Finola Howard (00:02.605)
Hi everyone, welcome back to Your Truth Shared. And today I want to talk about a topic that is fundamental to business growth, is fundamental to scaling your business. And it's the idea of actually building an engine that supports the growth of your business. And I wanted to talk to somebody who kind of really digs into this with her clients on a day-to-day basis and helps them elevate their businesses at a much sharper level.
dialed in level but I'm gonna let her tell you more about that. Today I want to introduce you to Maeve Ferguson. Welcome Maeve.
Maeve Ferguson (00:40.812)
Hey, Fanola, thank you so, much for having me here. I am really excited about jumping into this conversation and truly getting to the bottom of how to actually build.
Finola Howard (00:53.145)
I love it. So give us a little bit of an intro to what you do so people start to get a sense of this journey.
Maeve Ferguson (01:00.736)
Yes, absolutely. So we work with thought leaders. So some of the biggest, you know, kind of the big famous names in the industry, thought leaders and high end experts. So people who really have true intellectual property, real brilliance to bring to the world, none of the bro marketer types, all of the kind of, you know, spray and pray marketer type thing. It is not, you know, the world that we are in. So we're working with true thought leadership.
And what we do with these high end experts is allow them to turn their intellectual property into infrastructure that results in leads and clients for the company, whether they are on stage or not, whether they, you know, whether they are out there promoting their book or not, the engine keeps running in the background, bringing in qualified leads, converting clients for them so that they don't have to be kind of what I call on all the time.
Finola Howard (01:57.421)
Wonderful. How do you decide what is true intellectual property? So that people can get a sense of, am I close to this? Have I got assets in my business that I haven't really tapped into? Where am I on this continuum of true thought leadership or true intellectual property?
Maeve Ferguson (02:15.732)
Yes, a lot. It's a beautiful question. this is a continuum is the perfect way to describe it. Okay. I see two camps of people in the market. there are those who are like our clients, for example, who are Harvard professors, number one, New York time bestselling authors, absolute, like iconic IP.
that is literally there has been academic papers written on this, it's been statistically validated, all of those things. That is one extreme end of the spectrum. And the other account that I see people fall into is that they have IP, but they don't realize that it is IP. They have their intellectual property, they've just never actually given it this label. So they have their methodologies, their processes there.
way of being their way of doing their way of thinking and their way of working with clients. And but just because they haven't put a pretty name on it or it hasn't been labeled or trademarked does not mean that it's not intellectual property. So I see a lot of people I call a kind of hidden IP where they have it. They just don't realize the asset that they're sitting on inside their company.
And what I call the fake IP are those people who kind of wake up at, you know, seven day and decide on chat GPT that they want to become a life coach and use chat GPT to create their framework of their process that they do and then try to peddle out the internet. Okay. So that's what I call fake IP.
Finola Howard (03:43.939)
I like that you differentiate that because it's knowledge that's hard won. You studied it, but you've experienced it. You delivered it. You framed it. You found a better way of doing it. How? Yes.
Maeve Ferguson (03:49.472)
Yeah, 100%.
Maeve Ferguson (03:55.916)
Yeah, and you've stressed tested. So like you've just pulled a beautiful thread there. This is where it's like we haven't just like made this up this morning. We have been battle tested the work that we do with our clients. We've been doing it for seven years. We have built it. We have failed. We've fallen over. We've made it better. We stress test it across a range of different markets every single time, improving the IP so that all of our clients now get the results exactly the same as the Harvard.
professors of the world.
Finola Howard (04:27.683)
This gives me an idea for another question for you, which is this idea of stress testing your IP. I wanted to ask you this question of how do you turn this? So somebody's listening and they think, God, I might have something here that I haven't really leveraged before. And I think there are a lot of businesses that have assets that they've not leaned into and not maximized, definitely not leveraged. How do we take them on this continuum to make it
like really valuable assets, really valuable IP.
Maeve Ferguson (04:57.614)
Yeah, so this is actually one of the first things that we do with our clients on our VIP days. And we call it IP mapping. And this is where we take you actually through a series of questions to extract the IP that is inside your brain and thereby turn it into a framework, turn it into a model so that you can be positioned as a category of one.
