767: Rethink Academy: Understand Your Market to Build a Coaching Business and Achieve Passive Income with Jason Osborn

announcer 0:00 Marketer of the day. Episode, 767 rethink Academy, understand your market to build a coaching business and achieve passive income with Jason Osborn.

Robert Plank 0:16 Hey everyone, and welcome back to the marketer of the day podcast. We are here with Jason Osborn from rethink Academy. And Jason is a highly accomplished speaker coach and consultant in the fields of digital marketing and mindset. And we're going to be talking about being a marketing consultant. We're going to be talking about what you do if you are just starting out, if you have no following on social media. You want to get those trustworthy relationships built with clients and so much more. Jason, glad to be talking to you. Hey,

Jason Osborn 0:46 Robert, it's great to be here, man. I'm really looking forward to the podcast today. So,

Robert Plank 0:50 so am I? So what ha what has got you excited these days? I mean, out of all the you know, the things that seems to be it's always the world speeding up, there's always, always things to like, new, bright, shiny objects seem to be focusing on, what has you personally excited and what is your focus these days?

Jason Osborn 1:06 You know what? I'm really the cool thing that I'm really excited about is the there's a lot of crazy stuff going on right now in the world. We all know that, but it's forced people to look for alternative ways on how to be able to communicate, how to be able to market, how be be able to promote their businesses out and a lot of it's having to go online. And so it's what I'm really excited about. Is, while it's a lot of people kind of go, oh yeah, the online stuff, we should be we should be doing that. Or I'm maybe they're skeptical of doing that. People are having to do that now, because you can't get out there, you can't do the meetings that you're used to be able to do, and all that sort of stuff. So I'm just excited. There's, there's a lot more kind of open mindedness around where we're going with online marketing, how to promote yourself. There's a lot of people not doing it right, but these people are more open to and saying, look, we've got it. We've got to pivot our business and somehow, or we're just not going to survive. And so being able to help people do that's been really cool, man, really enjoying that. Well, I'm

Robert Plank 2:06 excited to jump in and talk about that. And you know what you said there? Reminded me of, like, lately I've been when I've been trying to get, like, getting work done. I've been putting on, like, a YouTube video of someone driving through cities. Like, you can choose any city and just find a video of someone driving through a city. And it made me think, back to going to conferences, events, like in person, things like that. And maybe think, like, first of all, that seems like decades ago, but like that seems really old fashioned, like you'd have to, like, book a flight and get to the airport, and it would waste, like, a day or two before, a day or two after, you'd be so tired. Like, in hindsight, it seems, it seems really silly, and, like a lot of like, a waste of time, and and now that, like, you know, because of covid, and we have faster internet and, like, video chat and being on camera, it's, it's really less years. It's really sped up. I mean, even with, like, the podcasting I used to do audio only just a few years ago. And so like, you're right, things are really revolutionized, and it seems like it's been a long time coming. But then also, I can see how maybe some of these businesses you're mentioning might kind of hesitate, because if you're just at home, just at a desk, just at a computer, on camera, it's like, it's not, it's still not as good. So, I mean, like, what are your thoughts on that? Like, so these businesses say, you know, okay, we need, no, we need to go online, or I need to network on Zoom and podcast to get my, you know, get my clients. But it's, it's sometimes tough to do it, right? It's tough to, like, shower, to put your pants on. So, I mean, what do you say to people like that who just say, like, well, I'm so tired of being sitting at the computer all the time. Yeah,

