Welcome to the Lighten your launch podcast today, we’re talking about running Facebook ads, like a scientist stove. Stay tuned!

Our first guest today spent 8 years on one of the top engineering teams in the world, running 230,000 experiments a month, producing business growth EVERY single month. She left what could be called a “dream job” to join a small web design studio…

At this new venture, one of her clients spent $80,000 on a custom website, had a failed launch – generating only $900 in revenue – and three weeks later started over with a new agency. She felt horrible and knew something was terribly wrong with traditional expectations of a website.
She then turned her gaze to marketing. After following all the “Marketing Best Practices”, and having lots of highs and lows, she realized everything they were doing would never produce consistent business growth like she knew was possible–like the big dogs we see making millions everyday. So she drew a pile of dog poo on the whiteboard, crossed it out, and told her team, “STOP EVERYTHING! We have to invent a new way to grow.”
The first time she applied this new approach… she went from 400 leads to 10,000 leads with just ONE Facebook Ad and ONE landing page. Her next “Unlock” was her webinar, which went from ZERO sales, to 1 in every 5 attendee.
That’s when she ran into her current business partner. A woman who was already successful in her own right. As an Entrepreneur, CEO, and champion of women in tech, she co-founded a $20-million dollar tech company in just 17 months. She brings nearly two decades of experience in a variety of roles, from management consulting to business development, communications, entrepreneurship, investor relations, and launching start-ups just to name a few.
Together, this passionate duo founded MintCRO to bring An Engineering Approach to Marketing. This is Business Growth Backed by Science.
Listen in to find out what it means to take an engineering approach to marketing and how you can perform highly targeted research for about $25 in just 24 hours.
As a special gift, MintCRO has offered our listeners 50% off their “Like Big Dogs” Mini-Bundle: $500 curriculum + 6 hours of LIVE training, data reviews, copywriting hot seats to get all of this for $25
And use promo code “LYL-PODCAST-50″ to get 50% off.
Steve Pieper
Erin Athene
Jessica Jobes

Katie: Welcome to the Lighten your launch podcast today, we're talking about running Facebook ads, like a scientist stove. Stay tuned.

Katie: Welcome back

to the show. I'm Katie Collins and I'm back. again with Jeffrey . And today we want to talk about how to handle the ever-changing world of Facebook ads so that you can get the

best results without wasting money

on ineffective ads. Jeffrey, would you do the honors of introducing our guests?

Jeffrey: I would love to, we actually have a few guests today. Our first guest

today spent eight years on one of the top engineering teams in the world running 230,000 experience experiments a month producing business growth every single month she left what could be called a dream job to join a small web design studio at this new venture.

One of the. Uh, she worked with spent $80,000 on a custom web. Had a failed launch generating only $900

in revenue. And three weeks later started over with a

new

agency. She felt horrible and knew something

was terribly

wrong. With traditional expectations of a website. She then turned her gaze to

marketing after

following all the marketing best practices and having

lots of highs and lows, she realized everything they were doing. Would never

produce consistent business growth. like, she knew was possible. Like the

big

dogs we see making millions every day. so, she drew a pile of dog poo on the whiteboard, crossed it out and told her team stop everything.

We have to invent a new way to go.

The first time she applied this new approach, she went from 400 leads

to 10,000 leads with just one Facebook

ad and one landing page.

Her next unlock was her webinar, which went from zero sales to one in every five. Attend. That's when

she

ran into her current business partner, a woman who was already successful in her own, right, as an entrepreneur, CEO And

champion of women in tech, she co founded a $20 million tech company in just 17 months. She brings a nearly two decades of

experience in a variety of roles from management consulting, to business development, communications and entrepreneurship and investor

relations And launching startups. Just to name a few. Together this

passionate duo founded mint CRO to bring an engineering approach to marketing.

This is business growth backed by science, please. Welcome Jessica Jobes and Erin Athene.

Erin: Wow. Thank

you.

Jess: Well, thank

you for that introduction.

Jeffrey: Uh, Jess, I want to start with

you

really quick, cause I know, uh, I've I've known you for awhile and, uh, One of the things we connected on, uh, is your propensity for imperfection, especially when it comes to things like websites and marketing.

I'd love to like kind of lay the groundwork for that kind of

concept.

Jess: Yeah.

that's great. I think, um, that's a really good place to start and we do go way back. You were running my first, I think, I, think you purchased the program. You were one of the fi like when you're talking about the webinar or one out of five purchase, you purchase through that webinar. Yeah.

So

yeah. Yeah, it's been a while. Uh, Yeah. So one of the things I noticed in the agency that I worked for right out of leaving, um, the engineering organization, that agency, we spent four months developing the perfect product, the perfect website, all these decisions are being made about what made that So

perfect.

And then. Um, we did our launch and it was a massive failure. And I realized that took us four months to run our first test because when I think of testing and getting data, it's when I think of testing, it's getting data like what's, how do you know

which direction to go in? The

only way you know, is to put it in front of your audience and to get that, feedback back, hopefully it's like real click data or real conversion date.

Um, versus

asking, do you like this, or do you like that? It's actually like getting that action taken by your audience. So anyway, so the,

that first test with that client took four

months to get that data back.

Whereas the imperfection comes from like, how

fast can you take an idea from your head and get it in front of your audience and get that

click data.