So the easiest jumping off place here is like if your IP is still all trapped in your head or it's just kind of scattered across your keynotes and your book or master classes that you might run or webinars or even the conversations you're having on sales calls, where I would start with this is always at the end. OK, so we want to begin with the end in mind, stealing the famous quote. OK, and then what we like to do is reverse back out of.
where we are sending people. And for most people in the expert industry, that is going to be some sort of offer, whether it's a private one-on-one offer, a course, a program, membership, live event, whatever it may be. So what are the offers that we have on the backend that are our way of bringing our IP to the world and monetizing it? Okay, so we begin with the offer.
Then we want to reverse out of that and say to ourselves, if we haven't formalized our framework or methodology, how are we actually getting the results for the people inside of those offers? And a really, really good way to kind of just get the ball rolling with this is to think through your curriculum. OK, so if you have a course or a program or a group coaching container, what is the curriculum that you are delivering on inside of that?
And that will start to give us kind of what we call pillars. So there's like, right, well, we do this thing over here and then we move on with people and we do this thing here and then we do C, D and E. OK, and that starts to get the kind of the thoughts moving as to like right here are the pillars of the framework here are the the pieces of the pie that I help people with. OK, so what I help people with is different to what you help people with. Same and so on for everybody else. So we'll all have our own unique way.
Maeve Ferguson (07:12.685)
of getting our clients results. Okay. So from there, we now have these pillars of our framework. want to start to think through, is this a model that thing A has to happen before thing B, which has to happen before thing C. So is it on a kind of a timeline or is it the type of framework where it's more like a Venn diagram where we have to have A, and C all at same time.
for the person to get set results. That will really start to allow us to see like right here's all of these different areas. We don't want 72 pillars or 17 steps in our methodology. We want to what I call roll it up. So if we have like four or five things that are similar, we want to merge them together and roll them up into one kind of macro piece so that at the end we only have three or four maximum five parts of this frame.
Okay. Package in the framework. Exactly. So we want to see like what can we group together? What can we roll up? What is when you start to do this exercise, you're like, gosh, we do this one thing with the client every single time. And now that I'm looking at this, this isn't actually adding anything. So less is always more. We don't want to do what I call a trolley stuffing, where we just get everything we've ever learned ever on every single skill we ever had. And we whack it all into the shopping trolley, hoping that that's going to be more valuable.
Finola Howard (08:11.779)
So you're packaging the framework for them.
Maeve Ferguson (08:40.203)
All that that does for clients is cause overwhelm. So we want to strip it apart and strip it apart and how can we get them from A to B as fast as physically possible? And then once we've done that categorization piece, then we want to start thinking about what are labels or names to these pieces that are going to become memorable, that roll off the tongue, that just become synonymous with your name. Okay. So we, for example, we have IP mapping.
How do we map the IP and map that into an infrastructure or into a sorry, into a framework that then we go on in our company to build into diagnostic assessments, which is the infrastructure that qualifies them. Yeah.
Finola Howard (09:21.753)
question for you. Do you challenge the framework during this process?
Maeve Ferguson (09:26.605)
100%. So we should be challenging our own frameworks every single day. So my highest value as a human being is continuous improvement. So my way of being and my way of life is every single solitary day, what am I doing? What is any member of my team doing? What are we doing? Delivery, sales, onboarding, all of the different aspects of business where it could be even just 1 % better than it was yesterday.
Finola Howard (09:30.585)
Mm.
Finola Howard (09:34.542)
Mm.
Maeve Ferguson (09:52.331)
We are continually back to the stress testing where we're continually challenging our framework. Is this the best way to do this? Is there a better way? But the AI landscape has changed everything so dramatically that we are and like we have a whole agentic AI division of the company. And we're very, very aggressive these things, but we are continually changing how we're delivering to clients because the speed of change in AI is so ridiculously rapid.
that we have an entire division that are just focused on rolling that type of stuff out to clients, keeping abreast of it. And we're updating our frameworks and our methodologies based on the change that is running at the speed of light. Okay, so we have to do that job.
Finola Howard (10:35.609)
Do you find it, do you, when you're looking at mapping IP, I'm sure that you see things you've seen before. So that sometimes, you know, when we're, when you're looking for the thing that's unique, you're looking for the point of difference that would position them in the marketplace. But with AI and, and anyway, I think you would, even if there wasn't AI, if you're working with enough clients, you'll see similarities anyway.
Maeve Ferguson (10:39.373)
Mm-hmm.
Maeve Ferguson (10:50.253)
Yes, 100%.
