You can invite folks in to do acomplimentary training, do a
guest training, right, do abonus training.
That's one great way to meetfolks.
People have, you know, it'sreally whatever platform you
have, people have blogs that arereally well read.
(16:50):
If you have a blog post that'spopular, people would love to
write a guest blog.
I know that's not as popularthese days, but if you have a
very well read blog, that is alegitimate thing to do.
Podcasts are very popular.
You know.
Social media lives, any kind ofthese collaborations, bringing
folks in to speak, any kind ofway that you can.
You can highlight the otherperson via whatever means you
(17:12):
have.
I even have some B2B clientswho go ahead and write white
papers, and part of the reasonthat they write the white papers
is, yeah, they want todistribute it, but also they
want to invite some targetedfolks to come in and participate
in those white papers and beinterviewed for them right and
get their names in the whitepapers, and that is a great way
(17:32):
to build relationships.
I don't want you to go to thehassle of writing a white paper
if it's not also going to dosome other work for you.
But if you're doing some ofthat work, let's be strategic
about who you talk to to do that.
And then one of my favoriteexamples is I live in a small
town along Lake Michigan and weactually have a yoga studio
who's brilliant at this.
So Yoga Studio on Main Streetand they are looking for those
(17:54):
collaborations and how can theyshare their clients?
And my favorite example of whatthey've done they figured out a
way to collaborate with justabout everyone in town.
But my favorite is we had oneof those axe throwing bars open
in town and on Friday nightsthey will collaborate where you
can get a joint ticket and yougo and get all your aggression
out from the week.
You throw your axes and thenyou go over to the yoga studio
(18:15):
and do like an hour longwhatever they call it with the
relaxing yoga.
And I just think that's abrilliant example because on the
surface you wouldn't thinkthose businesses had anything in
common, but their clientele isactually exactly the same.
Right, the people who go to axethrowing tend to be younger.
The vibe of those places is alittle bit younger and they're
(18:35):
also going to the yoga studioson Saturday morning.
So the examples are everywhere.
You just need to think abouthow do I gather my audience and
how can I hand whatevermechanism that is to somebody
else.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Yeah, and I want to sort of leapfrog on that because
really, in spite of what I saidat the intro, you're not
actually advocating that peopledon't publish content and don't
put yourself out there in somekind of content delivery way,
whether it's written or video,or you're making a presentation
(19:10):
somewhere.
That's not it at all.
It's just more the distinctionof, instead of going for traffic
, now you're going for thisrelationship and more of a
trust-building thing.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
Yeah, let's get into the nuance of it, because a lot
of people just default tocreating content and pushing it
out on their channel andassuming that whatever algorithm
is involved is going to somehowbless them and they're going to
go viral and people will findthem.
And what I'm advocating for is,instead of this, just constant
content pushing, let's bestrategic about the content.
Number one when people arefirst meeting you so I think of
(19:45):
marketing in three stagesawareness, engagement, sales
they need to know you exist.
Then they need to engage withyou, then they need to buy
something with you.
So at that awareness stage, alot of people aren't even
thinking through that realstrategically and, again,
they're just assuming analgorithm is going to bless them
.
They're going to post onLinkedIn 14 times a day and
somehow people are going tobecome aware of them, right?
So instead, let's think aboutthat and let's take 80% of your
(20:05):
awareness activities off of yourplatforms, right?
Go borrow audiences, go takeyour content somewhere else.
Now, that is more efficient too,because when I do that, you
know I have like two or threepieces of great content that I
can repeat over and, over andover again.
So I don't need to push out45,000 types of content because
I'm going onto other platformswhere it will always be new.
(20:25):
I'm always borrowing anaudience so that content is
always going to be new and fresh, right, so I don't have to
constantly produce new stuff.
And so that's one piece liketake your content during
awareness, take it off of theplatforms and then, during
engagement, once they've met youand they're going to come hang
out with you, then maybe youknow it makes sense to send out
newsletters.
