the bossbabe podcast - 7. Secrets to Growing a 7 Figure Instagram Empire with Amanda Bucci

Episode Date: April 3, 2019

In this week’s episode, Natalie interviews fitness youtuber turned 7 figure business coach Amanda Bucci!  Amanda explains how she dealt with criticism and fear of judgment when building her fitness brand. She shares how she made the pivot from fitness to business and what she did to build trust with her followers. She gives actionable tips on monetizing your platform, scaling a business, and creating content that sells. She also shares how to attract your ideal client when you apply 3 specific Instagram growth tips. Amanda chats about her unique morning routine and what she does for herself before getting into her busy work day.  This episode is sponsored by Insta Growth Accelerator.  IGA is a 12 week training program designed to show you how to grow and monetize your Instagram account. You’ll learn how to consistently attract your ideal client and effortlessly sell your product / service. Head to InstaGrowthAccerlertor.com now to get early bird pricing!

I think images, pictures, videos will grab people's attention but what you write and what you say is going to keep them there for whatever reason. If you want to send messages that really resonate with people and make people feel like holy shit this is for me, you have to get a little bit more specific and go a little bit deeper. The number one mistake I see is that people don't go deep enough. They're afraid to go deep. I say, lean into that thing. Welcome to the Boss Babe podcast, a place where we share with you the real behind the scenes of building successful businesses, achieving peak performance, and learning how to balance it all. I'm Natalie Ellis, your host of this week's podcast and CEO of Boss Babe. Now if

you know Boss Babe, you'll know that we're famous for our sassy insightful quotes and that's why we feel it's only right to dive into each episode sharing a new quote with you. And this week the quote is, the more consistent you are, the more consistent your money will be and consistency is a word you're going to hear a lot in this podcast as we talk about building communities and businesses consistency is so important if you want to achieve anything to be honest it's that commitment of showing up every day to move the needle further towards where you're actually going and listen when you're consistent you are telling yourself that you are capable as you're showing up to your commitments and honoring that and that's actually going to boost your confidence. So before

we get started I'm actually so excited to also tell you about a brand new product at Boss Babe. We've been asked thousands of times to release the exact Instagram strategy that we've used to build a global brand of over a million followers and growing at about 28 to 30,000 weekly, as well as doing it for countless of our own clients. I've done a few online trainings here and there, but there's so much that I've never released before. And Danielle kept pushing me to release it. And I'm going to be completely honest with you. I have resisted this for a really, really time and I was really nervous honestly to do it and I was diving into why I had that resistance and it's not because I care about the competition like you know me I'm here for collaboration way above competition I believe there is room for us

all to win and I love sharing what we do if it's going to help someone else but I was really really anxious because I wanted it to be right and I just didn't want to release something that I'm so passionate about and I know is my absolute zone of genius if I didn't feel completely proud of the work as well as fully convinced that it could be replicated whether you've got a hundred ten thousand or a hundred thousand followers and I'm actually finally excited to tell you that I said yes and decided to go into this head first. It did take a while and I really do encourage you to confront whatever fear that is holding up whatever you're working towards or really examine where that resistance is coming from but it took months and months of development and I can honestly say I am so proud of what we've created I even go as

far as to say that this is my best work yet and it is one of the best products that we've ever launched at Boss Babe and I know it's going to be one of the biggest and most important products that we do have because we truly believe in this idea of being multipliers and what that means is we can impact millions of people alone with just our message. But when we work with our amazing clients, and we do this a lot in our mastermind, where they have big audiences and communities, and they're teaching their own thing in their own zone of genius, they are also going to impact thousands, if not millions of other people. And we believe that's us being a multiplier. And it's fun fact, it's actually one of our core values at Boss Babe. It's something that we really try and instill in all of

our team. But it wasn't just enough to create a product that was just an audience growth program, because monetization is just as, if not more important than audience growth. And we made a million dollars way before we had a million followers. So Insta Growth Accelerator is a 90-day online accelerator to show you how to grow and monetize your audience on Instagram. If you know that having an audience of ideal clients who are crazy excited to pay you would completely change your business, you honestly can't afford to miss the enrollment period for this program. And not only that, but we're currently offering $1,000 off as early bid pricing for anyone that's joining us right now. So if you want to join or you just want more info,

you want to ask us a question, just head to instagrowthaccelerator.com. That's I-N-S-T-A growthaccelerator.com. There's a live chat on there and you can message us with any queries you have if you want us to look into whether it would be a good fit for your business and listen I already know what you might be thinking but they've got over a million followers of course our engagement's so high it's not going to happen for me but here's where it's going to get really exciting. Our social media audience growth rate is almost eight times the rate of our closest competitor and our engagement rate is nearly double that and that is by no accident at all we've been very strategic about what we've done we've tested our strategy countless times on

accounts with 100 followers and here's what we know for sure it works so whether you're 100 or 100 000 just bring commitment that you are ready to scale you're ready to do the work and let us work our magic that's our our job. And speaking of Instagram queens, I want to introduce you to a special friend of mine and the absolute definition of a boss babe, Amanda Bucci. Amanda is an entrepreneur, coach and influencer. She has hundreds of thousands of followers in her online community, an incredibly successful business and is such a genuine, intelligent, and magnetizing person. I love her. In this episode, we dive deep on creating content that