Jason Osborn 3:45 well, it's a transition, right? I mean, as you said, it's not the way we normally did it, and we thought that you had to do face to face because, and yes, there's a lot of kind of, you know, we look at pros and cons. There's a lot of pros of doing face to face. You get kind of that personal rapport. You build someone you shake someone's hand. You can, you know, you can sit down and have lunch together and chat through stuff. There's a lot of stuff that, yes, that does have. It's hard to replace that, but we're realizing that actually, when you when you're talking and you're having a conversation over, you know, zoom or any other type of platform, Skype or whatever. WhatsApp doesn't matter. Have you can still create those good connections and those good relationships by doing that online. And, you know, yeah, it'll be great one day when we can start doing, you know, conferences and workshops and all that kind of stuff. I mean, there is an element of being in the room, the excitement. I've been public speaking since I was 15, and so, you know, getting in front, you know, on the stage, chatting to people, and you can't really replace that. The buzz you feel in room is amazing. And if you're an attendee, like a delegate at a conference, you know who you're able to meet, and all that kind of. Off. You know, you it's hard to do that online right now, but in terms of where people are going in their business, being able to go on and market yourself online, promote what you're doing, it's like the world's your oyster right now. And I think people are understanding that more and more and more, and the it completely lifts the geographical boundaries for a lot of businesses. You know, obviously, if you're, if you're restricted to, let's say, a particular country because of, you know, let's say you're an attorney and you're only regulated to do law in a particular state or country or whatever. Yeah, I get that. But a lot of people, they're able to expand their business around the world now, and that's what's been really cool is, you know, helping people. We've been doing this for years, but particularly last year, it was interesting when all of this hit, you know, February, March, kind of time, April time last year when people going, what do we do? What's going on? There was a lot of businesses that just didn't pivot. They just went under. And then other businesses that pivoted really, really well, and they've seen their business fly. What we've done in rethink Academy, and we had a we a lot of what we were doing in our business model was speaking in front of people, and we had to pivot that. And it's just, it's like what you said, we're able to speak to people all the time. I'm particularly like the founder, Paul, you know, he'll do a lot of webinars with people, and he's just in his in his office, his home office, he's not having to go travel. And as you guys, spend days traveling and hotel rooms and jet lag and all that kind of stuff. So it's just amazing to see where we're going with it. And and I think more and more people, particularly some people, are just struggling and with business, people been furloughed or lost their jobs because of what's gone on over the last year now, and people are looking for opportunities, ways to be able to go, Okay, well, we've got to do something. How do I make this online thing work? And so it's, it's been exciting. It's been exciting year for us, for sure. And

Robert Plank 6:59 you know, as you're explaining all that, what comes to mind is like, every decade we get hit worldwide with something, right? If it's dot com bubble, recession or this, it's like every decade, it's the thing that can be guaranteed is that we'll just be knocked over in some way. And it's like, even as you were describing that, it's like some people just give up, or some people see it as well. I've been I've been attacked, or I've been hit again. And then others say, Well, now it's time to pivot. Right now. It's time for the the weak hands to be weeded out. Now it's time for for new opportunities. And so as far as like, rethink Academy and the people you've helped, do you have any interesting stories of like that? Of like people that have have used this, this latest disaster, to their advantage in a good way. It sounds shady for some reason.

Jason Osborn 7:46 No, no, no. I mean, well, the thing is, about, right? There's always, there's always an upside to every downside, you know. And I know that sounds kind of overly optimistic, really positive. And I don't mean it from a, you know, a raw, raw, let's just be positive about everything. So yes, acknowledge the downsides, but there's always an upside to it as well. And so, you know, taking advantage isn't a bad thing. It's going okay. Where are the opportunities in this situation? And there's a lot of people, a lot of clients, that we've seen do really well with this. And you know, one, one of our clients, when they started with this, they were starting off wanting to we were training them and teaching them. One of our particular programs is helping people create Facebook ad agencies and stuff like that. And they were wanting to go in and help travel agents. Well, March comes that went down the drain real quick, and so he had to pivot through what he was doing through that, and say, Okay, well, who is actually needing this product, this service, this service at offer, to be able to help them grow and expand their businesses? And the guy started earning full time income within three months doing that. And just by pivoting those what he was doing with that, you know, we've had other clients come in and are looking for opportunities, because they're just not they don't know how long their job's going to last, or maybe they've been furloughed, or, like I said, they've lost their job. And so coming in and looking at what what areas of knowledge do you have right now that you can help people with. Because the thing about it is, all of us probably have an area that we can help people with, and if we don't have an area where can we upskill to be able to provide a valuable service to people. Because every there's so many needs out there. There's needs everywhere. Businesses need stuff. Individuals need stuff. So whether it's coaching, whether it's consultancy, you know personal, or whether it is with businesses, whether you have a product, whether you already are an existing service provider, maybe an accountant or solicitor or whatever, everyone needs those services, but how to be able to position yourself in a way that makes you stand out about above everybody else. Really important. So that's what we've been able to do long term. We've been able to do that, but obviously this last year, seeing that and helping clients with that, it's just been amazing. So yeah, we see it all the time, and it's phenomenal.