Finola Howard (11:03.351)
So it's harder to pull that uniqueness out. What are you seeing there in the marketplace? Like, because if we're wanting listeners to figure out, have I got something unique? Have I something that's worth, like that could be really strong intellectual property that could take my business to the next level? How do we, tell me what you're seeing there.
Maeve Ferguson (11:09.943)
Mm-hmm.
Maeve Ferguson (11:20.429)
Thank you.
Maeve Ferguson (11:26.31)
Beautiful. So what we're seeing over and over again, those who have the chat GPT generated frameworks where it's like, I'm a life coach and we look at mind, body, spirit. Well, so do you and 16 hundred, 16 thousand other life coaches. OK, it just makes everybody sound the same. let's let's you let's kind of kind of bash about my business. So we build diagnostic assessments for thought leaders. OK, so to build their client engine.
Finola Howard (11:40.311)
Yeah.
Maeve Ferguson (11:54.605)
and we have a whole data play on the backend that's for a conversation for a different day. So essentially, if you break that down, what is it? We are marketing. We are doing top of funnel marketing. We are doing an elaborate and sophisticated version of the very well-known quiz funnel. Okay. And there are a gazillion funnel builders on the internet. Okay. So cool. That's grand. We're in an...
red, what we call a red bloody ocean. This is not a blue ocean where it's like you're the only person. We are in the reddest, bloodiest ocean of them all. So then we have to say like, right, this is the truth, right? So it's red, it's bloody, it is, there's a lot of bottom feeders in the market. There's a lot of bro marketers, nasty, Mcnasty stuff. Okay. So we want to then say like, what makes you different? What makes you so special?
Finola Howard (12:30.232)
It's very graphic.
Maeve Ferguson (12:47.819)
And what we actually do is a blend of a experience. this year, don't think a year of the IP is a set up and forget a thing. It is evolving in our business is evolving monthly, nevermind yearly. Okay. So it's not a build it once and that's it for life. It's constantly evolving, constantly changing as thing as new doors open and you have an opportunity to move here. You want to be, you want it to be fluid. You want it to be something that is living and breathing, not an exercise you do once and walk into a job.
Okay, so that's one.
Finola Howard (13:18.988)
But that's also possibly a big shift in the marketplace.
Maeve Ferguson (13:22.925)
But you have to remain agile because if we just have, it's like, right, here's the framework that I created in 2017. It's no longer applicable. Now that's obviously specific to my vertical. Okay. So somebody might be on a different vertical where it's just not as rapid a pace of change. But for my specific situation, this thing is changing weekly at the moment. Nevermind monthly, nevermind yearly, you know.
Finola Howard (13:28.92)
Mmm.
Finola Howard (13:39.397)
Hmm. Hmm.
But I think it's a really good mindset to have people not just kind of after listening to this digging around to go, do I have any IP that I could really leverage? But it's like, yeah, but am I actually growing this IP? Is it moving? Is it fluid? I just wanted to get that point across.
Maeve Ferguson (14:01.4)
Yeah. Yeah. And I think think just like I'm going to pull a thread on that and I'll get back to answering the previous question. One thing that I'm really seeing in the market and those who are struggling versus those who are just absolutely like crushing it are those who are like, but I already built a funnel. I already built one. You're like, and you know, everything has to keep moving. Everything's evolving. It's like something that was working six months ago.
Finola Howard (14:20.664)
Hmm.
Yeah.
Maeve Ferguson (14:29.291)
doesn't mean it's going to work today. And we got to be agile. We got to shift. can't have this mindset of like, I invested in this thing two years ago and it worked back then. Like it should still work as everything is changing. And that's part of the beauty and the joy of entrepreneurship is being agile enough to run with stuff like that. So that like that's a really, important.
Finola Howard (14:49.154)
Which is why, which is why something I always say, you should be doing the work you love. And this is something that you said when we chatted, you said, the journey from not to six figures is the hardest chapter. But you also said, if you're not enjoying the journey, then don't be an entrepreneur. And that is really.
Maeve Ferguson (14:52.941)
Yes.