helps you to grow and monetize, whether you're a personal brand or a business. We also talk about the highs and lows of entrepreneurship. And this was just such a fun conversation to have. I know you're going to love it. There was a lot of really specific takeaways and steps. So even better if you've got a notepad with you or you're taking notes on your phone. And just one more thing to share before we get started. If you do love this episode, take a screenshot and tag me and Amanda in your biggest takeaway and we'll repost you to our audiences. Collectively, we have nearly 2 million followers. So that's going to be huge, huge engagement for you. So yeah, give us a screenshot and we'll just dive in. A boss babe is unapologetically ambitious and paves the way for herself and other women to rise, keep going and fighting on. She is

on a mission to be her best self in all areas. It's just believing in yourself. Confidently stepping outside her comfort zone to create her own vision of success. I am so excited about this episode, selfishly, just because I want to catch up with Amanda. I am so excited to have one of my really good friends, Amanda Bucci, on this podcast. Amanda, you are so inspiring and I know this episode is going to go viral. So thank you so, so much for coming on. Oh, I love you. I'm so happy to be on. Number one, it's an honor to be on the Boss Babe podcast. Like, of course, it's such an incredible platform with so many amazing entrepreneurs following. And number two, I just love you. Natalie and I have become such good friends over the last couple of months, everyone who's listening. And again, it's like 30% selfish, I was saying, to just catch up with Natalie and be able to

talk with her. And you guys get to be the fly on the wall while we chat business and mastermind and discuss anything that's going to be helpful and supportive to your listeners. So I'm excited to dive in. Oh, I love that. Let's dive in. So can you tell everyone just a little bit about your story? How did you even get started? You have hundreds of thousands of amazing followers online. You have an incredible community. How did that all begin? Yeah, no, such a good question. I feel like I started my platform back when people were kind of doing things unintentionally. Like I know for me anyway, I like to call myself an accidental entrepreneur. I never really thought that I would build a business. But for some reason, I always thought that I wanted to teach people and I wanted to help people. Those were two things

that I knew about myself from a very young age. But I just didn't realize and what you and I are both doing right now, it wasn't really available 5-10 years ago, in the capacity that we're doing it now. So I got started when I was in high school, I was doing sports and I did okay at them. I was pretty mediocre to be completely honest. And my mom saw that I was suffering with exercise induced asthma. So she was like, I'll get you a personal trainer. And I got the personal trainer. I had a couple of friends who did fitness competitions. And I was like, you know what, that looks like my next favorite thing because I'm decent at this whole fitness thing. And I want to see how far I can take it for myself. So it was really selfish in a way where I wanted to see how my body can

change. And I started posting on Instagram and being in college, not everybody is excited about that. Right. So I was getting some criticism from people in my peer group and everything like that. So I started this separate Instagram, which is the Instagram that I currently own now, which is hysterical. And I made all these posts, like prove them all wrong, like hysterical things that I was just trying to prove myself and get validation elsewhere. And I had my Instagram on private for a while because I was terrified of the judgment. So by the time that I was starting to see and follow other people in this fitness community, I was like, you know what, people do this. And it's okay that I'm doing this. So I made that Instagram on private. And that's the one that I've been using ever since I was just so excited to share

everything that I was learning about fitness. So I was doing bikini competitions, I was posting about macros and the meals that I was eating and the workouts that I was doing, and how I was losing body fat. And I was making videos and posting pictures. And in the beginning, it was pretty crappy. I had like weird memes and like pictures of my food that were really blurry. That's just like not good stuff that you can knock it away with anymore. But back then, you know, people were interested. They were asking me questions and I really prided myself on this. I stayed engaged with my community as much as humanly possible. Like every single DM, every single comment, I responded back to it because I was

like, I am not here to like be this famous person that thinks they're all that. I'm here to answer these people's questions because I was just so happy to share what was so impactful for my life, which was fitness. And from there, I felt like captions weren't enough. So I started a YouTube channel. And again, I didn't really know or have the intention that I could create and curate this YouTube channel to build a business. But that's what happened. So I got on there, I was starting to make educational videos, I learned about vlogging and the whole vlogging world. I traveled across the country and did boot camps everywhere and collaborated with a bunch of other YouTubers in my space. And I made this video series called That Prep Life. And it was documenting my entire prep from start to finish from January until June or so. And I went from