Robert Plank 10:12 And I can see what why you guys are called rethink Academy, because a lot of what you're saying here is kind of just like asking the important questions and planning ahead and strategizing and not just going through the day to day. And like you said, some of these people that either they have a new business or maybe they have, like, a career, and it's really easy to just get locked into just a straight going ahead, not adjusting anything kind of path, and then wondering, well, what the heck happened? Well, what happened was you didn't plan for the worst and hope for the best. You didn't think about, like, well, you know what, if this industry changes and so, so, yeah, this is all really great stuff to think about. And especially that whole thing you mentioned there of upskilling. I mean, I think about that all the time. I think about, oh, yeah, this thing I did I learned that in high school, or this thing that I do in my business now, like, that's a skill I picked up when I was, like, working this, like, nine to five job. And so it's like, it's never a waste, right? It's always like, there's, there's things that we pick up throughout our lifetimes, or this or that job or business that that that pays off later. And so as far as you said that you help kind of elevate people, and you get them, get them attention, and get them kind of standing out from the crowd. So what sorts of things need to happen? I mean, the things that come to mind are, you know, like web, a website, and networking and consistent social posting, but I'm sure that's just like the foundation. So what do you think is like really missing and really important? As far as these, these people like getting noticed and getting clients, yeah,

Jason Osborn 11:44 well, there's a couple things around this. I mean, postings one thing, and different platforms work differently. So if you're posting consistently on Instagram and things like that, that could be really positive for you. My particular specialties around LinkedIn, and and I talk to people all the time that are posting on LinkedIn, and they say, I just I'm not getting any leads from it, and it's because they don't understand how that platform works. Who's on there, the mentality of the people that are on there. And oftentimes posting, in and of itself on LinkedIn isn't the best thing to do, but it might do really good on Instagram. So yes, posting and all that kind of stuff is good, but it it, not only is it consistency around doing that, because it's you know, you have to, you're constantly learning what you understand around how to market yourself online right now is it's going to evolve and change. And one of the things we see all the time with our clients, is when we when we do a training, they'll go away and implement what we're saying to do, come back, and sometimes they'll go, it's not working. I've done everything you've told me to do, and it's still not working. So when we go back and review it, we'll go, Well, what, you know, what about this bit? Or why isn't this there? And they're like, oh, I don't remember you saying that. Like, well, and then we'll start going, Oh, I do remember you saying that now. And so what happens is, you know, and that's not pointing fingers at anybody. Because the thing about it is, if we think about it, just from, from our own school, when we were in elementary or primary school or high school, whatever you're going to learn, you're going to hear something. You're going to take it in based on the knowledge and information of your life experiences right now. You're going to filter it through that. You're going to implement it on your knowledge base now, and you're going to miss stuff. And so it's about going back and realizing that just because you think you're doing everything around doesn't always mean you are. And you have to keep learning that over and over. So staying consistent. We always say, Tell tell our students, be it. Continue to be a student of the industry, even once you're done with their program, be a student of the industry. Always be learning through that. And then the other thing that that we're really, really big on is making sure that you're standing out. And I talk about this all the time, and I'm sure people that follow me probably get tired of me talking about this, but I can't, I can't like hammer at home enough around this is, I always tell people, you have to move outside of a commodity based market. And like, I repeat this over and over and over and over again, because people go in and they'll just go, oh, yeah, I'm a life coach, or Yeah, I'm an accountant, or yeah, whatever, as soon as you do that. I mean, I see marketing people do this all the time as well. I'm a marketing consultant. Well, great. I know, I know 50 of those. What makes you different. And so the thing that we're always looking at is how you're positioning yourself in the market to be able to stand out above your overall generic industry that you're in. What really makes you different, what is the real thing you're delivering and helping people to achieve, and being able to continually add value to people through that, if you can add value. People can see you as someone that's genuine, that's there to help, that's there to add value to them, and there have a very clear understanding of what's the main thing you're able to help them to achieve or the or solve the problem that they have right now, it changes the game for people. And I know that it sounds over simplistic, and people go, oh yeah, I know that. And that's one of the things we talk about and rethink all the time, is anytime you go, oh yeah, I know that you need to stop and just think and go, actually, do you know what? Maybe I don't know if I knew that. Why aren't you implementing it? And so that's what we always kind of work on. So that's a couple things you know, just to help people through that posting is fine, but it's about how you're positioning yourself, how how you're adding value to the market really makes a massive difference.

