How Creatives Can Shamelessly (And Tastefully) Self-promote | With Peggy Dean

[00:00:00] Welcome back to another episode of the six figure creative podcast. I'm your host Brian Hood. And today we have a very special guest by the name of Peggy Dean on the podcast. She is an artist who has been featured in, or she's worked with kind of a combination of the two with Google. The USA today, Martha Stewart, Vogue magazine, Disney wall street journal, a bunch of other things like that.

She is a bestselling author and she is what I'd call, what are the more influential artists online today? And on this episode, we're going to cover some topics that I think are really valuable to anyone listening.

Right now. Things like setting up structure as a creative, especially as creatives, who a lot of us, frankly, don't really gravitate towards being structured

self promotion as creatives. Great. As we suck at self promotion, this is an area that most of, most of our audience struggles with we under promote instead of over promote building email lists and lead magnets. Peggy actually has an email list of like 75, 70 8,000 people on it. So I think she's a very good person to listen to when it comes to actually building a mailing list.

And if, even if this is something that you've been [00:01:00] hesitant against, I promise you, this is something you want to listen to because this is just such a vital part of marketing in today's age. And this is just as important for creatives as it is for everyone else on earth.

And we also talk about the balance between passion and money. How do as creatives, how do we, how do we find that balance between pursuing things we're passionate about while also keeping mind the money element?

How do we, how do we keep that balance in a way that keeps us both grounded, but also making sure we're going the right direction, not going just towards money. It's, it's a very hard balance. And I think that Peggy does a great job of talking us through that.

So without further delay here is my interview with Peggy.

Peggy. How are you doing today?

Oh gosh. So good. How are you doing today?

Brian Hood.

I'm doing awesome. I know you call me Brian Hood. I

like we were discussing beforehand. Peggy Dean is like such a Southern name and like growing up in Alabama, like Peggy Dean, like that's how it would say in the south.

but I will try my best not to use a Southern accent and to just call you Peggy.

How about that?

My dad's from Mississippi. My grandma's is from Missouri. It wouldn't be the strangest thing.

Okay. So Peggy, Peggy on the show because She's [00:02:00] a, I don't know what to call you because you, you seem to be a bunch of different things. You, you go by artist, author, educator, on your website, but in your own words, can you tell our audience, like what, what, do you do.

can confidently say that I have the absolute worst elevator pitch of what I do. So I've landed on artist's author educator. And then I emphasize educator because it's my favorite, favorite thing in the whole world. But I think that more than anything at this point, I really am passionate about facilitating resources for creative entrepreneurs that has kind of organically stemmed in the last year as a way of summarizing what I enjoy doing, because I put my feet into so many little puddle buckets, whatever you want to call it.

I don't know what the phrases are for anything, but um, I don't know, everybody has strengths and I love researching and I love failing so that I can do better. And then going through all of the thick muck that nobody else likes to, I love it. [00:03:00] I'm a sponge to it. So I started off as a hobbyist and then moved into an artist and then moved into an educator and author. And I find that I

do much prefer offering value to other creatives.

that's great. So your background is, from what I saw in my, in my research is you did like hand lettering. That's like the thing that you've kind of found your, your name for your education around that sort of stuff. Can you talk about like, When we are creatives and a hobby, which is a lot of our listeners right now, they are, they're pursuing a hobby that they love their whole heartedly, pursuing it with everything they have, but they are just not making it work from a business standpoint.

And we were just laughing about this before the interview that your website, you says, we believe in passion above everything else. And then I literally have a sign behind me on my wall in neon that says it takes more than passion. how do you approach that,

Sort of head budding reality of like, I'm passionate about this thing for you as hand lettering and there's other things around your, your creativity that you've [00:04:00] monetized at this point, but how do you, how do you approach that conversation where it's like, I want to monetize something because I want to do this for the rest of my life and make a living from it versus like I am

in it for just creativity.

It's just passion. Like, what is, what is your thought process behind approaching that, that dichotomy almost.

It's so important to have an initial focus.

And that could be an initial goal And I wouldn't necessarily say like have a goal set in stone because you don't know what's going to come up along that path. So if you have a general vision and you just start doing it, instead of ruminating on all of the possibilities or lack thereof, then what you put your energy into will come back and then there will be room to grow and pivot and branch off and whatnot.

It does happen. I know that's terrible to say because it's like

well, proof's in the

pudding and everybody,

there Southern came out right there. This is putting.

did. It's shared it. Um, so you're not going to see that until you start. if you have started what I

find, and

I think this is relatable for everyone is.

[00:05:00] it's very easy to look at where the success is for everybody else and social media as a trap for that. I mean, I don't want to get into the regurgitating

of how social media is good and bad and all

that. But I do think like when we're analyzing that kind of stuff, we should really figure out why, like, where's that coming from?

What is it specifically the thoughts that we're having and what is it about that person, that account, that space that makes us feel like that's what we need to do to, for example as an educator. So I show up a lot, I'm very extroverted. My face is everywhere, but I put it there. So I think that that's the case for a lot of people who show up in the same way that I do.

You have a podcast, so you probably hear people, you know, say something like, well, what if I'm not comfortable jumping on and talking to people in a public setting, blah, blah, blah. My first question to people is, well, why do you want to? and usually it's because that's where. Whoever it is that they're watching, that's what they think they need to do for their own success.