6,000 subscribers to 100,000 subscribers in six months. So it was really fast growth. I was constantly cross pollinating my audiences with each other and everybody else's audience who I was collaborating with as well. And things just really blew up and took off from there. And since then I switched and made a pivot from teaching people about fitness, nutrition, and workouts. I feel like I kind of exhausted that for myself. I started learning about business and personal development. And I was like, you know what, this is definitely my next evolution. I feel like going from the physical to the mental and emotional is where I'm really feeling called to go and teaching people about business and social media growth just sounded so fun to me. So I switched into that and now I do coaching and

consulting for people that want to utilize social media to build their business and their brand online. And it's so fun. Let's take a quick pause to talk about my new favorite all-in-one platform, Kajabi. You know I've been singing their praises lately because they have helped our business run so much smoother and with way less complexity which I love. Not to mention our team couldn't be happier because now everything is in one place so it makes collecting data, creating pages, collecting payment, all the things so much simpler. One of our mottos at Boss Babe is simplify to amplify and Kajabi has really helped us do that this year. So of course I needed to

share it here with you. It's the perfect time of year to do a bit of spring cleaning in your business, you know, get rid of the complexity and instead really focus on getting organized and making things as smooth as possible. I definitely recommend Kajabi to all of my clients and students. So if you're listening and haven't checked out Kajabi yet, now is the perfect time to do so because they are offering Boss Babe listeners a 30-day free trial. Go to kajabi.com slash Boss Babe to claim your 30-day free trial. That's kajabi.com slash Boss Babe.

Oh my God, I absolutely love that story and it's so inspiring you touched on three things which these three things when people ask me how do I grow my social I'm doing everything and it's not working I feel like they're missing one of three things intimacy consistency and collaboration so you said you were applying you were actually like seeing yourself as part of the community you are consistent like showing up every single day and then collaborating with other people. And I feel like as long as you've got those three things, you're going to grow and you're going to get there. But people often don't want to put in the work that intimacy and consistency really take. So I love that you touched on that. So when you talk about you did this pivot from teaching people

how to do fitness to talking about business and personal development. How did you go about monetizing your platform in the beginning and switching that way? Yeah. So I'll talk about how I was monetizing before and how I switched my monetization methods. So before I was again, posting about fitness and I never had to promote or sell my coaching because I was so consistent and so intimate and so relevant. People were just asking constantly, like, how do I work with you? How do I work with you?

So I was doing like a one-on-one fitness coaching business. I didn't know anything about group coaching, scaling, anything along those lines. So as I was growing my audience, people just kept asking me if I can coach them. So I got to a point where I was filled up on my day-to-day and I was doing one-on-one coaching. I was emailing people all day and I was like, oh my God, I'm like filled up with these emails. But as I was growing my platform,

I was also getting a lot of influencer reach outs from companies and brands and my YouTube channel grew. And I was also in the middle of competition prep. So my brain fog was just growing at a rapid rate. So I was like, you know what? I'm going to slow down my actual business in terms of one-on-one fitness coaching because it was getting a little overwhelming. And I felt like I could reach more people with my educational messages and videos on

YouTube and focus on the influencer stuff. So that supported me for a little while. I actually had a six-figure income from my fitness coaching business and a six figure income from my influencer stuff. So I was making six figures just from promoting brands. I had some companies that I was working with on a salary and commission basis, some that were just one-off products and some were that were a commission basis only, and then doing appearances and stuff like that. So it was a hodgepodge of a lot of things. And I got to this point on YouTube where I was like, you know what, this influencer thing is great, but it's definitely not a long-term business model. I knew that and I felt it.

And I knew that there was something else out there for me. I didn't know anything about digital marketing at this point. And then I met Lewis Howes and he said he had a mastermind. And I was like, what's a mastermind. I've been living in this little bubble where people make $30 eBooks and do $200 a month fitness coaching, or they're an influencer. Like I didn't know anything about scaling a business. And I joined this mastermind and I was like, holy shit, there's so much untapped potential. I didn't have an email list at this point, Natalie, like I had 200,000 subscribers on YouTube and no email list. Like I had no clue what an opt-in was. So that's when everything kind of started. I started with my group coaching program that I have now, which has been alive for two years. It's absolutely incredible. We've had over 250

people in it so far. And it's a 90 day accelerator program for people that are just getting their businesses started. A lot of fitness coaches, health coaches, life coaches, business coaches, relationship coaches, stuff like that, that comes through. And then I also started another company that I saw a gap in the fitness industry specifically for this. It's a fitness online coaching certificate program. So the goal is to get nationally accredited, but it's essentially a personal training certification program for people who want to do fitness coaching online. So it's a little bit different. So I had those two ideas initially, and I kind of just went with them on the first year. And my first year doing this, I immediately quadrupled my income very quickly.

And then this year, which is my second year fully doing the switch, I've doubled that income again. So at the seven figure level really quickly, which I think definitely goes back to, and I attest a lot of this to my consistency, intimacy, and collaborations in the beginning where I spent so much time building trust with my audience, educating my audience, creating really valuable content for people that it was really easy. It wasn't necessarily easy. Like I still had to do all of the things in terms of sales, handling objections, creating a program that delivers really well and teaching people and educating myself on how to teach people and hiring mentors and all of the things still. But it was this trust that was already built with the audience

that by the time I got there, the offer was already relevant to them. So it was this trust that was already built with the audience that by the time I got there, the offer was already relevant to them. So it was really exciting. But that's how I switched from one way of monetizing to another. I love that so, so much. And I love that you mentioned trust because I think that is so important. And a lot of people feel like they can just start an Instagram account and start selling and they wonder why people aren't coming in. But that foundation of trust is so important. You said you have a mastermind. You kind of went from this idea of having $30 ebooks to having this group program. And it was for early stage entrepreneurs.

