S02 Episode 2: Leveling Up Your Automation Skills with Jennifer Nelson

Apr 24, 2018

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Whenever Jennifer Nelson sees a new innovation for online business, she immediately learns it and apply it to her own work. This passion for finding the best way of doing things is how she became a certified Drip automation expert and a successful independent consultant and coach. Listen to this episode of DYF Podcast to see what strategies and innovations you can borrow from Jennifer and how to implement them into your daily practices. She’ll also discuss communication with different types of clients, managing multiple funnels, and how she gets her conference audiences to pay attention even after her presentation is over.

Key Takeaways:
How to talk automation to business owners
How to become an automation expert
How to win customers with a softer sell
How to maximize your funnel with a variety of lead magnets

As a Drip certified automation expert, Jennifer Nelson has fully automated her own business and now works with others to introduce automation to their routines. Her goal is to enable her clients to focus on the creative work and projects at the core of their businesses rather than spending all their time on marketing or upkeep tasks. Jennifer takes a piecemeal approach when she works with freelancers and agencies to find ways they can delegate day to day tasks in their businesses to machines.

Jennifer wasn’t always an independent automation superstar. She says about two years ago, she reached a point of reckoning. She had been working comfortably at an ad/tech start up, but she needed to see what she could do on her own. Jennifer started a consulting business and began the quest for clients. She started a newsletter which she distributed using the email platform, MailChimp. This helped, Jennifer, but she really got into automation after seeing it in action. Jennifer recalls, “I was following this blogger who I just remember I liked. I read one of her blogs and then I downloaded something. It came immediately to my email as a PDF. I was like, ‘Oh my God. That's cool,’ and how'd she do that? Then I learned that she was using ConvertKit. I was like, ‘Okay, let me sign up for ConvertKit.’"

By then, Jennifer was also following Brennan who sent an automated message that ended with “By the way, I used Drip to send out this email." Jennifer was intrigued. When she attended the Leadpages conference 2 yrs ago, they offered the first ever Drip Certification Course. Energized by the conference and having already spent a lot of money to attend, she decided to shell out another $1000 to get certified. She feels more knowledge is never a bad thing. The course was hard at first because it was so new. She had her doubts but once it came time to test, she discovered she had learned the methods. Excited about automating her own business, Jennifer realized other people would need that service too so she niched herself as an automation specialist.

For her personal business, Jennifer has created three main funnels. She has a site that encourages people to book a call with her, she has a 5 day email course, and Drip promotes her as a certified consultant which also drives leads. When clients come to Jennifer via Drip, she talks about the software, but when speaking with other clients, she generally asks them more open-ended questions like “How do you need to make your life easier?” and then offers ideas. Jennifer’s approach with these clients is to stay focused on the problem and the solution, keeping the talk about marketing in general rather than specific tools. Jennifer’s background in advertising sales helps her talk the marketing game while demonstrating to her clients that she knows what she’s doing.

Brennan agrees that aligning the language you use to the type of business you’re working with is key. He says that for more traditional businesses, the framework will sound more like “Look, we're going to basically package the stuff that your sales team is already doing into something that doesn't require your sales team to constantly show up and do it (though of course, they’ll still be there to close the deal etc).” While you don’t want to talk down to your clients, you also want them to be able to connect with what you’re proposing.

Jennifer created her five-day course, Email Automation 101, about a year ago and it has since become her most popular email series. The course came about because Jennifer had noticed she was mostly meeting clients in person and introducing them to the idea of automation for the first time. As a result, she was spending a lot of time on potential clients, explaining the principles to them before signing a contract or getting any assurance that she would be hired. Rather than continuing to try explaining automation to everyone she met, Jennifer handed new contacts her business card and asked them to check out her course through LeadDigits. Of course the downsides to this tactic are that people tend not to revisit the stack of business cards they’ve acquired after an event is over, and some are put off by LeadDigits thanks to fear of spam texts.

Jenny has more success when giving presentations and workshops. She’ll invite the audience to text the LeadDigits number to get her slide deck and she informs them that they’ll also be enrolling in her 5 day email course. Jenny attributes her success here to the fact that she is striking while the iron is hot: she has just met the people reading these emails and because they’re daily rather than weekly or monthly, she believes the enthusiasm is maintained through to the end. She now spends far less time explaining what automation is, and her Email Automation 101 course emails have a 75% open rate and 11% click through rate. Jennifer also borrowed a tip she learned from Brennan in that she labels her emails according to their order (“email 1 out of 5” etc.). Her next objective with the Email Automation 101 course is to target this funnel towards one specific product but she is still testing which product that will be.

