How to Create a Bestselling Online Program with Shawna Kaminski

Transcription

Hey guys. What’s up? Yuri here. Are you ready to have some fun today? Well, if so, this is not the place. We’re going to have fun today. We’re going to get down to business. I’m going to introduce you to a dear friend of mine who I’ve known almost since I started my business online.

I was introduced to our guest Shawna when I joined my first mastermind group after struggling online for three years—because I thought that I could figure out all this stuff on my own, which apparently, I couldn’t. And then I made the realization, “Hey, you know what? Maybe I should get a coach. Maybe I should follow the proven path.” And that’s when I was introduced to Shawna. We were actually in the same mastermind group and we developed a nice friendship. We’ve kept in contact for almost the last eight years now, which is pretty amazing.

The other thing that’s cool about Shawna is that she’s a Canadian, and I love featuring Canadians on the show because I’m a proud Canadian, and I think Canadians are awesome. I also think Americans and every other culture in this world is awesome as well, but I’ve got a soft spot for my fellow Canucks.

Shawna is doing some really cool things, and what I’m most impressed with about her is that this is her second career. This is her second career, and she’s been crushing it.

She was actually a school teacher for 20 years and then she got into small-group training. Then she had her own boot camp, and then she came online back in about 2009-ish. She has a Bachelor’s in Kinesiology and a Bachelor of Education, in addition to a number of different certifications—which are probably too many to mention, like a lot of other fitness pros.

When she came online, she started building information products, and one of them really took off and became super successful. She is going to share with us exactly how that all happened, along with the number one skill she really believes that most entrepreneurs online must possess in order for their programs and services to do well.

Shawna  was also a guest fitness expert on Spike TV’s Gym Rescue. She’s authored many articles in both local and national publications, and she has been a lead instructor for Fit Body Boot Camp University—where she also helped to create the curriculum for them.

The cool thing here is that Shawna’s in her 50s. She’s got two children and a one-eyed rescue dog.

She’s really awesome. We’ve had a lot of fun hanging out together over the years, and I’m really excited to bring Shawna on the Healthpreneur podcast, because I think what she’s going to share with you will really make a big difference in the way that you look at your business and the way you approach your business moving forward.

With that said, let’s welcome Shawna to the show, and let’s get down into it.

 

Yuri:                Hey, Shawna. How’s it going? Welcome to the Healthpreneur podcast.

 Shawna:         Oh, it’s great to be here, Yuri.

 Yuri:    Yes, it’s always good to connect with you because we’ve known each other for years and we’ve got many similarities, in the sense that we both love dogs, fitness, we’re both Canadian …

 Shawna:         Absolutely.

Shawna’s journey into her second career and the value of coaching

 Yuri:                … lots of good stuff, and you’ve been, I mean, you’ve been doing this for so long now. It’s just great to see your journey over the past several years. Let’s get right into it.

You started off as a one-on-one coach, then you had the boot camps, then you came online. Talk to us about that journey. What was the moment were you decided, “I gotta start to maybe leverage my time a little bit more, and how do I do that?”

 Shawna:         Well, it’s interesting because you missed the first 20 years—you forget that I’m almost a hundred years.

 Yuri:                No…

 Shawna:         I was a school teacher for 20 years, and then I started small-group training, and then fitness boot camp.

In 2009, I realized I couldn’t reach enough people so I went online with my first information product in late 2009, early 2010. I still have one fitness boot camp and have just continued on since there, developing more and more on my programs and coaching. And the rest is history.

Yuri:                What was the moment? Do you remember, was there a pivotal moment where you were working with people in person and you were like, “I can’t do this anymore. I need to figure out a way to leverage myself better, help more people.” Was there a moment in time where there’s like an epiphany for that?

Leveraging and repurposing content

 Shawna:         Yes, based on laziness. I had so many people that were in my fitness boot camp or couldn’t train with me personally that were asking, “Hey, I’m going on holiday and I need some help,” “Hey, I can’t come to your boot camp. I need some help.”

I found myself doing program after program, and it’s like, why am I doing this several times when I can actually do it once and leverage that one program to hit a number of people? Then I realized, hey, I can actually hit people that I don’t even know. I can help people that are lost and at home.

The whole idea is it basically started out with wanting to do less work and help more people, and one way that I was able to leverage my time was by developing that very first program, Female Fat Loss Over 40—which, when I look back at the 1.0 version of, it was horrific.