One thing I hear a lot from clients is, well, early stage entrepreneurs won't pay for this. And I know that to be untrue because when you're pre-start or early stage, you normally still have income coming from elsewhere. You're still making money and you have more money to spend. Yet often when you first get started and it's your full-time thing, your money's being plowed into the business and you have less money than you did before you started. So what is it like for you attracting pre-start and early stage entrepreneurs? And what do you think is key to that? Yeah, I think that's a good question. And I love that you brought up that a lot of people feel like pre-stage entrepreneurs don't have the money. I feel like we run into that on the phone definitely.

But I feel like when the offer is relevant enough, and they are at the stage where they're really, truly ready, and they know that something like this kind of offer is what they actually need. I think a lot of a lot you can do to support people in that is a lot of empowerment conversation. So I'm constantly empowering people to take action to support themselves to trust themselves to be in the right mindset to know that they're going to be resourceful enough. I think a lot of people have fear that once they spend a lot of money on something, they're putting themselves on the hook, that they don't trust themselves to actually take everything and get their return on investment. A lot of the time, if you're doing a really good job at discussing your program, what the results are, what it offers, what the big promise is, and all of that stuff and building the trust.

A lot of the time, people are scared that they're not going to be resourceful enough, or they don't believe in themselves enough to get their own results. So a lot of empowerment conversations, I think. And again, it's kind of just like collaborating with them and brainstorming, where can you really truly come up with this money? And like you said, a lot of people have money from their current job that they're doing, a lot of people have money from their current job that they're doing. A lot of people have started their businesses already, but they're like severely undercharging, or they don't have consistent lead gen and all of these things. So it's going to be collaborating with them and seeing where can you really come up with this. And I think if you have a great sales process in place, which you could probably learn from someone like Natalie and

Boss Babe, you're going to work on constantly getting the right people who are really truly qualified. Because if they're ready, they are prepared mentally to invest. So getting that conversation to start for them, I think it's going to come from a lot of your content that you can create. So letting them know it is an investment. This isn't for everybody. It's for people that are really truly ready to take this and go. This is an investment that you're learning how to get a return on. And if you're not doing business coaching, you have to share with them specifically what the return is going to be for them and what the promise is going to be. And if it's the right client for the right program, they're going to see the value in it. I love that so much. And it's so true. I love that you said empowerment And it's so true. I love that

you said empowerment conversations. I think if you're listening, write that down unless you're driving. You mentioned content a lot. And that's where I really want to dive in because there's a few things I love about your content in particular. You're so real and transparent. And that comes across in everything from the way you edit your pictures is so real. And a lot of people looking at it probably think that you photoshop your pictures and you really don't and I absolutely love that transparency and I think the more that we have of that online the better place social media will be and the second thing you're always sharing the real behind the scenes people feel like they really truly know you even when you're

going through a hard time you still show up and you speak about it. And the third thing I love about your content is it's so captivating. I want to read every single caption and you make it so digestible. It's a bite-sized caption, but I get so much value. And I would love for you to talk about content and what it means to translate your uniqueness onto social media. Yeah, I love that. And thank you so much for the feedback on that. I really appreciate it. Sometimes when you're in your own space, and you're not really getting feedback like that from friends or other people that you look up to, you're like, is this stuff really still good? So we really appreciate the feedback on that. I don't know if you experienced that, like you really know, but it's really nice. I'm like, does anyone even care about this?

Like the people still read these four years later. Yeah, no, I love them. I really love all of the distinctions that you made. Even something like the way that you edit your pictures and like the kind of pictures that you post. I feel like those things really make such a huge difference because it represents you. And I like what you said just about the realness as well.

I remember specifically, I had a stint where every single picture was a professional picture for a little while. And I remember I posted a selfie that was just like, Oh, it's not a professional picture. Like sometimes I'll just do a photo shoot every three weeks. And I'll have all my professional photos, and I'll make my feed look really nice. But I've never been the person that has a very well curated feed to the point where it's all professional pictures and there's no realness to it. Even my professional photo shoots. I'm like, I want it to just look like I'm hanging out on my street that I live in or in my house where it looks like I'm just doing what I would normally do. Cause that's what I want to

represent. Again, it's going to depend on you specifically. And we'll get into that after, but again, I posted this picture that was just like a regular selfie. And someone was like, Oh, I miss just these regular pictures of you. Like, it's really nice to see. And then I kind of started throwing them in there again. And I was like, Oh, yeah, people just really like the regular, authentic nature of just like a mirror picture or a selfie or something that's really not edited super highly, it's still nice and aesthetically pleasing and it matches the brand or whatever you're doing. But I do think people are really craving that realness and that authenticity. And they're craving not just the highlight reel or