Maeve Ferguson (15:02.093)
you
No, it's there's so many people. Yeah, this is what happened in this industry too though. And I get on my hobby horse with this quite a lot. But there are so many people who were peddled the just whack up a funnel and you'll be a millionaire by Friday laptops lifestyle. It doesn't work like that. There is no such thing as like push a button and you're going to be a millionaire. So many people who should never have been entrepreneurs listen to that fell for the super marketing around it.
subsequently, they hate their lives and they'd be far happier in a corporate career getting paid every month than they are, like literally like destroying their confidence, their like their health, everything, because they're trying to be something that they were never born to be. Because like true entrepreneurs, we are a weird bunch. It's like there's not too many people who are wired this way and thrive on it. So don't be if you're the person that it's like
you're hearing every moment of it, maybe it's not for you and that's OK. That's not failure. It's just it's OK. You don't have to do this. And for those of us who are are wired this way, for those of us who are driven this way, it is like you've got to enjoy the ride. There is no destination. And this is a huge thing that has hit me as our company has become more and more and more successful. As I said to you, like not to six figures was.
hands down the hardest chapter. And then it's like getting to seven. It's like once you get over that, it's just like everything just doesn't automatically happen, but it just becomes easier because everything's dialed in. Your messaging, your position, your offers, you've got your social proof. Everything gets easier. But if you're waiting for, you know, I laugh now. It's like where we are in business right now is what I used to literally dream about. It's like.
Finola Howard (16:58.36)
Hmm.
Maeve Ferguson (16:59.541)
It's just a different set of problems, it's scaling and team and we're growing like crazy and higher than crazy. We cannot keep up with the demand. So it's just different stuff. But again, there's there's no magic or like once you're there, you're just going to like kick back. That's me done. It doesn't work like that. So you have to enjoy the journey along the way. So anyway, I want to close the loop on your.
Finola Howard (17:23.032)
But I think a good lead in for you continuing is it's not just about enjoying the journey along the way. It's also being an active participant in the journey to to consciously create something that grows, that generates you a financial income, whatever your financial goals are, whatever your personal goals are. So all of this, it's got to be worth it. This is what I say to a lot of clients. It's got to be worth it. And what's it worth it for you? And one of the ways.
Maeve Ferguson (17:32.013)
Yeah.
Finola Howard (17:50.7)
that you can make it worth it consciously is by building an engine, which you are going to talk to us about now.
Maeve Ferguson (17:56.301)
Yeah, absolutely. So, to build that engine, we want to take that IP and just to close the lid on that, it's going to bother me if I don't close it for you. People are like, she didn't tell us hi. So we take that IP, we take our way of doing and then we have to inject ourselves into that. So what is your experience? So for me, for example, I used to be to work in Big Four. So I was a corporate consultant in Urchin Young for many years in financial services in London.
Finola Howard (18:05.196)
That's okay.
Maeve Ferguson (18:24.909)
I spent years in private equity working in product development and continuous improvement, managed a team of 47 people. There are unique, I used to be a steeplechase jockey. I have loads of different angles of me, my personality, my background, my experience, my expertise that I then infuse into that process that allow me to be different to some dude in his basement who builds funnels for people. Okay, so that is how you
set yourself up as what is called as a category of one, how you show the marketplace that you are different to the sea of all the choices that they have, where they want. And then you make a personal connection. And it's like of all of this red bloody ocean of people, we're going to pick you. OK, so that's that's how we do that piece. Then what we want to do is turn it into this client engine that you mentioned and what we have to decide there. So back to the conversation where we were like, begin with the end in mind.
We start with our offers and we reverse out between the intellectual property and the offers, we have to have sales mechanisms. OK, so for example, for us, we have a multi six figure offer. You're not going to buy that in a sales page. OK, so click and buy here, you know, hundred and forty thousand dollars. Click and buy doesn't work that way. OK, so you're not going to have a click and buy for a multi six figure offer the same way. You're probably going to have a click and buy up to at a push a 10k thing.
Most people, even at the 10k level, want to have some form of conversation. OK, so you might have an application. You might just go direct to sales call, depending on your stage of business, depending on your wait list, all of that type of stuff. You got to choose the appropriate sales mechanism. Likewise, if you have a forty seven dollar course, you're not having an agency director having sales conversations about that thing. There's no need. It's just a click and buy with maybe a bump and maybe an OTO in the back end. OK, so we choose your sales mechanisms.
Then what we want to do is take that IP that we mapped out and we want to start thinking about what is the best assessment. So I use the word assessment, you may use the word quiz. Sometimes you hear me use the word diagnostic. They're all one on the same thing, except there are three different types. And I'll go through those types that you can kind of see, bingo, that's the one for me. Okay. So one end of the spectrum, have the, what's best known as the quiz funnel.
