Success In Your Online Niche - Sarah Duvall

I over-delivered to every single person that bought my program. And then they told people, and then my programs grew by grassroots instead of me putting all of this into social media. I said, you know what? I post multiple videos a week to the people paying for my program, not online to my potential clients. So I probably put 90% of my effort into the people that are paying me and 10% into growing my business. And that has come back simple.

What's up, FitnessFans? Welcome back to the Future of Fitness podcast and interview series. This is your host, Eric Malzone, and this is episode number 85. And it was a bunch of fun to talk to Sarah Duvall. So why is this episode important to you? Well, first of all, Sarah has built an impressive online business and she has really carved out a specific niche. And I'll let her explain what that niche is. Um niche, I still go back and forth on that. Um but the point is, you know, it took her five years uh to build a business. And I think when a lot of people get into the online space, they think it's gonna be maybe easier than the in-person or brick and mortar uh style business, but it oftentimes takes quite a bit longer to get your voice heard. I know this because um I do it on a daily basis, and um, you know, I can contrast both uh models, but but Sarah's done it swimmingly. She is highly successful, and uh I know um having a lot of conversations with her that she's only gonna grow um her business probably double within the next few years. So take what you can from this. There's a lot of very, very actionable items and insightful and inspirational and all those things. So um, and it's a lot of fun. She's a good person. And before I get into that, I just I have to talk to you about the fitness accelerator. So, you know, after all of these podcast uh interviews, about 350 now to date, and uh everybody within the fitness industry, all interviews within the fitness profession, and you know, there's some specific things that I see um that I want to make an impact and help change. And the biggest thing is that we have an industry that is very siloed. And what I mean by that is that you know, people within a specific area or specialty, like say CrossFit, uh, they talk to CrossFitters, um, and that's all they do. They kind of stay within the silo, the same information bounces around, and we want to help bridge those gaps, uh, do some cross-pollination uh for lack of better term, and uh and start sharing ideas. So we've uh we've introduced the fitness accelerator, it's an online community. Um you can check it out, go to fitnessprofessionalonline.com forward slash fitness accelerator. Uh, you'll find people like Sarah Duval, for instance, um, very successful people in that group. And we're all sharing ideas, we're sharing insights. It's equal parts, uh, incubator, mastermind group, and networking group. And it's the best $147 a month that you could possibly spend. Trust me on this, it's the best value out there. So go check it out. It's fitnessprofessional online.com forward slash fit accelerator, and uh get two weeks on me. We're doing two week free trials right now. So risk free, two weeks, get in, make some introductions, see what it's all about, and uh really enjoy the experience and just accelerate the growth of your business and the industry overall. So it is fitnessprofessionalonline.com forward slash fit accelerator. And with that, number 85, Sarah Duval, on to the show.

Dr.

Sarah Duval, welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.

Yeah, this is gonna be a lot of fun. Um, I think our our listeners are are gonna get a lot out of this. And uh let's do this. Um, let's kick it off with just, you know, kind of give a synopsis of your story through health and fitness because I think that's important in the background. Then we'll get into, you know, kind of the nitty-gritty of of what you're currently doing, which is really, really cool.

Okay. So back to what drove me into this profession um from the beginning.

Yeah.

Okay, so I started out at the age of 11 as a candy striper at the hospital, worked on the cancer floor. I knew I wanted to help people for a living after that. I loved you just you you love brightening somebody's day. You know, there's absolutely nothing that can replace that feeling, being able to help people. Uh, but I couldn't handle all of the death that surrounded the cancer ward as amazing as being able to help those people, as amazing as it was. So I found the physical therapy link and that was like, oh, okay, this is great. You know, 99% of the people here are getting better, and I'm helping them get better, and that I could handle. Um, so I fell in love with physical therapy at the age of 14. Um well before I was, you know, an athlete per se in the athlete world. And then that just solidified it as I pursued sports and I ran track for Clemson University and with a sponsor Kate Warder after college and just managed to get myself hurt a lot. So it's good, good for fashion choice.