I send out a newsletter.
It can make sense to be onsocial media so that they
(20:47):
remember you exist.
But this is now for following,and it's in its ongoing
engagement and its ongoingconversation.
It's not this like playing thealgorithm game of just running
in that endless hamster wheel.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
Yeah, I mean there's not much benefit to the hamster
wheel.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Yeah, yeah, and I want to be clear, like that's
really like, if you're thatservice-based kind of higher
ticket item, right, if you'remass marketing and you're
selling e-commerce products,like please go play that traffic
game.
That's kind of how it's played.
But where we get screwed up iswhen you're not, that you're
trying to sell higher ticketitems that require a little bit
more loyalty, trust, all thosethings.
Like yeah, that hamster wheelis not going to get you anywhere
(21:29):
.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
Yeah, for sure.
Well, we've got a comment herefrom Angela.
Yeah, she says love thesynergies within an ecosystem.
I always tell my B2C folks touse LinkedIn to find other
providers they can work with.
Leverage their audience, Likethe wedding photographer should
find the wedding baker and thewedding planner and the wedding
DJ.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
I always use the wedding example.
I'm surprised they didn't bringit up today.
Yes, angela, you nailed it.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
Yes, Right, exactly Another.
That's good example, perfect,sort of like.
One person can you know hasneeds all these different things
, especially in that one momentlike I'm getting married.
Help, yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
And those are really obvious examples and people will
say to me oh well, that doesn'thappen in my industry it does.
You just have to maybe look alittle further.
You know who's working withyour customers right before you
or right after you.
Those are really natural placesto take a look at to build some
of these relationships.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
Yeah, I guess Pamela Slim talks about this the PB&J
peanut butter and jelly partners.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
Yeah, we were actually.
I just did a podcast with her.
We were talking about this.
I think it was last week.
It came out oh nice, absolutely.
There's a ton of synergybetween how we think about these
things.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Yeah right, and what she's doing like she has this in
the real world center forbusinesses that just seems to be
thriving as a communityecosystem for all these things.
You know small local businessin the neck of the woods where
she lives, so I just think it'sjust really terrific work on her
part?
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Yeah, absolutely yes.
We think very similarly aboutthese things.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
Right, right, all right.
Well, we're getting close tothe end of our time.
It goes by super fast.
If there's something that wehaven't touched upon, do you
have like final words to put abow on our conversation?
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Really just to be aware that this relationship
side of things exists.
And so if you are a person inthose service industries or in
some of the higher tickets andyou're finding yourself on that
content hamster wheel, justencourage you to recognize that
there are other options.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
All right.
Well, if there is anyone who iswatching this, listening to
this, and they're super inspiredand they're going well,
michelle, I want you to help megrow my relationship so that I
can take my tiny business andmake it last forever.
What's the best way for?
Speaker 1 (23:49):
them to hook up with you.
Yeah, they can find me.
My website isthemichellewarnercom.
You can come over there and Iactually host a monthly event
where we do a Q&A and talk aboutall this stuff, so you'll find
the information on how to signup there, or you can always ping
me over direct message onInstagram or LinkedIn.
You're not going to see meposting a lot for the reasons we
just talked about, but I amthere, so if you want to connect
(24:11):
over there, I'd love to see you.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
All right.
Well, thank you so much forcoming on today.
This is really, I think, wellneeded conversation.
More and more people,especially in sort of the high
ticket world that I operate inpeople, have this thing of like
oh no, I've got to grow, I'vegot to be big and I've got to
(24:32):
get the biggest reach ever, andI'm guilty that I used to have a
program that I called Big ReachVideo.
It's like I don't.
I'm not doing that one anymore,but that was where I was and I
tried.
I'm doing in a very differentgame now.
So, anyway, I just reallyappreciate your take on all of
this.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
Yeah, I appreciate you and we need some right reach
radio right Instead of BigReach or Right Reach Video.