But it was the best I could do at the time, and that’s the key to success is just go forward.

The Value of Getting A Coach

Yuri:    That’s awesome. How did you get started online? You came online and … I don’t, I mean, for me, I was working with a coach, I think a few years before I met you, and he’s like, “Why don’t you set up a website?” I’m like, “I’ve got no idea how to do any of that so just lead the way.” How did you know what to do when you started online?

Shawna:         I got a coach. Anybody that is listening and is thinking about doing something online or something out of the ordinary or something that you have no skillset for, you just need to buy speed and get a coach.

Back then, I had started coaching with Bedros Keuilian in 2008 for my offline businesses, and at that time, I had spoken to him, and he said, “Hang on. I’m going to be running a mastermind starting in … ” I guess it was 2009, maybe in April when I spoke to him, and he ran his first event, I think it was in November of 2009, and I just hopped on board with him and Craig Ballantyneright from the beginning because they just guided me through because otherwise, it takes a lot longer. You need to springboard to success just by investing in coaching.

Yuri:                Yup, totally, and we were in that group together, which was how we met, I think. Which is pretty cool.

Shawna:         I think so. Yeah, that’s right.

Yuri:                Yeah, and I keep telling people, it’s tough to know the exact ROI going into a coaching group like that but you develop these friendships that last forever and people in the group—we’re still in contact with many of them, and it’s amazing to see nine years later. It’s incredible.

Shawna:         Exactly. Right, and it’s fun to watch how we’ve spread out over the industry, but we still have those solid relationships and we help each other out. The value of coaching is not only the coach and marching orders, but the relationships that you develop with the coach and the people that you’re surrounding yourself with.

I can’t speak more emphatically about surrounding yourself. You need to find the people that are doing the things that you want to do and model and learn from them.

Yuri:                That’s awesome.That’s been one of the most common trends in all the interviews we’ve had so far is finding a mentor, hiring a coach, and really being surrounded by those people who’ve already paved that path. Because if you don’t, you’re just trying to figure things out on your own, and that can take a long time and a lot of wasted time and energy. Great advice.

You started with your digital eBook program. What were some of the initial challenges that you had with that?

Outsourcing, picking your 5%, and copywriting

 Shawna:         Well, initially … The thing is—lots of your audience are probably fitness trainers, and they’re probably amazing trainers, but there is an entirely different skillset in taking your knowledge and putting it online.

Initially, for me, it was just those technological things, “How do I do this,” that sort of thing. I’m actually not sure if I would change that because you want to learn the process, you want to know what goes into making an online program, but you don’t have to do it all.

I think the thing that I would do sooner is maybe outsource a little bit more. Of course for anybody starting out, finances are a little bit challenging, probably, because you don’t know the return on your program. But with Fiverr and 99designs and all that kind of thing, there’s so many services out there that are really affordable—and a coach or a mentor can put you in touch with those things so that you’re not doing every single thing.

The challenge for me, at first, was I hooked up everything to ClickBank and then to AWeber. It’s great that I learned the process, but I think just an understanding of the process is necessary. You don’t necessarily have to do every single thing.

 Yuri:                Yeah, that’s good advice. Of all the things that you didn’t like doing or realized you didn’t need to do, what was the one or two things that, as you started to get some traction online, you realized, “These are the big needle movers, and these are the things I need to keep doing myself?”

 Shawna:         Well, I mean, that’s the big thing is making that list of, these are the jobs that I need to do, and I’m picking out the 5%.

There’s very few things that I actually have to do. I don’t need to build my website. I don’t need to connect everything to ClickBank. I don’t need to do the technology.

But what I do need to do is write the sales copy. I need to be connecting with my list. I need to be developing a list. I need to meet people, introduce myself to people so that they know who I am, that sort of thing.

The things that I don’t need to do are, really, I don’t need to do that technology aspect. I don’t need to know the technical end of it. I need to trust in someone that will connect those dots for me so that I can put my energy into creating a great sales letter, a great product, that sort of thing.

Yuri:                Writing sales copy, connecting with your audience, obviously creating something of value for them, which you’ve done numerous times. What would you say to people who don’t like writing copy? Let’s say we’re talking to a doctor or trainer or artist—a technician like we all are—who doesn’t want to do that stuff, but they still want to build their presence online. What do you say to that?