But the truth [00:06:00] is like, you will do so much more by putting your energy and time into something that you're passionate about doing versus something you feel like you need to. So you could do the super lucrative path that you see proven, but you're not going to, because you won't have the passion and the satisfaction there, you will not be as successful as you would be if you were following exactly what it is you want to be doing.

If that makes sense. And another big question is when you're on this these spaces where you see other inspirations, so to speak according to your goal is

that where your target audience lives, because it might not be. So what's the point in putting all that effort

someplace where it's not going to be sustained, you know, sustain you for where you want to go.

So many people they're just imitating other people in an area they're not themselves passionate about or talented in. And they start just regurgitating or, or just copying those people in an area [00:07:00] that doesn't even contain their ideal clients. And usually what I see, and this is just kind of talking directly to freelancers right now, if you're a freelancer and you are trying to do something

like create content or be an influencer or whatever, a lot of times you fall into this trap of making content that only appeals to people just like

you, Maybe you're making condoms only valuable to music producers, and you're a music producer, then you're not, you're

not really doing yourself much justice there, but I want to talk on something else you mentioned during that

whole thing is some not breaking the rules. This is something you're big on is basically building your life in a way that's against the rules.

And I, I love breaking

rules. The other day we were, me and my wife were driving to the nerdiest

thing on earth, which is the Renaissance festival here in Nashville. And

there is like a secret back entrance that avoids all traffic. Well, there was a roadblock in the way literal roadblock that

said rose CLO road is close to festival traffic and everyone was just turning around because they didn't want to break the rules.

Meanwhile, I look at my wife and says, do you trust

me? And then we drove around the roadblock and we sat in zero traffic. I will break the rules a hundred percent of the time, as long as [00:08:00] I don't think the consequences are as bad as the benefit of avoiding 25 minutes of sitting in dead stop. So let's talk about breaking rules because

I think I was like the first place to start as

creatives. When it comes to business is what rules can we break and what roles do we need to follow? And how can we kind of forge our own path instead of just looking left and right at everyone else,

I think in this space, it's super important. To understand that if we are to be creatives, then we need to think creatively. You have to think outside the box in order to make any stride with ourselves, with our progress. If we followed a rule book that doesn't exist on these topics, then none of us would be creatives.

And it would just be the same, you know, if we're talking design, there wouldn't be any demand for anything. So, think about surrealism. Like it's one of my favorite things because of what it is like just period, anything hybrid, like give it to me.

I'm all about it. I will drink it. It's so good. So, [00:09:00] yeah, you know, I have no formal training. I'm a high school graduate.

Do you know what your high school GPA was?

Okay, this is actually

funny. I do. And, but I have to share, In my freshmen and sophomore year in high school, I could not sit still. I couldn't focus. I was kind of a smart ass with my instructors. I, I'm not proud of that at all, because I really respect teachers, but you know, your kid, your frontal lobe, isn't developed blah, blah, blah.

So I would skip a lot or I would just get bored and like tell the grammar teacher that they spelled something wrong on the whiteboard. Cause I was really smart, but I just like wasn't, you know what I mean? Like I was?

that kid.

Smart and smart ass.

Yeah. So I would skip a lot. And then my mom was like, you have too much potential to be doing this. So she pulled me out and she got me set up on this situation where it's not like homeschooling, but it's like, you meet with a teaching consultant once a week for an hour, I think. And she gives you all of your work and then you go home and on your own [00:10:00] time, you do everything.

And you study, you do your testing, you do all the things and then you'd go in there to test or whatever. So that was for my junior and senior year, my junior and senior year, I completed in one semester. So in half a year, I

did two years of high school and I, got 4.0 on all of it. And it was not easy because it was a private school.

See, I, I was secretly hoping you just utterly struggled and failed at high school. Cause

like D I didn't go to college. I had a 1.9 GPA in high school and I'm like,

and I wear it as a badge.

it kind of

does count though, because if you look at

behavioral stuff, like had she not done that and like, recognize my

learning, just the way that I learn, whatever I would have failed high school because, because my overall

average with those two years of 4.0 my, it was 2.5.

So that's how she, that's how I

was for freshman and sophomore year.

Bring it, bring it back on. We were talking about the a

as creatives breaking the rules [00:11:00] so that we're not just putting out stale stuff. And then we got sidetracked by high school GPS, which is fine.

I think that it all loops, I think it all loops together. And I think that a good example though. Traditional education doesn't always work for everybody. I'd say 99% of all statistics are incorrect. 99% of people, artists that I know have never, no, they'd never gone to art school.

And, and, and one of the things I love so much is that I've heard people who will either listen into a podcast regularly or they'll take a course or whatever. And the thing I hear over and over again is I learned so much in X amount of time that I've spent listening or engaging in this than I ever did in college or in art school or wherever.

And I'm like, that's because it all stems from experience, trial and error. Like there's so much of It

It can be absolutely crippling and. De-motivating I guess, which totally that's fair. That's totally fair. And I understand that. And some personalities, like my [00:12:00] own we'll push through that because we're just like, no, I don't take knows I'm going for this.

So I just like challenged me. I dare you. Like, it gets me pumped, but um, I think that there's definitely some importance, I guess I should say, to being able to grasp and give yourself permission to break out of that

mindset of like, I need to do things a certain way.