And a lot of times whoever's running that test. Isn't the best designer. Isn't the best copywriter can't make something perfect. And so you learn to live with that imperfection because getting

the data back is more important than having the perfect, whatever that is that you

Jeffrey: I love that. I L I since we first met like that, that was

why

I was

probably one of the first there. I was like, this

is different. This is totally different than what

everyone else is

doing. Uh, I came from, you know, web

development

background and I've

had, I can't even tell you how many

projects sat in develop. because the site owner was like, no, it's gotta be perfect, before I launch it. It's just not right. Can we change the font? Can we change this color? Can we try this over here? Can we try it? It was like, you know, the mover trying to

move the

refrigerator, the, the grand piano. Let's try it upstairs. Oh, let's try it downstairs.

Let's see what it looks like in the bathroom, know? And we're like, how do you, like, is this

gonna make a difference? Who cares? Who cares?

Erin: Can I, can I share something about that?

Cause you're, you're speaking to a deep pain point

because I, when I met Jess, I

had a marketing agency, we built a websites, um, and we built software for the BC government and Canada. And we were building websites and doing digital marketing

campaigns. And I was always in the middle of.

Horrible arguments between the client who wanted the font and the layout this way and the colors this way. And then my graphic designer, who's

trained as a designer and they're saying, that's going to look horrible and really you should have it this way. And they, you know, had

all of their opinions about it.

And then of course I'm in the middle and I'm more the

strategy person. Okay. And I'm just going okay. Like I've been inside of really fast growing

companies. I, you know, that first software company that I built in 17 months, we went to 20 million.

I promise you, we did not argue about.

Color, uh, layout. I mean, none of it, I had this, I was in the middle of these arguments going, I feel like we're, we're not talking

about the right stuff.

And you know, none of these things are the needle movers. And at the end of the day, it was all opinion-based. And I, you know, I'm not the buyer of their product. The client's not the buyer. And my graphic designer

is not the buyer. And the web designer is not the button. Right. What I loved when I was. Jess.

And

I understood this approach, this engineering approach to marketing. what I loved

about it. Was it so lean it's so lean startup it's so customer discovery,

it's just like straight into

market validation. You don't waste any time. My opinion and your opinion, how about let's

go

straight to your potential

buyer and see what do they actually click on? Not what they tell you their opinion

is, what do they actually take action on? And that's what we measure, which is so different. Anyway. So I just, I can't even tell you

how grateful I am. I have never been in an opinion

based argument since our company totally

shifted. We are data

informed a hundred percent

data and.

By the market.

Jeffrey: I love that. I love that. And so Aaron, that's a perfect segue here. Uh, given your background, you know, I think you can spot a good thing when you see it. So tell us how,

uh, when you met Jess,

you.

know, and she explained what she was doing, uh, what, what was that meeting like?

And you're, uh, beginning to work together and

Erin: Yeah, we met actually down at, um, Sumo con in Austin, Texas was the first place. So I went to a marketing conference and, um, had fun. And anyway, then circled back in San Diego for the next marketing conference down there. And, um, I just checked in with her and was like, oh, how are things going? And. I see my background after, after my software company failed, my

$20 million company went to zero six

months later after huge success, I call that entrepreneurial whiplash.

It was really shocking. Um, but after. I was asked to be an advisor and an entrepreneur in residence are called EIRs at tech accelerator. So I would coach these different, um, early stage tech founders and CEOs, and I was coaching them on the best practices out of Silicon valley. So I was teaching them lean startup, customer discovery, market validation, and you know, the best of the best we're going out there and interviewing about 30 5:00 PM. And 35 people, it take them about 90 days to interview 35 of who they thought was their best customer and learn a bunch of.

Jeffrey: Yeah.

Erin: then I'm leaning over the justice shoulder at these conferences going, what are you doing? What are you doing? And like, meanwhile, her company is just taking off. Like, I mean, pretty easy growth.

Every time I see her as radically grown, I remember the next conference. I was like, so what are you doing all day? And she's like, oh, I'm just doing hot yoga. She's like, totally just fixed weeks straight of hot yoga. Cause she cause she built a fully packed. Sales funnel that produced predictable revenue and just grew.

And I said, Jess, hold on a second. So rare, like I work with so many entrepreneurs who would want your life. And, uh, and the difference being is it with this testing methodology, I can get input from 400 people in 24 hours like that. I don't have to wait 90 days and do 35 interviews. Only 35 data points I can get.

And that's their opinion, this, these 400 people, it's actually what they took action on, which is really different. That's sub count subconscious data versus conscious answers. So that's what

I loved

Jeffrey: that's, that's huge. I think we need to unpack a little bit of that, right? So the first thing we need to unpack is how the hell are you? 400 people's feedback in 24 hours. And then we can, then we can definitely touch on like the difference

between, uh, what you just said, conscious, uh, feedback versus

unconscious feedback.

Erin: right, right. Um, and just to be clear, and we only spend $25 in that 24 hour. So, I mean, think of what, if you went to a market research. How much you would have to pay to get focus groups, get all this stuff. And the end of the day, you have a really beautiful, beautiful, fancy report about what these focus groups told you, but you don't have any sales.

