Tyler Jorgenson 0:01
You’re listening to biz ninja entrepreneur radio. This show was created for entrepreneurs, business owners, marketers and dreamers who want to learn from the experts of today and drastically shortcut their own success to build a business that supports their dream lifestyle. Since 2011, Tyler Jorgensen has been interviewing business thought leaders from around the world, a serial entrepreneur himself, Tyler also shares his personal insights into what’s working in business today. Welcome to biz Ninja, entrepreneur radio. Welcome out to biz ninja entrepreneur radio. I’m your host, Tyler Jorgensen. And today we get to have the honor and the pleasure of visiting with the legendary Amy Porterfield, a fellow Californian, which is exciting, but a true legend in the marketing education space. Super excited to be visiting with you today. Amy, welcome to the show.
Unknown Speaker 1:02
Well, thanks so much for having me.
Tyler Jorgenson 1:04
How do you describe what it is that you do?
Amy Porterfield 1:09
I okay. It’s funny you asked that because when my mom and dad are my husband, try to tell people what I do. It’s kind of wild, what comes out of their mouth. So I’ve always tried to train them and say, Okay, this is what I do. I help entrepreneurs take their knowledge, their know how their skill set, and turn that into a profitable digital course. So that instead of working one on one, or in small circles, they’re able to reach the masses and scale their businesses.
Tyler Jorgenson 1:37
And so I’m assuming you’ve learned that from your time working at Harley Davidson?
Unknown Speaker 1:43
Well, not so much so.
Tyler Jorgenson 1:46
So we’re gonna wind back and we’re gonna come all the way up to where you are. Now, when I first realized that you were an entrepreneur.
Unknown Speaker 1:54
Oh, you know, never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d be an entrepreneur. It’s funny, because I always thought I’d be a corporate girl working up that corporate ladder up until 11 years ago, I thought I’d always be in corporate. And so the only little glimpse of maybe I’d be an entrepreneur is that when I was really little, my sister and I would be playing with Barbies on the floor. And my dad, he was a firefighter. But he also had a side business, air conditioning and heating, blue collar to the bone. And so he would go to work, and he loved his job, but he’d go to work every day. And while my sister and I were sitting playing on the floor, he’d say, find a way to be your own boss, girls, you’ve got to find your way to be your own boss, and the world will open up to you. And we were like, yeah, yeah, whatever, dad, we were super little. But remembering that now I think it’s always been ingrained in me. My dad’s always encouraged it. But I never knew how it would come to fruition like it is now. But yeah, I didn’t grow up thinking I’d always be an entrepreneur.
Tyler Jorgenson 2:55
Those 11 years ago, what was the big catalyst,
Unknown Speaker 2:57
the big catalyst was I worked for Tony Robbins. So for almost seven years, I was the content director for Tony Robbins traveled the world with them got to work on content that he does on stage, like unleash the power within and date with destiny, anyone who knows Tony’s world. And I would be in the back stage listening to Tony talk about how valuable or how wonderful your life could be as an entrepreneur, the freedom, the lifestyle, freedom, the financial freedom, the creative freedom, and how you get to call the shots. And after listening to that year, after year after year, I thought, I’ve got to have a piece of that. So that’s really where it came from.
Tyler Jorgenson 3:35
So I always wonder with people whose business is helping people become entrepreneurs, it’s like, how do you keep employees like all day, every day, you’re amping people up to go start on their own. And you are not the first former Tony Robbins person I’ve had either on the show and also just that I’ve met. So it’s a it’s interesting, right?
Unknown Speaker 3:54
Such a great question, I will tell you a little glimpse of that. I used to worry about that a lot. And I have 20 people on my team now. And they’re full time employees. And so what I do is I know at any time one of them could say, you know what, Amy, I want to do what you’re doing. I want to be an entrepreneur, and I’m going to literally cheer them on every step of the way. But not everybody wants to be an entrepreneur, however, everybody does want to feel that freedom in their business. So we have unlimited time off. We have really, really great opportunities for bonuses so that you never hit that glass ceiling. We have an environment that feels entrepreneurial, even though they’re working nine to five. So I really do bring a lot of the entrepreneurial spirit to my employees, because I think of that same thing. I don’t want to be the only one feeling it I want them to feel it as well.