Shawna:         The best copywriter is the person that is the most passionate about the program. I really feel like everybody has to take a stab at writing sales copy, and then maybe outsourcing it. But I really feel like everyone should have a hand in the writing of their own sales copy. You can get help with it, you can hire a professional, but you have to be careful because unless you’re paying top dollar, if you just do a bit of studying you’re probably going to do just as good a job as an entry-level sales copywriter.

Yuri:                Sure. 

Shawna:         I feel like it’s one of those things that you need to study. And there are great courses, but some of the best sales copy is just … go to other programs that are doing well and study what’s going on in their sales copy.

And then don’t copy it, but model it. Look at the template and model it.

Yeah, I do some information marketing coaching as well, and that is always one of the hardest things that actually should be done first. And I’d to just throw this out there—a lot of people go ahead and build a great program, but then they go to write the sales copy, and it’s more difficult. Whereas if you start with a sales copy, then you can build your program a little bit that way.

Yuri:                Yeah, that makes sense. It’s funny because starting with the marketing before the product is backwards for a lot of people because we’re all so creative. We’re like, “I’ve got this amazing idea. I just want to put it out there,” and then it’s like, “Why does no one want it?”

For everyone listening, we’re trying to prevent and stop you from in making all the mistakes that we made back in the day.

Shawna:         Right, yes, yes.

Yuri:                That’s why we’re here. That’s why we’re here.

Shawna:         That’s right.

Building a better mousetrap

Yuri:                What’s your process look like? Without turning into this a sales copy writing workshop, what does your process look like when you’re sitting down to write some copy? Just so people can kind of get a sense of, “okay, it doesn’t have to be that complicated.”

What does your process look like? You’ve got this idea. How do you start to flush it out and what are some things that our listeners can keep in mind with getting them started? Or if they’re a little bit more advanced, some things that they can keep in mind to make their sales copy more effective.

Shawna:         Well, It’s basically building a better mousetrap.

“Why would somebody want to buy what I have to offer over what’s already available? I need to have something that’s innovative and different, not a me-too program or product because especially when I’m just starting out, there’s some big names that people are going to probably want to gravitate towards.”

So you have to have something new and different, what is called a hook.

What makes your program different, better or more appealing than what’s already out there? You have to have the hook, and you have to know who your perfect buyer is.

Creating that avatar, giving that person a name, a job, visualizing exactly who that person is so that when you’re writing your sales copy, that person on the other end is saying, “Oh my goodness, they’re speaking exactly to me.”

Those are two really important things. And I know that the beginners I’ve worked with—say they’re building a fitness program, for example. “Well, it’s for men and women, it’s for people in their 20s, 30s, and 40s because I don’t want to eliminate anyone.”

When you make something that’s for everyone—you really make something that’s for no one, so it’s better to go narrow and deep in your niche and say, “This is for this person at this age group” and eliminate, polarize your crowd so that some people click away and say, “This is not for me.”

Because then, there’ll be some people that say, “Man, this is for me!” But I mean, you don’t want to be targetting 35-year-old women that play chess. That’s a little narrow, so …

 Yuri:                You never know. 

Shawna:         You never know. I just threw that out there. Maybe, who knows, that might be a huge market.

But there’s a little bit of research that goes into figuring out who you want to speak to and finding that person. And then figuring out what else is out there that solves that person’s problem and then how you can solve it better, faster, more innovatively to get that person to buy from you as opposed to what’s already on the market.

Yuri:                Yeah, that’s really good advice. There’s so many little nuggets in there, guys. If you missed any of that, rewind it, play it at half speed.

Just a couple of things I want to touch on. Narrow down your niche. We talked about this several times. We’re in a very competitive space, obviously, so at the core, you and I do the same stuff. We help people lose weight, we help them get in shape, and so does everyone else in our space.

And as you mention, if you’re coming up with something, it’s gotta be unique, different, better, faster, and more innovative. So that’s really important.

If you’re listening to this, that’ll save you a lot of time if you just start thinking with that as a framework to begin with.

Speaking of niche, you really hit it out of the park with one of your more recent programs called Lose Your Menopause Belly. Talk to us about that—how did that happen? Because I know that you guys were at the top of ClickBank for a while with that product, and I think a lot of people were doing really well promoting it.

What was the difference there? What was the real inflection point with that specific offer versus some of the previous ones for you.

Keep it simple, stupid

Shawna:         That program is called My Bikini Belly, and full transparency, I didn’t write the sales copy.