Yeah. So going back to kind of the passion, what your thing is, we believe passionate above anything else and kind of what you just talked about there, where you, you move towards the things that you're passionate about and you focus on those and you say, I'm going to break the rules and not do the things that I'm not necessarily passionate about.

Where's the line drawn though, because as creatives, we can fall into this trap of I'm just going to endlessly pursue. What's the, what's the term when you're just like only focused on self pleasure I'm blanking on the term. It'll come to me in a second, but Basically, you're going after self pleasure.

Only the things that you're passionate about, and you're not actually doing anything to push a business for. Cause you maybe are allergic to marketing or maybe you're allergic [00:13:00] to, I'm using the word allergic as a joke here, but like you're Not towards it. So w how do you, how do you bounce that, you know,

This is important. This is something that comes up for all of us. You know, you really, really badly want to do something yet. You don't take the first steps. I think that usually this is because of mindset and it's because of fear of not knowing what the next step is, and not even knowing where to search for how to find the next step, because it's usually very specific to your unique situation, which absolutely that makes sense.

But you're not going to know until you take action. So I think this comes down to discipline and being able to like set up in Asana or Trello board or something along those lines, that's going to give you visuals of boards, where you can actually have steps that you can move into

the next set, like section of what needs to happen those steps,

Is that like a Kanban board where it's like to do doing done that kind

of.

yeah, basically and you can get as specific in between as you want to. And it's, it's one of the most helpful things for people [00:14:00] who don't know, because maybe that first task is figure out what all these tasks need to be, but it's working backwards.

So that's the best part is like, if you can work backwards, give yourself four steps, just four. So the four quarters of a year or however you want to do it. So you have your end goal Well, what's it gonna take to get there in the broad spectrum? You're not thinking about the little steps or who you need to network with or anything like that.

What do you have to do to get a book published? Well, you have to write the book. Okay. So it's right. The book. What do you do between, you know, starting to write the book and publishing the book? Well, you're going to probably do some research. So maybe research isn't, you know, basically it's that.

And then within those points, all of those are like considered milestones and then those milestones become the end goal. Before the actual end goal. And then you break those down into baby steps and doing it this way is giving people of any mindset whatsoever. However, your brain works. It's giving you something tangible that you can actually follow instead of [00:15:00] ruminating, because think about it.

Like the amount of time it's going to take. You're like, oh, a year. That's so long. Okay. Well, how many years ago did you think you wanted to do the thing? probably two or three, right. You're going to get a lot further taking action

now than continuing to ruminate for another year or two.

Yeah. So this is a, this is probably my biggest sticking point when it comes to trying to accomplish the things that I wanna accomplish. First of all, taking the big task and breaking it down into little

steps is, has been so helpful for me because I, I do what you called ruminating. Like that's, that's something I do all the time.

I just think about I plan so that I can plan. Like, I, I plan to plan, I think about thinking about things like I think of like all the things that I want to do. And then I think about

how do I do those things? And I think about what do I need to know to do those things? And I just think about it instead of actually getting it out on paper or in my case, I do what I call a brain dump, where I just put everything out of my brain into an Evernote file or a Google doc with a lot of bullet points and sub bullet points and sub sub sub bullet points and things like that.

And then kind of structure it, how you did

with the big end goal

and the milestones. And on top of that, when I structure my, life, that [00:16:00] way. I'm always

working towards something because I know what my

next step is. in maybe at this time, I'm not, I don't feel like doing step a, but they're not always

sequential. Sometimes I can do step B and come back to step a later. But I always have something to work on. And I've noticed the times where I feel the most aimless, I feel the most lost. I felt the most like

anxious is the time that I don't have some, one of those big projects that I'm working on. I don't know if you're the same way.

I am exactly the same way. And that's when I feel like I started to panic. And I think it's because I have a busy mind and I like to constantly be there, but I totally know. Yes. That feeling very, very well.

Well, speaking of that, I actually remembered the word I was trying to think of earlier.

It's creative hedonism. That's the word I was looking for where you're only looking after the pleasure of being creative and none of the structure or the actual billing of income or business or, or whatever. Again, if you're listening to this podcast, it's likely because you're interested in making a living from your creativity.

And so we have to look at both of these. We can't just have one again. That's why the sign behind me for watching this on YouTube says it takes more

than passion.

I wanted to also mention [00:17:00] with outlining though. Cause what you said, you're like bullet

points, some bullet points, some bullet points, of some bullet points and it just goes on and on and on and you keep adding stuff

forever, forever. And this is actually when I started doing this, these brain dumps, but doing it in a structured way where I like categorize and then move things around as they make sense because you're, you're essentially forming like whatever project it is you're working on. you're essentially forming what could be a really meaty content, whatever it is. Okay. So this is my favorite thing to share is that people think that one project is one project and it's like taking that huge, huge chunk that you just created.

And like, you're going to want to obviously like prune, right. And then make a final outline for whatever it is that you're making an outline about. But rather than getting rid of all those bullet points or the things that didn't make it into the final draft is like, those are all side projects now that you can build off of as well. And you just have a huge body of all [00:18:00] of these ideas or processes that you can, know, attack by recycling that work because it's all based on, , value that you put together in one brainstorming session. I mean, maybe that brainstorming session is three weeks long, but it's one session. Which I am a huge fan of and didn't realize it until I started actually writing content. Which I know is separate from what we're talking about, but

I think it's, I think it all overlaps.

my mind immediately goes to content creation and I know no, not everyone in our audience wants to do that or cares to do that. But I also, my brain goes to other things like when you're planning out big new things in your business where you're trying to like split up, Anything in your, in your marketing initiatives, anything in creating awareness for yourself, self promotion, anything you are doing in your businesses, they massive project. There's going to be byproducts of that. And I can't remember who it was. We've talked about on the podcast before, but there was a big, like billionaire back in the day who made so much money from monetizing byproducts and fun fact.