Maeve Ferguson (20:49.165)
This is the kind of seven to ten questions. It's fun. It's fast as quick. It's easy It's not the what type of Disney princess are you type thing, but this is like a quick easy Lead generating machine we have clients for example running a million dollars in month in ads to one of their quiz funnels. This thing is Printing leads like at volume hundreds of thousands of leads pouring into the business. Okay, we're able to categorize them We're able to put them into buckets and we're able to sell them stuff
Super, super simple, but it's not a positioning play. Okay. Works incredibly well, but it's not an authority play. Far end of the spectrum. So that's one type. That's for you if qualified leads are a thing for you. So you want to know, can they afford to work with me? Are they ready to start? And are they struggling with something that we know in our offers we solve for. Okay. Qualified lead quiz funds for you. Far end of the spectrum we have.
Finola Howard (21:45.108)
up to what value is the offer at that point, that kind of quiz funnel.
Maeve Ferguson (21:49.861)
It can be any, any price point. OK, so we sell everything from your $47 course right through to like into we're not selling six figure offers with the quiz funnel, even though you could. But it's kind of like the 10 case, the 15 case, the 20 K type offers. OK, works beautifully well. Again, it's not going to be a clicking by in the back end. You're going to have an application. If it's a 20 K thing application on to a call with closer or yourself, if you're doing your own sales calls and convert.
Okay. One end of the spectrum, very far end of the spectrum. This is where we build multi-dimensional diagnostics for the, what we like our clients are the Harvard professors, the New York Times bestselling authors. This is the, if you've ever been through Enneagram, so I'm a three with a four wing or Myers-Briggs, I'm an INTJ. You become a household name. Everybody, when you say I'm an INTJ, people automatically know that's Myers-Briggs.
Okay, so disks, strength finders, all of those big, big, big household name assessments, those are multidimensional. So those are best suited for those who have really, really thoroughly tested intellectual property. So it has been through strict validity testing, reliability testing, they've done all the statistical modeling. This thing has been tested to within an inch of its life before it even goes out to the public.
People are mapped out in percentiles and all of this kind of thing. Super, super complex, really appropriate for a certain end of the market. But for most experts in the industry, probably not the right play. Somewhere between the two is what we call a score based diagnostic. This is actually about 95 % of people fall into this category. And this is where the assessment actually acts as a gap analysis tool.
So what we do is we take those pillars of your framework that we had mapped out earlier, and we then ask questions people against each of those pillars. They then get scored on how they're performing against each of the pieces. And then the result that they get is completely personalized to them. And it's like in this area over here, you're 82%. Everything's going grand, but oh my goodness, in this particular area, you're 32%. Therefore acting as a gap analysis.
Maeve Ferguson (24:13.493)
And the beauty of these diagnostics is that the copy that you see is different to the copy that I see. The invitation that you get is different based on the results that you get. The invitation to the offer you get differs depending on how much you're able to invest. So we're not offering people our multi six figure thing if they've got 10k to spend or vice versa. OK, so all of this acts, what I call it is like a routing engine. It gets the right message and the right offer.
in front of the right person at the right time. And because it's built on your framework and the framework came from your offers that we talked about earlier, then it's just this beautiful, obvious choice when they get to the invitation, speaking to their exact problem and your offer is positioned in a way to solve for what they have just discovered. It just becomes the net. most logical next step is to go and work with you.
Finola Howard (25:11.33)
So what really needs to happen is you need to have a very cohesive offer ecosystem that makes sense, that's completely mapped to the pain point of each customer at each stage. So that when you are kind of spitting out, I know that's not a very nice way saying it, but when you're outputting, when someone scores X, Y and Z, it just matches and it has to really match.
Maeve Ferguson (25:30.253)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I got it. got it. Yeah.
Maeve Ferguson (25:41.004)
Yeah, and again, back to the shopping trolley analogy. So let's pretend you have a group coaching program, okay, that you cover these 10 things in. When somebody is going through a normal sales mechanisms, like here's all 10 things and you don't need eight of them, but here's all 10. And then they're not interested because they're like, oh, I don't need any of that. The way. Yeah, it's too much stuff. Exactly. Yeah.
