Guest Appearance on The Goal Digger Show: Business Coaches Need Support Too!

When you’re a female entrepreneur building your business and chasing your goals, it can feel like you need to already have your shit together before you even start.

You need to be one of those women like Oprah Winfrey or Marie Forleo who oozes confidence, persuasiveness and marketing skills.

You need to be crystal clear on the steps you need to take to launch your business and make it a profit-generating success. At least that’s how we are often made to feel, isn’t it?

But the truth is, even these women had to start from somewhere to make their dreams a reality.

They believed in their vision, trusted their community and invested in coaches and courses that would help them grow, change and build the skills they needed. That’s how they achieved their incredible level of business success.

And that’s exactly what I have been doing so far in my business journey too, especially a few weeks ago when I was invited to be a special guest on the world-renowned podcast The Goal Digger Show, hosted by Jenna Kutcher.

Today I’d like to share with you the story of this eye-opening experience including how being brave and taking action brought this opportunity my way, how I overcame my fear of being seen and what my key takeaways were from our conversation. Enjoy!

Getting the support to launch the podcast

I’d been following Jenna for a while but decided to take the plunge and sign up for her programme back in April.

It was just before I launched the Eleshia Show podcast and I was starting to get jittery about the whole thing.

I wasn’t sure that I was on the right track and was even considering pushing back the launch date or, worst-case scenario, giving up on the dream completely. Yes, I loved the idea of chatting and adding value to my community, but the whole editing and marketing thing felt completely overwhelming. (I’m sure you’ve been there too!!)

I decided that the best way forward was to hire a team which ended up being my first big win! Doing the course confirmed that this was absolutely the right thing to do. And as they say, the rest is history! 

I’m so glad that I didn’t push the launch date back because these last couple of months have been so amazing! I love looking at the stats and seeing that we’ve been heard in another country and the downloads numbers are going up steadily.

So far we’ve been heard in 37 countries and 327 cities across the world, and for me sat here in the UK, that's a huge achievement.

Am I anywhere near Jenna’s numbers? Hell no! But I’m feeling super inspired and can’t wait to see where this podcasting journey takes me. I’m so happy that I took the plunge!

Expressing my gratitude

After my positive experience with the course and Jenna’s support, I was feeling so uplifted and grateful to have come across her.

So much so that, in the middle of a bad day, I decided to drop her an email to say thanks. It was just my attempt to change my energy with this gratitude practice and she was the first person who came to mind.

I honestly didn’t believe I’d hear anything back. In fact, I was just happy that I’d plucked up the courage to write to her. I just sent the email and didn’t think much more about it.

Fast forward to the next day when I was talking with two of my mastermind buddies. I was sat there telling them that I was thinking of signing up for another programme and they were asking me to prove why I needed to spend this extra money. (Love those two!)

I opened my email to build my case for the course and just so happened to spot a brand new email. It was from Jenna’s editor.

I was like, “WTF???!” and burst into happy tears. Jenna had invited ME for a coaching session to be recorded and aired for the Goal Digger Podcast ….OMG!!!!

I remember running downstairs to tell my husband and he just looked at me blankly.

You know those looks your partner gives you when they just don’t understand your level of excitement and they can’t even hide it?? Haha, yes! That kind of look.

Facing the fear

For me this was everything! I was going to hang out with Jenna Kutcher, the lady who teaches all things business and marketing through her amazing podcast The Goal Digger Show which has over 53 million downloads so far……

I gulped when I did that research!

In fact, that piece of information alone did have me pooping my pants a little bit. I mean, I’m just at the beginning of my podcasting adventure so every download is a win for me.

Then so many questions started to come up;

• Is this really happening?
• Is it really going to be aired?
• Are you going to mess up?
• What if they change their minds?

My brain went into full overload for two weeks!

I mean, I’m not a known name. I don't have a huge Instagram following. Yet here I was being invited to be on a well-established amazingly successful podcast show.

Then my questions switched to, “What the hell can I ask the woman who seems to have covered EVERY aspect of business and podcasting??”

After extensive research and after calming myself right down, I finalised the questions and sent them off.

Of course, I’m a wellness queen so I made sure that I continued with my usual routine of exercise, hydration and nutrition beforehand. I must admit my sleep was a little off because my little one was a little unsettled that week. But I believe that making sure my other three non-negotiables were OK really helped.