I believe it's, Webster's charcoal is a byproduct of another manufacturing process. And so [00:19:00] they were manufacturing something that had all this like sawdust by-product and they turn it into a Coles for your grill and made a ton of, I mean, an entire brand off of that, that makes me

Tens or hundreds of millions of dollars,

Per year. But let's bring this back to, to something that I think piggybacks off this really well.

And that is self promotion as a, as a creative, you clearly don't struggle

with self promotion which is a good thing.

I think all creatives should be amazing at self promotion,

because like, you can be the best in the world at what you do, but if you can't self promote, you will just stay in your little

box, no one ever hear about you. And, and you took something as what I call simple,

as simple as

hand lettering, which it sounds simple when you just say it, but when you look at your work, you're like, oh, okay, I get it. Yeah. It's hard to get it across in an audio medium. But if you're watching on YouTube right now, just go Google, Peggy Dean's work and you'll see what

she's, what she's up to him.

But uh, you take something as simple as that and you have built it into,

like, I wouldn't call it

an empire. Cause like you're more than just hand lettering. Now you're doing a lot of different

things, but that was like your first foray into like education and self

promotion and

other things like that. So

how would you [00:20:00] tell someone who's maybe not a natural at

self promotion to just get the hell over.

Okay. I'm going to be honest with everybody. And I think that this is the same, like, Brian, you're good at self promotion, but I think that you might have this maybe correct me if I'm wrong, but even people who are good at it, like when it first comes up, like, it feels heavy. like it has this heaviness to it. That's attached to it because it it's because it requires

mental work. So it's not just

like busy work.

It's

scary. Like my first business coach, I was paying her. This is like 2017. I was

paying her 3000 or $3,500 a

month. I kept her for a year. She was great. She was

pushing me at the time to get way outside of my comfort zone and do things like Facebook lives. That's back when

Facebook lives had just launched and Facebook would push you like crazy if you were alive on their platform at the time.

And it was terrifying. And that was, I remember how scared I was to do Facebook lives. And the first one I ever did, how it messed up. And the first like four minutes of it were just me sitting in front of the computer because I didn't realize the [00:21:00] latency from the OBS I was using was going to Facebook.

It was just a

I the same exact thing happened to me the

first time I

used streamed. That's

So funny.

it was such a just absolute show, but it got me over the hump of like getting out there. And so it it's scary at first. So I want to go back and just remember that. I, I remember that and now I don't think twice about stuff like that because I'm immune to it.

Yeah, You get used to it. And it's hard. I know a lot of people, like, it just depends on what it is that you're doing because obviously not every avenue of self promotion is for everybody else, but . At the end of the day, it comes down to, we don't want to come across sleazy, markety, like salesy gross slimy which I get, but like the people who you enjoy, like whether it's in the same industry or not.

Do you ever feel like when they have a launch that that's slimy of them or do you get excited because you're interested in it. So really what we're doing is we're giving people the gift of excitement about something that you feel confident in, that you created or did. You know, that there's [00:22:00] value that you're

offering by doing it. you knew that in the creation process from step a to Z and now it's time to share it. And now's the exciting part. So really when

we just talk about things, rather than saying, you know, Coming up with some formula on how somebody, if they buy this and they're going to get this,

like, spend more effort talking about the why behind

it and like how it made you feel during the process.

And even maybe say like, you know, oh gosh, I'm so nervous to put this out

there. And you don't have to be extroverted to do it. You can be who you are and somebody is going to, you know, people are going to appreciate and be drawn to that.

And it really doesn't matter. It's just like showing up authentically. So you don't have to use, do obviously teach on marketing and there's like a formula that I give out and blah, blah, blah. But like at the end of the day, pushing all the formulas aside the root of where that comes from needs to be organic and genuine, and.

exciting for, for you to [00:23:00] share about, or it was going to always feel like pulling teeth it's gross. And the more you do it, the easier it is to do. And really it comes down to just timelines, like, okay, I'm going to share about this on this platform, on this date. And I'm going to, you know, build up a schedule and that's literally it.

So if you give yourself a schedule, the rest of it kind of falls into place. And I think that's like, anytime I've been effective at marketing, it's when I can have dates and then I can share, I'm so impulsive. And in the moment that it helps me know that I'm connecting to everybody else too. If I can, just have the content and then I'm going to put it out there. But In the beginning, I'm going to talk as me in that moment. And that helps me a lot with marketing so that I feel like it is like a genuine right now connection

You mentioned you tease us with the marketing formula and we'll have to get that from you in a second, but when I go back to where you're talking about your content. I take it that you're not a, a batch creation person. You don't just do a bunch of workup. And then schedule it over time and anything you do or do you batch,[00:24:00]

I didn't before and I have taken to

bash working. I am obsessed with it now and it's, it does kind

of conflict, but it depends on what it is. So we all

know that I do a million

things So if I'm talking about like my membership and the flock I will take two months, sometimes one, it just depends on how much it is, but I do it and

apply it to the next six months of content.

