Susan Friedmann [00:00:00]:
Welcome to Book Marketing Mentors, the weekly podcast where you learn proven strategies, tools, ideas and tips from the Masters. Every week I introduce you to a marketing master who will share their expertise to help you market and sell more books. Today my special guest is Carolyn Choate. Carolyn's the founder of Financially Free Author and she's a heart guided sales funnel builder who helps coaches, speakers and authors grow their business after their book launch. A multi genre author and host of the Financially Free Author Show, Carolyn has been publishing since the early days of Kindle. Her latest book, Supercharge youe Website Traffic Unlock the Secrets to Infinite Website Visitors and debunks the myth of a one size fits all traffic solution. In it, she shares her unique framework built around four core traffic pillars. Carolyn blends her love of marketing tech and systems with a deep passion for helping others succeed.
Susan Friedmann [00:01:12]:
Well Carolyn, what an absolute pleasure it is to welcome you to the show and thank you for being this week's guest expert and mentor.
Carolyn Choate [00:01:22]:
Oh, thank you so much, Susan. I am thrilled to get to share my ideas with the authors in your audience.
Susan Friedmann [00:01:29]:
Well, and I know you've got lots of great ideas and as you and I were discussing prior to the show, we were talking about websites and that like I said in the intro, a one size fits all doesn't necessarily go well when it comes to website traffic. So let's sort of kick things off with this big question of why do so many websites struggle to get traffic even when the content could be really very good?
Carolyn Choate [00:02:04]:
Really important question. Yes. You put all this effort into making a website and then nothing, crickets. And you just don't know how to get people there or people get there and they don't do what you think they're going to do. So you're saying, well, everybody says I have to have a website, but I don't really know what it's doing for me. It just sort of feels like a digital business card that nobody is taking. And I think the first, most important thing is to look at your website from the eyes of your ideal client, the person that you want to come to your website and to say, oh, this is the person for me. This person's going to help me.
Carolyn Choate [00:02:46]:
You have to be able to put yourself in their shoes and look at it through those eyes. So walk yourself through your website. What is the first page that someone lands on? Is it your homepage? How crowded is the homepage? Is it easy for somebody who has no idea who you are to see immediately what you do and how you help and how they can take a next step with you. You want to make sure that your website is very welcoming to the right people. And from there, once you have the website really optimized in that way, that's when you can start thinking about, okay, now how do I utilize these different pillars of website traffic to start bringing those ideal people here? But before you do that, you want to make sure that the website is really doing everything that it can do. It's not just a billboard, a business card. It can be really helping people get to know you, selling them on your services, being that important touch point. And your book can also be part of that too.
Carolyn Choate [00:03:53]:
Does that answer the question?
Susan Friedmann [00:03:55]:
Oh, and more so. And I mean, I'm already on these different tangents about even that beginning as to that first welcome page and what should it even have on it that's going to entice people to continue looking? Because more often than not, it's this big fat photograph of you and not you personally, but the author, the person whose website it is, and it's all about them. It's like, let me tell you how wonderful I am. And that's.
Carolyn Choate [00:04:33]:
And there's a place for that. It's not that you don't want that at all because sometimes we hear like, oh, focus on the client and what's in it for them. And that's super important. But there's also a place for they need to get to know you and build that know like, and trust. So it's like a dance. It's a balance between those things.
Susan Friedmann [00:04:51]:
At what point does that come in versus enticing people? Is there a question you should ask? What would be that first sort of door opener?
Carolyn Choate [00:05:04]:
I think that it's very important to have your lead magnet kind of front and center. A lead magnet is called by a few different things, but it is the gift that you give people if they agree to sign up for your emails. And it's called a lead magnet because it's meant to draw people who would be ideal clients for you. It's something that they are going, ooh, that's so juicy. I really want that. And they're willing to give you the Internet gold of their email address and permission to contact them. That is huge. It's really important that that not be something, you know, as an afterthought at the end of your website.