Yeah, thank you for being opento the conversation and thank
you so much for having me.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
For those of you listening at the end here, I
just want to remind you that ifyou'd like to go and binge on
all the archive of the StandoutBusiness Show, just go to
standoutbusinessshow and you canget in the door all of the
audio, all of the video, all theshow notes, all the links to
(25:23):
all the relevant stuff.
It's all there and you canbinge to your heart's content.
We go live every Thursday at11am Eastern Time, and until the
next time, so long everyone.
So when I am looking to go meet my potential clients,
I like to do something calledaudience borrowing.
What does that mean?
It means looking for otherfolks who I can collaborate with
, who are already talking to myaudience and we can provide a
win-win.
Right, I can come into theiraudience, provide some great
value and then I get introducedto their folks.
And so when I'm looking forthat, I need to be really clear
(00:23):
about who my ideal client isnumber one, so that I know where
they're hanging out.
But then I take it to the nextlevel and I actually create an
ideal connection avatar formyself.
I want to build relationshipswith the folks who have access
to my similar audience.
Right, we work with the samegroup of people, just in
different ways.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Welcome to the Standout Business Show.
I'm Brad Powell, and todaywe're asking this question can
you get fully booked withoutusing social media?
Just think about that for aminute.
If you're ready to stop withthis endless social media
posting and you're sittingaround hoping that clients are
(01:07):
going to find you after you'veposted forever in a day and
you're waiting on the phonegoing gosh, why aren't they
calling me?
Or if you're sick of living inthis sort of social media
malaise, where most people whoare participating in this game
are just exhausted becausethey've been chasing traffic and
(01:27):
trying to grow their followers.
Well, my guest today is reallyposing what if you could opt out
of all this frenzy?
So, like, here's the thing whenit comes to building a standout
business, most people arethinking that they need this
perfect website, they need alarge social media following,
(01:51):
they need to send weekly emails,they need all the pretty
graphics over everything, theyneed perfectly adorned videos.
And my guest, michelle Warner,she believes that, instead of
doing all of that, you can getoff the social media bandwagon
(02:11):
by building real connectionsthat lead to real clients and,
most importantly, real revenue,and she's developed a system
that she calls relationshipmarketing, and I'm here to tell
you that it's really distinctivefrom any other form of
relationship or referralnetworking that you have heard
(02:32):
of.
She has been on this mission todesign tiny companies that are
built to last.
So stay tuned, because we aregoing to take a deep dive into
how you can shift from trafficmarketing to relationship
marketing, and with that let'sstart the show.
(02:53):
Michelle Warner, welcome to theshow.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Oh, thank you so much for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Right, and I'm excited too because I'm going to
share that.
As we said in the green room, IFirst came across you because
you were being interviewed by,actually, a friend of mine, jay
Akanzo.
He published a podcast that youwere the keynote on and you
were talking all about yourrelationship marketing, and one
of the things that struck me is,first of all, it's just quite
(03:23):
different from a lot of thingsthat I've heard before, and you
shared a story of and like a lotof things, like you found this
way of being and this way ofevolving in terms of doing your
own marketing by solving yourown problem of struggling with
selling yourself to a group ofin this case it was non-profits.
(03:43):
So could you share thatparticular story of just a way
of sort of letting us into, like, your brain and how it works?
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Yeah, it was an interesting challenge I found
myself with.
About 2010 was the timelinehere, and my background at the
time had been very much indirect marketing email.
I had managed large nonprofitemail lists 100,000 plus email
lists so I knew that massmarketing and all of a sudden I
was running a startup thatneeded to sell to very small
(04:13):
organizations local governmentsand nonprofits.
We were headquartered in Denverand I needed to sell into
cities around the US.
Well, as you can imagine, localgovernment leaders, local
nonprofit leaders are veryuninterested in jumping on a
large email list and so I didn'thave a skill set to reach them
and I was really struggling tomake the sales that we needed to
make for this startup.