There was a bit of falling out with my sales copywriter, and no one is going to get thrown under the bus, but we are no longer working together. He did a great job in writing that copy. What differentiated that program from others on the market is its simplicity.

In the offer—this is another mistake that beginners make—you know those commercials about the Ginsu knives that, “You get this and this and this, and then I’m going to throw in this, and I’m going to double your value,”?

What we did with My Bikini Belly is we made it very, very simple. The offer was super simple, so there was no confusion, and it really targeted in on women over 35 that had, it solved a very specific problem of what was called menopause belly.

Since that program in 2015, what do we all see now everywhere, Yuri? I mean, right now, there’s a huge launch going on, menopause belly. Everybody has jumped on the bandwagon for using menopause belly, that term, and hitting women over 35, over 45, over 50. That just turned out to be such a huge demographic.

It’s funny because I started with that exact demographic in 2010. Who would’ve thunk that my page and being the age that I am.

You always think, “Oh, it’s awful getting older,” but the fact is, that probably makes me the most credible to sell that program.

So, a couple things. It was a simple program. It was represented by someone, me, who’s that exact, fits that demographic, so it was credible.

Yuri:                Yup, that’s really good advice. The cool thing too is that you’re serving the same market, for the most part, that you were years prior. But now, it’s just a slightly different angle, slightly different hook, and it’s stuck. It really made sense for them.

When you say, just so everyone knows, the simplicity of the offer, you’re basically saying you didn’t throw in like 20 bonuses when you buy now type of thing, right?

Shawna:         Exactly. While those can be appealing, people are more confused than ever, so you just want something very simple and straightforward. Yes, you want to be having terrific value with your offer, but sometimes you just complicate it, and when people get confused or overwhelmed, they will not click the buy button.

It worked because it was a very straightforward and clear with a clear call-to-action, plus it was a low-barrier offer. It went for $15, so it was really an irresistible offer.

And then, of course, you can be adding value with your upsell flow by adding nutrition, adding a short, seven-day solution, adding other workouts, that sort of thing. You can be adding that value in an order bump and in upsells, but you want to make what you’re offering amazingly clear.

This is what we’re offering, this is what the benefit is.

Yuri:                Awesome. Good advice, and it’s funny because when we both started, it seems like so long ago now, it was almost the opposite. It was almost like, slap them with bonuses until they’re blue in the face. And I think that kind of fed the monster, and now people want simplicity, so that’s really good advice.

Looking back over the journey—and obviously, the journey isn’t over—what’s been the biggest challenge you’ve ever faced in your business, and what did you learn from that experience?

Being ‘everywhere’ on social media and Dean Jackson’s cow milking analogy

Shawna:         Recently, I feel like the industry is changing a lot because the buyer is getting so savvy. Your Gmail, the way it’s configured—your emails can end up in junk, in the promo folder. It’s changing quite a bit, so just navigating and learning how to use social media … You really have to be everywhere now.

You can’t just be in a buyer’s inbox or a prospect’s inbox. Although you want to have their email and be hitting them with email. You have to be on social media, you have to be on Instagram, on Facebook, doing Facebook Lives, maybe on a podcast.

And it’s a double-edged sword.

I feel like it separates the true pros that are the real meal deal from the scammers, and we all know that there are people out there that might have something that’s not as genuine, but if you’ve got a great brand and you live your message through social media and email, then you can create a more meaningful bond with your listeners, with your buyers and followers.

Whereas before, you could have a list of a hundred thousand people, you could send an email and it would get delivered. Now, it just won’t get delivered and you don’t get the opens.

You know what I’m talking about.

Yuri:                Yeah, totally. That’s such a good point, and it’s so interesting because the pace at which things are changing now is incredible. You said brand, and I think we are in a day and age where direct response and brand go hand in hand together.

If you just do one or the other, you’re really going to miss the boat. I love how you talked about doing social because you can’t just email people anymore. A lot of people are either not receiving the emails or they don’t take action on them.

A lot of people now do most of the research before even considering buying something, so they’re going to Amazon or they’re looking online, they’re looking to see if you’re a scam artist or a reputable company. So, as you said, being everywhere is important.

But how do you navigate that? It’s a challenge because people want a bit more simplicity in their business so they have more free time instead of working 28 hours a day—how do you navigate being everywhere without burning yourself out?