So I have,

you know, the. Kind of chart in there where it's like, this is what I need to write. This is what I need to fill. And this is what I need to create tangibles for. This is what I need to edit. And then it just goes down the line and then get scheduled out and queued. And then

all I have to do is say, here's what drops Tuesday or whatever.

But then the other part of batch working you know, aside from coaching or teaching or anything like that is in creative work.

Scotty, Russell just said something we were talking about seasons of art where.

Rather than like working in collections, like, let's say I'm going to do eight things that are along [00:25:00] the same style or same color palette or whatever. It's

like seasons of trying something And, sticking to it and committing to it. Maybe that's a week, maybe that's three months, whatever it is,

So I like the batch working

aspect of that because it's forcing

you to like commit to something .

Yeah, I get it. I get it. You mentioned Scotty Russell, which for those of you who are not familiar with him, he was on episode 1 54 episode titled forging your own creative path, overcoming depression and escaping the American scheme. he has his own podcast. Awesome podcasts called uh, the side hustlers perspective, which I think it used to just be called the perspective podcast.

Highly recommended for sure, for those of you who if you, if you haven't heard Scott and go check out that podcast or at least that episode. So going back to the marketing formula, I want to know what this formula is that you talk about because I like formulas and I, because formulas give me structure and it's funny, cause like I can't put a pin on, on you as a person because you are all over the place.

Similar to me. I have hardcore ADHD, but similar to me, you [00:26:00] have structures in certain places of your life. And so for me, like formulas or frameworks or things like that are my structure. I love learning these sorts of things because anytime I'm struggling to focus on something, I say, w where's a framework or structure for that.

And can I use it in my own business? So give me, what is your marketing formula?

Well, there's a few, but I think that the most helpful is to have A very specific content plan and like, is this going to live on social media? Is it going to, and how is it going to live in video form? Is it gonna live on a post? Is it gonna live on a story? Is it going to live on a real or a Tik TOK or whatever, and or is it going to be something that is shared on email? is it something that is going to be, but I think just having these visuals of these bullet points is also what helps you come up with content. So you know, networking, being a guest on someone else's blog, being a guest in someone else's newsletter, that's the best way to network. I think it's like um, being able to offer value to somebody else's.

Audience while, you know, you're getting exposure [00:27:00] for your thing, it's like a win-win and then they can do, you know, vice versa, but being able to come together and doing like the column J J B

is joint ventures. It, it could be like a micro version of that,

Which is basically just someone it's just someone else promoting your, your stuff to their audience.

And uh, this was something that was in the client acquisition toolkit that I recently put out this past week where this is common in the online course and co world th that the Peggy and I are a part of, but this is so utterly uncommon in the freelance world of finding people who control your ideal clients, like the command of their clients, whether it's like an email list or a social media following and have them promote your work to their audience.

And a lot of times there's a commission involved with of some sort, but go get that guide. If you haven't already, it will be in our show notes@sixfigurecreative.com slash two zero.

Also, I would think about. Who's not in your exact industry so that you can cross network into a different industry. As an example, I wrote a book called botanical line drawing.

And when I say I wrote it, I mean, I [00:28:00] drew a book called Vedanta line drawing. I think the words in it, like it just says, step one, step two, step three, a million times with no instructions. That book did so, like it just blew all of the other ones out of the water still does. It's crazy. But I think it's because it's so vague, but it's so specific at the same time that it can apply to all these different industries.

So all of a sudden my everything is blowing up with bullet journal.

people who do bullet journaling and thinking about like, who's just outside of that reach, mindful sketching is my book that just came out. And that one, we have a bunch of like mindfulness, yoga instructors, all of, you know, people who are not necessarily in the art or creative world at all. And they're more into the wellness space who are, you know, that's an awesome market because it's important to me too, but getting back to this structure, so thinking about where things are going to live, so it's not just your own platform, it can be other people's platform. And the simple way to do [00:29:00] that is to ask. And the worst thing that's going to happen is that you don't hear back or you get to know, and nothing changes if nothing changes.

So, have literally nothing to lose. But then the other part of this is. What type of topic will this be? So this could be like expanding on what something's about.

It could be uh, education around that. So maybe hot. Things like this. It could be

like a mentioned to like a warm lead kind of thing, or it could be, here are some results. Here's the demand. Here's what happened, like case studies. when you hear a sale, like, okay, $39 for this hose. I don't know why where's this coming

from? I'm

I just bought a

new garden hose, so it's fine.

Maybe we're just connected now.

Okay. So you say $39 for a hose. Well, that requires your active thinking. You're just like, okay. $39. This hose what's around here. What can I compare? Do I look up reviews on my phone real quick? This one's 39, this one's 59. Is it a brand thing? Does this have [00:30:00] better specs? Whatever. But when you talk to somebody about what that hose is going to do, so maybe it is like an ergonomic eco-conscious blah, blah, blah.

And that's, those are the words that come at you that requires more of a passive thinking. So that is something that you're going to connect with emotionally, one of the reasons why I like to come in organically is because it's like, oh, this is why as I'm like, you know, growing this business and learning more about, and I'm like, this is why I'm successful is because I only come from this approach. Like, I don't really, I mean sometimes, and I'll be like, guess what?

