[Transcript starts at 0:40]
Hello, hello, hello, my podcast people. And thank you for joining me for another episode of my
favorite online business podcast, if you're listening, tuning, watching on the day, I said, tuning,
tuning in, watching on the day that it drops, it is Monday, June 15th. Welcome to the middle of
June and happy pride month.
I didn't say last time, but I'm a terrible gay. I'd be recording things before the day. And then forgot,
let me move this mic.
I don't like where it is. I tried to have the rainbows on behind me. Didn't really work as great as I
wanted.
But the other option was to have the ropes. Like, if you're listening to this, you're like the ropes,
what I have neon lights on the ground and it's called a rope. Uh, and I set the colors of them and I
said, it's hard to say it's a rainbow this time, but like, they didn't have it as a set scene and then it
was moving.
And I was like, someone's going to have a seizure. So we're working with that. Happy pride
month.
Uh, I realize I haven't done life updates in a bit. It's been getting right into it. Uh, so I'm gonna do
that real quick and then we'll hop into today's main topic, which is what to do when you outgrow
your avatar.
So I just got back. We just got back from visiting Lex's parents upstate for her mom's birthday.
Uh, it was a good trip, quick trip.
Um, I got the effects of food poisoning on the flight back home. 12 out of 10 do not recommend
50, a hundred out of 10, 11 billion out of 10 do not recommend, uh, but did make it. So bless up.
Um, I'm always grateful to be able to travel, but, um, you know, like just like financially be able to
do it. And the fact that we have planes and can travel, like you can wake up and then be another
side of the country. That's, that's fucking amazing.
But I'm also so grateful to not be traveling. Like I did it for so many years. And then last year we
had a lot of weddings to go to.
I'm happy to not be traveling. I love being home. I hate going to the airport.
I love coming back, but I hate dealing with people. People are dumb. Uh, I don't like dealing with
them.
So yeah, happy to be home, but we do have a big trip, our very big trip coming up at the end of
the month. We're going to Gstaad, Switzerland for the volleyball. Um, so that's in like 21 days,
which is three weeks.
Um, so I will have to batch some episodes. I'm saying, thinking that as I'm saying it, uh, but that is
a problem for future my show. Um, what else? Tactic programming.
It's going great. My knees are feeling really, really good. Um, and it has been really good for me
to work out in the morning.
First thing, although I am recording this first thing before working out today, I needed to switch it
up, um, just from a time thing, time perspective, but, um, then I will just be at the desk from like
12 to 8 PM, but I don't mind. Actually. That's why I'm recording this in the morning because
yesterday, my normal podcast day, I was working.
And then by the time I was ready to record, the light was bad and I'd rather just wait and record in
the morning. If you're watching, you see bright light. It's great.
It's easier than dealing with the back lighting and everything like that. Cause literally the sun
moves to the other side of the house and then it's annoying to record. So, yeah.
Um, but the knees are feeling really good and, uh, I'm really liking this schedule switch. Um,
especially with the sun staying up so late, like I can, that's why I can work till 8 PM cause it's still
sunny. Um, still light out.
Um, but from a health perspective, you know, if the knees are bugging, I think you all have that. If
something's bugging you, especially if you have like a problem area, everything else sucks. Life
sucks.
Um, so I prioritize my physical wellbeing. It's also good for my mental wellbeing. Um, and it helps
get me through the shittiness.
Um, I'm also taking curcumin. I switched to a different one that Lux was taking. I like this one
better.
I think it is helping. Um, but it gets me through the shittiness of this fucking administration and the
whack responses that I read on threads, not even threads, on, on Instagram, uh, to pride month,
people stop being the worst, even if it's, maybe it's a bot. Hopefully it's a bot, but I'm like, stop
being fucking worse.
But some of them are videos. And I'm like, stop with your attention seeking, uh, all these fucking
AI companies and companies in general being the worst, right. And the fact that the internet
exposes you to the worst parts of humanity.
Uh, but when I have good knees, I can deal with that. Right. So what else can I fit the 11 house
projects to do? And I wish I could just do that.
My guy, Jojo. I know he's watching this right now. Cause he edited it.