Yeah, yeah. Interesting. Yeah, I um, you know, personal anecdote, I got my I thought for a while I want to be a firefighter, so I had to go get my EMT. And towards the end of the EMT, you have to get certain hours um in in the ambulance, right? And I happen to be in the one where uh we would take um cancer patients to chemo and then we would pick them up again. And that was such like I mean, it was only I only did that for like four or five hours, right? But it was such a a powerful, like wow, life is really fragile because you get these incredibly energetic, happy, talkative people, and you bring them to, and then you brought them back out. And it was just it was how it was tough, you know. But um, you know, I realized that you know there's so much more to um, you know, care or helping people than just like the nuts and bolts of like um you know what medications, what movements to do, but just the caring aspect of it. And I think you probably tapped into that at a very, very early age.

The the psych side, I I don't know. Sometimes I find it almost more important than the exercise prescription side.

Yeah.

We're learning that with pain science. I mean, pain science is incredible. What we're learning, that you can give somebody something completely random that has no basis and shouldn't help them, but if they believe in it, then they get better. I mean, pain science is just it it it blows everything that we think we know out of the water, which you know, I I sometimes I think is very scary to a patient who wants this perfect, you know, this is gonna fix me. It's like, well, you know, the body is very complicated and we don't understand it a whole lot.

Yeah. Yeah. So when you when you talk about that, like um pain care and things like is that are you are you talking about like placebos and how that rolls into into player as well?

There's yeah, I mean it's there's placebo and then there's also just nerve pain, there's rewiring, how we're connecting to um the pain and connecting to different parts of our body and how we're perceiving it. I mean, it's I it gets it's complicated, but it's really interesting.

Yeah, yeah, it is. So um so you're you're tell us about your practice, like how was that evolved? You know, after school, um, you got your PT and and how has that evolved? Because it's it's a really interesting story to get to where you are now. Uh I know because I also interviewed, you guys can check out um Sarah's interview on the fitness blitz as well. It's a shorter form, but let's let's dive a little deeper into that journey because it's interesting to me.

Oh well, thanks. Well, I um I started a personal training in college. So, you know, I ran track for Clemson when I was home in the college, home from college for the summer, I worked as a personal trainer at the Y. So, you know, help people go through the Nautilus equipment and show them how to set it up. Uh, so that was that was my first introduction into personal training. So it was just a whole lot of I want to lose weight, and then you know, how can I get stronger? Uh so I continued to personal train through undergrad and then through physical therapy school, and that was invaluable. The because I would learn something in the classroom and then I would step into my side job that was paying for school and apply it. So I thought that was always just a really neat application for PT school and something that I wish more people got the opportunity to do because you take Ortho one your first year and then you wait four years to apply it. And so I think it's it's kind of neat to apply it as you go through. Um so I had that personal training background because I've always just loved fitness and athletics and movement. Um, and then I opened my own practice in Charleston, South Carolina, and had kind of a hybrid out-of-pocket pay physical therapy, but I also had a personal trainer and a Pilates uh instructor working for me. And that was really fun. I felt like we were able to meet the needs of people who wanted physical therapy, but then also wanted to continue on and work with someone that was a little more highly specialized. And that's kind of where I offered continuing education. Uh, it kind of bridges that gap between physical therapy and personal training, so it's more on the corrective exercise side. Um, then we moved around a bunch.

Yeah, yeah.

So I sold that practice, opened another one, left that town, opened another one. Then I'm finally like, okay, I'm starting an online business.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So let's let's talk about that because you do have uh really carved out a specific niche. Niche, niche. Um what do you say? Do you say niche or you say niche?

It depends on who I'm talking to.

Yeah, yeah. I go back and forth every day. Um so anyway.

Colorado? How do people say it from Colorado?

Nevada, Nevada, Nevada. That's always a tough one too.

Yeah, exactly.

So let's talk about that. Like what is the niche that that you have really found yourself in and how did you get there? Did you plan getting there, or is it something that that just I plan to go online?

I we were talking about writing a book earlier. I've written an entire back pain book, but it's sitting there on the computer. So I've always treated mostly back pain, SI joint, um, chronic pain take people because when you're out of pocket pay, you're generally the fourth physical therapist that somebody goes to see in the last resort. So it always involves lots of outside-the-box thinking and outside-the-box practice. Um, but then I had babies, and there was not uh enough resources for me to figure out how to navigate my own postpartum rehab. Um, I saw a couple uh pelvic floor physical therapists that didn't help me. I was very disappointed. Um, there are amazing pelvic floor PTs out there and amazing PTs. I just didn't happen to see them. And me being the ortho, I dove into research. Um, as I was telling you, I'm married to a scientist. So it's uh it's really great for being able to also grab some access through him at the time. So I was like, okay, I have every journal I could possibly want to read. And so I dove in and read every study I could on the public floor and started putting the pieces together. And I just felt like women should be able to get back to CrossFit or be able to get back to rock climbing or be able to get back to, you know, whatever high-intensity sport they want to do after injuries from birth. And I really do think that a lot of times having a baby is should be treated like an injury, not just um this specific part of life. So I kind of fell into it because I needed it and there wasn't enough uh help for me out there.

