How to Find Your Niche from the Inside Out

Transcription

1 How to Find Your Niche from the Inside Out TRANSCRIPT With Anastasia Netri

2 How to find your niche from the inside out With Anastasia Netri TRANSCRIPT PJ Van Hulle: This is PJ Van Hulle. Anne Cleveland: And I am Anne Cleveland. PJ Van Hulle: And welcome to Total Niche Clarity. Yehey! Anne Cleveland: Yehey! PJ Van Hulle: We want to acknowledge you for jumping in here on our Total Niche Clarity event. As I said before, any hour that you can give us in the niche marketing arena is going to save you at least ten hours, if not a hundred, down the road so it s very worthwhile to be here and be working on this for your business, and today we are going to talk about how to find your niche from the inside out. It s a completely different approach to discovering your niche if you ve been struggling with it. If you ve listened to a few calls now, this is going to be a different perspective for you, and that s one of the goals of this event. It s to come at it from enough different angles that by the end, you are a niche marketing rock star, and it totally clicks for you. So on this particular call, you will discover the number one secret to finding your perfect niche. You will learn the top three features that you need to know when marketing to your niche, and you will find out what you need in place to choose 2

3 your niche and get started with your business or if you ve already started, then take it to the next level. Anne is going to introduce Anastasia. Anne Cleveland: Yeah, so I m so excited today to have you on our call, and as we said, our guest speaker today is Anastasia Netri, and she is known as the business building expert and the glass-ceiling buster. She is the founder of the Entrepreneurial Goddess Coaching, a company that helps women coaches, speakers and trainers expand into the next level of their business. She has a passion for helping women move into more powerful leadership so that they can really help the world evolve, build community and also experience true human potential. Anastasia said that she is a spiritual teacher that works from the lens of business building. She feels that starting, building and growing a business that transforms lives is really a spiritual boot camp at its finest. She is in the process of serving more people, and you will begin to move into the most authentic expression of yourself, experience your value, and open up to greater intimacy and connection with others. So I want to welcome you, Anastasia, and I m really looking forward to what you are going to share on the call today. Anastasia Netri: Thank you. I am very, very excited to be here. Anne Cleveland: Yeah. You have this unique perspective on niche marketing, and I m wondering if you can just begin with sharing about that. Anastasia Netri: That would be one of my favorite things that I could think to do right now. Thank you, it s perfect, so that s great. So really, one of the reasons I m so happy to be here, especially talking about niche marketing, is because I was an entrepreneur that struggled with this niche thing. I struggled with this niche thing for like two years and I tried out seven, yes, that s seven different niches. PJ Van Hulle: Wow! 3

4 Anastasia Netri: Well, yeah, seven different websites, business cards, offers, like just really bouncing around looking for what was right for me, and I realized through this process that some of the things, which again, I don t want to say that the things I learned had no value because they did, but what I heard was just to pick something and that really kind of messed with me because what was happening when I was first learning to market is that I was having certain mentors who told me, Oh, this is a hot problem and just fix this, or just work on this, or pick this. And what ended up happening is because I wasn t intimately connected to it, and in some cases didn t even understand of the problem that I was solving, I would get no clients or would get two or three and they wouldn t be a good fit for me. So I actually just recently this year really got fascinated with this topic, even to the point of developing a program and it was called the Building the Bridge Program, How to Bring You and Your Divine Right Clients Together in Partnership, and this program was like the answer to the prayer that I had several years ago. Really what my view on niche that I have is that your niche has a lot to do with who you are. And actually, as I work with many entrepreneurs and help them build their business, I haven t found a single one yet that really have very similar challenges and desires as the people that they want to help. So first of all, I ve actually said this at my live event this past weekend and I had a lot of people kind of open up their mouths and breathe when I said it. I have this belief that anything will sell, anything will sell. What s really kind of magical is when you are so aligned with your passion and your gift, and when that meets up in a way that your divine right clients hear you, then you ve got a successful business and it could be anything because I see people left and right who are doing all those things that so many people said wouldn t sell, and they are and they are very successfully. I feel like your niche is really something that comes from a deep, soul place inside of you, and as we are all learning marketing, the most important thing I think that 4

