In this post, I’m covering the 6 things you need to build a profitable online business. If you’ve been offering Zoom classes or 1:1 sessions through your website but have not been seeing the results you’ve been hoping for, and you’re wondering what else you need – this post is for you.
#1 Irresistible Offers
Before you think about how to grow your followers on social media and start spending hours each week creating content for Instagram, you need to create products/offer services, so you have something to sell!
If you want a profitable online business, it’s not enough to just have a low-priced offer like Zoom classes or a low-priced membership. I recommend that you have a range of offers instead:
First, low-priced offers like Zoom classes and a membership.
Secondly, 1:1 offers like private sessions.
And lastly, you should definitely have (or be working on) a higher-priced offer like an online course or a group coaching program (check out this blog post to find out more about different things you can offer as part of your online yoga business).
So, what makes your offers irresistible? What can you do to make your classes or course stand out from all the other offers and something that your people cannot resist?
It all starts and ends with your customers. You need to ask yourself what they want, what they’re struggling with, and how you can help them. This means you need a certain understanding of who your customers are and how they tick. I might even go as far to say that you need to fall in love with them!
Truly great offerings start with you falling in love with your customers because when you truly love your customers, you’re committed to delivering outstanding offerings because you want them to be happy. And when your customers feel truly heard and understood by you, they’re going to be happy to buy from you. Think about creating offers that make the life of your customers easier, more convenient, and often more joyful, because this is what they’ll want and is what will make your offers irresistible to them.
Your energy, your intention, and your enthusiasm also play a huge part in making your offers irresistible. Your customers can feel it if you’re not feeling it – even if it’s just text on a sales page, when you’re not excited about it, it’s going to affect your sales.
It’s also important to protect your energy and just focus on a few offers at once, or maybe just one at a time – whatever you feel aligned with. You can’t be everywhere and do everything, you’re not superwoman!
#2 A Clear Niche & Message
People have specific problems, and they are looking for experts/leaders who can help them with that. Choosing a niche will make your brand more profitable, faster. There will always be more yoga teachers all the time and everybody can teach similar things.
It‘s important to be able to distinguish yourself from the other teachers who are out there so that when people are looking for a solution to their problems or want to learn from someone, they can really zero in and see how you are a good fit for them and their learning style.
If you’re struggling with niching down because you want to do everything, you’re not alone. I know it can be tough to pick one topic or one style of yoga, and it might feel like you’re putting yourself in a box.
The reality here is, your potential clients have different levels of experience as well as different ages, genders, and backgrounds. Carving out a specific offering to meet the specific needs of a specific type of student is essential, especially if you want to build an online business.
As always, there’s never one way that’s right for everybody. But, having said that, especially in the online world you will get better results, faster when you niche down.
Here’s what happens when you narrow your niche…
#1 You make it easier for the RIGHT people to find you and to fall in love with your offerings.
As an added bonus, Google loves blogs or websites that are experts on a specific topic and will direct more traffic to it than to a website that covers all kinds of content because people will spend more time on it.
#2 You begin to stand out as an expert or leader in your topic.
This builds trust, which is essential to convert people into paying customers.
So I would say that, even when you teach all kinds of different things in yoga studios, for your online business, pick one main topic as your niche, for example, prenatal yoga, yoga for better sleep, mindfulness, meditation tips, there are a million things.
Remember, this doesn‘t have to be your niche for the next 5 years! I think it’s really important to remind yourself of this when you’re struggling to choose a niche. Make a decision for a niche that you feel passionate about, and stick with it for at least 90 days, or 3 months. You can do this, I promise!
#3 A Website That Sells
Your website is a tool that should help you sell your services and offers 24/7! You don’t need to hire an expensive designer to build your website and add all the bells and whistles. However, it needs to be well structured, easy to navigate, and it needs to build trust – it should look professional.
Add images of you where people see your face. Make sure that you have no grammar and spelling mistakes and that links are working. If you can’t do that, why should people feel safe in paying you?
I created a very clean template website especially for yoga teachers and wellness entrepreneurs and in my course, Blissful Websites, I teach you how to build your website based on this template in WordPress. Hundreds of my students are proof that you can build your website yourself.
You can of course also hire someone to design your website (I fully support that), but even then, it’s your job to brief that person. You need to decide on your website structure, your content, and write your website copy, and a million other things.
Your website will be your hub, it will be your online home. It’s how people will find you and where they can learn more about you and get in touch. It’s also where you place your offers and host your content.