Interesting. So um so what was the first step? Did you did you just start working with patients? Did you like know that you were gonna go online immediately?

Did you like how my first step was to read everything I could.

Okay.

Did some of the public floor physical therapy coursework through evidence in motion, and I still pay the head um person there, the head course creator for the public floor PT program once a month for a mentor session where I overload her with questions. I think having mentors is incredibly important. Um so I meet with her once a month, like, okay, what about this? What about this scenario? Let me talk you through this. And so we troubleshoot, and and that's I just think that's invaluable to have somebody like that that you admire to bounce ideas off of. Um so yeah, so I researched and I learned, and then I started applying it to patients after myself. I always love to feel things on myself. I'm like, oh, that's a new exercise for the serratus. Okay, let me see how it feels, let me see the troubleshooting. I because physical therapists and trainers that don't work out, I feel like they're missing this huge piece of the puzzle for being able to feel and describe things. Um yeah, and then I started working with women. I hosted a couple free uh courses for local women here, and then from there built my postpartum clientele. Um, and the stuff worked and I got people well. And I was like, all right, I think I'm ready to share this with the world, and then that's how the online program came about.

Oh, interesting. And over like, like when did this start? When was that I think you said like five years ago? Is that about right?

Yeah, yeah, right around five, four and a half, almost five years ago.

Yeah, yeah. It's interesting that um, you know, as we were talking a little before this, and you know, I I talked to obviously I talk to a ton a ton of fitness professionals. You do a lot. And uh, you know, I will all the time, you know, they all everybody wants to get into online coaching, you know, and that's um and you know, it's only a matter of time if it hasn't hit already before that's completely just saturated, right? Everybody offers online coaching because the systems are getting better, right? Um, you can get trainerized, you can get exercise.com, you can get Fitbot, you need all these tools. Um but so rarely do I see people um approach it the right way first. Like, you know, first that everybody starts broad, right? And they're like, Yeah, okay, I will help anybody, and then they end up helping nobody, right? But if they start narrow, um, and then maybe think about it like, okay, I'm gonna build this over five, because they all want it now, right? Everybody wants it now and they want 50.

But I was telling you, I worked for a full year, a full year online. I mean, I was seeing people and making some money in person, but I work for a full year writing blog posts and building that website and even you know offering stuff and without making it dime for an entire year.

Yeah.

It's a lot of work, yeah. And that's the hard part, right? I mean, honestly, like, I mean, you can you I mean, I'm sure people can do it faster than me. I don't know. I don't know. Like you ask, I mean, you know Tony Gentlecore. Um, you know, I've had him on this show, and uh, you know, I have pleasure working with him too, um, pretty regularly. And all the time he gets asked the question, like, hi, how do I get a successful blog? He's like, Well, start writing. Start, and then call me in 10 years. And that's kind of what the you know.

So speaking of mentors, I love Tony. So we moved to Boston, I was like, oh my gosh, I have all these resources right here. And so I paid for a session with Tony online, and then I sent him an email and I said, Hi, I want to talk business. Because this was back when I was fairly new. Um, things were just, you know, they were just kicking off, but I was figuring out how to scale. And I was like, okay, I need to talk through ideas with somebody. I need some, you know, to bounce some ideas off of things are starting to take off. I want to, I want to do this right. And so I emailed him and I was like, okay, here's what I want from your time. And he refunded my money. And I was like, no, Tony. So we agreed a place to meet. I paid him again before the meeting. I was like, Don't you dare refund it. I value your time.

It sounds like Tony. Yeah.

He does. He's such a nice guy. And then we uh we sat down in a coffee shop and I asked him this long list of questions. And um, you know, I felt good about it because I had I respected his time and I wanted to be paying for it. And so I think if you're wanting ideas from people, just book a session.

Yeah.