Shawna:         Well, the beauty of being in this business a long time is I have a ton of content over the years, and I’m really learning how to repurpose content.

I’ve got some strategies to go, “Alright, I’ve got something on my blog,” or if I do a Facebook Live, “Alright, I’m going to do a YouTube practice video first,” because anyone doing Facebook Live knows it’s a little unnerving to turn on the camera and go.

Oftentimes, what I’ll do is I’ll do a three-minute YouTube video first to practice, and then I’ll go live, and then I’ll take part of that and put it in Instagram, and then I’ll take the YouTube video and I’ll put it on my blog. I’m just going to be starting a podcast, so I’m going to take that same idea and then do a podcast with it.

It’s just a matter of taking one piece of content and then duplicating it and having some support along the way. I’m just learning, even now—and I guess I’m a real slow learner on getting help—outsourcing. And saying, “Okay, this person is going to take this content and put it on the podcast, this person is going to put it on YouTube for me.”

Taking those small jobs—you know how they are, Yuri. It’s like, “Oh, it only takes 10 minutes, I’ll just do it.” Then all those 10 minutes adds up to the 24-hour day.

Yuri:                Yup.

Shawna:         Right? Outsourcing some of those smaller things. Our job is to create the content, and then if we can get virtual help or administrative help within our circle to do those rinse and repeat jobs so that that we’re not always doing the blog post, putting it up on YouTube, that sort of thing.

Our job is to create the content and then become content-creating machines, and then our viewers are seeing us. “Oh. I see them on YouTube. I see them here. I see them there.” You’re hitting your audience from a variety of modalities, and you become all the more reputable. It’s like, “Wow. He or she must be something else. I keep seeing them. They’re just showing up everywhere.”

Yuri:                Yup, that’s really good. I don’t know if you know Dean Jackson. He runs I Love Marketing with Joe Polish?

 Shawna:         Yes.

 Yuri:                He’s a good friend and such a smart mind, and he talks about this concept of the self-milking cow where we are essentially cows. We’re the thought leaders, the idea generators, the content creators, and we’ve got more milk than we could ever supply to the market, I mean, we have more milk than people can ever know what to do with.

It’s tough. If you think of a cow trying to milk themselves with these hooves, it’s tough to do. So when you mention finding people to support you, where they can take your content from YouTube, repurpose it on the blog, it’s almost like they’re the farmers extracting the milk from you. And the more of those farmers you have around you, the more you’re able to just share and share and share.

So yeah, it was a cool analogy that came up as you’re were talking about that.

Shawna:         It’s exactly true, and the thing is, when you surround yourself with those people—those are their unique abilities. It takes them a shorter amount of time, but my unique ability is not doing the technological aspect of my business.

It might take me six hours to do something that takes my webmaster 10 minutes, and so that goes for all the aspects of … It’s so important to list, what are the jobs that I need to do?

What’s the 5% that I actually need to do that’s going to move the lever forward in my business, and then I can empower other people around me to do the things that they have a unique ability to do.

Yuri:                Awesome. Love it. One more question before we jump into the rapid five. What do you think has been the number one key to your success?

Shawna:         Failure. Honestly? I am awesome, and was it Churchill that said, “success is going from failure to failure without the loss of enthusiasm”?

Yuri:                Yeah, totally. That’s the best quote of all time.

 Shawna:         That is me. It’s like, “Okay, well, that didn’t work. What do I learn from that, and what do I take forward to build that better mousetrap … ”

The other thing is, I’m really passionate about helping women over 40 in particular. And so, for example, say I had a great idea about financial stuff, and I had a great product. But I had to get up every day and read stats and do things in the financial world, and it’s not my passion—I would soon lose enthusiasm.

It would just become work, but when you’re passionate about what you do, it doesn’t feel like work, which sometimes can get problematic because then you do work a lot, but I would say my biggest success trait is being able to fail and bounce back. I’m just advising all your listeners to make sure that they’re in an area of passion.

Don’t be chasing dollars. Chase your passion, and the dollar will follow.

Yuri:                Yup, totally. It’s like a magnet. I refer to this concept I call delusional optimism where you almost have to be, you have to get to a point where you’re just like, “Okay, I just got knocked down. Let’s get right back up,” and it’s like, “All right. This is going work it, it didn’t work it. All right, let’s keep on going and try something else.”