(04:33):
And at the time I realized I wasjust coming out of business
school and I had taken a couplesemesters of coursework, kind of
unknowingly and almost by amistake, about how networks
operate and how your networksare structured, and I realized
that there was actually a way tothink about this to build the
relationships that I wanted tobuild strategically to get into
these conversations with folks.
(04:53):
So, instead of like thisconstant cold calling of some
woman from Denver trying toreach so-and-so in Philadelphia
and Boston and all these placeswhere they don't want to hear
from me.
I thought how can I build asystem and build some assets so
that I can build a relationshipfor them, get them to trust me,
before we start with the coldcalling and then move into an
actual sales conversation?
And listen, I was in a reallyfortunate position while I was
(05:16):
really struggling with sales.
I was in a fortunate positionthat I could book just about any
speaking slot I wanted withinthe niche that we were in, and
so I would do a lot of keynotes.
And instead of doing thosekeynotes, what I realized was
wait a minute.
I could start trading in thosekeynotes and instead ask for
panel discussions and host apanel discussion at some pretty
(05:36):
high profile events that thesefolks found valuable.
And so I started trading thosein, took the spotlight off of
myself and said hey, can yougive me a panel instead?
And then I reached out to thesesame people who won't give me
the time of day and insteadasked them would you like to
come on the panel?
Would you like to tell yourstory?
Right, I just spotlighted them,I built a relationship with
them, just forgot anything aboutselling.
(05:58):
And wouldn't you know it?
Right, they came, I gave them aplatform to share their stories
.
They had an opportunity toshare who and what they were,
and they trusted me and thensales flowed from there, and so
that really sparked the conceptin my mind that when you are
running particular types ofbusinesses that aren't
necessarily going to be a matchfor some mass marketing Listen,
(06:20):
some businesses are a greatmatch for mass marketing, and
I'm not going to argue withthose.
But when you're selling kind ofhigher ticket stuff to specific
niches you know, custom things,a lot of our service based
businesses, b2b businesses, alot of that stuff you have to
think about it in a differentway.
And so how can you find asystem, how can you find a
marketing that is going to workbeyond referrals?
(06:42):
What I see a lot of peopledoing is they get all the
referral business and then thatdries up, or you get nervous
that you're relying on referralsand so, yeah, kind of boomerang
all the way over to massmarketing again, and that tends
to not be the answer.
It's more, how can you buildsomething that looks like
referrals but something thatyou're in charge of?
And so that's what I think ofas relationship marketing.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I really like the partwhere you said you took the
spotlight off yourself, which isso counterintuitive from, like
all the noise we hear constantlyabout.
Oh no, you need to stand outand you need to be bigger than
life and you need to go out andbe everywhere, all over the
place, and I think I think thekey there for a lot of people.
(07:25):
You know this works extremelywell for people who are sort of
leaning towards the introvertedside of the spectrum, that there
are things that you'reintroducing with your work that
work extremely well for folkswho don't want to be like
exuberant and don't want to bein the spotlight all the time.
(07:45):
So let's explore that a littlebit.
Like what other aspects of yourstrategy seem to be super well
suited for the shy folks thatpeople are going?
Oh no, I want to stay in thebackground.
Speaker 1 (07:59):
Well, and I think, yes and right, it works really
well for the shy folks and italso works really well for folks
who are, frankly, like a bigpublic platform Isn't going to
get you anywhere.
If you're trying to sell intoC-suite executives and B2B, a
lot of times that's not going towork.
And so the same.
You know, to have a big publicplatform you need to have this
relationship.
And so when we're talking abouteither introverts who just have
(08:20):
a really tough time with thevisibility and, by the way,
that's me like I'm the first onehiding in the bathroom at any
kind of, you know, normalnetworking event, so if you're
that kind of introvert, or ifyou have the type of business
where people aren't just aren'tresponding to mass marketing,
thinking instead about how youcan hand a platform to them, how
you can kind of create aproject, do something that can
(08:42):
double as an excuse to meetfolks, while also, you know,
working with your marketing.