Don't even just book a session, then send them an email. Hey, this is what I'm gonna ask you questions about. Like, don't hesitate, don't be afraid. Um, for the money, for the value, I've gotten a whole lot out of connecting with people when I was first starting, and that's such a great way. And then he's like, Well, why don't you write an article for me? I'm like, Great, and then that made some connections, and then you know, it pays to connect with people. And if you need to book a session to connect with them and feel good about it, not like, oh, I'm gonna pick your brain, because that's that's always that's not the way. Don't send him an email and say, Hey, I'd like to pick your brain. Can you give me hours of your time when you're a full-time working mother of two? You know, it's like, oh that's great, but yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's a good point. And I think um what you what you did that's different than most in that approach was just the the um the authenticity or the transparency that you came through up front, right? Like I I started working with you know one of my first mentors when I wanted to get my online coaching or remote coaching, whatever you want to call it, going. I I hired one of who I thought was one of the best, right? I hired him myself. And that's another thing. So if you want to get online coaching, hire somebody, right? Um so you can be on that that client end and see how the systems work and then hopefully somebody who's good um and cares. And you know, I just told him very up front. I'm like, hey, I obviously I want to be coached, you know, I want to be a better CrossFitter. Um, but what I really want to do is just learn how to be a coach, you know. And once that was set, that was that was obviously the the intention of all of our meetings moving forward. He was very gracious. James Fitzgerald was very gracious with his time and still is actually. I just call him up and he'll just uh meet. But I think that that having that upfront conversation and being very clear um with that is really important too.

Yeah, no, and and I definitely respect people that want to learn and I want to help them. I have a continue education program for trainers. I want them to know what I know. I want to help more people. And to me, the more I can help educate people, the more people I can help from it. You know, it's it's I don't have the secret formulas where I'm like, oh, I'm keeping them to myself and keeping them secret. I'm like, here, learn everything I know. I'll package it for you.

Yeah. Yeah.

Let's see how many people we can help. Let's see how many lives we can change. Let's see how many, you know, how many women where we can completely rock their world because now we give them so much hope and so many options.

Yeah, I love that. How many women can we completely rock their world? So let's get into like how do you actually do it? Like what are the what are the tools? You mentioned you have a course, I believe it's it's CU credits, right? Continuing education.

Um, if you're at that point where you're trying to decide how where do I host my online programs, because that was a big one for me in the beginning. Like, could you kind of host stuff on YouTube or Vimeo and and do links or you know, host it on your website? And I was like, you know what, I don't want to have to worry about this thing crashing in the middle of the night. So I went with Kajabi. You've probably heard of Kajabi.

Yep.

Um and I had been nothing but completely happy with their um course hosting and checkout platform, and I never have to worry about it crashing in the middle of the night, and that's easy, like a drag and drop feature. Um, so that's what I use for my online courses.

Okay. Okay. So for me, I'm gonna go back a little bit because so you did a year of content, right? You started writing. Was it primarily writing? Did you do podcasting?

Did you do what what kind of content did you can't get on podcast if nobody knows you.

Yeah.

I'd love to say, yeah, I did five.

You could probably get on my podcast. I mean, that's you know.

So yeah, you know, you can't do a podcast if nobody knows you. So I started out, I reached out to, you know, that's the top tier to say, hey, can I write a blog post for you? Here's my here's what I'm gonna write on, here are ideas, here's my credentials. Um, and did not, I just got crickets. So then I went down to like the next tier and it was still crickets. And then I went down to the next one. Like some I reached out to Dan Pope. I don't know if he works at Champion Sports, but Dan has an online fitness blog. If you haven't interviewed him, you should. He's an awesome, awesome guy. Um, and he's like, Yeah, write a blog post. I was like, finally. So I answered my email. So I wrote a guest blog post for him, and from there I name dropped him to somebody else. I was like, oh, check out my blog post on his site. And then they're like, oh, okay, well, you know, Dan Pip, I made sure they had a connection. And you know, like, oh, okay, yeah, write one for my site. And then I worked my way up to where, you know, Shape magazine called me for an interview because you know, it did it. So it was not, I didn't start out with getting on these major sites. And um, so I just systematically kind of worked my way up, just like I would think about approaching any other challenge in life. You just you come with a plan, you start at the bottom, you you know, execute it, and then you're where you want to be.

Yeah. Yeah. That's so, and I mean, how many no's did you think you heard before you got a yes?