the beauty of a professional photo shoot. I feel like people really love like, Oh, that was just like a nice selfie. Thanks for that. Like, it makes me feel like it's attainable for me or achievable for me. And when you curate a brand that feels unachievable for someone, it's really hard for them to relate, connect with you. And you can keep your authority in that way to an extent. I think that there's still like a benefit to having, you know, a really well curated feed. But I think if you're in the service industry, and you're working with people in an intimate way, where you're coaching or teaching or educating, you're going to be working with people in their most vulnerable state, right? They're going to be coming to you in their most vulnerable state like, hi, I need help and I need support and I need to feel like you can hold space for

me and I can trust you and I don't feel like you're going to judge me because you're real too. So I think that depending on your niche and what you're doing specifically, you can really get away with that and it can be really working in your favor. But I don't know if you have experienced that for yourself, Natalie. Yeah, I think it's amazing that you said that they're coming to you in their most vulnerable state and they need to feel like you can hold space for them because I think that is so, so true and you need need to be relatable I think there are so many amazing celebrities online that aren't super relatable that given a chance someone would choose to work with someone more relatable than a celebrity and so I think we have a responsibility to show our realness so that people do feel comfortable shedding their

layers when they come and work with us. And I absolutely love that. And so when you're talking about showing up like that and creating content, is there a process you work through when you're writing captions and translating your vulnerability and your lessons into social? Yeah, I know. I love that question. So when it comes to captions, I truthfully think if you're not utilizing them to the best of your ability, unless you have a brand like Boss Babe, where it's really focused on the messages in the memes or the pictures, your captions are going to be where you're sending the messages that are going to really resonate with people. I think images, pictures, videos will grab people's attention. But what you write and what you say is going to keep them there for whatever reason,

whether it's going to be entertainment value. Ideally, it's both. For me, and like the way that I like to teach is that there's always going to be stuff that you want to write about, but you really also have to combine it with what your ideal client most needs. So I always feel like starting with yourself

is a great place to start. So think about step one. What do you like to talk about? What do you love to write about? What stories do you have that are really impactful to you and your own transformation? And also, what do you stand for and stand against? How can you talk about things that you're really passionate about that you have an opinion about, or things that you don't agree with maybe. So you're essentially taking a stance in one direction or another. So I think level one or layer one is what content do you want to write and what's important to you because that is going to attract a certain type of person and you sharing your story and little things about you, like where you live, what experiences you've had that shaped you into who you are, your perspective

on certain things that are going on, your opinion on something in your industry. Like, let's just say you're in fitness and you share your opinion on macros versus keto or whatever it happens to be, something like that. And maybe you're in the business industry. So you have an opinion on passive income courses versus high ticket coaching and you know who that's for for specifically anything that you care about, like what is it that you want to write about and start with that specifically, that's going to allow you to have a really great energy to start off with that will attract people who are also attracted to that because your energy is in like this excited energy. You feel motivated and inspired to write what you're going to write. So it's automatically going to come across a little bit better than writing

about something that you feel obligated to write about. But on the other side of the coin, you also need to know who your ideal client is. So when you're writing, it can't just be about what you want to write about and what you think your ideal client wants to hear. You have to do some market research and really know what is going on with this person. What would they resonate with? What are the messages that they have really resonated with in the past of mine? What are the conversations that they're having in their own head that I can speak directly into? Let's just say, for example, I made this post once that I always refer back to that did super, super well for me. And I wrote about influencer syndrome. So a lot of people

who follow me are influencers because I used to do that. And I used to be in like the influencer space. And I was writing this post about influencer syndrome when people who I guess identify as an influencer, someone who has a big following is making money through sponsored brand deals and stuff like that They're posting pictures with minimal value ad and you think you're going to make a lot of money through your following But you're actually really broke because you feel like your followers are going to think you're a sellout If you start building a program out or something along those lines and what's really happening Is that you're giving them the power? Over you and you're sitting on hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars. So that was like a big truth bomb for people. And I think honesty and saying and speaking into what your ideal

client really might need to hear is the second step to coming up with really powerful caption ideas. And then when it comes to curating it, what you definitely want to come up with is a frame. So like, what's the frame that people are going to get most connected with? So like, what's the headline? What's going to be the entry point to get the person to read the whole entire caption? Separating out the lines of your captions is really helpful because nobody likes to read a big blob. People are going to scroll right by that. I think it's really great to have emojis or checklists or again, something that's a way to put the caption that's really digestible.