Robert Plank 15:49 I like that a lot, and that it's easy to be it's easy to like, put yourself in a category and then just say, you know, I'm just like these 50 other people. And so what I'm hearing from you, and what I've been hearing from this whole conversation, is like, the how important that the people are that you're helping, which, like, kind of sounds like a cliche, but it's like, if you focus on, well, instead of saying on this label, I can help this type of person with this solution, then that has a lot of that has a lot built in there, right? It kind of has that uniqueness, if, if that specific type of person is looking for you, they can see that they fit right in. And it seems like it has a lot of the case studies and things like like that built in. But it just when, when I'm hearing that I hear like, Man, this is one of these things where it takes a lot of thinking, right? And a lot of like, kind of thinking over and over and like, re examining, and maybe even after a few years, once you think you have it figured out, re examine it again, and, and, yeah, this kind of thing that we're talking about of like, think, sometimes thinking fast, sometimes thinking slow, where it's really easy to to not, not be coachable, right? I guess that's what it comes down to. And like, I mean, we've all had, I used to have, like, a coaching client like that, in particular, who I would they'd ask me a question. I'd start to answer, and they say, oh, no, wait, I've heard of that. I'm like, Well, hey, hang on a second. I'm trying to answer your question, at least. Let me finish, because what I what I say, might not be what you say. And and, yeah, sometimes, like, I'll be communicating with someone, or they'll be communicating with me, and one of us will just say, like, Well, what I just said, Can you repeat that back to me, just to make sure we're all on the same page, even though it kind of might feel like a waste of time or might feel boring like sometimes it just helps to get all those things figured out. And like you said, many times we get advice in, you know, eight at age 30, and then we hear one thing, because that's how it's filtered. And later on, at age 40, we go and get the same exact advice, but then it leads to a different result. Because we're, our brains are not exact video recorders, right? It's, it's filtered through the thing that we're, that we already have built into our brain there. And so as we're kind of starting to get near the the end of our program here, I really wanted to get to this, this question that you have here, as far as our like possible questions, how do you get that first customer? Because that seems like that's right in there with the thinking slowly, following the steps, doing the fundamentals and getting some kind of achievable results. So what are your thoughts on if someone is pivoting, or a brand new or whatever, and they want to get that first customer? How do we get there?

Jason Osborn 18:26 Yeah, so it depends on the industry and what you're what you're doing, but, but overall, I'll just kind of give a simple answer to this. Your first customer, I'd say is you always want to lead with value, get them on a phone and have a conversation with people. And I know that scares people, because, like, Oh no, like they, you know, I know we don't have those phones, you know, back in the 80s, you know, the big old phones, you pick up and stuff, but you know, you pick up, you pick up your mobile, you pick a phone, and you chat with them, and it's not a scary thing. People think, Oh, what if they say this, or what if they say that, and what if I don't answer it, and people get so worked up in their head around that thing, but that's where their learning takes place, and you just have a conversation. And if you're if you get on the phone and and you and you are more focused on how you can help them, how you can add value to them, you're going to be able to help them a lot more, as opposed to, how am I going to sell to them? How am I going to have them buy my product? Because if or my service, if that's the way you go into and thinking in that, in that conversation, all you're going to think about is, yeah, but how am I going to get them to buy How am I going to get them by and which means, who are you focused on? You're focused on yourself, as opposed to your prospect. So we always, we always tell people, I mean, we go through a process within rethink and our kind of higher mentoring clients, where, you know, the first thing that we have people do is sell your time, which I know a lot of people don't like that concept, because people like this idea of passive income, but until you understand. Around selling your time being able to get on a phone, mentor, coach people, provide a service to people and really understand. You know that because you're talking about a brand new business, someone's getting their first client until you actually understand what their actual needs are, because you can think you know what they want, but until you actually get them on the phone and start speaking to them and doing it over and over and over again. It's just theory. And once you start doing that and understanding what their needs are, you'll get better at being able to move them into a paying client. Once you do that, you just get really comfortable with that, and then you can move on to creating digital products to help them and all that sort of stuff that helps create more of a passive income that you can start selling online and that sort of thing. So that's why, you know, again, it's industry dependent, but the easiest, fastest way for most people is to provide a service that's very valuable to people, get them on the phone, understand what their needs, what problems they need solved, and as long as you can solve them for them, be able to do that. And even if that means not, people don't like to hear this sometimes, even if that means you do it for a really low price to begin with. And I know people go, Oh, no, no, but I started this to make a lot of money, yeah, but you don't have the experience. If it's your first customer, you don't have the experience. To be able to charge that amount of money. The main thing is thinking long term around this, I like your whole that terminology of thinking slow. It's almost like just think long term as well, because you need that social proof, not only for yourself, that you can actually deliver what you're promoting and selling and offering, but that you have a happy customer that will do more for your business than charging an extra 500 or 1000 or $10,000 pound zero, whatever you charge in. So that's, that's what we always tell our clients, fantastic.

