00:00:01 You are listening to the Scaling to Freedom Podcast and if you are an online coach or course creator, you are in the right place. I’m your host, Christina Bernhard. I’m an ads agency owner that gets an inside look every day on what’s working and what doesn’t in the online coaching space. I’m here to share with you what we see works in our agency as well as what we see happening and changing in the industry. Stay tuned to up level your coaching business to have the freedom you want. Let’s get started.

00:00:31 Welcome to episode 187. In this episode, we’re going to be talking about green flags for being ad ready. So whenever you are wanting to run ads, and maybe you’ve ran ads in the past and it maybe didn’t work out and so you’re not running them anymore, it really is so important that you are nailing the timing of when you start ads. So there are a lot of misconceptions on when that is. So I want to go over kind of like a checklist and once you feel good about these different items that I’m going to go over, then I think you’re in a great place to start ads.

00:01:06 So these are some of the things that I go over in discovery calls whenever I’m having calls with people to see if we are a fit. It’s not just about whether we are a fit. While that’s important, it’s also are ads even a good fit for this business right now? And if you’re already running ads and they’re working, then obviously it’s fine. But if you are someone who is curious about whether this is a good time for you, this episode is definitely for you.

00:01:37 So the first thing is that you have a tested and proven offer. So this offer needs to be something that is selling. So I have heard of people and it’s been a while, but I have had some people apply for the agency and their reason for wanting to do ads is because they are not making sales. This is not a good time to be starting ads. Ads are going to just amplify the fact that you are not making sales and it’s going to be a loss. You’re not going to get a return. So you have to have that tested and proven offer. So do you know your conversion rates? That’s huge. Is your funnel converting?

00:02:16 And one thing that you can do also is I do have the ROAS calculator, the Return on Ad Spend Calculator. It’s free. And you do need to know your numbers to see if you can afford ads. So this calculator helps you with that. You can go to my website, I’ll put a link in the show notes as well to download that and it will help you put in which numbers you need to put in, but also help you with if you have to estimate how to do that as well.

00:02:43 So definitely recommend downloading that to see that. But if you have that tested and proven offer and things are converting, then that’s a really great place to start. You at minimum need to have this. So you don’t want to start ads before you have an offer that is selling and you know that it’s wanted and it’s proven. The second thing is, have you nailed your messaging? Now this is always evolving, right? So there’s never going to be a point where you have made it in the sense that you never have to worry about messaging again or doing any kind of market research. But I will say with ads and with anything really, it’s all about the messaging so the algorithm can find your people. The algorithm is going to be it still is very powerful. There’s lots of data behind it and you can really point it in the right direction if the creatives are top notch.

00:03:34 So the ad creative has to be something that is scroll stopping. It’s got to stop people in the feed so that they’ll even look at it. It has to speak to your ideal client and it needs to communicate the message and the right feeling and it also needs to encourage action. So these are a lot of different things and a lot of different components and you have to nail it to have an ad campaign do really well and get a high return. The creative is so important, I can’t stress it enough. It’s even more important than it ever has been. Also, there is just so much more competition. The ads are more expensive. And I don’t say that to discourage you in any way, but I do say that just to show and remind you that it’s not going to work if the messaging and the creative is not really good. So that is the way now.

00:04:28 It used to be when I first started running ads, you could put together not so great ad and it worked. It was really cheap and people responded to it. It was also just a different time where internet marketing was still kind of like up and coming. It was getting bigger and bigger. So webinars and things like that were still just kind of new and so a lot of people responded to those things. Now the stakes are a lot higher, like the competition is a lot higher. You do have to be better at this. And so it’s really important that you’ve nailed your messaging. It’s going to make a huge difference in your return and the performance of your ad. So the way that you would nail this is through market research and then trial and error.

00:05:12 That’s pretty much what it comes down to. So definitely figuring that out. Having sales calls I do have another episode about sales calls that I highly recommend checking out if you are unsure of doing it. But a big bonus and benefit of having sales calls is that you basically get to have market research kind of built into your business and you’re having these conversations with your potential clients and getting to know them better. And all of that is going to be huge in having those returns and having those funnels convert and having that offer put together in the right way and nailing that messaging.

00:05:50 The third thing is having proper expectations. So I wanted to put this in here because I want to make it clear that while ads are instant, and by instant I mean that when you press a button and you upload everything into it, it instantly goes out into the world. But ads are not magic and they do take time because the algorithm does need data, tests need to be ran, you need to test out different creatives. You need to try those different creatives. The audience that you’re bringing in is colder, so your sales process might need to be adjusted for that.

00:06:27 If you are someone who has been live launching or you’ve been launching mostly organically, and then you’re switching to using ads, so you’re having more colder people. Whereas before, maybe when you’ve launched the last couple of times, it has been people who have followed you for who knows how many years. And then now you’re going into ads, it’s going to be a colder audience. So that also takes time to re-optimize that for that. And it might also just take multiple launches or several months to figure it out.