Finola Howard (26:00.812)
But it's also decision overwhelming. If you give your target customer too many things to decide on, they won't decide on any.
Maeve Ferguson (26:08.119)
So what we do because of the power of the infrastructure behind the diagnostic is we're able to pull out the two things that inside the offer that solve for the exact thing that they have just realized is holding them back. We only speak to them. The rest of them can surprise and delight once they're inside the doors, but it feels for every single person going through it feels like the offer was created just for them because it.
the way it's positioned, literally is created for them because the copy that they see is bespoke to them.
Finola Howard (26:42.392)
So what I see in a lot of small businesses is this conscious, deliberate, methodical approach to building an engine that's directly aligned between building offers that are directly aligned to customer pain points freaks them out because it's, you have to be so methodical. And often entrepreneurs are not so methodical because they start with passion, they lean into that. And I think that's
that struggle piece that you were talking about, that journey to not six figures of moving from this kind of passive way of growing your business to consciously shaping it piece by methodical piece. Would you say that's fair to say?
Maeve Ferguson (27:26.581)
Yes. And I think, I think this is where a lot of people tie themselves up in knots and they make it like, I'm a big believer. Every single thing in life is choice. So I could choose to go and do my strength training every day by myself, try to figure this out by myself, probably get tangled up in weights falling on my head as I try to figure this out myself. Or I can have my PT that I go and work with every day. Okay. It's a choice. Same as me. was in, at the time of recording, I was in Paris last week doing a VIP day.
Finola Howard (27:50.38)
Exactly.
Maeve Ferguson (27:56.331)
with my mentor, I've spent over $400,000 investing in myself and in my business on my journey to where I am because there there's you can sit at home and try to figure something out yourself. But I like to hire people who are the category of one or the expert in that specific area and have them help me do it because they have this is this is their vertical. This is their lane. This is what they do day in daily.
You're going to move so much faster when you work with somebody that literally does the thing you're trying to figure out. You can try to figure it out yourself. Of course, it might take you three years or you can go and work with somebody that shows you exactly what to do because that's their area of expertise. not, I don't know enough about personal training and weight loss and fitness and strength and all of those things to, I could DIY it, but I don't choose to.
Finola Howard (28:54.392)
But I'd also say this is a decision that's critical to make a successful business.
Maeve Ferguson (28:59.565)
Absolutely, because if you don't have leads, you don't have a business, if you can't convert leads to clients, you don't have a business, you have a really busy hobby. And that is what so many experts is they are busy, busy, busy, and they're posting on Instagram when they're flapping about worrying about Canva graphics. And they say, what's your pipe? What's your pipeline? They're like, what's a pipeline? They're like, what do you mean? What's your pipe? They're not working a pipeline. They don't have a pipeline. They're literally posting on the internet.
Finola Howard (29:09.549)
Yeah.
Maeve Ferguson (29:28.513)
and then they would wonder why they don't have a successful business.
Finola Howard (29:32.396)
What would you like to leave people with today? Because that's already a nice clanger. But what would you like to leave people with today?
Maeve Ferguson (29:40.407)
So there's one piece that we didn't speak to yet, and it is one of the most critical pieces of all. And I say this as an assessment or company builds assessments, quizzes, all of the infrastructure piece. The fanciest infrastructure in the world is completely pointless if you've got the wrong water in the pipes. And what I mean by that is if we have either nobody coming through your business, IE pipeline,
Finola Howard (29:43.448)
Okay.
Maeve Ferguson (30:08.191)
if we have dirty water coming through the pipeline. we're bringing people into our world that couldn't even get close to working with us from an investment point of view. Again, we're just creating a whole load of busy work that doesn't actually convert. And what we want to do is make sure that the water running through the pipes in my company, in your company, in the listeners company is, are the right people.
And what we have to do then is we don't just build a funnel and walk it up on the internet and think that people are going to go through this thing. It doesn't work that way. So we have to have a top of funnel traffic strategy, whether that be organic, which is the slow play, or scalable organic, which is my favorite, where it is still organic. No organic is free, by the way, but scalable organic. I can have one conversation with you and have...