And everyone around is like, “Are you crazy, man? What’s going on with you? How many times do you have to fail before something actually works out?” but I think that’s what separates us from everyone else who doesn’t do what we do in the entrepreneurial world.

Shawna:         Right, because the problem is, you never know when you’re just at the cusp of success. It could be just around the corner and likely is.

So when you’ve invested so much, it’s just like you have to have this undying confidence in yourself. It’s not like I’ve failed miserably every time.

And this is how everybody goes. You’re always taking these baby steps forward, and so then when you look back, it’s like, “Man, I’ve come a long way.”

Yuri:                Yup. Totally. That’s great advice. That’s so good. I mean, that’s why I wanted to have you on the show. That’s why I’ve wanted to interview all these amazing entrepreneurs because no one’s figured it out.

We’re all just failing and learning a little bit every single time.

I think it’s so important, especially in today’s day and age where everyone wants that overnight success. Because we’re looking at what everyone’s doing on Instagram or Facebook, and it’s like, “Oh my God, that’s what I want,” and we don’t realize that it took them forever to get there. Still, it’s the highlight of real. You’re not looking at all the crap that’s happening behind the scenes.

So yeah, thank you for bringing some perspective once again to our listeners.

Shawna:         My pleasure.

The Rapid-Five Questions

Yuri:                Are you ready for the rapid five?

Shawna:         No, I’m a little nervous, but yes, I’m ready.

Yuri:                You got no prior knowledge of these questions. Whatever comes to mind is the right answer, so here we go. Number one, what is your biggest weakness?

Shawna:         Biggest weakness. There’s just so many. What do I pick? Well, the thing that hits me right away is just social situations.

I feel like such a social misfit, and I know that I can put it on pretty well, and people would think, “Oh, you must be an extrovert. You’re so comfortable in these situation.”

I think for me, I don’t know if it’s a weakness or a challenge that I have to overcome, but it is just constantly stepping out of that introvert personality. Nobody gets anywhere by standing on the wall and being quiet. I feel like that that is a constant challenge for me—just stepping up and stepping into situations that an extrovert would just love.

And as an introvert, it’s just like, “Oh my gosh. Keep, just keep going. The rest of you will catch up.”

Yuri:                Well, it’s funny. I would not have said that about you, knowing what I know about you. So thank you for sharing that. Number two, what is your biggest strength?

Shawna:         Resilience, I feel like. I feel like you can knock me down, and then I will not stay down.

Yuri:                Nice.

Shawna:         I will always find the silver lining and say, “Okay, well, this was a challenge, but these are the good things. I’m going to go with the good things, whatever the silver lining is, and then build on that.”

Yuri:                Wicked. Number three, what’s one skill you become dangerously good at in order to grow your business?

Shawna:         Hmm. Oh, man. These are hard questions, Yuri. Dangerously good? I think building relationships with people. I think because, obviously, we’re Canadian, Yuri. 

Yuri:                Of course.

Shawna:         We’re very genuine and sincere people, and I feel like I have a good connection with all the people that I’ve had the opportunity to meet within the industry. I feel like I have good relationships with them, and I think that that has really helped my business.

Yuri:                Awesome. Really nice. Number four, what do you do first thing in the morning?

Shawna:         First thing in the morning, I have some quiet time to reflect on gratitude, and I move from gratitude to what the big thing I want to achieve that day is. And dog walking.

Yuri:                Nice.

Shawna:         It kind of happens all at once.

Yuri:                Cool. I love, I find that dog walking is like a meditation for me.

Shawna:         Absolutely, and I go a lot. In the middle of the day, I need some … I need get up and move from my laptop, and then I get such great ideas.

Yuri:                Yup. I was actually thinking of a dog-walking business. If I wasn’t doing what I’m doing now, I would probably be walking dogs, I think, for 20 bucks an hour. I’d be totally broke, but it’d be awesome.

Shawna:         But you would be zen-like.

Yuri:                Finally, complete this sentence. “I know I’m being successful when … ”

Shawna:         I know I’m being successful when I get feedback from my customer, from the person. I get goosebumps when I get a Facebook message, a post, a text of other people’s success. When I’ve touched somebody’s life, whether it be through fitness or nutrition or info marketing information—any way that I’ve helped someone, and they are achieving success, that is my success.

 Yuri:                Awesome. Love it. That’s great. Shawna, this has been a lot of fun. Thank you so much for taking the time to join us. What is the best place for people to follow what you’re up to online?