Boom, it's $99 and you want it. I promise. But that's still coming across, like as me. And I'm just kind of laughing at how, about how salesy I'm being. But like at the end of the day, what I recommend doing is having, you know, that thing in place, whatever it is that you created and then going from there and thinking, okay, where do I want these pieces of content to live? Okay, great. [00:31:00] What kind of content is this

going to be? I don't know if anybody pins uses

Pinterest,

small Percentage of our

I would assume a very small percentage, but what I do like about it is that they have like, say like, even if you just got a free account and just looked real fast, it's great because it has prompts to connect with your audience in some way.

So it's like, this is going to be, this day is going to be for connection. This day is going to be you know, a piece of education that you share this day is something that's going to be interactive. And they give like

little prompts and ideas. I actually have

a spreadsheet that can be imported into like any spreadsheet

platform.

That's like 180 social media

prompts for

this specific thing.

that could be helpful.

Yeah.

It's a micro version. I'll, I'll

get the link over, but

it's a micro version of what we're

talking about right

now, because. On a marketing plan, ideally

like, depending on how long you

want something to live, like, if it's a huge [00:32:00] launch, then I would say like, you have a 60 day ramp up plan that you need to get into a 60 days like that sweet spot. And there are methods around how each one of those is going to look like. But then if it's something that is not so, you know, it's like a one-off, it's not

some huge, huge deal like that. Like go two weeks out, start to tease it, get excited about it. Maybe share some. Valuable, whatever you decide, it's going to be in a lead magnet or in, somebody else's space.

And in that somebody else's space have something live there that brings people back to you, like give them something of value, then give them something tangible of value. And then in that tangible thing of value, put something in there. That's like, Oh, you want more of this?

Okay, come over here. And that's where you're going to get it. Then you have them living on your turf and you can provide even more value and something that I truly believe in. And it's hard to swallow is like, you build so much in whatever it is you're creating. And then realize that [00:33:00] a, you need to do so much merchandising around that.

That's going to take. The same amount of time, if not more. And then you have so much marketing to do around that, which might require taking that initial outline. We were talking about earlier taking little pieces, either dissecting a section or building some supporting content around that and then offering

that as free value, because if someone can buy in and have

instant results from whatever it is that you're putting out there, maybe not

results, but satisfaction, you know, gratification instantly or whatever

it's going to be.

Then they already know the value and

they want more of that versus just a tease of what that could be. They don't, they

haven't experienced it yet. you know, you want to give them the opportunity to.

actually experience it and then get more from you. So it is, it's like offering more value for free than you do in your paid space, but it will make you more, it's much more lucrative that way.

let's talk about something that I think is an area of improvement for our audience. They need to really [00:34:00] improve on. I think that you Excel at Peggy, Peggy Dane, and that is, and that is the, the area of Content creation, which we've talked about. But I think specifically, like when we talk about marketing to me, marketing can be boiled down to this sentence.

It's the right message to the right audience at the right time. that's really it. And to me, content fits into that. So well, and that's the area that I think you've been you've devoted most of your time is creating content. Do you do any paid advertising? Are you, primarily just content marketing type person?

have

never done paid advertising. Um, One of these days I will look into it,

but

I've never done it.

you have over a hundred thousand Instagram followers, so that's all organic, not through paid ads,

And probably coming in close to a hundred thousand email subscribers. I'm not sure what the number is there,

Yeah. So what I'll say though, about an Instagram following, like, I'll just be totally honest. I wish that there was a way to prune it because I'd have a way to, like, I know that the big, like [00:35:00] let's grow is like, let's do a million giveaways. You guys don't do a million giveaways you're going to get, so you're going to get so many empty accounts following you like that just don't care.

Or they're like legitimately accounts that people sign up for just to enter giveaways. Like it's terrible. And I had no idea and I'm just like, oh, I'm so hungry to grow these numbers. Well, I stopped doing that and now the algorithm sucks. And guess what? Don't care kind of wish this number was lower because.

I mean, I, I, I recently did. I don't know how accurate these websites are, but I was like, I want to know how many of my followers are like totally stagnant. Like don't do anything. And they're like, the percentage

made me want to barf. It was 19%, 19%.

is your, is your email list, your main kind of like your main focus?

Okay, that's great. Cause I want to talk to you about that. Cause our audience I've been trying to get them to, to build an email list of some sort. And I think you're a good person to talk about, about doing that because like you're hanging out from someone right now [00:36:00] who has a following over a hundred thousand people on Instagram and is saying right now my email list is more, more valuable to me.

So let's talk about building that list because this is an area that, that I want everyone paying attention to.

Yeah. Okay. So this is so important and I wasn't. Okay. So I watched, I watched a six minute talk one time. It was, it took six minutes. That was it. To talk about the value of email marketing to where it was just like, okay, that clicks on so many levels. And you guys have you, if, if Brian's been trying to talk to you about this, then you probably are going to hear the same thing coming from me.

But like you live on rented land. If something happens to any accounts, all of those people that you're relying on are gone, they are gone. And so your email list, like

these are people who. Are actively wanting to be involved in what you're doing. So it is your target audience, no matter what, it's not some, you know, like quick eye candy, like let's, let's count on that, you know, whatever.

uh, there's somebody who, A friend of [00:37:00] mine who said this morning and it's is, she's just sort of post about it. But she said in the first 10 posts, or maybe it was 20, I don't remember.