And that first example that Ishared frankly, all these
keynotes that I had, my audiencewasn't listening to those.
The folks listening to thatwere never going to be my buyers
because of how the company wasset up, and so I, the keynotes
were doing nothing for me, likeit was nice.
It built some nice visibilityand I see that all the time we
(09:04):
build this visibility that's notactually in front of your
buyers.
So the key is like thinkingthrough how are your buyers
actually responding to you, whatare they looking for?
And then giving yourself anexcuse to meet them in such a
way that it is relationshipbuilding first as opposed to
thinking sales first.
Right, and that does helpintroverts, because introverts
get really freaked out and again, I'm one of you by going into a
(09:27):
relationship immediatelythinking how am I going to close
this person, how am I going tobuild a relationship?
And if you can instead go intoit in like, how can I hand you
some value, and some real value,and just give you something and
make friends with you, then wecan take care of the rest later
on.
Because introverts tend to begood once the relationship is
established, they can have thoseconversations.
It's initially getting thatrelationship going and feeling
(09:50):
it loaded with the necessity ofa sale that freaks them out.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Yeah, I really appreciate this idea of not just
a relationship building, butit's so easy to be thinking
about instead of going out intothe world and reaching a large
number of people in whatever wayyou want to try and do.
That it's more of where can Ifind a version of a local cafe?
(10:15):
Yeah, and I can sit down withone person and have a meaningful
engagement with that person sothat we get to know each other
and we build trust with oneanother and that good things can
happen as a result of the factthat the relationship is there
and it's going to continue.
Yeah, and this is the kind ofthing like, even when I go to
(10:35):
really large conferences, thisis how, like, I can't handle
being in the like the chaoticnoise of, you know, with 500,000
people sort of all going allaround and I was going I'm the
guy who's always like standingin the middle of the crowd and
nobody's talking to me is likewhat, what am I doing wrong?
How come all these people caneasily talk with one another and
(10:57):
I'm just sitting here all bymyself?
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Oh, I'm the same way and I go into those conferences.
They're not bad things.
But I think they're bad thingsif you go and just assume you're
going to run into the magicalperson who's going to change
your life.
Right yeah.
Instead, I'm going to thoseevents saying like, oh, who's
speaking at this, who's doingthis?
And doing some research aheadof time and knowing that if I
meet one or two key people atthat event, my ROI is going to
be so much better than if I justcome home with a random stack
(11:21):
of business cards and I can'tremember who these people are.
And so it's all about puttingthat relationship first and
understanding that the game forthe if your business matches
with it the game is, you know,quality over quantity.
You need to meet the correctthree people, or 10 people, or
100 people, as opposed to themasses of thousands.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
Yeah, so to the point , how do you decide, like when
I'm, when I'm doing anything,how do I choose who are the
correct people like, what kindsof people should I be looking?
Speaker 1 (11:54):
for?
Yeah, great question.
So I think about this in termsof ideal connection avatars.
So when I am looking to go meetmy potential clients, I like to
do something called audienceborrowing.
What does that mean?
It means looking for otherfolks who I can collaborate with
, who are already talking to myaudience and we can provide a
win-win right.
I can come into their audience,provide some great value and
(12:16):
then I get introduced to theirfolks.
And so when I'm looking forthat, I need to be really clear
about who my ideal client is.
Number one, so that I knowwhere they're hanging out.
But then I take it to the nextlevel and I actually create an
ideal connection avatar formyself.
And so that means I am veryclear when someone reaches out
to me or when I'm reaching outto build relationships.
Number one I'm not generallyreaching out to people who I
(12:38):
expect to be my clients, becauseclients come and go.
Let's face it, they're notforever.
But relationships with peoplewho always are collecting have
an audience of my clients, thoserelationships can be forever.
So that's who I want to buildrelationships with.
I want to build relationshipswith the folks who have access
to my, my similar audience,right, not in competitive ways.