Well, I wrote, I think I wrote the editor of T Nation at least three to five times before he got back to me and said, Yeah, we'd love that. I just ignored the no's and and kept asking.

Yeah. Yeah, that's a really powerful story. I mean, you know, I um now I don't I don't have an issue getting guess generally. Um that's not at first it was, you know, and you know, I sent out so many emails, so many Facebook messages because I didn't even have a show. It was just a dude with a computer and my little you know, earbuds, my iPhone earbuds, and that's all I had. And um, you know, I sent out so many emails and finally Dan John just replied back. I was like, oh whoa, that's great. And I was like, and he just said, Hey, you know, uh he's so good. He's like, here's my cell phone, call me tomorrow. I'm free in the afternoon, we'll schedule a time. I was like, oh my god, and that was it. And once you have someone like that, then you can say, Hey, you know, here's a couple of yeah, that's what I'm saying.

But you had to take the time to get, and that's how I met Kelly Davis.

Mm-hmm.

Um was I probably sent out an email to 70 people looking to do a collaborative article, like desk dab exercises or something, just to just for some networking, and they get word out on good exercises and to create a fun blog post. And I I had like eight people get back to me out of the 60 I sent it to, and she was one of them. And we hit it off and developed a great relationship and then ended up networking and doing a project. product together and then I mean you just never know what's gonna come out of the putting yourself out there. I mean no doesn't hurt.

It doesn't. But everyone's scared scared shitless of it. That's the funny thing.

So it doesn't make any sense to me. I mean if I'm thinking about pursuing a sport if if I don't get to failure, I never know where my limit is. You know, I mean I've got to fail. Like I'm a I'm a rock climber now. I've done a lot of sports but that's currently the one I'm pursuing and if I'm not falling I mean I'm not I'm not climbing you know yeah yeah same thing business.

Yeah that's a great message. So okay so you did a year content now you're starting to get published people are starting to find out a little bit about who you are now what? Now what did you do?

I put a I put my product together I was like okay I've got it and I I did the most expensive Facebook ads on the face of the planet but I sold 10 copies and of those 10 women I had like a support group and they're all still with me. It was very it was very exciting and I helped all of them and they all have I have testimonies all of them on my website and I started well below what I wanted to charge but I just needed to get the product out there. And that's hard because you're you're looking at what you want to charge and sometimes when you're first starting out you need to get people in the door so that you can figure out your audience. So I interviewed I called all 10 of those women that that that answered the Facebook ads where I think they I paid $2 a click or something. Yeah in the middle days yeah yeah exactly so they they clicked on it and they ended up following all the way through to purchase which was exciting um and then ended up talking to all of them and getting to know them and I figured out who my target audience was not surprising A-type women driven want to pursue sports had several kids and I mean it was like okay this is this is who I'm talking to and and from there I could actually talk to my audience because I knew I knew I had a product to help people I just needed to figure out who I was speaking to.

Yeah. And what was that product?

It was the course through now it was a pelvic floor it was a pelvic floor perfect program. So it was a it was just a pelvic floor program for women who were like me who just felt like they didn't get answers and they were looking for something else.

Okay.

So you put this program together it had like just work out like uh movement plans things like that like a lot of a lot of education a workout um you know progressions and um a lot of explanation you know I do a lot of teaching and now I've completely redone the program three times.

Okay.

Which is how it is I mean don't get married to your first product.

Right. So it's good.

I got feedback and I redid it and then I got more feedback and then I redid it again and now I think I'm I'm fairly happy with it. I don't know I'll probably redo it again in a year but um just trying to make it better based on the needs of the feedback that I'm getting.

Cool. So you have that avatar right which you're selling the actual so those are the people who actually have you know um you know they want to improve pelvic floor issues right and then you also have you're educating now other professionals in within the health industry the thing is is when I first started online I was scared to have a voice.