#4 A Clear Content Strategy To Grow Your Audience
To sell your offers you need an audience to sell to, and by this, I mean a list of email subscribers. And to grow that audience, you need content.
A lot of us focus on social media or think we need to grow our Instagram followers so we can get more customers. Sound familiar? To tell you the truth, I’ve been there too. Very often it’s fear and mindset issues that make us focus on social media because we believe it’s safer. Nobody’s really going to judge us for an Instagram post, but putting a real offer out there can be scary, so we focus on something like social media instead.
I’m not against social media, but I think it’s the wrong tool to grow your audience to sell them something – it’s more effective for building trust and connection with your customers. You should use it to tell people about your offers, but definitely don’t rely on social media. When you create your own content (e.g. a blog post/videos/podcast episode) you control it because you host it on your website.
This is important, even when you focus on videos and growing a YouTube Channel, create a blog post for every video where you embed the video and post this. In your blog posts, you can integrate forms to invite people to your email list, or you add some freebies. For example, one of my students created a yin yoga sequence as a freebie and people love it and sign up for her email list.
The only other option is paid ads. Again, while paid ads are a great strategy and can really help you grow your business, I think the content that you create is essential. Creating content is a free strategy so it’s great when you’re just getting started, but also, you control it and it has longevity.
I still get traffic to my website for blog posts that I published in 2017 – that’s what I mean by longevity. Nobody’s going to look at an Instagram post from 2017, right? But when you have a great blog post, even though it’s a bit more work to create at first, it can work for you for a really, really long time.
I recommend doing ads, using social media to build trust and connect with your audience, but also have a content strategy in place to grow your subscribers so you can sell to them.
#5 Marketing Skills
By this, I mean selling. There’s no way around it – you need to embrace the entrepreneur inside you and get comfortable selling your offer. Talking about your offers, sharing your excitement, inviting people to join you, this is all part of it.
People want authenticity, and we all crave connection. This is you, and your customers will buy from you because they like you and trust you, so you need to put yourself out there. The good news is that you don’t need a big audience to sell your offers. You need an audience of the right people, who really like you, and are interested in what you offer. It’s quality over quantity, every time.
What I think you also need, especially when you’re getting started, is a plan to follow.
Without a step-by-step plan on how to set up your launch, you’re probably going to play small. It’s completely normal to do this, but you can do so much better! You owe it to yourself, to your customers, and to your offer, to market it as best as you can and to go all out on it.
I know it’s scary and hard, so simply following a plan makes it so much easier, because you don’t have to question every decision you make, you just do what’s laid out and follow that for your first launches. After that, you can start experimenting and do something else.
#6 Support
You can’t do it alone. Every single successful entrepreneur that I’ve met or see online talks about their support system. I’m big on doing things alone – It’s not that I don’t ask for help, but I also like to figure things out by myself.
Then, around 2 years ago I joined my first high-level group coaching program, it was the Accelerator with Mariah Coz, and it took me a while, but having this support group was invaluable. I built so many connections with other entrepreneurs who were in the program, I had them on my podcast and as experts in my programs and it was so inspiring and motivating.
Then of course to actually get answers to your real problems and feedback on things definitely helped me grow so much. I don’t know where I would be without Mariah’s program, and now I’m in her new program, High Ticket Hybrid, and I love the support and the community.
There’s so much power in connecting with other entrepreneurs who are doing the same thing you are trying to do! It doesn’t have to be a big group, it can be just a few people, but you need to be open to receiving their feedback, and of course, you also need to involve yourself.
I promise it’s going to be worth it and it’s the secret ingredient to a successful business that doesn’t get talked about enough.
So, these are the most important 6 things you need for a profitable business that earns you a full-time income:
1. Irresistible offers
2. A clear niche and message
3. A website that converts
4. A content strategy to grow your audience
5. Marketing skills
6. Support
Remember, there’s always more to learn and discover, and that’s what makes it so exciting!
If you want to elevate your brand and offers and build a six-figure business, you’re invited in The Mentorship.
The Mentorship is a 12-month mentorship program with unparalleled support for coaches and other service providers who are ready to elevate their brand, sell out their offers and scale their business to six figures.
What really sets it apart is that you get a ton of video trainings to help you implement things and take action, but you also get 1:1 coaching, group coaching, and personal feedback and critique for work you submit.
Go to www.susannerieker.com/mentorship and get all the details.