Robert Plank 21:55 And what's really great about that answer is that's, it's, it's general advice, because it works in any any niche or career, but it's also really specific, because, like, it's it's a template that it can apply to a lot of different things, and there's so many, there's so many good nuggets in there. Like, what comes to mind is you said earlier that you've been public speaking since you were 15, and a lot of that, at least for me, is shifting the focus from yourself to others. And like you said there, when you get on that phone call, instead of you worried about you selling them, think more about you helping them. And then that way, you're not focused on how nervous you might be or saying the wrong thing. You're focused more about them and what their problems are. And it also ties into, like we're saying, how a lot of things are on, not online now, things are really quick. You hop on a quick zoom call, and it's, it seems like it's more of a numbers game and more of a long term kind of thing. And what I also liked, what you said there, is how sometimes people are eager to quit, jump to the passive income, which might be a few steps away. And by, by doing some of the this active income here, and like getting on the call, selling your time, there's, first of all, like the Quick, quick money, right? You can prove this works. And then you said there that there's social proof, but not in the I mean, there's the usual social group, but there's also, like the proof for yourself there. And then also what kind of came to mind was, well, say someone out there is, I don't know, like an accountant or like, like you said, a life coach, but they need to find that better terminology. So they're, you know, they're a unique life coach, and they want to make a course, but it should be based on the things they're hearing on on these calls, right? It should be based on, like, the objections they hear, their problems they hear, or like the the keywords of the term. So that way, when they put out that course, it it all, it makes sense and and it like, you know, speaks to their language, because it and I think we've all seen this where it's easy to just try to skip that and say, I'll just charge ahead at all make, I'll make a quick course about this, and I'll do passive income, and you've got no traffic, you don't have very good copy, and it might be like months wasted. So it's a little bit like a surprise, counterintuitive thing, that doing these calls, doing the active income, might actually save someone months or years of all this passive income not working, or it might, you know, one thing might gradually lead to the next. So this is all really good to think about, as far as, like the the long term strategy and the steps that I want to make sure that people can can find you, and they know where the how to take the next steps and go where they need to go. So how can people find rethink Academy, as long as, well as anything else you want to mention here.

Jason Osborn 24:44 Yeah, sure. So the best way what we'd like to do, we always lead with value, just what I was talking about. So if people go to rethink gift.com rethink gift.com you can download the first four chapters of this book for new. Are watching on video. It's called the rethink social media. It's a book by Paul Omani, who's the founder of rethink. You can download the first four chapters of that just to have a look. And then, of course, if you want to connect with me directly, I'm a LinkedIn guy, so connect with me on LinkedIn. It's Jason Osborne. You can find me there, but definitely the rethink social media books phenomenal. So rethink gift.com is the best place to go.

Robert Plank 25:23 All right, rethink gift.com and Jason Osborne on LinkedIn. I know we're short on time. I know you have to go, but before I let you go, can you give us one final piece of advice, any final parting words, anything that you you'd wish you'd known for the past 1020 years that you can just fit in a sentence or two, anything come to mind? Yeah, you

Jason Osborn 25:44 know the thing I was just thinking about this today, let letting yourself, giving your spells space, giving yourself the space and time to be able to succeed. We often try to rush things and make things happen really, fast, but if you give yourself the permission to let it happen over time, it sometimes it'll happen in two weeks, sometimes it'll take 18 months, but let it happen, give yourself the permission to just let that happen. Don't be hard on yourself if it's not happening in the way or time frame in which you would like it to happen, because sometimes you have to let that brew and grow and develop. So you know, again, we've probably heard that before, but if you really take it on board, it can really, really help.

Robert Plank 26:34 We might have heard that before, but it could have been at an earlier age where it was filtered differently. So it helps to hear that again, and those are some deep thoughts, and that's really powerful stuff. I appreciate that. Jason Osborne on LinkedIn, rethink gift.com thank you so much for stopping by.

Jason Osborn 26:50 Hey man, my pleasure. Robert. Really, really great being on the podcast. Thank you so much.

Robert Plank 26:58 Want to be a guest on marketer of the day. Or can you recommend an author, speaker, coach or entrepreneur with a great success story and awesome insights? Go to marketer of the day.com/ask and tell us who you'd like to have on the show that's marketer of the day.com/ask.