I mean I've been teaching continuing education courses in person since 2007. I taught my first continuing education course on the shoulder in 2007. So I've been teaching in person for a long time but putting yourself out there online is terrifying. And then being judged and teaching other professionals is even double terrifying. So it took me a while before I felt comfortable to be like okay I'm gonna put out an online continuo education I'm teaching this stuff in person. I've been teaching it in person for years. I mean I was teaching an in-person pelvic floor continued education class for at least two years before I put out a version online so I had been you know testing it and running through it and um so yeah I mean it's just it's scary. Yeah so with the fears that you had you know going into it did did that actually come to fruition like did people actually attack you like yeah everybody was like oh this is great thanks for sharing them never looked at it this way wow this is this is different this is you know this is this is this is interesting and I was like oh okay well it's not that scary people are actually nice yeah yeah and then you always have that one hater that comments on your blog like I can't believe you would recommend people should deadlift I'm like dude you just really blew everything out of proportion why you gotta be that person yeah yeah but you're always gonna have that person right yeah there's always gonna be it's a small percentage and my my thought is like as soon as you get those it's actually a sign of success.

You know as soon as someone's starting to criticize you means you've got to enough people where you've you've reached that one jerk. And you have an opinion. Yeah.

Because if you're always so careful all the time to make sure you you have you just you I think you lose a lot of your audience because you never stand for anything. Because I see lots of people online that are posting good stuff but they're coming across kind of meek in their voice. I think my writing is probably exaggerated for my opinion for how I would be in person. In person I'm a little bit more laid back I'm like yeah yeah I don't know it depends like I kind of feel that way but in writing I'm like yes this is how it is you know I feel like it I needed a voice I need to find a stronger voice to stand out because there's just a lot of noise. Yeah so that's interesting too so you found a voice and do you and do you feel when you're writing did you feel like you're taking on like a separate persona almost yeah I go into the um I go into the person of I'm not this kind of laid back professional person. I'm this is I I've got a patient in front of me. They have an issue I'm trying to convince them of a treatment okay go. Yeah and so it's more of like the okay this is this is the person I have in mind this is the argument I need to use instead of the okay let's keep everybody happy because it's scary. I mean I have lots of professionals that I'm friends with and they're more very comfortable giving one-on-one opinions when they want to never put their opinion online and I'm like you should you should you know you should write that and they're like oh I don't know and like come on people need to hear this stuff. So it's it's hard to get I think especially women um there's been several books uh written about it like the confidence code is really good if there's any women who are watching this um confidence code was great it it was just a bunch of studies um and they looked at how women basically don't sit at the table women have to know always like they have to know a third more than men to feel just as confident on a subject area. Wow yeah which is crazy which is why when you look at the online space yeah especially physical therapy you look at the online space I mean how many women physical therapists are there and how many women physical therapists are there online? I mean honestly you're the only one I know there's like four guys in my class and 60 women and there's like 90% males online and 10% women that's wild so let's let's talk about like now where what the things you've achieved and we digress.

Yeah let's no it's great I I I think and why I asked this question is not necessarily to impress people but to impress upon people what's possible after you kind of stick to the plan for five years right yeah you stick to the plan.

Yeah stick to the plan like what like what is your lifestyle like now like what how has the online business uh changed your life how how is it yeah give us this is a hard question because I still work all the time yeah okay well he probably don't have like this oh yes we were going to these tropical islands and I work two hours a day and Tim Bears is right you only have to work four hours a week no he lives you have to work more than four hours a week yeah that's BS it's a great concept in that book but it's four hours yeah it's BS I'm pretty driven so um so yeah continuing to continue to work hard just because I love it um but yeah no I mean we have we have extra income which is great we can do what we want to do things aren't tight if I want to take extra continue ed courses I can do that um if I want to spend more money um just you know working on things it's it's easy like life is good and and it's worked and I think there was another business podcast where he asked me about in person because he said a lot of the business um trainer CCs that want to go online their main income is in person and their online is their side business and I would say when I go in to see people I do it because I love it and I learn when I'm in person but I definitely lose money. So if that puts it into perspective so I still do one-on-one appointments because I mean that's that's where I learn. I mean I I spent a decade or more treating people and that's how I learned troubleshooting. And I feel like there's so many people that try to jump into the online space and they have no experience on real bodies. They're like oh I got myself in shape so now I'm gonna create an online program. It's like well you haven't troubleshooted that through a hundred people you know how are you gonna help these people you have just one you know this one generic um plan. Anyway I think getting experience on real people is very important and something I continue to do because I I find a lot of value in it for going above and beyond online.

Yeah.