You don't have any actual actionable, you know, you have everyone's opinion. So you have everyone's. You know, and people are very nice. And when their conscious mind, they're going to tell you, oh yeah, I like the blue one instead of the green one, like this ad over that ad. But in fact, they might click the green ad all day and buy from that.

And that's what you didn't learn from that period. So I love measuring the actual, real subconscious data because all sales are made from a subconscious, you know, that's how people make decisions.

Jeffrey: Yeah.

Katie: Yup. I love this. I'm like trying to just equate it in my mind because we have our clients do significant market research. And we give them 14 days to do it and we give them our whole process. And, um, and, and I started saying like, don't ask people, how much would you pay for this

program? Because consciously they're going to give you some answer.

That just sounds reasonable.

Erin: Yes.

Katie: And then they go and spend double

Erin: Yeah.

Katie: a

week later because their emotions got involved in the decision as opposed to during the interview. right? so I think you can get good data from an

interview, but I love this process because there is so much about the unconscious

and adds as a perfect way to run

Erin: And I don't mean to down there is great value in what you're doing those interviews. And what we would do is we

would take that data from the interviews and we'd run it quickly in a 24 hour tests for twenty-five dollars. And we would see from 400 other people how they aligned

with those

Jeffrey: Yeah. it's

it's

Katie: I think our interviews give us a starting point and then you guys can take it.

Erin: Yeah. That's great.

Jeffrey: So Jess, how did you come up with this whole sending this idea?

Jess: It was

Jeffrey: Yeah.

Jess: after the

Erin: Right after that.

Jess: uh, I actually, that's a great question. This takes me back. I had a

client who, um, I had a lot of

ideas and I wanted a way I wanted to show

off basically. Um, I have a show up. I have a

show off gene, which is, Hey, look at me, look how cool I am. Um, but essentially I he had a lot of ideas and I

wanted to be able to come back

and be like, these are good ideas.

These are not good. I just needed that way to give him that feedback. And I also had started tinkering around with Facebook.

And so I was starting to learn the capabilities of the platform. And,

um, anyway, I just threw up a bunch of ideas all at the same time, everything about the ad was the same, except whatever that copy was different on each of those ads.

And, and then I just, um, I got click data on it.

and I took it back to him. He was shocked. He's like nobody has ever been able to give me data. And he was a

former Microsoft executive. He's used to having data

and feedback. And so, um, so I I, knew I was onto something

there. And then I, and for me too, it really satisfied

kind of this gut calling of like I need data.

I need fast feedback,

you know? Cause when we were running 230,000 tests a month on

my

engineering, We had so much, so many tests, so many

ideas, so much data and then when I didn't have any of that, there

was this,

like, there was a gap. I didn't really know what it was or how to articulate it.

But once I started to get that data again, And that fast feedback, it just felt like this is right.

This is, this is exactly, you know, what you need in

order to grow a business. And it's, it's actually amazing because it was once

I got. Face figured out how to use click data on Facebook ads and

figured out the next two tools in

our tech stack and Jeff, you know, these and happy to share them. But anyway, once we, once I

got those three tools all working together, I hadn't

figured out how to get a page converting. But my, but I

knew that it was going to happen. I just knew it I was like, because

I have The agility, I have the data I need I have the fast feedback from my audience. I have the ability to iterate on the page really fast. I ha I can see

everything that's happening so I can like read the data and get all the gray areas that I need.

And,

and so it took me

three weeks to get that first

page

converting. But

the first

day that I started running tests with

Jeffrey: Yeah, because you had identified. The only relevant information you really

need to know, to tell if a page is working or not. Right. Basically like how many people are coming there? What are they doing there and where are they leaving?

Did I miss anything?

Jess: Yep. Yeah,

Erin: Uh, yeah, I mean, I would add really like what Jess was solving for was removing marketing blind

spots. And it's really, and I didn't even realize as a marketing agency owner, how many blinds I have and I knew, I you know, I knew there was a lot wrong with all

the best practices of digital marketing, but, and I

knew it was a good

idea to have heat maps.

And I knew all this stuff, But I didn't relate to it.

You literally shouldn't be building anything

without this data because you're building it with complete blind spots. You have no idea what is actually happening on the page. So,

Jeffrey: It really is equivalent to a non-designer saying, well, I think it should be this font. I really think it should be this

color. Right. Well, you don't know, and there's no data to back that up. You're just like, well, I think so.

Erin: Exactly. Yeah.

So what Jess is describing

Jess: can we.

Erin: laboratory that she, she wants, she created the little lab. She was

like, I can do micro tests.

Jess: And actually I'd love to, uh, Steve Piper's here from mint as well. I'd love to introduce him because, uh,

he got to experience all of this

as well,

Erin: Yeah.

Jess: firsthand

Steve: I think I was one of the first maybe the first is

pre mint

before we, before we call it.

Erin: it was the beta group. it

was the beta group before we knew the name.

Steve: I had met her at a Jeff Walker

launch conference and she turned around at the very

first break and

she

said something about like one day to a

0% conversion rate.

And I was like, who wants a 0%

conversion rate?

Like,

a desire? Is that, am I missing something here? She's like, oh no.

You just get something going, you know, and then you can gather the data and see how people respond to it. And then pretty soon you're converting really well. And I was like, huh. And it turns out they

were onto something, something fairly significant.

Erin: And I'll, I'll never forget meeting

Steve because he said something that just has always stayed with me. He said, I'd rather chew glass than run Facebook ads. My business.