Tyler Jorgenson 4:41
Okay, I have to ask a follow up to the unlimited time off. Yeah, I’m assuming then you just manage off off of KPIs or manage off of things that aren’t our related or time clock related, but maybe expound a little bit there.
Unknown Speaker 4:53
Yes. So my legal team tells me I can’t call it unlimited time off. I have to call it flexible time off. So I know I said unlimited time out, because everyone could relate to that. But technically, it’s called flexible time off. And what we do is exactly, we look at KPIs and every single quarter, it is very clear what every department is responsible for and what the business is responsible for, in terms of projects, as well as revenue and profit. And so we’re just constantly managing against that. And so as long as the work gets done, people get to take the time off that they want. Now, I will say I’m a launch based business, I create digital courses and launch them online. during launch time, we have blackout where way in advance, we tell people, you can’t be taking time off during these launch periods. So we do have some restrictions around it. But it is much more freeing and open. Yeah, let’s say the two weeks a year that you get off in a corporate environment.
Tyler Jorgenson 5:46
Very cool. And so I love that you’re trying to you allow the entrepreneurial spirit to be felt by everybody in the business, right? And so very cool. Okay, so you’re working for Tony Robbins 1112 years ago, you decide the spark hits you. And the power within is now unleashed, right. So what is the first step that Amy takes to go into this new venture?
Unknown Speaker 6:09
So the first step I took is that I asked if I can move from the content department to the marketing department, because I knew I wanted to create digital courses, we had been doing that in the Tony Robbins world, I was intrigued. I love to teach, I love to put together content, obviously, that’s what I did for so long there. And so there was an opportunity, and I jumped on it. So I actually moved apartments and got to start working on the product launches in the digital course launches that they were doing in the business. So I just made a lateral move at first. And then I told myself in one year, I want to go out on my own. So I started to take baby steps throughout the year, I’m a baby step kind of girl, I’m not like one day I decided to do it tomorrow, it happens. I’m not that girl. So over the next year, I started to work in the marketing department. But then I asked if I could work one day from home, then I asked if I could work a little bit more from home. So they were getting more open minded to the virtual work environment. So I started to work from home. And then I asked to go part time. And then I eventually took the leap. So I took a lot of baby steps throughout about a year in order to make it happen.
Tyler Jorgenson 7:18
So it’s very Tim Ferriss of you, right, like, yeah, start working to working to learn, then start phasing things out. And I look, I take leaps really fast. But I strongly encourage people to take baby steps because some people, they go way too aggressive. And so I think that’s really neat that you took those steps, and you made those moves. A year later, what did you first launch what was the first business that Amy brought to market.
Unknown Speaker 7:39
So the first thing I started to do was consulting and coaching for social media. I have done social media inside the Robbins organization. So I started to do it for small businesses. It’s funny, I always say coaching and consulting. And it’s so wrong. I did social media, I was in the trenches doing social media for small businesses. And what happened was, I didn’t know how to create digital courses on my own. So I wasn’t ready for that. So what happened was I ended up getting all these clients and I had like eight bosses instead of one big boss, Tony’s like a big guy, literally, I had eight bosses bossing me around telling me what to do. I had no boundaries, working crazy hours. And I thought, how is this the entrepreneurial lifestyle, I’m supposed to be on a beach with a laptop, working from wherever, whenever like that. It was not my experience at all. The first two years of being an entrepreneur, I built a business I hated. I did this social media for others. And then I did start to do some consulting, hated it. And I thought I’m gonna have to go grovel back for my job. But then that’s when I decided Nope, I did this so I could start creating my own digital courses. So after that time, I started creating courses.