Yeah it's really interesting because it's um you know the images that people portray online are often different than what's actually going on um I see it all the time is you know I see people who I'm like wow you know on the outside they're super successful and then I get on a phone call with them they're like yeah it's like dude think about quitting this online thing it's just not paying well and that's what yeah I talked to several when I when I actually started making connections I have talked to these people that had huge online followings and I was like I probably made 10 times more than they do with my like small online following but you know what I over delivered to every single person that bought my program and then they told people and then my programs grew by grassroots instead of me putting all of this into social media I said you know what I post multiple videos a week to the people paying for my program not online to my potential clients. Yeah so I probably put 90% of my effort into the people that are paying me and 10% into growing my business and that has come back you know tenfold.

Yeah. Yeah so I'm I know you've been asked this question before if you haven't I'd be shocked but you know if if someone's listening um you know let's say it's you know Susie Fit Pro or Susie um you know Dr. Susie right uh what is and they're like you know God I'm I'm really dying to get online what the first step um what is that and then even take it one step further because probably no one asks you what the second step is right so number one what's the first step and then what's what's the follow-up to that yeah so start your website find your voice start writing start doing some videos start putting out content you'll be horribly embarrassed by it a year later yeah you know don't look at my early YouTube channel don't do it it's awful right but but yeah just start putting yourself out there and get comfortable putting yourself out there because then you can stand in front of a camera and you can be yourself uh instead of being scared and you can write and get things across and and I think the second step is trusting that you're always gonna come up with something better in the future isn't that the isn't that the biggest question you get from people like oh well if I write that blog post I'm not gonna have this is all my ideas it's like it's never all your ideas.

Yeah and if it is you're in big trouble but don't think that way there's always more I write what I think is the best article in the whole world and then two weeks later I'm like oh my gosh this is an even better idea. Yeah yeah yeah just trust like do your best work do it every single day don't hold anything back and don't be afraid of you know that don't be afraid of running out of ideas ideas are plentiful it's the follow through that's so hard.

Yeah well the on ideas are like they never stop like that's ideas can be actually quite troublesome if you have too many. Oh yeah choosing the wrong ones and I think you know when I I talk to a lot of people too about getting online and I know because I live it you know is just spend a year just giving and go out there and just start producing content giving things value and just bear your head just commit to that year. You know plan whatever you need to do financially right to make that happen. But just you know even Gary Vanderchuk right I mean he talks about all the time he's like you got to spend a full year eating shit. Right?

Like just I don't know who he is who is he?

Oh Gary V Oh okay we'll talk about this after but yeah most people in the online space probably know uh Gary V he's just uh he's one of the most famous uh digital marketers out there um and just a business guru nowadays but yeah he talks about he's like you know you want to start building a personal brand you want to start getting online you're just gonna have to quit every year you know start building Instagram following start building this and start getting out there maybe just screwing up a lot and uh you know I can tell you will that that social capital will come back the universe has a funny way of doing it but too many times people quit after a month you know or two you know I see so many podcasts that have seven episodes yeah right yeah magic number like oh no one's listening of course you're not listening nobody's listening nobody's listening in the first year exactly exactly yeah yeah the internet the online space is so huge I mean you just named somebody who you think is like the person everybody knows and I've never heard of them right I know who Evan Pagan is I'm sure you know who he is I know who you know you don't know who Evan Pagan is no see oh my gosh yeah see exactly so that's what people get all worried about the oh there's you know somebody's already doing this is like 200 people could do it there's a lot of people in the world yeah and what do you tell people about really narrowing like how narrow does your niche have to be right I think at the beginning it needs to be very very narrow.

Okay you're you're wanting to help tennis players with their backswing I mean just you know or just to like how narrow can you go? Because then you can target and then once you start getting momentum then you can start broadening out and broadening out but if you can if you can really target doesn't have to be this giant search term on Google where there's you know two million people searching for it every month. You know you can find a thing where it's where it's you know a thousand people searching for it.

Yeah.

There's nobody else doing that one little specific niche. Yeah. And then you you got those thousand people. Yeah and from there you can grow and I think that's really cool is don't underestimate the power of doing something very narrow in the beginning.

Yeah and that's a really important mindset and I just I'm so excited you brought up like a little bit of SEO there. You know the like just get as narrow as you can um but do the research too. You know that's a big thing is like are people actually searching for this term.

You know if you've got one person searching for it a month yeah probably don't write that blog post with that title. But if you've got those thousand people then yeah that's a thousand people looking to read what you wrote that potentially leads into that nich down product that could really offer some value. And then that's where those ideas start coming and you're like whoa mind blown I don't have enough time in the day to follow all these ideas.