Carolyn Choate [00:05:47]:
Hard to find or. A lot of times I see people put sign up for my email newsletter here and they don't tell you why. They don't tell you why they would want it we all get tons of emails. You know this, we all get way too many emails. You do want to tell them, here's why you should join my email list. Here is the free gift that I will give you and my emails are going to be packed with value and they're going to help this kind of person, the kind of person who is your ideal client, make it as clear and enticing as you can and don't hide it because a lot of times somebody's first time coming to your website, they're not going to be ready to have a one on one call with you or purchase a service. They're probably just checking you out and if you don't have a way to stay in touch with them, they're going to say, oh this is so cool, I am going to come back to this later. And then they are going to forget to come back and you'll never see them again.
Carolyn Choate [00:06:48]:
So you definitely need a front and center way for those people who are not ready to take that bigger step yet so that you can keep building the relationship, keep on giving the touch points. That is what a lead magnet is for and the email list is for. The things that people should be able to see as soon as they land on your website are two things. They should see the offer for the lead magnet and they should see a headline that says something about what problem you help solve for whom. And that is called the fold. That's, you know, old newspaper terms was the folded up newspapers on the street. You wanted to see the most enticing things at the top. So the newspapers would sell because the newspapers would be folded over, you know, in stacks on the streets.
Carolyn Choate [00:07:34]:
And in Internet terms we call above the fold before somebody scrolls. So when they hit that web page, what are they seeing before they scroll? Those two things should be clear and visible.
Susan Friedmann [00:07:45]:
It's really interesting that you have that lead magnet so prominent right at the beginning, whereas I've always thought it's sort of. Yes, it's to keep us in touch with each other. You know, as you say that Internet gold, which I think is beautiful, that before they get to do that, as you said earlier, they come to check you out. But are they going to sign up for something before they've checked you out?
Carolyn Choate [00:08:14]:
You definitely have more things on your homepage and you're thinking again as the ideal client of yours, when they hit that website, what do they want to see? What are they interested in when they are checking you out? First thing is that headline that says what problem you're solving and for whom in an enticing way, in an exciting way, in a way that's easy to read and see. Other things that you're probably going to want to have on there are going to be your bio and your case studies and your testimonials, things that show that you're an expert. So there's where that balance comes in with some of the things about yourself, but in terms of how you are the right person to help solve their problem. And you can have your services on there. You can have more information about what you do on there as well. But you should definitely have the primary intent of the first page that people land on is to get them on your email address. That is the goal of the first page that somebody lands on.
Susan Friedmann [00:09:15]:
Yes.
Carolyn Choate [00:09:16]:
From there you can create that email sequence automated or if you're not ready for that, just sending emails. You can be offering your services. You can be teaching them more about what you do. You can be giving them the FAQs, the things they need to know before they're ready to say yes. All of that can then develop and happen over time. Instead of trying to like cram it all in. I have you for 30 seconds. Here's this and this and this and this primary goal, get them on that email list and then start nurturing them and teaching them and helping to guide them towards your services with it.
Carolyn Choate [00:09:52]:
Some people are going to come. They're already ready, they're already ready to sign up. So sure have that available. But for the majority of people, they're going to need a little more time to get to know you. And a lead magnet is a great way to do that. And here's what's also awesome for authors. Your book or a section of your book can make a great lead magnet.
Susan Friedmann [00:10:14]:
Very much so. I mean, your book is chock full of articles and tips and as you said, lead magnets, I mean, you can cut, dice and slice. That's one of my favorite things to do is how can you repurpose so much of your material without having to reinvent the wheel constantly? In your book, Carolyn, you talk about four traffic pillars. Can you explain those in simple terms for our listeners?
Carolyn Choate [00:10:45]:
Yes, I after working with a lot of authors and entrepreneurs on their websites and their sales funnels, I realized that they needed more support in how to get people to the websites. So that was when I started thinking about writing this book. And I observed all these different ways that you can get people to your website, these different ways of carving a path through the Internet that leads to you. And I found that they could be divided up into four types. Type number one is networking, partnership, affiliates, podcast, guesting, things like that, where you form a relationship with someone who has an audience that is similar. As you were saying, if you can find somebody who has a audience of the same as yours, where you do complementary things, then you can really get a lot of attention to your book and to your website. So that is what partnership traffic is all about. Then there is inbound organic marketing, which is my personal favorite.