Tyler Jorgenson 8:49
Okay, and so I think there’s a really powerful lesson there, right? So people sometimes want to be so badly they want to be on their own, that they actually take a worse job. Yeah, and now, right? You’re like, oh, man, I now have like a minimum wage job doing something I don’t enjoy. But I’m on my own. Right. Yeah. So I love that you had that realization? And then you said no, I have a bigger vision. And you stayed with us kept going on those baby steps. Yes. So to not go through every single day of that, and I would love to hear that longer story but you now really help entrepreneurs focus on that digital course and really skip from that first step that you just described to where they could be. So paint us a picture of what the potential lifestyle is, or in what the impact is for an entrepreneur who can go shift one to many and walk us through that a little bit.
Unknown Speaker 9:37
Okay, so I work with a lot of coaches and consultants that like you just said, work one on one. So they are life coaches, weight loss coaches, instructors, helping people that English isn’t their second language, just like all these different things, people that are helped training dogs, I mean, it runs the gamut, but they’re doing it one on one and what happens is, you know, with one on one is you could only make so much money. And more importantly, you can only make such an impact if you’re one person working with one other person. So they want to really expand in terms of scale revenue impact. And so what I teach is to take what you do in your one on one world and turn that into a digital course. And the reason I chose digital courses as the venue to do so or the vehicle to do so, is because now you are able to reach many people. And what I love, like the end game of that is now you’re saying yes to the projects that light you up, and no to the projects that you no longer want to do. There was so much in that two years of building my business that I didn’t like a lot of that stuff. Now, because I have digital courses, I’m able to make the kind of revenue that if I want to take on a new, exciting project, I can or if I want to pass on it, I have enough revenue coming in with my digital course that I don’t have to do the things I don’t want to do in my business is that lifestyle, freedom, financial freedom, creativity, freedom, that I think a digital course or scaling the business allows you to do.
Tyler Jorgenson 11:08
So what’s the weirdest course that you’ve ever seen be successful?
Unknown Speaker 11:14
Okay, let me think that we Okay, so this is a crazy one. I have a woman who literally has made millions with this digital course, that she helps mothers and fathers and moms and dads help their newborn baby be potty trained. Meaning they do not wear a diaper ever. from the get go. I still don’t understand it. I I’ve never had a newborn. I am a step mom. So I my son came into my world when he was four. So I didn’t have to go through potty trained.
Tyler Jorgenson 11:43
Yeah, sorry,
Unknown Speaker 11:44
buddy. Drink, thank God. But she it’s called there’s a word for something elimination. I can’t remember exactly. I’m not doing her justice. But literally, she is teaching out a potty train a newborn. But we have courses like one woman. She teaches people how to make caramel candy apples. And she is literally her first launch was $60,000 owes more than she’d ever made in a year as a baker. So she teaches caramel candy apples, I have another guy who teaches Etsy and eBay and Amazon sellers how to do their taxes. He’s a tax accountant, he works one on one with people. But he there was this need of how to do taxes specifically for resellers. So he created a digital course. So it’s business, it’s pleasure, I have another student, she teaches how to pair wine and cheese. And she’s done wild, wild success with a pleasure type, of course. So pleasure and business and everything in between. I really do believe that there’s an audience who wants to learn how to do it. Now in the world we live in today, the world is opened up with how many people are willing and wanting to learn virtually, I think the pandemic has allowed this rush of a new audience to say, Okay, I’ll learn online where before they thought they’d have to do it in person.
Tyler Jorgenson 13:03
It certainly is accelerated the digital, like information age, which we thought we were already there. And then we realize how many people were clinging on to the in person things. But so, I mean, it sounds easy, right? Obviously, it’s complex, right? Obviously, there’s the systems and there’s, there’s a whole batch to it. And I know one of the big things that you really preach is building an engaged email list. Yes. Tell us a little bit about why that’s so important. And maybe some common mistakes that people make.