But the ratio of who she followed that came up, that weren't suggested accounts or weren't like shop accounts was 45%. So you're not seeing people that you follow and vice versa. They're not seeing you, like it's not effective anymore. And email is most times deliverability is going to be pretty high in an email situation.

So there are plenty of free um, get starter, you know, places you can easily export your contacts and import them into a different email service

provider when it comes time to grow, because, you know, you're inevitably going to grow if you do it the right way.

But you know, it, it was hard

to get started until I heard

like the, the actual value, like this is so important. And when I started actually actively actually [00:38:00] actively

Building my emails, it was like,

I saw such a surge in engagement and, people who are

really paying attention to what I'm doing. And then also in pro you know, in, in income. I appreciate the, I did just update that number on my website. He was saying earlier, before we started 75,000, is that my email list on my website?

It says like join 75,000 of us. Uh, but yeah, it is, it's about 78 now. I wish it was

close to a hundred. I mean, I do. And I don't like, man, it gets expensive, but,

I know

how much you're probably paying something like active campaign or whatever you use.

Yup. Yeah. And we just switched to active campaign this year and I'm really liking it so far, but I don't think that anybody needs to think about all those crazy funnels and whatnot when you get started.

I think that what you need to focus on is your lead magnet into your email list, period. Like really focused on getting a good, solid lead magnet. And you've probably heard [00:39:00] a lot about this. But something that you can offer as value I don't like the word sign up for my newsletter to do this. I like join me, blah, blah, blah.

And then a cute little I'm never going to spam. you that'd be gross. Don't use.

those words. It's mine. No, it's not. I didn't like trade trade-marketing, but like, you know, something that, that feels you. I just don't like subscribe to the newsletter like that. Doesn't tell anybody What they're going to get.

They're going to bypass it. And then everybody hates pop-ups. So maybe don't do that. Maybe do an inline forum. I'll tell you something else. People like graphics, they like visuals. So if you can plant those in there with your form, like just give people as much as you possibly can as if they're holding the thing in their hand that you want to give them so that they know that that's the value you're giving them

immediately.

And then let them know what to expect in your first email. And be personable.

have you found to be an effective lead magnet for you specifically? Cause I know I have, I have a bunch of them right now and I have what I call, like I call them like secondary lead magnets. Like I created a piece of content and the natural next step was like, oh, I should offer this as like a lead [00:40:00] magnet or whatever, after an episode or after a video.

But then I also have like my core lead magnet. These are the things that I think can stand alone. And I found that those are just way better longterm than like the, the, the secondary ones. What have you found? As far as identifying what works, what doesn't work, give us your secret.

Yeah.

I agree. Um, you might have your core at the top of your head, if you're not sure yet you could play around with two or three and interchange them over time or interchange them with seasons or whatever I like that. You're asking me what works the most, but I want to preface what I'm going to say by saying this really has to do with your industry and what your end like goal is. I have people all the time who asked me, you know I was thinking about putting this up as a lead magnet.

What do you think of this? Aren't you quitting that part of your business.

So you want to offer this as a freebie, as a main freebie, but you're never ever

going to follow up on that content ever. So basically you're pulling in an audience

that isn't your target market anymore. And that means that you have the wrong [00:41:00] people on your list that

you're paying for, who aren't probably going to convert the way

that you want them to.

So it would depend me as somebody who, as we know, likes to give resources, I have created a guide

it's 52 pages of all of my

favorite everything having to do with creativity. So this is art supplies. It's, filming um, gear, it's, lighting, it's office supplies.

Like it's literally everything, packaging, whatever you want to do in this

space. Like I've got direct links. It's not like here are

all the options it's like, here are my favorites. I've luckily been fortunate to build trust with people because they know that I do all this digging and like

figuring stuff out and what works the best.

And like I say, you know,

this isn't necessarily the best in the world, but this is my favorite. And I've been through some hoops or two.

So hopefully this is helpful. It's 52 page guide. So that's a huge one for me for what I offer.

But then I also have like for, you know, coursework um, like I have

a free [00:42:00] masterclass that's an hour long that gives like value. It's not just a pitch or something I have a four day challenge. That's interactive. I hear a lot of people who are artists who say things like, oh, well,

Do you think that like, phone wallpaper is a good one? I have also been able to see the clicks on what I have offered in the year. And I'll tell you right now, I have never, even with over a hundred thousand people on my Instagram. And I think at the time, like 20,000 on my email, there

were six clicks, not downloads

clicks on iPhone wallpaper. So if that tells you

anything at all, I mean, it's not like over

time, it was like in that week, but like that's when you're going to get the most.

And so

I, I put that in the ground right away. Cause that was

just extra work I didn't need to do. So that's another part

about like.

this journey when you're going along, the organic process that's really helpful is that you're able to

test your market immediately and see what works and what doesn't, [00:43:00] and

then study that and go with the flow because then you're inevitably going to do what works

the most and then be able to build off of that demand.

that's the kind of the pro and the con of, of social media being mostly algorithmically driven. Now it's not like a timeline where the most recent stuff is always showing up in your timeline. Now it's about an algorithm now. So like, if your content is just not appealing to people that follow you, assuming you're followed by your ideal clients, which is not always the case, but assuming that you are, then when you post stuff, if it's not getting engagement, then it's likely not that interesting to the type of person that you're trying to attract.