I don't want to steal yourclients, but where we do the
(13:01):
same work for the, we do work.
We work with the same group ofpeople, just in different ways,
and so there's actually avatarsyou can build for that you can
say, hey, who are the types ofpeople, the types of roles, who
are likely, who have likelyalready collected my audience,
and how can we collaboratetogether?
And that's who I'm looking tomeet.
And when you get really clear onthat, guess what number one
(13:22):
random coffee chats go away.
Right, that's one of the firstthings people say to me is oh, I
don't have time to do 14 coffeechats every week, and I was
like I don't either, like Idon't want to spend my days on
zoom.
I definitely don't want to dothat.
But when you're clear about whoyou're connecting with, it is
really easy to have a fewproductive coffee chats that
help you get to know the rightpeople, where you can set up
(13:43):
really dynamic and excitingcollaborations.
Whether it be a podcastinterview or a speaking of some
kind, or I do like a lot oftraining within paid communities
.
I come in and be a guestteacher all of that sort of
thing can get you in front ofyour ideal clients in a really
effective way.
That actually ends up lookinglike a referral with those high
conversion rates.
Because you spend so muchquality time with these folks,
(14:04):
they just trust you right awayand the sale can move along at a
really rapid clip.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah, I love that, and when you're coming up with
these different characteristicsof like who's my, you're like
for me, I might be going.
Well, I'm looking for people whohave a podcast like mine that
is aimed at you know, businesspeople or something sort of the
same kind of people that my showis aimed at and, as one example
, or I might be looking forpeople who, like you say, have
(14:33):
some kind of group or groupprogram or some kind of thing,
and they'd like me to come inand talk to them about what I do
, which is, you know, video,marketing and so on, when I'm,
you know, when I'm reaching outto them and one of the things
that I do, which is how I usethis show like a show is great
for relationship building withall the guests like why else?
(14:54):
Why, what else are you doing ifyou're not doing that?
Speaker 1 (14:57):
I always tell clients like, yeah, if you already have
a platform, if you have a show,please, 50% of the guests at
least that you invite on shouldbe people who meet that ideal
connection avatar, because whoknows where you can take it.
That's such a great way tostart a relationship.
Now.
You're not randomly emailingpeople and saying, hey, could we
chat for a minute?
Right.
You're saying, hey, I wouldlove to offer you my platform.
(15:17):
This is the equivalent of whatI was doing when I got those
panels instead of the keynotes,right.
It's the equivalent of nothaving a solo podcast, but
instead saying, hey, who do Ineed to meet?
How can I bring them into thefold, give them a platform and,
by doing so, build a greatrelationship in trust, because
I've centered them.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah, for me, I found it's been a very easy ask for a
lot of people who I would liketo meet.
You know and or I hear aboutthem in one way or another and I
go, oh, they're doing somethingreally interesting, I want to
learn more about that and I cansay, well, instead of like a
random whatever on some platform, saying, hey, I saw you're
doing cool stuff, could we do avideo chat or could we have a
(15:56):
zoom call?
People are going, no, thanks,but come on, my show is a very
easy thing and what you weredoing with.
By the way, I can book you intothis being a keynote panel this
conference.
Would you like to come?
And then who's gonna say no tothat?
So, in your world, in terms ofother clients that you're
(16:16):
working with, what are the otherkinds of assets that people are
you know utilizing in this way,so that when they're doing an
outreach, they can say somethinglike, oh, I have this thing
that I would like you to becomeand be part of.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Yeah, there's so many different things.
Maybe you have a group programor a mastermind or a training of
some sort.
You can invite folks in to do acomplimentary training, do a
guest training, right, do abonus training.
That's one great way to meetfolks.
People have, you know, it'sreally whatever platform you
have, people have blogs that arereally well read.
(16:50):
If you have a blog post that'spopular, people would love to
write a guest blog.
I know that's not as popularthese days, but if you have a
very well read blog, that is alegitimate thing to do.
Podcasts are very popular.
You know.