Unknown Speaker 13:32
Okay, this is I’m so glad we’re bringing this up. I believe that anybody who is doing business online should have an email list. Now notice, I didn’t say have a huge email list. My students have done great launches with 300 500 people on their email list and, and have made six figures in their launches doing so so it can be done. But the most important thing is to first just decide, I’m going to create an email list so that I can connect with my audience. Here’s what I want you to know, social media the biggest mistake to answer your question, one of the biggest mistakes is to think that social media is enough. Social media is fickle. And when you build your business on social media, you’re building your business on rented land. At any time Mark Zuckerberg can change that algorithm, boom, the way you did business dramatically changes. We saw this when our Facebook pages were thriving, and then zero engagement because he changed the game and said you had to pay to play. So social media is powerful. I use it every day. But at the end of the day, the one asset that I want in my business and cannot survive without is a email list that is engaged. And by that I mean people that are genuinely looking forward to hearing from you. Now we all know that we get too many emails and we throw them into the trash and we don’t even look at them. But we also know there’s certain emails we get and every time we get it, we open it up because we want to hear from that person. That’s who you want to strive to be the person that they can’t wait to hear from And so getting into somebody’s email box, the way you started out is you put together a lead magnet, something of great value, a cheat sheet, a checklist, a short video and audio, something that they would think this is so good, I pay for it, but you’re giving it to me for free. That’s literally the best way to start your email list.
Tyler Jorgenson 15:20
I love that. So, email list is something like candidly, I’ve absolutely neglected as an individual, right, I’ve done it for our product businesses and things like that. But for many years, I kind of operated, you know, anonymously with a lot of other outside of the radio show. And so I’m an experienced entrepreneur, who has published on social and blogs and radio for a long time. So you’re saying the best way to get started is just find some kind of great content to deliver. So I can lead with value and start now, it’s not too late for me, me,
Unknown Speaker 15:51
Oh, my gosh, you’re in such a great, you actually have a quality problem. The problem is, you don’t yet have an email list for you as a person. But the quality part of it is you have a platform, a lot of people are starting out with hardly anybody on social. So it’s going to take some time. No, it’s not too late. But for you or somebody just starting from scratch, yes, you want to create something of great value. And let me give you a quick example. So for me, I created a cheat sheet on how to get started with your email list, like how to create a lead magnet, how to get it out into the world. And so I go out to my audience, and I say I’ve got something new, you’re gonna love it, here’s why you need it. And here’s where you go to get it. So first, you could just start out by saying, I’ve got this for you, and it’s free. But in addition to that, it doesn’t stop there. You’re going to link to it in the bio of your social media, you’re going to do Facebook Lives and mention it at the end. Hey, by the way, if you love this Facebook Live, I’ve got something even better. It’s a freebie, go get it here. Or if you do an ag story, you’re going to mention it in the ID story. Every week, you should be mentioning your freebie. Believe me, people need to hear it a few times before they sign up for it. Just one lead magnet is all you need to get going.
Tyler Jorgenson 17:03
I love that. Now, here’s another question about kind of branding and positioning. So your Amy Porterfield, that’s what I but most people know about you, but you also have digital course Academy and you’ve got online more marketing made it you have all these other things. Right, right. How did you determine and what do you recommend to other people to build? Do you build around your personal brand? Or do you really build around a business brand?
Unknown Speaker 17:24
Such a great question, I’ll say that I don’t think there’s a right or wrong here. And I think the question you want to ask yourself is, do you want to be that personal brand, as you know, there’s a lot of pressure that comes with it. If I’m not showing up on video, and I do believe we need to be on video these days. If I’m not showing up on video, if I’m not doing my Facebook Lives, if I’m not doing like the voice of my podcast, my business does not move forward. And the good thing is I love being the face of my brand. And I want to be personality that connects with my audience. But if you would rather take a little step back, or if you think a year or two down the road, you’d want to take a step back, and you want to build it around a business and create a team that can show up for you so that you don’t have to do all that heavy lifting. Because although there’s tons of work to do behind the scenes, I genuinely and I know you know this too, I really do have to show up multiple times a week. So I think the most important question as an entrepreneur is to ask yourself what feels right for you in your gut, because either way will work either way, you can have success. But you’ve got to make that commitment. Yeah, I’m going to show up, and I’m going to show up often.