Steve: Shoot a lot of

Katie: That's how I feel.

Erin: But the funny part is we don't run the Facebook ads. We just did the training. So it actually just empowered Steve to be able, and he has

phenomenal background engine engineering mindset background. He's worked with fortune 500 companies. He's a bestselling author. Steve's amazing. So you bet he is a data

driven person and I think that's more.

Once you knew this, it's more

like he'd rather to glass than run a muck around in the middle of a bunch of blind spots and

not

really knowing how to measure anything. But once you had this, I

remember the first day you started you, you texted me the first day you tried this methodology. I just, this just paid for the entire training today because

you could

see people leaving your site and you could see why. and

there was this glitch and you

just

fixed it like that

Steve: Yeah, people were getting

Erin: yeah,

Steve: funny. I still think about this

Sometimes

people were

just getting that there was a, there was a script that had

gotten. No, not disabled or something, but people were, were trying to sign up on the landing page for my site. And they were just being time warped, randomly to someplace else.

And I had no idea this was happening. It been happening for weeks. I don't know how many thousands of people had wound up in Neverland and who were trying to sign up for my, my program. And I added the tools that Jess and Aaron recommended and it's like, holy smokes. I mean, I'm glad I found this, but how much money did. Just burn, you know, just take out in the backyard and light on fire, because I just had no clue what was happening. It had no concept that I could have had a clue, but what the heck is going on on my site.

So yeah.

Jeffrey: your website's not going to like notify you and say, by the way, I'm not working.

Steve: it's,

that's one thing I noticed. They

rarely do that

for you.

It's certainly not on time. Maybe they'll tell you after the fact. Oh yeah. Sorry.

Jeffrey: Right.

Erin: And I mean, I wish I could say Steve story is

rare, unfortunately. So common. In fact, he is one of the lucky ones who only wasted a few thousand dollars running ads to a page that was, you know, doing that. We talk to people

all the time who run. I mean, we, one

company, uh, $15,000

per month running on an

ad that was producing zero sales because they couldn't read the data properly. I mean, it was just. Sir, you know, so anyway, we're kind of on this mission, this crusade to save people from just wasting all our marketing dollars. And we always, we have a joke called it as duck check. It says Zack PO pocket check is, is, are you giving money unnecessarily to Facebook because you don't need to, they're doing fine.

They don't need more of your money. You know, you need that money for your business. So, yeah.

Katie: So I'm curious, does

this just

work on Facebook or can you do this similar methodology on

the other platforms?

Jess: Yeah. So that's a really good question. Uh

that's

for the

testing, Facebook ads is still the cheapest, fastest place to get click data from your audience.

Um, we wish there was another platform we

could do this on.

Um, there either to the other

platforms are

either too cost prohibitive

to get that, that click data, or they just aren't agile enough.

You can't get that fast

feedback from your audience or they're too niche

like Pinterest, for example, doesn't is, is more of a niche platform.

Um, and so.

Yeah. So

even if Pinterest were to improve their platform all the way

to the point that Facebook ads is it still doesn't have that broad

audience that Facebook does.

Um, and So.

we're hoping we're hoping Tik TOK is going to

give us the

testing capabilities that Facebook ads does. It's still pretty early days and we haven't, um,

it's still pretty glitchy.

So eventually we're hoping.

Steve: Plus you have to learn how to dance to be on Tik

TOK.

We don't know how to dance

Jeffrey: right.

Katie: Well, and you have to be 15 to enjoy that platform. So.

Jess: Yeah.

Erin: But, but one of the things that's the beauty behind this methodology is it is platform agnostic. Meaning people get confused, they think, oh it can I only run Facebook ads? No, actually this is just how you test and find out what is the perfect headline for your lungs. Wouldn't you want to know that run a $25 test in 24 hours with a bunch of different headlines.

And you'll see. So Facebook can give you that really fast feedback. Now you might have a business. We've had lots of people. One woman comes to mind, um, who had a, um, Amazon product and a Shopify product. And she found that all of her audience was on Pinterest, for example, and that's where they bought, but she did all of her tests.

In Facebook using our methodology. And then she took those winning ads and put them on the platform where your people are buying. So she went to Pinterest and it actually, uh, eight times her revenue without increasing her ad spend. So this is the other key is like keeping really low, efficient ad spend.

And then she eight times our revenue, because she was saying the right things. Amazing. And you actually resonate with

your audience.

Jeffrey: Okay. Let's, let's

talk about this for a second. Cause you, you touched on something that's so

important and you just talked about how she was spending the same amount on ads, but getting vastly different, uh, results. So, so tell me about this engineering approach. What do you look for? What kind of things are you testing?

What, uh,

what's a successful,

uh,

Erin: Um, that's a great

question. Kind of just to frame

it, to give context is, you know, we really just, we're going to the 1% of fastest growing companies in the world, we call them the big dogs. It's the Netflix, it's the Spotify, Facebook, all the big dogs. And what do they do to grow so fast? And so predictably month after month

and what they do is they test like engineers. they engineered tests. So they're not really guessing

Like marketers do a lot of guessing and that produces a lot of spotty results. Um, they

test inside of a laboratory, a separate space. So we actually teach you the exact same thing, but on a

really economical level where you don't need thousands of engineers, you don't need

million dollar budgets. You need $25 for 24 hours and you need a

test laboratory. We call it a test lab. It's a fancy word for a couple pieces of software you put together. That works really well to be able to read all your data. Um, but inside of that,

there are high impact tests and there are low impact tests. And so where we see people get into trouble sometimes is they spin their wheels on low impact tests.