One thing Brennan recommends for boosting opt-ins is to maximize event contacts by saying “Hey, I have this 5 day email course, mind if I add you to it?” Though long-term this may not represent a ton of conversions, it is a good way to get close to a hundred percent opt-ins for a conference. Although this doesn’t scale as well as a landing page, it is one of a handful of opportunities Brennan notices for growing numbers in the wake of conferences. Another is creating a funnel based on automating messages to the people you’ve met. This would start with a message that reads something like: “"Hey, [Jenny], it's been really cool talking. I actually have something that I think you might interested in. It's a free course I've built on [XYZ]. Would it be cool if I send it to you when I go back to my office?" This tactic, which usually results in a strong uptick in opt-ins, may also present high-quality leads since they have also already had a quick conversation with you and feel a connection to you as an individual.

As Jenny looks to the future in considering what course to feature at the end of her sales funnel, she knows that it is important to revisit a product months and even years after it was made. Jennifer says this is “so you don’t forget what you’ve done.” In reviewing her course, she noticed that in the end, the course dumped customers onto her services page. She believes is far too quick for a sales pitch so she’s refining her process now. The new version will include more specific questions for her customers. She’ll then give the prompt, “Do you find that booking meetings is annoying? I have a solution for that,” which will then link to a softer sales page. Coming from sales, it is hard for Jenny to scale back the hard sell. She says now she is first seeking a tripwire sale: inexpensive, low commitment, great service and value. Of course, this little sale, is intended to lead to a much bigger sale.

As Brennan points out, selling consulting which requires a large commitment from customers in both time and money, is a tall order for the end of this sales funnel. He recalls a youtube consultant he once used who sold introductory sessions in which he’d walk customers through spreadsheets he uses and would input their information. At the end of the session, the data could show if spending money on youtube ads was worth it. For Brennan, the $200 cost of the service was well worth it compared to the thousands he’d be spending in video production, and at the end of the session, the consultant sold a monthly retainer for helping businesses optimize their youtube ads. The high-value, personalized service of the initial call, made the retainer something Brennan could consider where a downloadable pdf or a course would not invite that commitment. Brennan suggests some type of paid roadmapping session for Jenny’s tripwire product.

Jenny says she’s considering offering an audit to show customers their potential with email automation. She would offer an hour of her time to ask them what their funnel looks like now, spell out their current funnel and work with them to figure out the values of the different parts of the funnel. She’d ask: “What's the value of a visitor? What's the value if they're on the client’s list? What changes would amplify each different point of the funnel?” This establishes the relationship between Jenny and the customer, making them feel comfortable with her, and showing that she understands her business and can help them. She’s also considering roadmapping or a low-cost worksheet to help them see ROI potential.

Jenny also uses a Drift widget to ask customers who visit her site to tell her about their pain points. She says she gets some very in-depth responses since naturally, customers and visitors are already thinking about their businesses. She says this has lead to sales but the other purpose of the tool is to get the potential lead into Jenny’s Drip via a Zapier zap. From there, an automated message is sent saying “Hey, it looks like you were trying to book an appointment,” and it includes 4 days of follow up emails containing information similar to the automation question they asked. Since the customer is not yet on her list at that point, Jenny’s automated emails invite them to join one of three courses she offers. She’s interested in re-targeting down the line to those who don’t. With Drip, she can push them into a custom audience and promote the email course to on Facebook to that audience. Once they opt-in to that email course, Drip can push them out of that custom audience. Jennifer says that because she’s looking for big ticket sales, every added sale could be worth the effort and automated follow up.

Jennifer has developed multiple entry points to her funnel. She has also perfected the art of strategically discuss marketing with clients based on who they are and their experience while also demonstrating her authority in that field. When she sees something working well for someone else, Jennifer sets her mind to learning how to make it work for her and her clients. She is constantly looking towards the next innovation or time saving tool and will gladly help you find yours!

For DYF podcast listeners, Jenny has a special code to receive her 5 Day Email course, Automation 101. To receive those emails, text DYFJenny to 44-222 where you’ll be prompted to enter your email address. From there, everything will be email-based. You can see her liquid tags for personalization in action and imagine what in your business you can personalize without having to re-invent or re-write each message.

Jennifer Miranda Nelson is a professional business marketing consultant and entrepreneur. She is the founder of Automate This!, a marketing consulting firm and JennyMiranda.com. She is driven to help others succeed in their lives and their
businesses. When not consulting, teaching, or creating course material, you can usually find Jennifer taking a hike through the mountains of Los Angeles. She loves outdoor
activities, and gets on her road bike whenever she can find the opportunity to.