Tyler Jorgenson 18:29
So I like that. I like that it’s can be either one. But it’s about looking forward to what you want it to be what is the future you’d want to design and then staying committed to that. So Amy, like most people know that you crush launches and you help other people get going. Right. And so you shared with us a little bit of the struggle of readjusting and pivoting your business in the early days. What’s a recent mistake that you’ve made? What do you learn from it? And how do you move forward?
Unknown Speaker 18:56
Oh, a recent mistake that I’ve made. Okay, I’ll tell you exactly. So you say I’m known for launching and crushing my launches. And I do really well with these digital course launches because I better because that’s what I teach. However, this this time, we decided to do a 90 day pre launch, which is a pre launches, you’re showing up every single week, probably multiple times a week, and you’re getting your audience primed and ready for when you release your digital course. And 90 days felt like a lifetime. By the time we were ready to sell our course. I was ready to crawl under my desk and hide because I was so exhausted. I had to really find that second wind and I did thank God, but it took a lot. So the mistake I made was being overzealous, I teach my students to keep it simple. I always say how can we make this easy by still making an impact? But I didn’t take my own medicine. And I literally probably should ask myself how do we make this as hard as it can be? Let’s do 90 days of pre launching. Literally my launch was in September. We started in June. June, July, August, then we launched in September, just way too long, too long of a long runway. Here’s the silver lining in that. Yeah, I teach what I know. And so now I get to tell my students don’t ever do that. Because I would suggest, hey, try a 90 day, I will never suggest it to my students. And I promise you, I will never do it again. So that was one thing. You got to preserve your energy and everything you do, and I did not with this last one.
Tyler Jorgenson 20:27
I think that preserving your energy is such an important one. Because I think it that’s the thing that’s finite, right? It doesn’t come back, like your time passes, and you miss it. And if you burn yourself out and miss a month of energy, like it’s disastrous, but money can be replenished. Yes, hire new team members, there’s a ton of things that you can recover from, but energy I think has to be guarded for the entrepreneur does. So what are some I mean, that’s amazing. Thank you for sharing that. And okay, so you did a 90 day launch, it was too long, what would you have recommended,
Unknown Speaker 20:57
I would say for my level 60 days for my students just starting out, I say let’s just start out with 30 days. And so 30 days leading up to a launch fantastic. And because I’ve been doing this for 11 years now 60 days would be great. Just not 90, just I got to settle down a little bit. And I as I get older and wiser in this world of launching, I want to be an example of what’s possible in terms of working less, but making more more money, more impact. And so I’m at a place now that I’m thinking, Well, I better show up in that way. And doing 90 days is not an example of that. My motto, and my business is to be an example of what is possible. So I need to be really careful of what I try so that it doesn’t go the whole other way of doing too much. So lesson learned. Yeah,
Tyler Jorgenson 21:42
that’s huge. So your goal is to be an example your goal is to be doing in your business, the same thing you teach other people. What’s something that you’ve started doing here in the past nine months that you’re surprised about? Like, like, Oh, we never thought we would do this? Or are you just right at this point, just doing the basics?
Unknown Speaker 22:00
No. What’s something that we did that we’re surprised about?
Tyler Jorgenson 22:03
Like are you crushing tik tok? Are you
Unknown Speaker 22:07
never be the girl that crushes Tick Tock for the record. However, it’s funny you say that. One thing we have done is we’ve started to experiment with things like Tick Tock in reels I am. It’s really funny with my girlfriends and my husband and all that I’m naturally just funny and casual, and not awkward. on video on tik tok and reals, I am very awkward for the record, you make me dance on video and I want to die. But one thing that we’ve tried, and this is someone who’s been in the game for a long time, and does really well in my business, but I still think I always have to be innovating that I think you innovate or you die. And so with that, we’ve experimented with it. And we did tons of reels, which is like to talk during our last launch. And it made a big difference. We saw the traffic coming from them. So that’s one thing that we’ve embraced, and I just have to come out of my shell, I’ve been in the industry for so long. I never want to be a dinosaur with my strategy. So I’ll always be trying things even if even if the young kids are doing it. I’m still gonna try it.