For example,

Jeffrey, you would know anything about this.

I'm sure, but some people who want to spend a lot of time figuring out the call to action button, color, the color of the call to

action button. Well, that might be, you know, if you've had. Sand pebble rock Boulder. You know, that, that those type thing we call them tests.

So there's Boulder tests, the really big, high impact tests that move the dial. Those are the needle movers for your

business versus sand pebble and rock tests, which would be like the call to action buttons. So we really focus people in our training on the Boulder tests. Really, those will give you those two X to 10 X returns and improve. Um, you run those big tests and later you do need to figure out the button color, which is don't know at first let's, you know, let's a refining

apps you're going to do later.

Jeffrey: that's a huge priority right

there.

Katie: Yeah.

Steve: And it can sound intimidating to talk about it in terms

of like engineering, especially if you don't have an engineering background and what are we doing? Are we flipping switches and writing code? But really the test that you're designing is just to answer the question, like there's a hundred true and accurate ways to describe what you're doing, which ones resonate best with your market, which ones do they respond to?

And I've seen it over and over and it, and it's in all of my own testing. It's the same way that I think one angle. One, um, one benefit to what I'm offering is going to be the one that people really respond to. And it turns out not even to be close to what they're interested in. It's only because I tested a bunch of different angles and I can do it very quickly and very inexpensively.

And, um, I can test dozen variations in 24 hours for 25 bucks and I can get my mind right inside of a day. Instead of spending hundreds of thousands of dollars and half a year chasing an idea that turns out to have been well-intentioned but misguided. So the testing infrastructure is just sort of this, uh, built this.

Um, it just gives us the ability to discover what the humans that we're here to serve actually want from us and the language that matters to them, the way they're thinking about the problem that we're trying to help them. So. And that's the magic. It's not Facebook versus tick-tock versus Google versus Pinterest or clicks versus purchases of all the things that's it's what are the humans thinking and how do we reach them and how do we serve them?

And, uh, that's really what I think that they were trying to discover. And you can do that on a very granular level, you know, your headlines and your subheads. You can, when you can get crazy with it and you can build your whole webinar on concepts that really resonate with your phone. What were your, your launch materials?

Um, you're no longer spending like, uh, weeks in a vacuum, hoping and praying that all the brilliance that you hatch completely on your own is going to somehow magically work for the world. And instead you can test each one of those little gyms that, that feel so precious to you and discover

that, ah, maybe this one wasn't so precious and

this other one that I just about didn't bother testing.

That's the winner. So, um,

Katie: Yeah,

Jeffrey: I, I asked my mom and my brother and they said it was great.

So

Katie: right.

Steve: And that's an important point too, about the difference between like, what do people really do versus what do they say they would do when they're just being nice to you? Because you asked them a question. But it's nothing close to what they would really do out in the wild.

Jeffrey: Yeah.

Katie: and, and I'll say, um, you know, yeah, the word engineering for someone like me does feel overwhelming. Cause I, when I say someone like me, I just mean like I was a scholar in grammar and spelling and I was an English teacher. So it was always like the joke of like, Don't ask me anything math. Where's my calculator.

But, but Aaron kind of eased my mind when you were talking about, you know, there's technology that reads the data for you. I'm like, oh wow. That, that is so cool that I don't have to like analyze. Cause like the very few times that I've even gotten in the back end of Facebook ads, I just, I just. Ah, like it might as well be written in Chinese.

I have no idea. And I get, like, my frustration level goes from zero to. Instantaneously. And then I just know that's just not my lane. I have to hire for it or get jeopardy. That's not my lane. And I'm very clear on that. So you were saying, oh, most people want to learn how to run ads and I'm thinking not me,

Erin: oh,

Katie: it's, you know, but it sounds like you're really helping people like me who have been overwhelmed, make sense of it.

So I think that's awesome.

Erin: big time. And Katie, thank you for making that distinction because, um, I myself owned a

digital marketing agency, never ran at hired genius people to run ads. However, I didn't have this. So the way that I describe it now to entrepreneurs and to marketing agency owners who, um, maybe also, you know, hire teams out.

Um, but I think of it mostly like for an entrepreneur. I didn't have the control to grow my own business because I didn't know what dials to turn and, you know, you could give me and I, you know, I know Jeffery's totally great at all this stuff. I, you could show me Google analytics and I love data, but I would glaze over because I don't know which thing to turn the dial that's actually going to grow.

My company significantly like the real needle movers. And so what I loved was like, how this boils it down. I'm like you, Katie and. Don't give me, like, show me the backend of the Facebook ads platform. And I'm just like, Ugh, but but show me a couple of things I know which numbers to look at. And I know if that number is too high, that did not resonate with my audience.

That's all I need to know. My market did not like that. If that number is the right name. Oh, that's what we call a gold coin?

Do you know? Our people love gold coins. It just means stuff that totally resonates like Steve, Steve, did a great job, uh, example of like this isn't about what platform or that it's about the humans behind it and serving them in a way that you're actually empathetically resonating with them and really meeting their needs.