5 we can all remember about marketing, and especially getting a lot of information about how to do it and how to do it right, is that most importantly we have to learn to trust our own voice because our own voice is the most powerful marketing that there is. So when you are trying to fit yourself into a box or you are trying to sound like somebody else and you are not, like I said, intimately connected to what you are doing, it becomes a struggle. And when you are, you get much more in the flow. So I think finding your niche is like finding your soul mates. It s that perfect group of people that you were called to serve and stepping into that. PJ Van Hulle: I know we didn t plan this. If you are listening to this call, we don t have a bunch of like set questions that we are going to ask, so if this is a surprise to you, Anastasia, I m sorry. Anastasia Netri: Go ahead. Ask your whatever questions. PJ Van Hulle: What s your niche now, and how did you finally get clear on it? Anastasia Netri: My niche now is women coaches and speakers and trainers who have a little practice going and want to take their business over six figures, and actually, it s n story of how I found my niche. I started realizing that I have been an entrepreneur since I was 23 years old, that I ve built up two six-figure-plus businesses and that I have a really good head for business, so I started business coaching and then last year in 2010, I actually did a telesummit called the Entrepreneurial Goddess Telesummit. Funny enough like during the telesummit, my business was just AnastasiaNetri.com, and during the telesummit, I was like, Oh my gosh, I ve got all of these women who are responding to the Entrepreneurial Goddess thing. And I realized that that really embodied who I was and I changed the name of my business to Entrepreneurial Goddess Coaching in the middle of that telesummit, and it ended up, God, I wish I could say that I went through this big process. The process that I created in the program has helped dozens of people to find their 5

6 niche, but the way that it came for me was through years of trial and error, and then when I fell into this telesummit and did it, I found just a huge resonance of clarity on, This is what I want to do. This is who I want to help. These are the challenges that they are having, and this is the result that they want. And that kind of came through doing that telesummit, so that s actually how I found mine. Anne Cleveland: That is so exciting. Do you have anything to share, like secrets to finding your niche, like your tools, your techniques for helping people really zero in on that soul mate niche. I love the way you put that, by the way. Anastasia Netri: Thank you. Okay, when you talk about the number one secret to finding your perfect niche, here it is. I m inviting everyone on this call to write this down right now, you are your niche. You are your niche. I ve rarely seen anyone who this doesn t apply to in some way, shape or form, and actually, I ve become hyperaware of it since I ve started teaching about niche and I have seen across the board that what people are doing is intimately connected to either a challenge that you have had that you have overcome, a challenge that you are currently experiencing, or something that s really affected you in some way and you have a passion for it. One woman that I saw, it was on a TV show and I think it was Secret Millionaire, her business was around pampering to terminally ill people, and the reason that she was doing that is because her sister or a close relative of hers had a terminal illness and ended up passing on, and the whole time she was doing this kind of pampering and this nurturing and it just helped them with their quality of life so much more that she ended up starting a business out of it. Then there are people who like want to help people step more into their feminine power. I just actually talked to a client this morning who wants to help women entrepreneurs really bring in and embody their feminine power, and that s because it s been a challenge of hers pulling in that feminine power and being able to relax 6

7 into it and get into the flow and she has done processes and understands it, so she can help other people with it. I have seen across the board that if you are looking for something, a challenge that you have experienced or even are currently experiencing, because I m sure Anne and PJ, you know this. It s like the last thing that we all need to think is that we need to have all of our ducks in a row and be perfect before we can go out and help people. PJ Van Hulle: Yeah. Anastasia Netri: Because many times we are helping people who have the exact same challenge that we are experiencing, it can help us because in the process of helping somebody else, you aren t as blocked to the solutions. You are open. You are open to finding things. I don t know, but have you ever experienced that sometimes it s easier to help somebody else than it is to help yourself? Anne Cleveland: Yeah. PJ Van Hulle: Yeah, totally. Anastasia Netri: Exactly. So I say to clients all the time, If this is something that you know about and it is a challenge that you understand, that s kind of a level that people can connect with you on and you also know it because it s you. It s you. So that s my big secret. It s look within because when I talked about finding your niche from the inside out, that s where it is. And actually, in the first class on Building to Bridge Program there is this visualization that people walk through in discovering what it is that makes them want to help people, where that passion comes from, what their challenges are, how they ve overcome this, how this might keep showing up in their life, and how that qualifies them to help somebody else with the same thing, and people have breakthroughs left and right with that. 7