Uh, I know you get it. We just want to like, I just want to be able to do some work. I got a door
hanging off my, my thing that I have all my equipment and it's like my little shed.
They put it on the fucking door. They did a terrible job with it. Uh, so we've got to rebuild that.
Uh, I got some other stuff that I need to do, but that's like the big project. I cut up some, some
pavers, turn them into like a bottom part of things. I got things I got to do and I got no time.
Right. It's one of those, I'll do it when life slows down, AKA in six months, when I feel like that can
be my procrastination of choice. Um, but hopefully maybe this weekend we'll see, um, the kids
are doing great.
Where's Rupert? Is he behind me? No, he's not behind me. He's on top of the chair. He's
somewhere in here.
Uh, Moose is doing great. The weather is great as per always. Cause we live in the best place.
I love living here. Um, but the trip was nice because it's a little taste of summer, the summer heat.
We don't really get that here, which I don't mind.
It stays nice and right in the middle here. Um, and speaking of being here and it's the best hooray
for the primaries. Fuck Spencer Pratt.
What the actual fuck is going on? All right, let's jump into today's episode. Today's episode today,
I want to share with you something that came to me while I was working out yesterday. Um, but
it's a topic that's kind of always bouncing around in my head because it's pretty central to running
a personal brand and, you know, personal business, online business.
Uh, and that is what to do when you outgrow your avatar. So I realized that, you know, that, that
phrase is a little bit of, of like online biz parlance, online biz speak. And I'm going to assume that
most of you know what I'm talking about, but if you don't, it's all good.
Um, by avatars mean your ideal client and, you know, that's the main person that you're trying to
attract, that you're trying to help. So what do you do when you no longer want to help that
person? Right. What do you do when you no longer want to solve those problems? And I think
that I'm going to guess, um, uh, people like us do things like this.
I'm going to guess that this is especially relevant for folks that are around my age, right? 41. And
if you've been in the business and you've been doing online business, you've been doing this in
your specific niche for an extended, extended period of time, you know, typically like five years
plus, right? Obviously you are allowed to outgrow your avatar before then. Um, but what I do see
is folks like bouncing around before then, uh, you know, with who they help and the problem they
solve and they never get traction and they just spend years and years getting traction, which is
fine if you're like genuinely trying to figure out, you know, that your person, um, but it, but it is
something to consider, right? Are you bouncing around? But for many of many of us, when you're
working with the same folks and solving the same problems for a long time, at some point you're
like, I'm bored.
I don't want to do this anymore. That was me. Physical therapy.
I was like, all right, I'm good. You did it for eight years. I've seen enough knees.
I'm done. This is not to say that it's everyone's life experience. Um, but if it is your experience,
you're like, fuck, I'm done.
I'm bored with this. You're not alone. Right.
If it's not your experience and you know, after 10 years, you're still loving your demographic and
you're still loving those same problems. Bless. I love this for you.
Not my story. So for those of us who get the itch to move on, what do we do? I think we have
three phases and thus three options. So I am never here to tell you to do shit that you hate, but I
will say that breaking through the trust wall as a business owner, it takes time, right? As such, if
you are less than like two years into this, working with this avatar, stick with it.
And I'm saying this because I want to make sure that you're not over it because it's not quote
unquote working, right? Money has a funny way of making things more enjoyable. Some folks will
bounce and be like, ah, fuck this avatar, right? Because they're not getting traction. And in reality,
the thing that will help them get the traction, so they enjoy that avatar, enjoy those problems, is
not bouncing.
So that's the first phase. If you're in that less than two year time period, I'm going to suggest you
stick it out. Again, never here to tell you to do shit that you hate, but there is definitely a reality of
the time it takes to break through the trust wall, the trust barrier.
The second phase, which is, you know, that kind of like two to five year mark, if you're in that
spot, take advantage of being so far ahead of your avatar and teach everything you know, a.k.a.
stack that paper, get that cheddar. This is actually where you should be. This is a good place to
be in business.
I really hate the sentiment that you just need to be one step ahead of your customer, one step
ahead of your avatar. Perhaps in terms of building the thing, yeah, you could totally just be like
one call ahead. I'm just one podcast ahead, but like one podcast episode ahead.