X number of thousand listeners of the show to hear my message or I can go and post on Instagram and hope that the algorithm shows it to seven people. OK, so scalable organic is a good play. This is why I do a lot. I do about five podcasts, interviews per week. I do a lot of guest masterclasses. I speak at a lot of mastermind events in America because it's scalable organic. I can get myself in front of a room and get in front of tens or hundreds or
thousands or even tens of thousands of people, depending on the on the audience sites. OK. And then obviously you've got your paid traffic play. It doesn't have to be the million dollars a month in ads like one of our clients that I mentioned earlier, even just running 20 bucks a day, having steady flow of lead flow coming into the business every single day is what allows is that it's the lifeblood of your business. OK. Then we use the infrastructure to classify
qualify and those unqualified leads, no problem. You can't afford to invest with us. Here's my YouTube channel. I wish you all the best. Our attention as a company is always going to be on those who match the investment criteria that it takes to work with us. OK, so we've got to be really, really aware of what are our traffic strategies. And then the final piece, and this is the piece that you can actually do today in your business. This is an actionable thing, is your rich niche positioning.
Maeve Ferguson (32:29.005)
Okay. This is a, an immediate shift. Okay. This is how I moved away from working with early stage, like no money people. Okay. In the very, very early years of my business, the people who were like, you know, they wanted it, but they didn't have any money to invest themselves to now working with some of the most famous names in the industry. is this one piece. Okay. So what we're going to do is we're going to look at
who you are attracting through your content. We're going to flick that to speak to what we call your rich niche. If you are talking about struggle plus problems like, you don't know how to bring any leads into your business. Using my business as an example, or you're really struggling to convert sales. Well, what's that going to attract? That's going to bring in people that aren't getting any leads and don't know how to make any sales. Therefore, they're going to have no money to invest in me. OK.
Instead of that, you obviously think, listen to that and make your own version of that. If you're help people in love and relationships, it's like, you've been rejected and you're so broken hearted and you're dying and you know, you've everybody has left you behind. What's that going to bring in? A whole busload of struggle bus people. OK, with no money, all the baggage, all the drama. Horrible. What I call pitta clients, OK, pitting the ass clients.
Finola Howard (33:30.711)
Hmm.
Maeve Ferguson (33:51.598)
Instead of that, for us, what we what we did all of these years ago is we flicked and started talking to the upper end of the market problems. OK, so, for example, for again, in our specific business, we talk about your keynote. What does a keynote mean? If somebody is doing a keynote, that means that they're a certain caliber of expert. OK, this is not their first audio, their caliber or your best selling book. Somebody who had and I don't mean one of the
Finola Howard (33:51.672)
you
Finola Howard (34:14.904)
Hmm.
Maeve Ferguson (34:21.518)
kind of gimmicky, yeah, I made the best seller list. I mean, a proper best seller. If you're hitting the best seller list, again, this is not your first rodeo. You're not a mid-stage or early stage person, okay? So what we have done is flipped the problems that we're speaking to. It's like, whenever you step off stage and your keynote ends, you have to be peddling these keynotes all the time to keep the leads coming into your company.
Did you know put a diagnostic assessment in place and it runs for you even when you're not on stage. That's a very different problem that we're solving for than the struggle bus problem that we mentioned at the start. So think about the problems that you're speaking to. If you're speaking to problems that are going to attract people with no money to invest in you, your business is going to be some form of hell. Flick the problems that you're speaking to.
to successful people problems. Back to the love and relationships angle, you're speaking to it's like you're going, traveling the globe, saying it at all the five star resorts, but yet in your heart, you still feel lonely. Okay, can you see how that's gonna bring in a different person? Because the person who's going to five star resorts has the money to invest in themselves. It's exactly the same thing we're solving for. We've just done a rich niche positioning to bring in a completely different who.
Finola Howard (35:30.808)
Mm.
Maeve Ferguson (35:44.972)
We bring clear water into the pipes instead of a quagmire of mud coming through that can't afford to work with us. So do that flick today that whenever this episode airs and you're listening to this flick that top of funnel to richness positioning and you'll start to see the caliber of the people coming into your world. Whether you have the diagnostic or not or whether you have a quiz or not, you're bringing that
right level person in. So the investment in our company, the investment is barely even part of the conversation because it's the right who coming in and then it's just a matter of how does this work, when do we start.
Finola Howard (36:25.024)
Not any customer, the right customer. Fantastic. Thank you so much, Maeve. So informative and I really appreciate it. Thank you.
Maeve Ferguson (36:34.466)
Good, thank you so much for having me, really enjoyed it.