Yeah.

Jess: I give a example of a gold coin?

Erin: Yeah.

Jeffrey: Yes,

Jess: Steve, Steve, you might want to try to think of some too. So when, uh, Steve was saying like some of your best ideas fail, but some of the ones that you never would have tested end up doing well. So we're in the marketing space, which is highly competitive. We're competing with every other marketer out there.

So to attract people into our funnel, it's actually like, you really have to cut through. And so, um, one of our gold coins that I couldn't believe worked was the wallet saving blind spot remover. And I'm like, I'm like, what does that even mean? I don't know, but everybody clicks on it. So, so I ended up

Erin: um, that

Jess: yeah,

the wallet saving blinds.

And I remember because there's so many restrictions too, on Facebook ads on what you can, and can't say, so from a copywriting perspective, You have to get really creative. And when you can find that copy, that cuts through, even if it's the silliest thing you've ever written, you're like done. I'm going to start using that because what gets people clicking on Facebook ads is the same stuff that gets them converting.

It's the same stuff that gets them buying from you. So if you can train yourself to get comfortable with just a little bit of click. And go with that signal then that's how, that's how you break through. So that's, I don't know, Steve, if you

have any gold coin ideas,

Jeffrey: wait, please tell me you paired that headline with like a generic

looking spray bottle or something because.

Steve: Yeah.

Jeffrey: I'd buy that. I'd buy that spray

bottle.

Steve: Yeah, you do. You do have to get out of

your, like, you have to

become comfortable testing things that you, you really like, you wouldn't just put out there, like you would never put this on the top of your landing page. If it didn't show up as a winner in a test. That first like personal growth step is to allow yourself to even test some of these ideas.

Like I, um, some of them were bold claims, you know, um, via high ticket that that helps other authors and good number of my folks, uh,

have developed career level incomes in six months or less. And they did it by selling directly to their readers and. And it was one of the other coaches have meant. That was like, great.

Why don't you say, in your silly landing page six months to a career level income selling directly to your readers. And I was like, can I say that, that sounds so boring. And she's like, they're right there, your case studies and your testimonials, then Claire results. That's exactly what you're doing, you know, for people.

So you do have to stretch a little bit to test these things. Um, and you'd be surprised. I mean, That one resonated. And it

was the, the fuel for a very successful launch as well. I wouldn't have tested if someone hadn't given me the nudge and if I didn't have that psychological fallback that says, well, I'll just test it.

Only 400 people will see it. If they think I'm a snitch that's okay. We'll test it and see what happens. And it turned out to be the big winner. Um,

but yeah,

there's all sorts of unexpected.

Jeffrey: Yeah. And it feels like you're, you're

giving, you're actually encouraging that creative

permission, the permission, just to be creative, to be unhindered, to be bold.

Right. And just try it.

Erin: well, And I don't know if you're like me, but some of what inhibits my just trying something is the.

Of it. So a lot of people say, oh, I'd love to, I have a lot of questions about what would market would like, but I don't have thousands of dollars to figure it out. And so, you know, I'm just

like, I'm thinking of Steve, those that was $2 and 50 cents per each idea.

Right. So it allows you more freedom

to test

cause like, okay, I'm not breaking the bank here by testing a few ideas.

Jeffrey: So, so that's interesting because to, or to bring up. I can just tell there are people listening right now thinking the exact same thing. Like I don't, I don't run Facebook ads because I don't have thousands of dollars to do that. It's like, how, how do you guys get it?

Erin: cause we, we teach you how to read predictive data. And so.

Jeffrey: It's a big

word.

Erin: really. Okay.

big

words. So it's the little things, the little tiny, tiny

things.

Jeffrey: out.

Erin: Have you ever want to say Carl Sagan

talks about little tiny thing.

So we read it's micro data. We just, we teach how to read. Metrics that are, that happen within 24 hours.

So you're reading things really fast. If you were a normal marketer with less or anyone really would let that run for quite a while

before they would make a decision because they would say, oh, did they actually purchase

anything? So they might let it run two to four weeks to figure out if that ad created. And so, um, by letting it run, you're going to spend $600 to $2,000, perhaps on one test, this is very common. We ask people all the time, how do you know which ad to run? How do you tell how much does you know, they don't call it a test? They call it marketing. They just say, well, I, I just run my mark. I just run my ads.

And they're like, well, how do you know when to

turn one off? Oh, okay. Well, I have to run it for two to

four weeks and I'll spend,

you know, between

Katie: Yeah. When I wasted thousands of

Erin: to 600.

Katie: and I didn't get results,

I turn them

Erin: Yeah, but you know, but then that's fair. Cause they're

like, oh, well now I know that was a dut, you

know there's and then the one that did produce a sale I'll run that longer.

Whereas we just teach you to read that data really like predictively. You're not waiting for the sale. You're seeing if they won't even click like Steve's exam. If they won't even click on this. I promise you, they're not going to be buying it. So you don't have to worry about waiting for the sale because they're not

even interested in the initial curiosity even to open the door.

Right? So we, we

teach you to look at it really deeply.

Jeffrey: essentially, it's what I hear when I hear the big dogs and what Netflix and Amazon and. They must be using that's that's big data, right? They've got thousands and thousands and thousands and probably millions of customers, all taking certain actions. So they get huge data points.