But in terms of your knowledge base, you need to be eleventy billion steps ahead of your
customer, eleventy billion steps ahead of your your avatar. You need to be able to answer the
questions that they have and speak from experience, not just theory. I've said this before, but
then not in this episode, but in previous episodes, there will be times when you are straight up
bored by what you're teaching your audience.
You still care about it, but the topic itself is behind your current interest. You lived it and you were
in it and in those things a long time ago. Good.
That is where you should be. Teach from the scar, not the wound. I think about this with my PT
stuff.
I was doing Wim Hof experiences. I was doing cold exposure stuff with Brian McKenzie way back
in 2016. I didn't do my breathing course until 2018.
And some of that shit didn't really take off until recently. So if I had stayed in it, I would be that far
ahead. Your avatar will be and should be way behind you.
They should be way behind where you're at and what you're doing. Way behind, way behind.
Your earliest adopters may be close.
You may have like, I'm learning this thing. I'm excited. I'm sharing about it.
And you're only people like, yeah, let's go. But we know that the few there's early adopters are
few. And if you yourself are an early adopter, bless you.
But that adds on more time to this because then you have to let folks catch up to the trend. Like I
said, if I stick around with in the PT space, like I was doing Wim Hof, cold exposure, breathing,
2016, it is still like becoming a thing with people going into the cold plunges and things like that.
And it's 10 years later.
So the second phase of outgrowing your avatar is to simply take advantage of being so far ahead
of them and teach everything, you know, teach everything, you know, make all the sales, make
all the money, because this is what's going to allow for the third phase, which is the pivot, right?
This is where you move on and, you know, you move on to a new problem that you're solving or
you move on to a new avatar, right? If you've been doing things for long enough, this can
absolutely be the same person because they will come with you, but the avatar themselves will
have changed. Meaning, you know, I'm an example of this. I've been doing this for so long.
I'm going into the messaging side of things, or even when I made my switch from physical
therapy content into a movement content into online business content, completely different
avatar, a completely different person that I'm solving, you know, completely different problems
that I'm solving, but it was the same actual individual, right? Different avatar, same in terms of like
values and things like that. But what I'm looking at in terms of, you know, the problem that they
want solved, that had changed, right? From the avatar perspective, because before I was
movement stuff and now it's online business and now it's messaging, right? But it's that same
person came along with me. And if you've been, if you broke through the trust barrier, that will
happen, right? And you stay close enough within the same like niche, right? So, so one thing we
see here within this evolution and this pivot is moving from beginners to a more advanced,
excuse me, to a more advanced avatar.
So the thing to note here is that there will always be more beginners than advanced folks, right?
This is actually what inspired today's episode. I was doing tactics programming and the questions
that are being asked in the Facebook group are clearly from folks that have a young training age,
right? As it relates to working out. They're definitely like middle-aged women and I'm middleaged, right? So they're 40, it's like the 40 plus crowd.
But the ones that are asking the questions aren't like me, like they don't have this 25 plus year
training age. They are new to doing these, at least new to doing this kind of stuff, right? Which is
great for folks that continue to be enthralled by solving the same problems, right? If that's you,
you're very fortunate because those beginners will continue to come through, right? And you will
have this same avatar, the beginner always in forever. There's always coming through.
But when the questions from the beginner have you rolling your eyes and losing your patience, it
is time to move along, right? And in this case, I think that there are two very common paths and I
alluded to one earlier, right? That first one would be completely new niche, new avatar, new
direction, right? This is scarier. This is somewhat starting from scratch, depending on how
different the niche is, right? I'm doing that a bit now, um, with the, um, what is it called? My AI
stuff, right? That is, uh, I also am doing it somewhat with the pivot into messaging, right? But you
see what the pivot into messaging, it's not completely unrelated. So folks will come along and
plenty of the folks that are in my, my audience, you know, we'll have used for the new service.
Um, but you definitely want to plan for this. If you're going to be doing a full ass pivot, because
your whole audience will not come along. And if it's a super different niche, I mean, none of the
audience comes along.
Right. I understand that if it's a completely different niche, your current idea, a current audience
likely will not come along. Right.