8 PJ Van Hulle: That s fantastic. Anastasia Netri: Yeah, thank you. PJ Van Hulle: Cool. Anastasia Netri: Yeah. And really, one more thing I want to say about this finding your perfect niche, I said it before but I just want to really make this point, that the magic combination is where your gift and your passion matches up with what people need, and when that matches up, then people hear you, and that s really what finding your niche is all about. I mean, that s why we do that because when we are talking to people, they need to be able to hear, and I ll talk about that because I want to talk about marketing to your niche. So I ll get into that in just a few minutes, but when your gifts and your passion match up with what people need, you ve got your niche and your business will be very successful. PJ Van Hulle: That s super cool, and I think I found it to be true for myself, and I think I ve seen it in your business as well, Anne. There is a couple of things I want to speak to. One is that, yeah, I would say I pick myself every time, like I m super, super passionate about helping people set up their lives so that they can live out of freedom and joy instead of debt and obligation, and so that looks to me around creating financial stability, financial freedom so that you cannot like give up on the things you love because of money. Like I m so passionate about that, I never get sick of talking about it, so whatever way, even though my business has evolved over the years, that s always been the core message and so now it s through the lens of helping people market their business and get more clients and that s why we are doing the niche marketing thing because I feel like that s the cornerstone to all of this. So yeah, totally, I can see how my niche is tapped in with what I m passionate about. So what I heard you say if Anastasia went too fast to just take notes down on this, what I heard you say is look for a challenge that you have overcome, a challenge 8

9 that you are currently experiencing or something that has affected you in some way and something that you are passionate about, so those are some like trail markers or clues to discovering that niche that s actually right in front of you. Anastasia Netri: Absolutely, absolutely. Most of the time it s in the mirror. PJ Van Hulle: Yeah. Anastasia Netri: I kind of geek out on this because I find it s an area of fascination for me and it s when you go into the world with this particular awareness, you begin to notice things, and it s something that I ve taken a study on because it started as a theory and then I was, You know, all right, we need to make sure this is true, and as I started to work with more clients in this area and go out and meet people, and when you find out what their business is, you can either talk to them about this directly or once you get to know them, you find that what they help people with is so intimately related with who they are and what they ve been through. One of my friends, Jenn August, says this all the time which I think is great. She s says, You go through the fire swamp and then you are going to go back for the others. And so that s really what it s about. There is that great movie, The Princess Bride, where they went through that funny fire swamp, and it s like once you know where all those things are and all the landmines are and the PJ Van Hulle: The rodents of unusual size. Anastasia Netri: And the rodents of unusual size, you can take people through and be, Okay, so let me show you how you can come through this and not make the same mistakes that I ve made. As a business owner right now, I find that I do that with my clients constantly. The things that I ve been through and I get challenged at, I learned from and I apply that learning and it goes right into my coaching. The very minute I have that awareness, I take it right into my coaching 9

10 and help somebody else through it so they don t have to experience the same mistakes. PJ Van Hulle: Yeah, I found that, too. A lot of times with something that I m just learning or just working on ends up being, What my people need next? Then I m like, Oh well, I ve been working on this, and well, look at that. Anastasia Netri: Always. PJ Van Hulle: The other thing I want to speak to you is you had mentioned people feeling like they need to have all their stuff together. Anastasia Netri: Yeah. PJ Van Hulle: And I kind of locked into that because I remember you and me and Jenn August and Alison Marks and Sage Lavine, all of us were speaking on this Total Niche Clarity event together. We were doing the work at your house where we were working on our projects with these high-powered, amazing like six-figure business owner women. Every single one of us at some point had this meltdown. Alison was in the middle of having her telesummit and she was, I m leading a telesummit on balance and organization and I am losing my mind. Well, I don t remember. We all at some point had this thing about it, I don t have everything dialed in. And I think the conclusion we came to was, Wow! Well, if this is how you guys are feeling and you are just amazing, then I guess I m in good company. Anastasia Netri: PJ, I haven t met a single person who doesn t have some challenge in some area, and most of the time it s interesting because I notice this with people in our field, too. A lot of the things that they are talking about and helping other people with is a place where they themselves are challenged and that s okay because you intimately understand this challenge and you are looking for help for it. 10