So there's lots of different ways you can write. You can tell a story, you can give a list. I love what you did one time, Natalie, where you gave, I think it was 10 steps to something and you made each post like, this is one out of 10 of my 10 like that was great thank you yeah so again there's lots of different ways that you can do it but I think figuring out what you want to write about and what you're passionate about teaching

along with what your ideal client really needs to hear and then just structurally making sure that each line is separated and the way that you're putting it is easily digestible and in their language, those are going to be like your big top three. I love that. You touched on something which made me laugh. You said the influencer syndrome, some people are going to think that you're selling out. And honestly, at all stages in your business, I feel like you're going to get this. And even this morning, I had a DM from someone on the BossPaper account. I still read every single DM. I know what you guys are saying. Every influencer reads all their DMs. We just don't respond to all of them because it would take an entire week, right? Oh yeah, completely. And someone said, I can't believe you're selling

on your page. You act like you want to help people, but actually you're selling people into your program. In the past, that could have been quite triggering. people, but actually you're selling people into your program. In the past, that could have been quite triggering. Like, oh my God, am I doing something wrong? And instead I was like, oh, this is cool. Like this is great feedback. And I can decide if I'm going to take it or if I'm going to let it go. And instantly I was like, I'm going to let it go. That is someone else's reflection and mindset that they're so frustrated. They're not making money that they are reflecting onto me. Like how dare you be making money and so I replied really lovingly and said hey can I give you some feedback and she was like yes and like instantly quite surprised and I don't normally do that though I would normally ignore it but I responded and I wanted to just challenge why she

was thinking that because at the same time I can now share that with my audience and give them validation that actually when people are complaining, they monetize their platform. It's never about you. It's about them. I think that's so powerful that you said, hey, can I give you some feedback? And I think the other level of what this conversation does for people is to let them know there's also a content idea around that, right? You can also go on your stories and say, hey, I know there's a lot of entrepreneurs that are probably struggling with this. So I love talking about how to deal with something like criticism because people are going to get it and how you deal with something. You can even share that as a piece of content, right? Here's how to deal with someone specifically who

is messaging you, criticizing you for selling out or whatever your ideal client's judgment is going to be. And this is just a testament to talking about really out or whatever your ideal client's judgment is going to be. And this is just a testament to talking about really getting clear on your ideal client. What is your ideal client the most scared of? Like, let's just say if you're working with business owners or entrepreneurs are terrified of judgment because they feel like it's a reflection of them. And no one wants to feel like they're doing something wrong or bad. So many entrepreneurs aren't actually sellouts and we do want to help, but we also are monetizing our businesses and monetization and selling programs has nothing to do with manipulation. It's truly just a way for people to go deeper with you rather than just sharing everything for free, keeping people accountable, allowing them to invest in

themselves is a really powerful gift and all that stuff. So it's a great teaching moment too. I love that so much. And I feel like I'm going to take that on board and even do that today. Yeah. And it's so true because we wouldn't be able to do what we do if we didn't monetize. So I love that.

And for anyone listening that is feeling scared about that, just know that you're not alone. Everyone's going to get that feedback and it's up to you to be able to deal with that and let it go. And I would love to talk about the captions and monetization.

What do you think the key is when you're creating content online that is to sell? So you've got a program and you want to create captions that direct people to book calls with you or watch a webinar. How do you go about creating content that sells? Yeah, that's such a good question. So again, I think it really goes back to what's truly going on with the client. So one week that I was selling a $1,000 program, it was a bunch of videos that I had made that were all like an hour and a half long trainings. I was doing it for something else. And I was like, let me bundle these all together. And that was the first time that I really was intentional about doing a whole series of captions that were directly to sell. So I usually like to use this series for my clients. If you want to like scroll back in my feed and find this eventually you can the first picture is I'm wearing a white sweater and jeans, but you don't have to like go back and do this, but it's a very specific, like I'm wearing a white sweater and then I have like a white skirt on and a pink thing. So the first post I think for the series was on

August 17th. So feel free to go back. It's really specific. So again, something to think about when you're selling is that you want to warm people up to whatever you're selling. So it's kind of like the pre-launch. So you want to give people, like, let me just say, for example, what I did, I taught people what my big mission was. So you can start this as if you were starting the trajectory of your online career. So I was like, Hi, I'm Amanda. I'm the business brand and connection coach and strategist who's showing people how to create profitable businesses that aren't just successful, but fully aligned with who they are and how they want to show up in the world. Here's what I've done. So here's my social proof. Here's what I'm really

passionate about. Here's why I like to work with people who are in this, this, and this position. Tag five leaders and coaches who you think embody the Flourish and Conquer mission. So telling people what you do, why you do it, why it's important to you, and starting off with that before you even launch anything, I think is such a powerful way to really allow people to learn a little bit more about you, number one, and let things land for people and be like, I'm in this community. Like, hell yeah. The next thing that I did was seed the sale. So I talked about what a lot of people struggle with. So it can be a social media can be an overwhelming place. We don't necessarily know what to do all the time in terms of content creation. So I also talked about, I have something for you

that teaches you this, this, and this. It's going to become available to you this week. Are you interested? Comment below. So it's something that's just seeding like what you're going to be offering. So allowing people to get interested and excited about it, giving them a space to ask questions

and to really engage with you about what your offer could be as well. Like I think getting people to engage with you about your offer is really important, whether it's asking people if they're interested before you actually sell it, doing your market research to make sure it's something people are interested in, I think is really powerful. And then the day of, I actually did a podcast before I launched it to my Instagram. So I talked about whatever I talked about on the podcast.