Yeah yeah and I'll I'll give whoever's listening to this I'll give you a golden nugget because I was going to do this and then I just realized I'm like I don't have the time you know I'm too busy with everything else but I'm like okay I really want to develop you know uh because I'm a water polo player that was my background I'm like I want to develop you know a uh a strength and conditioning program for water polo players so I started searching it and then I found the golden term this is it you guys the golden term that had plenty of action on it but very little competition was dry land training for swimmers. So if you develop that program and you market it correctly um you will find probably a very enthusiastic and open crowd um and that's that's how specific you can get I could even get right into shoulder health for swimmers right or even deeper into how you're niching down.

And then look at all the articles you could write that could lead into this really great product that could help this niche. And you just have to think a little creatively and then do the research.

Yep and how much easier does your content get when you have that narrow like you know exactly who you're talking to right you know exactly the avatar in your mind versus like having to sit down and be like so broad like what do I talk about today?

Well I can help everybody with back pain yeah that you're not getting anywhere with that one. Yeah yeah exactly yeah you probably can help everybody with back pain but you're you're not gonna be able to on the online space yeah and another approach what's that at least not at first.

Yeah and another approach to take that is find a a uh a tribe right that's very enthusiastic. I mean you look at um Kelly Starrett do you know that that name yeah so he he got into CrossFit right when CrossFit was still you know just about to just boom and he just carved out you know his niche there and started talking to a tribe of very enthusiastic people you know um what what do CrossFitters like to talk about CrossFit right so he just found a particular tribe that's very very vocal and he served them correctly and then he just you know essentially I mean he's a very talented great speaker great salesman all those things it's a huge combination of his success but he was able to also ride that ground swell right so there's a couple ways to to approach it. But uh like I said once you get online there's so many ways to skin that cap um that you can do it. So sir where where do you think you're gonna be in two years? Where do you see your business?

I don't know I don't I don't know if I necessarily I guess I do look that far but I try to focus as much as I can on the day to day because if I dream a little too much I don't get enough done. So I just I want to continue building I want to continue building courses I want to continue building products to help people because I know how hard it is to get in and have regular appointments with physical therapists and you know if I can make things easy I can help more people. So yeah that's my goal just continue to do what I'm doing and find more efficient better ways to do it.

Yeah awesome I love it well this is um I mean I know I learned a lot so and this is it was fun thank you I I know I if I learned something I I I'm guessing other people learned something because this is just what I talk about all day. So um and it's cool because you know there's so many like you're a living breathing application of of principles that so many people talk about you know but I don't think when you started these principles didn't exist you know um finding your core competency we talk all the time number one find your c core competency number two niche down really really specifically three get started right like four start scaling five you know data and analytics like that's our stages of online and it's you just did all that you know over a span of five years which is incredible I don't think you really you had a roadmap I might have been able to do it faster. Yeah sorry yeah um so it's really cool to see that you know you probably unintentionally went through all those stages and now you're just you know scaling in a big way so um yeah thank you for for coming on and inspiring people and thank you I mean you're you do you have a great position because you're truly helping people and you're helping yourself and you're helping your family and um you're making an impact. So I think it's really awesome.

It's great. Thanks for having me appreciate it.

Yeah yeah ladies and gentlemen Sarah Duball Hey fitness fans don't leave yet it's your host Eric Malzone and I have a quick favor to ask actually three favors. So number one if you're a fan of our show I asked you to do something it takes under three minutes. Go to iTunes please and subscribe to our show. Please please please it means so much to us it's so important and then give us a favorable review. We would really really appreciate it and uh I can tell you how much it means and helps us out. So I know it takes two minutes of your day and uh it means a lot to us. So please do that. Number two, go to our YouTube channel or Fitness Marketing Alliance and uh please subscribe to our YouTube channel there. Number three, if you like this episode or any of the episodes that we've released, share it on social. That's huge. That's a big deal for us. And when we put a lot of work into these episodes uh trying to give you great actionable content uh for the fitness industry so that would mean a lot and that's it so we have some big plans coming up for this show. I'll be talking about that in the next couple episodes but thank you so much for listening. It means so much and uh if you have any questions please reach out to me. I'd love to hear from everybody. Eric E R I C at fitnessmarketingalliance calm