11 I think I actually got this in a download. I did a 30-day silent retreat three years ago, and when I did this 30-days of silence, I got this really strong download from the Spirit that says, Your path to self-realization is to help others on their path to self-realization, which is why I call myself a spiritual teacher that works in the lens of business building. I don t want to get too woowoo here, but all of us have this awareness that there is actually no other, and it s really important to think about this when you are talking about your marketing when you are wanting to help somebody else, it s okay that you get help from that. Actually, it s funny, I was just helping a client this morning with a sales letter, and as she was doing it, I was laughing because I m like, Oh my gosh, here are some things I need to put in mine. Here are some things I left out. I get so much clarity when I m helping somebody else. So I really want to encourage you all to remember, oh, and this is another very important thing, so remember this, this is a really important point. I d write this down. If you have a desire inside of you, that desire is coming from the prayer and request of another. So it goes up, when people have a desire and a request, it goes up into the universe and it comes down and it lands in us as an idea. And that s why I believe that anything will sell, and if you have that desire, it s because that desire was put there from somebody who needs you to help them through it. Part of what qualifies you is the fact that you have an understanding of this challenge, and if you have a passion and a caring and you have a sense of expertise in it, you are completely qualified to help somebody. So if that s the big thing you get out of this call today, which is just fine and go out there and do your work. Anne Cleveland: Well, this is so beautiful. I just love the way you are putting this, and it really speaks to me as well. Anastasia Netri: Yeah. Anne Cleveland: Just kind of going through your struggles because when someone have something really excellently, they might not have gone through 11

12 these struggles that someone else might have, so you become a perfect teacher that way. Anastasia Netri: Yeah, exactly. Anne Cleveland: And my question is what if you are very multi-faceted? You have all these ideas and desires and all kinds of ways you want to help the world, do you have any advice for people of how to pick between those things or tie them together? What do you have to say? Anastasia Netri: Oh, that s a great question. Anne Cleveland: Yeah. Anastasia Netri: Like what if I m multi-dimensional and a visionary entrepreneur? Anne Cleveland: Yeah. Anastasia Netri: Yeah. Okay, this is actually something that I help people with a lot. The thing about it is that as an entrepreneur, when you are making a choice of something it s actually taking okay, here is the most simple way I can explain this, like a lot of people think that once you have a particular tool that that s your niche, let me just clarify it just for everyone, your niche is a specific group of people that has a specific challenge that s looking for a desired result. So let s say that you are trained in EFT and you play guitar and you ve taken this training and you got a coach and you know how to do NLP and you ve got all of these things, you can pull out every tool in your toolbox to help them achieve that desired results. And the thing is that once you are starting out, it becomes more important to get that stuff very clear. I mean, again, I ll just go ahead and say this here, that s exactly what my program is designed to do. It s designed to help you to get clear on who that person is because really what niche is, it s about 12

13 marketing. It s not necessarily what you do with every clients. You might have different things that you do with different people. So when you are making a choice, if you can decide, Okay, I want to coach people and this is a group of people that I understand. This is the challenge that they have. This is the result they have. I know because I ve had these challenges, or my mom had these challenges and I want to go back and help other people with it, or something like that, then you can whip out every tool in your toolbox to help them through that. I hope that helps. Anne Cleveland: Yeah, that s excellent. Anastasia Netri: Okay. Anne Cleveland: So you could EFT and sing to them and play the guitar. Anastasia Netri: Well, yeah, exactly, exactly. So it s funny, I actually see on here where somebody said don t people question someone who has not solved the same issue that they are coaching on. An example is a doctor who smokes. That s a really good question, so what you are saying is if somebody is a particular kind of showing up to help somebody to do it with a particular challenge that they themselves have not completely solved, that they are not trustworthy, I think this kind of goes back to that thing of thinking that you have to have all of those ducks in a row to be able to help somebody else. Here is the thing. Okay, I would say that it takes more than just you understanding their challenge. You need to have a specific area of expertise in that and a way to help people. That s very important. So whether or not you go and get some training or take a couple of programs, being able to understand the process that you walk people through is important. I have had like single people who teach about love. I think that depending on what you are teaching on, you can teach on different aspects of that on places where you are an expert, and like you might 13

14 have taken some training in tantra or something like that where you can go through and you can share that expertise with somebody without necessarily being in a relationship. And I think people are going to be drawn to you because of who you are and your expertise and your passion and your caring, not necessarily because you are walking the walk. Because frankly, I know people who are excellent coaches who don t have all their ducks together, but are great at helping other people. So that s my short answer. PJ Van Hulle: Yeah. And I would say the key to making that work is authenticity. Anastasia Netri: Absolutely. PJ Van Hulle: You are saying this is the challenge that I m struggling with here. Some things that I have found that have helped me so far that I think can help you. I was in a women s leadership program where the leader was very clear. She s lsaid, I am in this inquiry about what it means to lead like a woman. I don t have the answers, but this program is about exploring this inquiry together. And she had 26 women in this year-long program that she charged thousands and thousands of dollars for. Anastasia Netri: Yeah. And I m guessing you got a lot of value out of that. PJ Van Hulle: Totally. Anastasia Netri: Exactly, that is a really good example, and that s very important to really be authentic and honest with people about where you are at, and I think in this world of marketing, things are changing. We really hunger for more authenticity and intimacy, and that s where people are going to trust you. And here is the thing, even though you may feel like, Can I share this with people, I think that if people see that you are sharing vulnerable things about yourself in areas where you are still challenged, they will actually trust you more because they know right from the get-go that you are not going to BS them, you know? 14