And then I said, in today's Bucci radio episode, it goes in depth into the five moments that I decided to say yes, in my life, I hope it inspires you. PS, anyone that listens is in for a surprise. So again, I kind of seeded that there was something going on in the episode. And the episode was where I first launched. The next thing that I did was talk about the actual launch. So I just did like a straight up announcement post. So it wasn't like anything that was a roundabout way to sell. But I just said, hey, for those of you who have been craving to know how to break past your follower account, how to not feel salesy when you're selling, blah, blah, blah.

The program that I have is finally available. Here's who it's for. Here's what's included. If you have any questions, go to this page. Here's the big promise. Here's when it's for. Here's what's included. If you have any questions, go to this page. Here's the big promise. Here's when it expires. Go do it. So it was really specific. The next post that I made was a story post. So I talked about when I first moved to Los Angeles, the big shift that I had inside of me. So again, a story, telling a story that really was pivotal for you and why that story was pivotal. I think

if you want to create content, whether you're teaching, sharing a story, making a direct announcement post, something that is really powerful to put maybe like three quarters of the way into your caption or in your story pitch is, and this is why I created the blah, blah, blah program. And this is why I'm filling this gap, right? Again, continuing on into the launch, it's kind of like writing an email campaign, but doing it on Instagram. I did some myth busting.

So I talked about, do you really need to have 100,000 followers to make six figures online? I also handled some objections in my captions. So I talked about, do you remember that last time you went for toenail clippers and left with an entirely new decor set for your bathroom? And I talked about managing your money properly. So handling objections in your content ahead of time will really support your sales process. And then I think I just continued on with some education, teaching,

value adding, and then empowerment posts. So empowering people to take action, especially if you're doing like an open close launch. Highly recommend going back to see all that, but it's essentially like taking your sales process and creating content from all of the things that you might need to handle with a person if they were on the phone with you. Oh my God, that is incredible. That might be really good gold for people to go back

and take all those notes that I just- Yeah, I think it's good. So if you scroll back and look at Amanda's posts, I would love for you to just share them and tag us and then tag us in the ones you're writing so we can see what you're doing with it. Yeah, that'd be so fun. I would love to see. Yeah, that'd be amazing. And I love one thing you said in particular, and if you're not driving, write this down. Here's who it's for and here's what it promises you. Because all too often, I think, well, a couple of things, some people are afraid to polarize, they kind of want to attract everyone, they want all the money and everything. And they're afraid to be like, this is who it's for, in case there's

people reading it, who might not be that exact demo. And I think, honestly, like the most you can polarize that someone reading it is like, holy shit, this is exactly me. Every single thing. Yeah, that's exactly what you want. You want people to be like, that's exactly what's going on in my head. That's exactly what I need. You don't want it to be like, I kind of need that, but it's not like 100% for me. So maybe not. Bye. Yeah, exactly. And then also, here's what it promises you. So we call it the transformation, like what transformation are you providing someone and be really clear on that. I love it. One thing I did on my stories this morning, I was giving some teaching on something I'd learned

and I said you're either feeling one of two ways a and I listed away b and enlisted away and then got them to click a or b on the poll feature on Instagram which I highly recommend everyone listening uses because it really boosts you in the algorithm but I did that and it meant that anyone that was engaging with the option that I thought they would, it instantly validates, wait, she's talking to me. And I think that's just what people want to feel like. They want to feel like you're talking to them and not just the hundreds of thousands of people that might be following you. Yeah, absolutely. I feel like if people can feel like they're having a two-way conversation with you, it's so powerful because so much of social media is just the one-way conversation.

And that's what engagement is. Engagement is feeling like they're actually talking back and forth with you. You're not just talking at them. So anything that you can do to facilitate that, like answer this poll, send me a DM, respond back to my question box. I thank you so much to Leslie for responding to my DM.

Leslie just messaged me and she said, this isn't this. Like, I wonder if anybody else on here can relate to what Leslie said. That's what a community feels like. And that's what a group feels like. So curating that on Instagram is hard because it is your platform. But you do want people to feel like they're in your community. So they keep coming back. That is gold.

I love it. I have one more question about content. Where do you feel like people might make mistakes in terms of their messaging? So they'll say something pretty basic that has been said over and over. And they're afraid to go deep or say the thing that they're scared to say. I say, lean into that thing. If it's something that feels like a little polarizing, like, yeah, this might be a thing. Like one of my clients, and she's also a coach of mine, Isabella Silverio. She made a post today on setting boundaries with your clients. And she did such a good job. And so many people don't want to talk about that.