Social media lives, any kind ofthese collaborations, bringing
folks in to speak, any kind ofway that you can.
You can highlight the otherperson via whatever means you
(17:12):
have.
I even have some B2B clientswho go ahead and write white
papers, and part of the reasonthat they write the white papers
is, yeah, they want todistribute it, but also they
want to invite some targetedfolks to come in and participate
in those white papers and beinterviewed for them right and
get their names in the whitepapers, and that is a great way
(17:32):
to build relationships.
I don't want you to go to thehassle of writing a white paper
if it's not also going to dosome other work for you.
But if you're doing some ofthat work, let's be strategic
about who you talk to to do that.
And then one of my favoriteexamples is I live in a small
town along Lake Michigan and weactually have a yoga studio
who's brilliant at this.
So Yoga Studio on Main Streetand they are looking for those
(17:54):
collaborations and how can theyshare their clients?
And my favorite example of whatthey've done they figured out a
way to collaborate with justabout everyone in town.
But my favorite is we had oneof those axe throwing bars open
in town and on Friday nightsthey will collaborate where you
can get a joint ticket and yougo and get all your aggression
out from the week.
You throw your axes and thenyou go over to the yoga studio
(18:15):
and do like an hour longwhatever they call it with the
relaxing yoga.
And I just think that's abrilliant example because on the
surface you wouldn't thinkthose businesses had anything in
common, but their clientele isactually exactly the same.
Right, the people who go to axethrowing tend to be younger.
The vibe of those places is alittle bit younger and they're
(18:35):
also going to the yoga studioson Saturday morning.
So the examples are everywhere.
You just need to think abouthow do I gather my audience and
how can I hand whatevermechanism that is to somebody
else.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Yeah, and I want to sort of leapfrog on that because
really, in spite of what I saidat the intro, you're not
actually advocating that peopledon't publish content and don't
put yourself out there in somekind of content delivery way,
whether it's written or video,or you're making a presentation
(19:10):
somewhere.
That's not it at all.
It's just more the distinctionof, instead of going for traffic
, now you're going for thisrelationship and more of a
trust-building thing.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
Yeah, let's get into the nuance of it, because a lot
of people just default tocreating content and pushing it
out on their channel andassuming that whatever algorithm
is involved is going to somehowbless them and they're going to
go viral and people will findthem.
And what I'm advocating for is,instead of this, just constant
content pushing, let's bestrategic about the content.
Number one when people arefirst meeting you so I think of
(19:45):
marketing in three stagesawareness, engagement, sales
they need to know you exist.
Then they need to engage withyou, then they need to buy
something with you.
So at that awareness stage, alot of people aren't even
thinking through that realstrategically and, again,
they're just assuming analgorithm is going to bless them
.
They're going to post onLinkedIn 14 times a day and
somehow people are going tobecome aware of them, right?
So instead, let's think aboutthat and let's take 80% of your
(20:05):
awareness activities off of yourplatforms, right?
Go borrow audiences, go takeyour content somewhere else.
Now, that is more efficient too,because when I do that, you
know I have like two or threepieces of great content that I
can repeat over and, over andover again.
So I don't need to push out45,000 types of content because
I'm going onto other platformswhere it will always be new.
(20:25):
I'm always borrowing anaudience so that content is
always going to be new and fresh, right, so I don't have to
constantly produce new stuff.
And so that's one piece liketake your content during
awareness, take it off of theplatforms and then, during
engagement, once they've met youand they're going to come hang
out with you, then maybe youknow it makes sense to send out
newsletters.
I send out a newsletter.
It can make sense to be onsocial media so that they
(20:47):
remember you exist.
But this is now for following,and it's in its ongoing
engagement and its ongoingconversation.
It's not this like playing thealgorithm game of just running
in that endless hamster wheel.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
Yeah, I mean there's not much benefit to the hamster
wheel.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Yeah, yeah, and I want to be clear, like that's
really like, if you're thatservice-based kind of higher
ticket item, right, if you'remass marketing and you're
selling e-commerce products,like please go play that traffic
game.