Carolyn Choate [00:11:55]:
I feel like we all have, like, one that we're kind of more comfort zone, and that one is 100% mine. Organic means that you don't pay directly for it. It's not advertising. And inbound means that you are drawing people towards you. Like you're putting content out on your front lawn, as it were, and letting people discover you. So this is things like you're posting on LinkedIn, you've written an article on LinkedIn and you've posted it, and you're waiting for people to come and read it and say, oh, this is really interesting. I'm going to click back to the website to learn more about them. You're putting out content, you're letting people discover you and find you.
Carolyn Choate [00:12:37]:
You're kind of leaving breadcrumbs. The SEO also falls into this. So SEO stands for search Engine optimization, and it is how your website gets discovered on search engines. It used to be a lot simpler. Right now it can get quite complicated because there's a lot of competition. But there are some simple ways that you can still get pretty good results. Making your website and your blogs and things like that more optimized to be found by search engines. When your ideal clients are searching for the problems that you solve, that is, again, you're creating content that then draws people to you.
Carolyn Choate [00:13:23]:
Inbound organic. Next is outbound organic. That is you directly reaching out. That would be things like cold messaging, cold calling. The word cold is usually involved. It is fast because you're not waiting for people to discover you. You're going out there and kind of introducing yourself. But it's also scary for a lot of people and something that I avoid, and I know many of the clients that I work with avoid doing.
Carolyn Choate [00:13:53]:
And then the final one is, of course, you can pay for traffic. You can set up ads, you can have Amazon ads, you can have Facebook ads, you can have YouTube ads, like, everywhere around the Internet. You can pay to let people know that you exist and draw them back to your website. I usually advise people to hold off on that form of traffic until they know that they have a converting website, that their website is doing what they want it to do, that they are getting clients from it. Because you could waste a lot of your money on ads, that you're sending traffic to a website that is not actually giving you a return, not giving you a profit from those ads. You're not supposed to be spending money and not getting it back when you're doing ads. Those are the four different types. And within my book I dive into, I'm pretty sure it's every single type of traffic you could possibly do and which one of those four types they fall into.
Susan Friedmann [00:14:49]:
That's fabulous. Like you, number four is the one, you know, the advertising. Paying for that traffic is my least favorite. And whenever anybody says to me, well, I'm thinking about purchasing as I'm hesitant, you know, in terms of it's very hard to quantify advertising. So yes, if you were to coach an author and give them just one of those to start with, which one would you recommend as being the easiest one for an author to start with?
Carolyn Choate [00:15:29]:
I would say networking and partnership, especially for nonfiction authors, is a great place to start. When you are going to online networking groups with people who are your ideal clients or who are other service providers who work with your ideal clients, you get an opportunity to usually introduce yourself and say a quick little 30 second advertisement about what you do, as it were. That is a great place to start. Make sure that you can sum up your book in one or two sentences with what people get out of it, who it's for, and and use that when you are going to different networking groups. And I would say I'm Carolyn Choate and I have a book about all the different ways that you can get your website more visible so that you can get more out of it. Get more from your website and here's where you can pick up a copy or you can come to my website. You get that call to action in there. I think for nonfiction authors, networking is definitely the best place to get started.
Susan Friedmann [00:16:36]:
One of the things that you mentioned as part of that partnership was podcasting. And podcasting is, I believe, the number one way for authors to get out there, be heard, be seen, and have the opportunity to talk about their book. So yeah, I'm pleased you included that in that one. What about turning traffic into leads and then into sales? What is that process? Because we want to know if we're bringing people to the website and we're getting them on our list and we're creating that Lead. But then what's the next step in terms of turning into a sale?
Carolyn Choate [00:17:23]:
It always goes back to thinking through your customer journey, whatever business you are in, that there's a path, and it's different depending on what you do and who you serve. But there's always a journey that a typical customer of yours is going through. And the more you can know about that customer journey, the better. So if you're doing like market research or asking your previous clients, how did you hear about me? What made you want to say, yes, you can get some really good data that you can then build into. We call it a funnel. I know people are a little bit nervous about that word, but it really can be a beautiful, beautiful thing because it can automate a lot of this customer journey so that you can be focusing on serving your clients and doing the things that you're good at. So you can let your website kind of be a virtual sales team for you. Once you get this nailed down, for each step of your customer journey, you want to have a piece on your website that corresponds to that.