Shawna:         You know what? I just started a free Facebook Group called Healthy Secrets for Women 40-plus, but I vet every person, so women can only get in that group-

 Yuri:                Sorry, men.

 Shawna:         That’s a great place, though, to, whether you’re in information marketing or whether you’re in fitness, just to see what’s going on. That is an amazing group that we’ve started.

I’m also on Instagram, just Shawna, Facebook Shawna Kaminski. I think I might be the only one in those with that name, so

Yuri:                That’s pretty good.

Shawna:         Yeah, I’m lucky that way, although there are some imposters, which really means I’ve made it, Yuri.

Yuri:                Yeah, exactly.

 Shawna:         I’m pretty happy about that.

 Yuri:                Then you can you just own the domain shawna.com.

 Shawna:         Shawnak, actually, it’s shawnak.com.

 Yuri:                Exactly. Cool, so Instagram, Facebook, and the Facebook Group.

Shawna, once again, thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to join us and sharing a bit about your journey. Thank you for your friendship over the years and for all the amazing work you continue to do and all the people you continue to serve.

It’s awesome, so thank you so much.

Shawna:         It has been a pleasure. Thank you, Yuri.

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Yuri’s Take

There you have it. Another great interview with Shawna this time around, and I hope you’ve enjoyed this one.

It’s always fun reconnecting with friends who I haven’t been able to connect with in person for a while, and to be very honest with you, that’s actually one of the selfish reasons I do this podcast, is because it gives me the opportunity to reconnect with people that I really have a dear friendship with or I kind of hold them dearly in my heart. Or they’re just people I want to connect with.

Here’s a little tip for you guys. If you want to grow your business like Shawna and I have mentioned in this episode, you need to be surrounded by other people who are doing what you want to do.

There’s no other way around it.

It doesn’t matter what your business model is, it doesn’t matter how you want to build things, it doesn’t matter what product you’re selling. The fastest way to accelerate the results is to get around other people who are doing what it is that you want to do. And that means being part of a group, attending an event, hiring a coach.

All of those things are going to help you, they’re essentially helping buy success. You’re buying speed.

I tell you this because, as I mentioned before, trying to figure this out on your own is not going to happen. It’s just not going to happen. Well, it will happen and it can happen, it’s just going to take a lot longer.

I’ve mentioned my story before where I struggled for three years, trying to do things on my own. It didn’t happen. It did happen very slowly. When I look at a lot of other people that I know in our space and I see their success, I really congratulate them because they were smart out of the gates—you find the right coaching.

Even if you don’t have the money, there comes a point where you’re going to get to a crossroad and there’s going to be an opportunity presented to you.

It’s going to seem uncomfortable. It’s going to seem like a stretch, but I can tell you, if it feels right in your gut, if it feels right in your soul where you’re saying to yourself, “I know this is the right person to guide me,” or, “I know this is the right opportunity for me,” but you’re a little bit hesitant because of the financial component … As long as it’s not way out of left field and you have to remortgage your house, I’m going to encourage you to follow that.

Because if you’re following the right kind of guidance and the right kind of coach, you will get a return on your investments.

It may take a little bit longer than you want, I don’t really know. It depends on the nature of your business and the program, but what I can say from experience is that every single time I have invested in a coach, I’ve invested in an event to round myself with other people, every single time it’s paid off in multiple ways.

At our Healthpreneur Live event back in September, one of my presentations, I was talking about this journey of every single event I went to and I showed on my slides, I’m like, “I went to this event, then this happened, and this happened from that, and this happened, and this happened and … ” and it literally connected the dots of the most impactful decisions I made, and it all came back to people.

Every single thing I’ve experienced in my business, The New York Times Bestselling books, Dr. Oz, all this other stuff, all the success we’ve enjoyed, the only reason I’ve been able to enjoy the success is because of the people, the relationships that I’ve built over the past 12 years.

Please, I urge you, this is one of the most important things you can do for your business, and if it’s uncomfortable, if you have to get on an airplane, if you have to stretch yourself financially, I’m telling you from the bottom of my heart, it will make a difference for you.

You will find a way. You will find a way to make it work because when you pay, you pay attention. And as an entrepreneur, when you put yourself out there, we sink or swim, and I have no doubt that you will swim because I know who you are at the core. I don’t necessarily know you personally, but at your core, I know that you can make magic happen when you put your mind to something. So never, never doubt that.

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