Like, I don't let my clients have a hundred percent access to me and her ideal clients really need to hear that because they're overworking themselves and they're giving their clients full text access and they don't feel like they're getting an equal energy exchange with their clients. And people don't want to talk about that. Right? So I say, lean into your edges and lean into what feels a little bit polarizing and scary for you. And really write about that because I see a lot of just surface level stuff that's not really going to make you stand out online. And I think that if you want to send messages that really resonate with people and make people feel like, holy shit, this is for me, you have to get

a little bit more specific and go a little bit deeper. I love that so much. And I think there's definitely a boss babe quote in there that I'm going to be pulling out. I love it. Okay. Well, I feel like everyone has got about a hundred things to take away. I want them in particular to go through and read your captions and be able to see all of this in action because I think it's so helpful. I agree. Like having concrete examples is so helpful. I love that we do that on the podcast. Me too. So another question that I want to ask you, you have a very successful seven figure business. You have an amazing team. You have hundreds of thousands of people in your community and hundreds of clients. How do you stay sane? That's such a good question. People feel like once they hit a certain revenue amount that their

problems go away and there's actually just new problems. I'm sure you know about that, right? Like there's just constantly new things to manage, people to manage, projects to manage. You can feel like you're, you constantly have to be working and there's always a fire to put out, right? Again, I think having a support system is my number one thing personally. I am so blessed and grateful to have the friends that I have and support that I have. And I do think again, that the friend group that Natalie, you and I have been able to build together and separately as individuals really just comes from what we've built individually on our own. So when you are constantly focused on growth orientation

to yourself, you're going to keep leveling up the people in your community that can support you. So again, it's not just about becoming friends with people that are crushing it and that are the best of the best. You just want people that get you and that know what you're experiencing and going through. So if you have a seven-figure business, you want to also talk to people who have similar problems because otherwise, you can feel like you're alone and you can feel like you're the only one experiencing what you're experiencing. So I think community and having a group is like part of the Maslow's hierarchy of needs right above having shelter and sleep and food.

We need to feel like we belong and people get us. And if you're doing business and you're an entrepreneur, a lot of people won't get what you're doing. And I'm sure if you're listening, you've experienced that. People will just tell you that you're crazy and you should have a backup plan. I still have people from home. I went to nursing school and I have my nursing degree.

I still have people from home saying like, yeah, you can always fall back on it if your like seven figure business doesn't work out for you, you know? It's crazy that people haven't let that really land that this is a real thing. It's not just some funny, scammy internet thing. It's a real thing that's helping real people

create real results in their real lives. So I think that if you're an entrepreneur, having the support system is the thing that makes you feel sane. So not only do I have great friends, I have a therapist that I talk to every other week. I'm constantly doing things to ground myself and to take care of myself, whether it's go to the gym, go to the beach, do some meditation, eat really healthily. All of those things are so important. Daniel DiPiazza, do some meditation, eat really healthily. Like all of those things are so important. Daniel DiPiazza, our mutual friend, he talks on his story the other day and he said, as entrepreneurs, we have to be emotional athletes. So we have to do a really great job at mastering and managing our own emotions and our own stuff so we can lead and listen to our callings.

Oh my God. I love that so much. Emotional athletes. I feel like we 100% are because the problems never go away. They just amplify if you don't take care of them early on. So fully in agreement with that. I would love to just ask you one more thing. What is your morning routine? So I have like an interesting take on morning routines. I feel like you should have one. I don't personally feel the need to have a ritual every single morning. I also have a dog. So he's like a very big part of my morning routine. But I do know that if I don't have something to get me grounded in the morning, I don't feel great. So I think that if you feel like you can't stick to something 100% every single day,

I know for me, that doesn't work for me sticking to something every single day, the same exact thing, but I do need to stick with something. So like I give myself options. What is the thing that's going to help ground me the most today and give me the energy that I need to bring to the world? Like what can I do to fill up my cup this morning? Is that going to be journaling? Is that going to be going to the gym and doing a workout? Is that going to be doing a meditation? Is that going to be going to yoga? Like what are the things that I need to take care of for myself before I get into my workday? And I think you can give yourself a list of options. And I like to kind of self-regulate and feel into what I really need. And again, sometimes it doesn't always happen. Like we're human and I don't always stick

to my morning routine every single day. Like I said, my dog takes up quite a bit of my morning routine. We always go for a walk. That's pretty grounding for me as well. But I think the more intentional that you can be about it, the better. I love it. And I love that you said that because I just recently talked on the podcast about the need to change up your morning routine because it's so much better for your brain. Otherwise, your brain creates these neural networks that are the same every single day and you end up actually going autopilot and you're not being intentional so much. So I love that.

And where can everyone find you? Yeah, definitely Instagram is my best place at Amanda Bucci. And then I also have a podcast, Bucci Radio, if you want even more of these kinds of conversations. Amazing. And then if anyone's interested in your group coaching, is there a link they go to for that? Yep.

So you can go to amandabucci.com slash apply if you're a startup entrepreneur and you're a coach, service provider, anyone who works with people. amandabucci.com slash apply. Amazing. Thank you so much, Amanda. Yeah, thank you, Natalie.

It's been such a great time talking with you and I hope that everyone got a lot out of this podcast. If you loved this episode, please subscribe and be sure to leave us a review. We want to hear what you enjoyed, what your main takeaways were, and also really want to know who you want to see on the show. And speaking of reviews, I've also got a little something on my sleeve for you. So I want to send you a copy of The Boss Babe 25. This is a brand new resource that we've created and trust me, you're going to love it. So the Boss Babe 25 is the 25 essential resources you need for personal and professional growth.

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