By the day before the interview, I was super excited.

Here’s a video insert of how I was feeling the day before.

The session with Jenna

When it came to our actual session, I realised that my anxiety was unfounded- Jenna made me feel soo comfortable! She jumped on the line like we were old girlfriends and literally dived into talking about our kids and her pregnancy.

I felt so at ease, although I still had to push down the nerves. You never know how you’re going to come across, especially knowing that her shows gets tens of thousands of downloads each episode.

I managed to get all of my questions in and she graciously answered every one of them so openly. Yay me!

What I’ve done so far

We discussed so many topics and I’ve already implemented so many of her tips. Here’s a snapshot of what I’ve been up to:

Following her advice, I’ve really started to pay a lot of attention to my insights. I mean, I did before but I’ve now made it a weekly process.

I'm paying attention to the downloads and also the reach and have started to shout out the countries that I’ve been listened to in.

It feels so amazing to actually be able to do that and I love that it's a way that I can connect with the listeners around the world. It takes me back to my raving days when the DJ would shout out your city. I felt so seen so I love this strategy!

Keywords

We’re currently working through existing episode titles and show notes to ensure relevant keywords are sprinkled in them and I’m truly excited. I’ve also revised my show description to add some more keywords that my audience may be searching for.

I wish I’d done this straight away. But I was focused on just getting the show out into the world.

Now that I got over the fear and excitement of it being out there, I’m super excited that I get to learn all of these strategies from Jenna to make even more traction

Celebrating my wins

I’ve been paying attention to the small increase in downloads and I'm loving seeing the podcast grow. I'm here for the long term so I’m celebrating all of those wins. It's so exciting to see!!

Clickable links

I’m making sure there are more clickable links in the show notes to drive traffic.

Monetization

I'm slowly adding more affiliates into the episodes of products that I personally use and that I LOVE LOVE LOVE following Jenna’s advice.

<pI’m also starting to be bolder when it comes to inviting people to work with me and building my email list. I love this idea as it means that I can continue to share the things that I love and you guys know that I’ve used it.

Repurposing existing content

I’ve tweaked and repurposed some of my previous freebie resources. As a side note, I really do believe that email is important. Hey, if I hadn’t had the courage to send that email, I wouldn’t have had this opportunity

Batching episodes

I’ve enjoyed batching some episodes so I can get back into the flow of marketing them properly. As Jenna said, sometimes you can fall behind with marketing. This way I’m giving myself enough time to strategize too which is also great as that's what I love to do.

It also means that it gives me breathing space to continue to grow my business and look after myself whilst doing so.

Social

I’ve recently set up an Instagram account just for the Eleshia Show, because I realised I was getting a little shy about just posting about my show on my main Eleshia Lifestyle page. [Click the link and follow me now!]

It’s early days, but I’m excited for the podcast to have its own page in the world of social media. This way I can track insights well.

But it’s not about doing it all

We also need to carefully select the strategies that work for our unique situations and then implement the ones we believe would work best for us

For example, although I got excited about the possibility of adding another episode per week, I’m going to follow Jenna’s recommendation to stick to the one for now and build up momentum before I do anything else.

I have to remember that I also have an energetic kid, a husband and a brother who I care for. I don’t want to start to resent the podcasting progress at all

Key takeaways

This experience just goes to show that we always have lessons to learn, even if we believe that we’re already heading in the right direction. We just never know when our actions will lead to greater things. Here are some key takeaways from the experience:

• We need to hear things multiple times before we take action. Yes, I already knew that I should be doing a ton of the things we discussed. But speaking to Jenna opened my eyes, made me more accountable and gave me that push I needed.

• Be your own PR person (and believe in yourself!). You need to get out there, invite people to work with you and stop being afraid to share what you’re selling because you don’t want to come across as salesy. How else will people know about working with you??

• Understanding your audience is vital. Listening to podcasts is a unique experience that depends on who is listening and what their needs are. That’s why we always need to focus on where people are and how we can best serve them. Talking to Jenna helped me recognise the fact that I play a powerful role in helping people on their business journey whilst they consciously think about themselves and put their wellbeing first. I love that we’re having informed and honest conversations that may also help somebody unpack their journey.

Want to learn more about me?

Head over to my about page to learn about my journey, follow me on Instagram or Pinterest and make sure you check out my previous podcast episodes if you haven’t already.