My younger daughter just turned one!
The first 12 months weren't easy, but do you know what’s the one thing that is worth celebrating? It is also something really cool about babies.
They don’t beat around the bush.
If they want milk, they say it. If they poo-ed, they say it. If they are sleepy, they say it.
It is kind of nice!
If you want to have a successful creator education business, you want to turn your audience into babies.
It means getting your audience to tell you exactly what they want.
It is not as hard as you think. I figured out a way to integrate it into my process so it is all automated. Let me show you.
Eliminate the guessing game
When I teach and coach creators, I realize a lot of them are playing the guessing game.
“I think they need this. I think they need that.”
What about you? Are you making assumptions about what your potential customers need?
Once you build several products people don’t actually want, you’ll learn your lesson.
You'll know that successful entrepreneurs are not all geniuses. Many of them are just really good at asking questions and listening to the answers.
That’s usually called user research interviews. You do it in a 1:1 setting.
These days, creators are ​building their products in public​ and they can ask open-ended questions to quickly get dozens or even hundreds of data points about what their audiences are thinking.
I’m not here today to talk about building in public or user interviews. I want to give you 2 easy ways to tweak your workflow to get a ton of data and eliminate your guessing.
But first, there is one thing you need to understand:
People will give you what you want if they need something from you.
You’re not getting data points from them to hard sell them. You’re using data to serve them better.
Capitalize your opt-in flow
If you want to build a creator education business, you have to leverage email marketing.
And to do that, you’ll have to use the email opt-in form.
Are you simply taking their email addresses and then showing them a thank you page?
If you are, you are missing out on a lot. A LOT.
Think about it — when they put down their email address, that’s the moment they want something from you. And so that’s the perfect moment to get more. Ask your questions.
This is my ​opt-in form​.
This is what I show them after they enter their email address.
It is important to show that the opt-in process is not done yet. Why? If it is not done, they better keep going.
If it is done and you want to ask more questions? They won’t see the need to do it. This is why if you wait until the first email to ask them questions, they know they don’t need to give you.
Let’s do some math here.
If you get 100 opt-in, 60% open the first email (60 people), and 20% fill in the form, that’s 12 people.
Out of 100 people, only 12 will!
12%.
That’s not a lot of data to tell you what your audience wants from you.
But with my method, I’m seeing 60 people fill in! That's 60%! This is a much higher conversion rate.
And what’s the best part? With a little technical help, I set up a way that even if they drop off after the first step where they enter their email address, they are already in my system. If you're interested in more technical details like this, you can join ​our course community​ to get access to me and other creators.
Leverage your free events
Free events are a great way to build up trust between your audience and you.
Social content is nice. Newsletter is also nice.
But nothing beats getting connected over a live call and really seeing you speak, move, and interact.
I try my best to do a number of free events throughout the year to connect with my audience.
One of them was the Build in Public bootcamp.
On the signup form, other than asking for a name and an email address, I added one more question:
“What’s your burning question in building in public?”
If they want to get in, they have to answer.
This becomes my greatest source of knowing what people want to know from me.
I used to run this event 4 times a year (not anymore now) and I got 100-200 people registering each time, so that’s 400-800 data points!
Imagine how much you can do with the data — brainstorm new products, create content, and improve your sales pages.
Here’s the secret formula
Let’s revisit it together here:
Offer Something of Great Value→
Before They Get It →
Ask Your Questions
But don’t fall into this trap
You don’t want to be greedy and ask for a lot of information.
You “think” you have the upper hand with this smart setup, but remember that people can bounce anytime.
Say you added 5 questions to the event sign-up form. Some attendees might feel that you’re asking for too much and decide not to RSVP.
I always try to keep it as minimal as possible.
- If you want my newsletter, you likely want me to personalize my content for you. This is why you’ll willing to answer 4 quick multiple-choice questions. It takes less than 40 seconds.
- If you want to join my free event, you likely want the knowledge I described. You’ll likely be willing to answer one quick question, but not 4. It should take less than 10 seconds.
See. Not only do you need to know when to ask the questions, but you also need to know how much you can ask in each scenario.
This is how successful creators get helpful data to grow their education businesses, and now you can do it too.
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