That's kind of how it's played.
But where we get screwed up iswhen you're not, that you're
trying to sell higher ticketitems that require a little bit
more loyalty, trust, all thosethings.
Like yeah, that hamster wheelis not going to get you anywhere
(21:29):
.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
Yeah, for sure.
Well, we've got a comment herefrom Angela.
Yeah, she says love thesynergies within an ecosystem.
I always tell my B2C folks touse LinkedIn to find other
providers they can work with.
Leverage their audience, Likethe wedding photographer should
find the wedding baker and thewedding planner and the wedding
DJ.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
I always use the wedding example.
I'm surprised they didn't bringit up today.
Yes, angela, you nailed it.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
Yes, Right, exactly Another.
That's good example, perfect,sort of like.
One person can you know hasneeds all these different things
, especially in that one momentlike I'm getting married.
Help, yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
And those are really obvious examples and people will
say to me oh well, that doesn'thappen in my industry it does.
You just have to maybe look alittle further.
You know who's working withyour customers right before you
or right after you.
Those are really natural placesto take a look at to build some
of these relationships.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
Yeah, I guess Pamela Slim talks about this the PB&J
peanut butter and jelly partners.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
Yeah, we were actually.
I just did a podcast with her.
We were talking about this.
I think it was last week.
It came out oh nice, absolutely.
There's a ton of synergybetween how we think about these
things.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Yeah right, and what she's doing like she has this in
the real world center forbusinesses that just seems to be
thriving as a communityecosystem for all these things.
You know small local businessin the neck of the woods where
she lives, so I just think it'sjust really terrific work on her
part?
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Yeah, absolutely yes.
We think very similarly aboutthese things.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
Right, right, all right.
Well, we're getting close tothe end of our time.
It goes by super fast.
If there's something that wehaven't touched upon, do you
have like final words to put abow on our conversation?
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Really just to be aware that this relationship
side of things exists.
And so if you are a person inthose service industries or in
some of the higher tickets andyou're finding yourself on that
content hamster wheel, justencourage you to recognize that
there are other options.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
All right.
Well, if there is anyone who iswatching this, listening to
this, and they're super inspiredand they're going well,
michelle, I want you to help megrow my relationship so that I
can take my tiny business andmake it last forever.
What's the best way for?
Speaker 1 (23:49):
them to hook up with you.
Yeah, they can find me.
My website isthemichellewarnercom.
You can come over there and Iactually host a monthly event
where we do a Q&A and talk aboutall this stuff, so you'll find
the information on how to signup there, or you can always ping
me over direct message onInstagram or LinkedIn.
You're not going to see meposting a lot for the reasons we
just talked about, but I amthere, so if you want to connect
(24:11):
over there, I'd love to see you.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
All right.
Well, thank you so much forcoming on today.
This is really, I think, wellneeded conversation.
More and more people,especially in sort of the high
ticket world that I operate inpeople, have this thing of like
oh no, I've got to grow, I'vegot to be big and I've got to
(24:32):
get the biggest reach ever, andI'm guilty that I used to have a
program that I called Big ReachVideo.
It's like I don't.
I'm not doing that one anymore,but that was where I was and I
tried.
I'm doing in a very differentgame now.
So, anyway, I just reallyappreciate your take on all of
this.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
Yeah, I appreciate you and we need some right reach
radio right Instead of BigReach or Right Reach Video.
Yeah, thank you for being opento the conversation and thank
you so much for having me.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
For those of you listening at the end here, I
just want to remind you that ifyou'd like to go and binge on
all the archive of the StandoutBusiness Show, just go to
standoutbusinessshow and you canget in the door all of the
audio, all of the video, all theshow notes, all the links to
(25:23):
all the relevant stuff.
It's all there and you canbinge to your heart's content.
We go live every Thursday at11am Eastern Time, and until the
next time, so long everyone.
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