So you're not going to get in many clicks. And so it's kind of like one of those things where a lot of times, social media is a great place to test. Like we have a tech talk that we've been growing over the last six months or so that allows us to quickly learn what topics people care about and what they don't care. Which can then lead to, now that I understand that I can actually create content or lead magnets or whatever around that specific stuff. And I do do paid advertising. So now I can know what content I can turn into paid ads to promote the podcast or promote a lead magnet. And not everyone in our audience is going to go down that same [00:44:00] path, but just understand that like, it starts with understanding who you're trying to target, why they would want this and answering the most important question, which is what is in it for them. If you can't answer the question, what is in it for them, what are they going to get out of it, then don't make it because otherwise the wallpaper, I look at my phone, my wallpaper has on my phone has not been changed. And over over 10 years, I think I've gone through, I've gone through like multiple phones at this point and had the same wallpaper on it.

that's so funny. Well, mine's always pictures of my cat or my dog. Like, that's what we're into. Um, like my iPad, I use it for procreate. It might as well just be called procreate. Like I don't open it for any other

reason. So nothing's been changed on that. It's all default. Like, let's think about where we're spending our time.

is just funny because I just learned about procreate. Cause my wife's got into it now and I'm like,

that's the funniest app name. I love it.

Yeah. It's something it's it was confusing when you would search for

anything procreate when it first came out, because it was like, what search results are we wanting to show you here?

The birds and the bees. Thank you.

Thank you.

[00:45:00] All right. So just kind of wrapping this conversation up,

For people who are maybe struggling, trying to get their, their hobby transitioned into more than a hobby, they're trying to take their passions to more than just passion led stuff, something where that they can actually pay their bills.

Looking back to yourself, you know, I don't know how many years ago you got into this, but like where you were kind of on the cusp of trying to make it, what would you tell yourself back to that period of like. This is what you need to know to get out of this Like what here's whether it's inspirational, motivational or tactical Elliot to you, but like, what would you tell that person?

I think more than anything,

it's just like, resilience. To your own mindset. So I think now this isn't necessarily true, but I have

a 90 10 that I talk about and it's like, it's 90% mindset. Like we are the only people that are standing in our way for anything. I love failing. I love hitting dead ends because it allows me to know, okay, this isn't going to work next time.

Like this doesn't work now, it's not going to work [00:46:00] next time. Or it's only going to work with X, Y, Z. And that to me is like gaining knowledge and confidence in my decision, moving forward, as I find out what works and then I can show up and have conviction behind what I'm saying, because I do feel confident in that and that's experience.

And I know like, this is kind of like the rule breaker in me, you know, like not to listen to what everybody's telling me. And like, even though I have advice, like I tell people, challenge me, like really challenging. Because I might not like what I'm saying might not work for you. It might not be the right thing for you.

Like I'm only speaking from my own experiences, your experiences are going to be different than mine. I will say that it does help

to talk this stuff out. So, you know, if there are people that are,

working parallel

in some degree with you, like talk it out, having that person like to just kind of spill on.

Sometimes they don't even need to say a word and it's just like, you need to like, [00:47:00] get all this word vomit out and then you kind of figure out your own answer. Right. Then it's like, oh my gosh, like, I don't know why I was stuck here when this is all I needed to do. Like Or somebody says something just in the right way where it triggers your own thought, that answers your own question.

Like just trust yourself. Like our intuitions are here for a reason. Like you're listening to this episode for a reason. So trust yourself.

Yeah. And I'll add to that. Just saying, like, if you're an external processor, like my wife is, and I find it helpful as well, when I'm like, something's on my mind and I needed to just process it externally with someone sitting there, I don't need their advice. I just need to talk it out in those cases.

Make sure that when you were talking to someone like this and externally processing, it's the right person, someone that's encouraging someone that's got your best interest at heart. And not someone who's going to try to pull you back down to their level because when you're early in your career and you're still not certain about something and you don't have that confidence to push through.

Someone's bad advice. It can be detrimental to your future. So make sure it's person has your [00:48:00] best interest at heart. Peggy, thank you so much for coming on the show. And, uh, is there, is there any place you want to send our audience about where they can maybe connect with you or learn more about you or, um, if you're going to do what I would recommend doing share a lead magnet, right?

To get them on the email list. Is there some, is there someone you want to send the.

Yeah, absolutely. Um, no, this is actually where I'm not very good because I'm like, oh, I should have come prepared with something to share about this, but really I just like talking. So if you're like want to do a podcast yeah. That's as far as it gets, um, no, I've got plenty of lead magnets. I've got a ton of freebies, all sorts of things for all sorts of reasons.

I'm at the pigeon letter's dot com. You literally land there and it's a resource Haven. So my lead magnet is my website, but I do have, a ton of content on there for creating for creators and resources. otherwise I want to just say thank you so much. Um, this is the kind of stuff I nerd out about so much, and I think it's so fun to be able to share and then know that somebody on the other end is like, yes, [00:49:00] because, you know, I think we all need that.

So Oh. And then I will share that in show notes. I'm just going to make Brian do it. Um, I'm going to give you guys. Social media master prompts list, because I think it will be helpful

I think it'd be helpful for me as well. Cause I, my top nine goes back like nine years. Like I don't post on social very often.

it, will be helpful, but I think if nothing else it'll, uh, be motivating and holding yourself accountable is I think a pretty huge, just, just a huge little thing, right.