Carolyn Choate [00:18:32]:
They're learning about you. They get onto your email list, they're curious, they want to learn more. You're sending them a series of emails. Now, I usually keep the series of emails pretty short. I always say the funnel should be as simple as possible. You want it simple for yourself, but your leads need it to be simple, too. You don't want to confuse them with a complicated funnel. You don't want to confuse yourself with a complicated funnel.
Carolyn Choate [00:18:54]:
But some services require a little bit more education than others. That's really going to make your email sequence longer or shorter. But I usually will do just three or four emails every day or every couple of days just to get them kind of acclimated to you. Starting with encouraging them to use the lead magnet. If you sent them your book, if you sent them a chapter from your book saying, hey, how did you like it? Have you had a chance to read it yet? What did you think about this part? Really make sure that they're getting that value out of it that you wanted them to. And then going into more about yourself in the next email. I usually would put what your vision is, what your mission is, what you're hoping that your business is going to help people with, get them excited and on board and seeing why you're so passionate about what you do, and more examples about how you do it and how you're good at it. And then an email, maybe with a special offer or a here's how to Take the next step, get on a call with me, let's talk about how to do this or this thing for you.
Carolyn Choate [00:20:03]:
And then you can bring people into a more general newsletter list. So if they're not ready to take that step yet, you just keep on sending them value. You can either create a newsletter sequence that is really long. Some people will do, you know, a year's worth of newsletters that are all pre written. I prefer to stay a little bit more agile and send around once a week. Here are some of the valuable resources that I have found. Here are some of the workshops you can attend that are related to what your ideal client needs so that you become this one stop shop, you become the hub. They can unsubscribe from every other email because you are going to send them everything that they need in those emails.
Carolyn Choate [00:20:48]:
You have a little P.S. you know, here's how to take another step with me. Here's how to get my book so you can learn more. Always with the. So that you can. What are they going to get from it? Why should they take this step? That's really where the sales part comes in. And for some people, they have already been doing the research. They come to you and they've decided already that you're the person to work with.
Carolyn Choate [00:21:11]:
And for others, it might take two years of being on your email list before they say I am ready for this step. Now I am signing up. You just keep on nurturing them, you keep building the relationship. You keep reminding them that you exist and that you're here to help. And you give them useful things so that when they are ready they say, hey, that person was super helpful, they really cared about me and I'm going to go and work with them.
Susan Friedmann [00:21:35]:
I really like that and I'm pleased you emphasize the fact that it could take two or more years for them to even say yes to you. And I literally recently had this where a person had been interacting with me over a two year period and had never bought anything. And I really didn't think that he was going to do anything. And then all of a sudden he says, you know what? I think I'm ready to work with you.
Carolyn Choate [00:22:04]:
Oh, that's so lovely. It is.
Susan Friedmann [00:22:06]:
I mean it's, it is.
Carolyn Choate [00:22:08]:
I want people to have respect and love for people. We expect the Internet to be fast all the time. Everything about the Internet, it's going to be quick, quick, quick. And it's not. It's really not. And it makes me sad when I see people being like, oh, my list is full of freebie seekers or these people don't because they haven't bought anything. And just like, if your attitude is that, then they shouldn't buy from you. Like, you should be giving that respect and nurturing and kindness to everyone.
Carolyn Choate [00:22:42]:
And eventually they're going to remember you when they are ready for what services you provide. And if they aren't the right ideal client for you, they'll take themselves off your list and you don't have to worry about it.
Susan Friedmann [00:22:55]:
Yeah, it's as simple as that. Yes, I remember that. My first mentor told me. He said, it takes 15 years to become an overnight success. I often mention that to clients who are like, why isn't it happening quicker than this? I've done podcasts and I've done a newsletter and I've done this and I've done that, and there's crickets. And I was like, it's perseverance, it's perseverance. And you just don't know. As you said, it could be a few months, it could be a few years, it could be even longer than that.