Jess: Yeah, they do.

Erin: read small data. I mean, it's

yes, it's

Jess: read small data,

Erin: they're reading. That's what just did. That's how she did that at Microsoft, how they had every single month they grew for 49 consecutive months. How do you do that? By reading? Small data actually, because how do they run all those thousands of tests?

They were running very small tests. Actually. They just did it at a scale that you and I, the average entrepreneur, we would

never be running

at that scale, but, but we can do a similar thing at a really small budget,

Jeffrey: wow.

Steve: to

realize that they weren't really doing it at a large purse, with a large percentage of their traffic and their customer base. They're doing a very small percentage of their customer base and their traffic. And then they were making inferences as to what? So let's test 10. Um, two of them are promising at small scale.

Let's do another test at a larger scale, but that's an educated test now and not, uh, not throwing dogs in the dark. So they still use a very small percentage of their, of their, their traffic, a relatively small cost, and they make smart, early decisions based on, Hey, did a lot of people click on this headline?

Well, I bet more will click on it if I show it to more people, right. That's the kind of metrics we're not talking about, like the square root of whatever you're talking about. Did more people click on this or did less fewer people click on it. Right. That's the kind of, that's the kind of math that you have to do, but it will tell you, is this resonating or not resonating?

Erin: It's all I'll even make it simpler than math. It's a thumbs up,

thumbs

Jeffrey: Or a thumbs down.

Erin: That's

it? That's it. And actually the big dogs, they get that data by

putting those little, like things underneath each video. That's that predictive data they're looking for.

Katie: Hmm.

Erin: Hmm.

Katie: All right. Well, I know that our

listeners are like WTF. Do you guys actually do? And how do I learn more?

Erin: I know it is a bit mind blowing. Yeah.

Katie: our, I know we arrange a special gift for our listeners and so I want to make sure they find out about that and can get signed up. Um, and I know you guys do trainings all the time, but you've got something

coming up here. So tell us how to get the deal.

Erin: thank you. And we are just so thrilled to be connected with you guys. Um,

we just love, we want to support people doing launches all over the world. Don't waste your money, doing the launches, you guys.

So do all this great

work with the, with the launch squad and, and hear that you're

listening to.

So, um, So, we offered something and Jeffrey and Katie just went, yes, we want it for our listeners. So we offered what we call and you're going to laugh. Okay. It's called the, like the big dogs. Mini bundle. Why in the world did we call it that? And can I just tell you, like, I don't think that's a good name. I never would have picked that name, but can I tell you that is a gold coin?

Jeffrey: right.

Erin: and market day, click on that all day long. They love it. So I'm going to explain to you what it is cause.

So what we are giving all of your listeners as a gift from, um, lighten your launch, it is $500 worth of curriculum. Plus. Six hours of live training, which includes we'll look at your data.

We teach you how to run your very first test. So we're going to teach you how to run that one $25 test. It's a high impact test. You can learn. You get to just, just for quick explanation, like you. 10 different ideas for a headline for your lunch, will you, we teach you how to put it into a very simple test.

You're going to run it overnight 24 hours and $25 later. You're going to know which one your market actually likes a lot better.

If it's, none of them you'll know that before you do a huge lunch, you'd like to know that you want to make sure you launch with a good, with a good gold coin headline as an example.

So you get all of that six hours of live training. We do copyrighting hot seats. Um, we give you the curriculum. That's yours forever. You do we add Steve here

does data reviews on that?

I add those trainings. Um, he's our head coach

at

Steve: I put on my nerd glasses and I get

Erin: And he puts on his look, he looks at your three metrics and tells you that's a gold coin. That's not a gold coin.

so normally, um, so anyway, you get all of that for just 25. And that is normally, uh, goes for twice that much at, or more we've sold it at different prices. We also teach you how to do price testing.

Hey,

Jeffrey: Oh, my

Katie: Hey, well, that is awesome, Erin. That's a really great, great

gift. And, um, do you have something? Is something coming up

next week?

Erin: do. We have, um, it's called conversion domination live. Uh, and so that is where we spend that's that's that half day of training and a lot of people, they, they take advantage of the curriculum and I hope your listeners do like, just dive in it's. So. Step-by-step paint by numbers. Just how to set up this first little test.

You learn so fast from your market. It's so fun. Like this.

The Steves of the world who hate, would rather chew glass than run Facebook ads. Actually you start to geek out and like, oh my God, I know what my market wants. This is so fun. And so people do that test and then they typically come to the event.

And then in those, that event, we deep dive. And so we're doing it on Wednesday next week. And.

People have us look at their copywriting, um, for, I think three people. Um, so if you have three people you'd recommend, we will actually write all their we'll do their tests for them. Like we'll write all the, the copywriting, um, for their tests.

It's really fun. So it's the cooperating hot seat. And then you get to get the data review

from Steve.

Jeffrey: I think Katie's going to sign up for

Erin: Yeah, totally shit. Oh my God. He's so fun. So fun.

Jeffrey: That is huge. That's incredibly generous.

Wow. Now w what about if people are not listening to, or listening to this after Wednesday? Is this something that can still kind of look

up or

Erin: Yes. That link we give you. So we'll give you the URL and I'll just say here's you always have it. Mint cro.com. It's our website is mint C R o.com. And this the event is always at mint, cro.com forward slash Dominic. Dash now,

and that, that we'll always have our most up-to-date training right there.