So for me, I have two parts here. Me that's like with AI, that's a completely different niche. That's,
it's, it's a fun side quest for me.
I did not expect anyone to come along with me and I was like, all right, I just got to build this. And
if there's anybody, if I figured it'd be a handful of people, but I knew it would not be some
massive, like everyone's interested in it. Though I do think with time, but anyway, that's a, that's a
topic for a different podcast episode, uh, for my other podcasts, honestly.
Um, but as it relates to this pivot, if you go into a completely different niche, you move in
completely new audience. Remember, build the audience first, attract the audience first, then
productize the service. Don't just be like, oh, I'm going to build this business and like build these
services.
And then like, hopefully I can attract someone that is backwards and it will not work. Right. So
remember we're in phase three.
This is the pivot, two parts to this pivot, one new niche, new avatar, new direction, right? This is
why I wanted step two first or phase two, where you build up money and you save money so that
you have a bit to float you as you make this change. Option two within this phase three, right?
Option two within the pivot is to solve the same or similar problems before a more advanced
avatar and likely in a more one-on-one setting. So I still do social media stuff with my one-on-one
clients.
There's one that in particular I'm thinking about that I do more than other people. I offer Instagram
guidance to my Luxury Mind folks. I'm absolutely still doing online business coaching.
I'm coaching launches and offer creation, but it's for more advanced online business owners. It's
not for beginners and it's definitely on its scale, right? So I'm not running it as like some like
webinar or workshop for everybody, right? So I'm still doing the same problems, but I have
changed the avatar from like a beginner, from an intermediate business owner into the more
advanced business owner. So you can see clearly I'm doing a hybrid of the two options within
phase three, right? Which is the new niche, which is messaging, but then I'm also still doing the
old stuff, online business coaching, Instagram stuff, but that's for a more advanced avatar, which
has always been my approach to things.
I'm very much not a burn the ships kind of person. So like I'm still doing, I'm doing some of the
new stuff, but I am making sure I'm doing the old stuff so that I am not poor. And also I still like it.
It's just like, who do I want to do this with? And I, and this is a conversation that I had, I remember
with someone on one of my, one of my friends on Voxer. But sometimes we, as humans aren't
necessarily the best at figuring out why we feel a certain way. And if you take a moment and for
like, I don't like doing this, it could be that you just don't like doing that thing with that specific
person and with that avatar.
But maybe you really do like online business, but not with the beginner. You've moved past it
because you don't like the questions and the kind of support they need. You like the more
advanced person.
All right. But again, things to remember as we switch avatars, there will always be more
beginners than there will be more advanced people. So, you know, things to consider there.
All right. So, you know, it's also impossible to divorce yourself from your past experiences and
your past accumulated knowledge. Everything bleeds into everything else.
So yes, I'm still, I'm still using my PT knowledge. I've been doing that. It never went away.
Like the way I liken things, the way I explain things. And I'm actually doing a lot of website copy
for PT practices, pelvic floor PT practices in particular. So having that knowledge is helpful.
And so it's like, you never like, I'm just a new person. I'm not talking about this stuff anymore.
Maybe that happens for you, but definitely hasn't been the case for me.
And I wouldn't expect it to be the case for most people. So all this to say, all this yappin to say, if
you feel like you're outgrowing your avatar, you're not alone. From a biz perspective, business
perspective, namely a messaging and marketing perspective, it is important to know who you
want to help or to figure out at least who you want to help and what you want to help them with so
that you can speak directly to them and attract them.
I plug, not shameless at all. If you want help with any of the messaging things, Lucy's marking. If
you want help with any of the messaging things, check out the messaging offers, or you can
shoot me a DM, shoot me an email.
Uh, if you're not sure which one would be the most helpful, but I am deep in all the things I am
enjoying all the things. Um, and yes, I'm doing a lot more copywriting. It is happening.
Uh, so hit me up if you got questions, thoughts, ideas, wishes, anything. Um, but I'm gonna wrap
it up there. I'm going to wrap it up there as always.
Endlessly, endlessly, one more time, endlessly appreciative for every single one of you. Until next
time, friends, Maestro out.
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