Susan Friedmann [00:23:29]:
Yep, you're in here for the long haul. I had one author once who said to me, how long do I have to keep doing this marketing thing? And I was like, well, how long do you want to keep selling your book?
Carolyn Choate [00:23:43]:
There are ways to set up some more what they call passive forms of traffic, but that also takes time and takes effort. My fiction books, a lot of them sell without active marketing right now, but it's because 16 years ago, I started SEO with them. Search engine optimization is something that can become a passive source of traffic and sales, but it takes a long time to build it up. And you have to be able to create that little machine on your website that brings people in and converts them and sells them on your book, which is a skill that a lot of people do not know. And you have to think, is it worth it to me to try to learn that skill, or should I just do the things that I am already good at? And that's kind of part of the purpose of the website traffic book as well, is to say there's lots of marketers out there saying, oh, in order to be successful, you must do cold calling. You, you must do Facebook ads, you must do whatever it is that is their personal favorite. But there is no must. There are so many different ways to bring leads to your website to get visibility online.
Carolyn Choate [00:25:01]:
And the most important thing is that you find one that is sustainable for you, that feels good for you, that feels good for your ideal Clients, something that feels aligned to your values, try different ones out, see what feels right, and stick in that vein and try different things within that vein. That feels right to you. And yeah, just keep going.
Susan Friedmann [00:25:28]:
That's a great segue, Carolyn, for our listeners to find out more about you and the services that you offer. So take it away.
Carolyn Choate [00:25:37]:
Absolutely. I love to build these sales funnels for people. I have a gift for seeing the perfect kind of customer journey pathway that you should have in your business. So I do a funnel mapping strategy session where you get to tell me all about your business and your goals and your ideal client. And then I go away and I create an actual diagram, a map of the funnel that you should build. And then you also have the option to have me build it for you. And I do that in one day because I have ADHD and I hyperfocus and I thrive on the momentum of doing it in one day. My website, financiallyfreeauthor.comhas some examples of funnel in a day builds that I've done.
Carolyn Choate [00:26:27]:
And you can sign up for the funnel mapping strategy call, which is $150. You can also get a copy of my book along with the funnel build. Or you can start with the book and then see if you think your website is ready for the traffic that you could bring in.
Susan Friedmann [00:26:45]:
That's fabulous. And I love this idea of funnel mapping. So, yes, we'll put all of that in the show. Notes for people, Carolyn. And as you know, we always have our guests leave our listeners with a golden nugget. What's yours?
Carolyn Choate [00:27:05]:
Oh, there's so many things that I want to impart. I think the most important is, like you were saying, perseverance to have a hopeful attitude in everything that you're doing. It's just like with Internet dating, if you're giving off desperation vibes and like, please come to my website. Please, please, please. Why isn't anybody buying? Ah. That is driving people away. Being confident and secure in what you offer and keep on putting it out there and keep on saying, hey, if you're this type of person, you might find some really helpful stuff here and keep going, it will pay off eventually.
Susan Friedmann [00:27:42]:
Fabulous. It will. I know. It just takes time and you've got to be in it for the long haul. Marketing is a marathon, it's not a sprint. And I think that's really what you're saying, too. Yeah. Just realize that you just gotta keep doing something as long as you keep doing beautiful.
Carolyn Choate [00:28:05]:
I know a lot of authors who are kind of reluctant to do marketing and I think what better thing is there than you get to tell people about this book that you worked so hard on and you get to tell everybody why they're gonna love it and what you love about it.
Susan Friedmann [00:28:21]:
Like it's beautiful and that can lead to speaking engagements or coaching or training and consulting. I mean it opens multiple doors for income generation.Â
Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom.Â
And by the way listeners, if your book isn't selling the way you wanted or expected to, let's you and I jump on a quick call together to brainstorm ways to ramp up those sales because you've invested a whole lot of time, money and energy and it's time you got the return you were hoping for. So go to bookmarketingbrainstorm.com to schedule your free call. And in the meantime, I hope this powerful interview sparks some ideas you can use to sell more books. Until next week, here's wishing you much book and author marketing success.
Here's how to connect with Carolyn:
Website
LinkedInÂ
The Funnel Mapping Strategy Call
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