And then we have a code we'll give you guys and you can post that and it gives you that training for just $25. So

it's a 50% off the

training.

Katie: Thank you so

Erin: no happy to do

it.

Jeffrey: amazing.

Katie: Yeah. And

thank you

guys so much for your time and just, you know, the, um, the, it was a good conversation. I think it was really informed.

Jess: important, Especially,

Katie: for people like me, who just has a major version to all of Facebook ads in general, that I'm willing to give them 25 bucks.

That's about

Jess: it,

Katie: but I'm willing to spend 25 and do some tests. So I know I'm kidding. I mean, that's the thing I'm willing to spend money on Facebook ads. If I know they're going to work, I've just wasted a lot of. Money. um, and before I used to sell high ticket sales type stuff and I put high ticket and in air quotes, for those of you that are listening, um, and Facebook does Not like that term.

And it's like, you know, a Russian bot gets more rights on the Facebook platform than Katie Collins. So, um, so if your company can help me learn words, not to use

to not waste my money.

Um, with that tech giant,

that would be wonderful. So I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels that

Erin: They're not at all. And I mean, it's just so important to say, you know, you, maybe you don't waste money on ads, but you know, waste your time and energy, trying to build a company towards, in communicating in a way. That your market doesn't resonate with and you might have the most beautiful product, the most beautiful service, but if you're not able to communicate it in a way that it resonates with your market, you're going to spin wheels, whether it's years, whether it's money.

I mean, I know way too many precious, precious friends and entrepreneurs of mine who got totally burned out because they didn't unlock what that was. That right. Message. And we have something we proudly call the pivot posse, which is the proud folks that you test your way in and you find out you need to pivot, like you've learned so much from your market so fast and you go, oh, well now I know, and now I have some choices.

Do I want to build that company the way? And now I understand what my market wants and we've had people. No, that's not the business I want to build. And what's different is they can, in a matter of weeks and just testing for a few weeks or months, they can pivot to the kind of business they do want to build it.

That meets their market where their, what their

market wants to.

So,

Jeffrey: Wow.

Katie: squad clients, you know, had, um, tapped into using you guys over the last six or eight

weeks. And she came

back with a lot of new ideas and,

oh, this, you know, I thought this was going to work, but I'm going

to shift it over here instead.

Jeffrey: right. In fact, she, she discovered her lead magnet needed to be different.

Right. How she was attracting

Erin: lead markets. Right. And I think for her, we actually did what we call an unlock, which is

really it's our, it's our, only done for you service. And that's where we'll actually, we will totally.

And build your first two assets for you. So we will completely, so you don't have to be in there at all, but we'll completely test and build your high converting traffic ad and we'll completely test a high converting landing page for opt-ins.

And we guarantee that over 25% on. Opt-in page. So these are really high converting assets that we know that we know. And we also give you a whole spreadsheet of all your gold coins, so you can use it. And like you should be talking that way you should, it should be in your webinar. You want to throw throughout your emails, you want it in your subject lines.

Jeffrey: Yeah. And I love how those, when you are finding those gold coins, they can, they're not just headlines you should use on your landing page, but there are also concepts that you can test and create entire sales pages or courses and

Erin: new province. Yeah,

Jeffrey: yeah, right everywhere. There's just every there's no, there's no limit to really what you can do.

I think this is so profound.

Erin: yeah,

Katie: Yep. Well, I'm really glad we got to have you guys here. Jeffrey has been singing your

praises for Two years that we've been meeting practically daily.

So, um,

so

yeah, it was, it was, uh, it was a delight,

Erin: Ah, seven

Katie: um, and yeah, super helpful. So we will definitely

check out your event and, uh, for our listeners, we'll get that link in the show

notes.

Um, and

Erin: And that's, that's an evergreen link, so it's happening next Wednesday, but that link will always update to the next

training that's available. So,

yeah.

Jeffrey: awesome. Excellent. So, so awesome. Thank you guys. Thank you all for being here, Steve, Aaron and Jess. Thank you so much for your time. And I just really want to express that for, cause I know you guys are busy and I think you guys are doing an amazing groundbreaking thing that nobody else has.

I think it's profound and I'm, it's an honor to have you guys talk about

this on the podcast.

Steve: thank you such an honor to be.

Erin: Well, thank you for yes. Providing a platform to get the word out because it can save businesses and totally transform them. So, yeah. Thank you. All right.

Jeffrey: All right. Thanks everybody for joining us. And if you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a five star review and hit that subscribe button, and you can check out all the show notes and these amazing links to what we're talking about [email protected] forward slash episode 55. All right, we'll see you guys next time.

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About the Show

The Lighten Your Launch Podcast is for Coaches and Course Creators who want a lighter online launch experience. Maybe you’ve done a few launches already, and feel exhausted just thinking about it! Or, it’s been one of your goals, but you don’t know where to start.

Tune in to learn from our team of experts, The Launch Squad, who aren’t afraid to dig into all aspects of launching: sales, strategy, technology, mindset, funnels, and even a bit of woo to get you through the toughest times. Let’s put a stop to perfectionism and procrastination, and finally take your launch from intimidating to money-making!