00:06:58 So this time is nothing compared to the reward. So putting money in, getting more money out is a huge reward. It’s definitely worth the journey, but it is a journey. So I think it’s really important to have proper expectations. So if you have an offer and you have a newer funnel and your goal is to hit a million dollars in six months and you’ve never done anything like that before, and you don’t have a massive audience or something like that, just doing ads, like just adding ads to your strategy, is not enough.

00:07:32 It’s a journey and it takes a lot of other variables and components. So make sure that you understand the process. And if you are confused about that, if you want to apply for the agency, whenever I get on discovery calls, we talk about those expectations as well, just so that you are aware of what that journey looks like and also just to see if we can help you with whatever that goal is. So if you are trying to quadruple your business next week, we can have that conversation and decide if we are the right fit. But having those proper expectations is so important before you get into ads because you are investing money.

00:08:07 So you don’t want to be disappointed and be seven days in and wondering why you’re not a millionaire or whatever the case is. I’m obviously being dramatic and silly, but sometimes that’s actually the case, but it’s typically not quite that dramatic. But also you just want to make sure that you have the proper expectations, right? So the fourth thing is that you are ready to invest consistently. So you don’t want to pull in and out of ads. And I went over this last week on the podcast. It’s a shorter episode, so definitely check that out. I just break down whether you should pause ads. What are some good reasons to pause them? What are some not so good reasons to pause those?

00:08:46 Because you don’t want to be pulling in and out. So make sure you’re at a point where you are ready to invest consistently. You can actually afford this as a business expense to regularly every month put that money towards ads. It’s really important too, because you want to make sure that that lead generation is consistent and it’s building momentum. It’s going to help your sales process, but it’s also just going to help overall, just having those leads coming in. If you do pull in and out initially, you might not see a hit, but it will happen later because depending on whatever your purchase cycle is. So if the average person goes into your world, if the average person takes like three months to convert and start working with you, then you might not see that hit come in for three more months. So you just need to be aware of that. And that’s also another reason why pulling in and out of ads isn’t really recommended. So you want to make sure that you’re ready to have that consistent investment.

00:09:43 And my personal recommendation also is that you don’t want to be in a situation where you can’t actually afford ad spend and you’re just putting it on a credit card and hoping for the best. It’s just you want to invest strategically when it’s the right timing, when you’re more likely to actually get a return. It’s going to be a journey regardless, and you don’t really know how long that journey is going to be. So I recommend starting this at the point where you do have the money to invest. That’s a good time to amplify what is working. Also, it’s a good indicator that things are working. If you do have revenue, then your offer is selling. It seems like your sales process is converting. So that’s also a good time to start ads as well. The last thing is, is your business ready for traffic?

00:10:32 So I do also have some podcast episodes about this, about the effects that having volume going through your business, what that looks like. And sometimes whenever people start ads and they have that volume going through, it’s a good thing, right? They have lots of people coming through, they have lots of people purchasing, but also they’re seeing like just operationally in the business, things start to break. So this is where the back end operations and support is really important. We don’t want things to break once that volume starts going through.

00:11:03 So it’s the back end operations and support your systems and processes and an integrated team. So having a team that you can really rely on is super important, of course. And there are lots of information out there on all of that and your systems and having that back end really solid. So I won’t go into that. It’s also not my expertise.

00:11:25 But you do want to make sure that all of that is put together and ready for traffic, because Ads do ramp up the volume. And so you want to make sure that you can actually manage that volume of people. So sometimes volume can be a bad thing. It feels very glamorous to have even more people coming through and even more sales, even more clients and all of that, but it can be a nightmare. So make sure that back end is ready for that.

00:11:54 So those are the main checklist items. I think that if you meet all of these five things, these five things that I went over, then you are ready for Ads. I think that you’re probably in a good place for them. So the first thing is tested improve an offer. Second thing is that you’ve nailed your messaging, you have proper expectations, you are ready to invest consistently and your business, the back end of it, is ready for that traffic and things aren’t going to break.

00:12:23 I mean, obviously all of this is going to be going to be an ongoing thing. You’re never going to have the offer is never going to be completely perfect. The messaging is always going to be evolving, all of these things. But once you’re at a good place with all of these areas, ads are definitely a good place to start with. Ramping up that volume and amplifying what is already working in your business so you can grow and scale it to whatever you want to grow and scale to.

00:12:50 So that is what I have for you today. I hope that you found that helpful. If you have any questions, definitely connect with me on Instagram. My DMs are always open. I would be happy to help.

00:12:59 And of course, if you need any support or have any questions about whether the agency is right for you, definitely don’t hesitate to either DM me on Instagram or go ahead and apply and we can get on a call and chat about it. So, hope you have found this helpful and I hope that you all have a wonderful week. Thank you for listening to the Scaling to Freedom podcast. If you are a seven figure coach looking for ads management with an agency that partners with you to get your work out into the world and amplify your impact, see if we are a good fit by applying for a spot in our agency at christinabernhardt.com/apply. Find the link in our show notes.