Tyler Jorgenson 23:08
Yeah, you’re still pretty young. So I think that’s okay. So what is something that you still call on from your early days with Tony Robbins, or in your corporate experience that you still find yourself calling on now as an entrepreneur,
Unknown Speaker 23:22
this idea that I have to be resourceful, I learned this from my Tony Robbins days. And what I mean by resourceful it’s one of our core values in our business is that there’s always a way to get it done. Now, we have to be careful that we don’t throw too much money at it or too much work at it, because that’s easy way to get something done. But there’s ways to get it done. And now because I’m more focused on streamlining, finding a way to streamline, but there’s not one person in my business that would ever come to me and say, Amy, we can’t do it. It’s not even in our vocabulary. And so that has made a difference why I think we’ve been so successful over these last years is that we will always find a way no matter what. And that just that mindset shifts everything into a positive light. And
Tyler Jorgenson 24:07
I love that I feel like that’s entrepreneurship one on one, right? He’s you look for the solutions, not for the brick walls.
Unknown Speaker 24:15
Always. Yeah,
Tyler Jorgenson 24:16
so one, obviously, I know that people can find you at Amy porterfield.com. But what of your platforms are you most excited about right now? Is that your podcast? Is it some of your guides? Where do you Where do you if you’re like man, if I could pick everyone starts right here and finding me wherever that
Unknown Speaker 24:30
million percent my podcast online marketing made easy. And it’s full of list building strategies, digital core strategies, how to get started as an entrepreneur. Definitely some of my best of the best free content would be there.
Tyler Jorgenson 24:44
Awesome. Say the name of it again.
Unknown Speaker 24:46
Online Marketing Made Easy, and thanks so much for asking. I appreciate that.
Tyler Jorgenson 24:50
Yeah, absolutely. I look I mean, you’re a legend in the space, right? You’re really well known as a high quality teacher and people that go through your You know, courses and go through your coaching are known to get results, but that what’s so weird about the world we live in, is in the marketing world. You’re famous, but you leave the marketing world. It’s like people are who’s Amy who’s Tyler, they don’t know who we are. And so hopefully we can reach a few more people each week and each month and continue to grow. What is something that you’re doing to continue to grow? And like you said earlier, not become a dinosaur?
Unknown Speaker 25:24
Yes. That’s the first time I’ve ever said that. I was like, whoo, that sounds like I really aged myself there. But it’s true. I really do believe that. So one of the things I’m always in some kind of coaching, or mastermind, I’m always paying to educate myself, no matter how much I think I know or how much success I’ve had. So right now I’m in a mastermind with Michael Hyatt is well, and he’s a dear friend and a mentor of mine, but also in a peer ran mastermind as well. So I think being around other people doing big things, maybe even bigger than me even better. So that’s one of the things that I just to make sure that I’m not the dinosaur. I don’t think I’ve ever used that term. Again. I feel 90 when I say it,
Tyler Jorgenson 26:05
yeah, we will. We’ll we’ll hit that with an asteroid and put that in the past. So you know what, I think that’s super consistent. I would say that most of the higher level entrepreneurs that we have on the show, all answer very similar. They all are in masterminds, they all have a coach. And what’s interesting is people would expect Well, these people have transcended that need, they no longer need that level of coaching. But really, it’s I think the people that continue to grow realize that you never leave the need for growth, mastermind connectivity, and that sort of thing. So that’s really cool that you’re still doing that. Well, I encourage everybody go check out Amy Porterfield comm please go subscribe and listen to her podcast. I’m sure she’d love it if you even gave her a five star review and the digital high five. But Amy, thank you so much for coming out on the show and to all my biz ninjas everywhere. It’s your turn to go out and do something. Thank you for tuning in to biz ninja entrepreneur radio. What you didn’t hear was one more very important question that Tyler asks each guest if you want to be a fly on the wall when the real secrets are shared, go to biz ninja.com slash VIP and get your access today. Remember to subscribe so that you don’t miss any future episodes. And our one last favor. If this episode was meaningful to you, please share this podcast with a fellow entrepreneur so they can grow along with us is ninjas. It’s your turn to go out and do something