15 Anne Cleveland: Yeah. Anastasia Netri: And I think that s really important. They are like, Well, this is somebody who I know is going to tell me the truth. And that s really a good thing because I think we ve all been taken in by people who don t share that stuff and we don t really know who they are that makes this. In the days of internet and social media and videos, we want to know who somebody is and we want to be able to relate to them, and that s very important, too. PJ Van Hulle: Yeah, so Anastasia, I do want to make sure that we talk about this. You said you are going to share the top three features you need to know when you are marketing to you niche. Can you share that? Anastasia Netri: Yes, I would love to share that, and I would actually love to, right in the middle of this call, share with you something, a new perspective on marketing which I think is going to be very good for this telesummit because I really want to talk about what marketing really is first and why so many of us have some kind of negative associations and what to do to shift those into something positive. So right now, things are really changing in the world of business and there is a huge reason why there is a lot of people that get kind of freaked out with very traditional marketing strategies, and this stemmed from this world of a masculine push, push, push dominated model that doesn t feel right to some of us. We want to do things in a more inviting kind of way and we want to show up in a way that uplift and inspires and invite rather than manipulate or pushes, and we don t want to make people feel bad. We want to give our gifts all the way through whether they are on your website or in your program and everything in between in a way that has them feel good the whole time and uplifted. So I wanted to share with you some new marketing language that I came up with and I work with my clients in this language because I feel like it can really shift the way that you do things. So first, you can write these down. These are very good 15

16 to write down. So you can write down the word marketing. I like to do a kind of a circle or slash. So if you write down the word marketing, do a circle or slash and let s change that to the word inviting. So if you are going to be sitting down to do your marketing, wouldn t it be much more fun to sit down and do your inviting. Isn t that great? There is sales letter. I know I said that earlier, but I don t want to confuse people. Now, we will start calling it with this, but change sales letter to invitation letter. I mean, come to my party, you all. I mean, that s what it is. So let s call it that. I also like to change closing a sale, which sounds so icky to me, to opening a relationship. So from closing a sale to opening a relationship. Anne Cleveland: That s great. Anastasia Netri: Isn t that good? And lead generation which again just makes people sound like faceless and non-existent numbers to making new friends. So here, I can sit down and I m like, I m going to work on making new friends today. PJ Van Hulle: Yehey! Anastasia Netri: I mean, the whole energy around that is lighter. Yeah, I know you would love that, PJ. And then I like to change the word potential clients with people who are pretty much in your pipeline. You ve already made friends with them and now they are your potential clients. Change that to my community. That feels more inclusive and just feel you just want to serve them. They are your community. And I have this phrase, this sentence, and I ll say it a couple of times so that everybody can write it down, but just first listen to it. So when you are sitting down and making new friends and opening relationships, here is a mantra that you can say that s really effective, I invite new friends to open a relationship with me so that I may share my gifts and they can experience the transformation they 16

17 desire. I mean, can you just imagine if we are to go out doing videos, doing blog post, writing our invitation letters with that energy behind it, and I ll say it one more time slower, I invite new friends to open a relationship with me so that I may share my gifts and they can experience the transformation they desire. PJ Van Hulle: Hot. Anastasia Netri: Yeah. Thank you. All right, so now I want to talk about the three features you need to know in marketing to your niche. So here is the first one. This is probably the most important thing that you can do. When you sit down to do your inviting know what it is that you offer. It s just knowing what it is that you offer. Because when you know that, everything that you do can naturally lead into those offers because we offer the thing that people give you their credit card for that is the transformation that they are signing up for. And in fact, the more you charge, usually the more transformation that they get. I ve seen that time and time again. Time and time again, I ve seen the results in my clients when my coaching hasn t changed that much but my prices have. When I jump my prices, people just get more transformation because they are more invested. So knowing what your offers are and when you are sitting down to do your inviting whether it be on your websites, on your invitation letters, on your social media, this is a big key and this is where finding your niche, knowing who you are talking to is very important that you always talk in language where you are talking to one person and not a group. In talking to one person use you a lot, not people like you, or I help women, but I help you with this. Because that s the thing, when people read that, they feel like, Oh my gosh, Anastasia, get out of my head. How did you know I was thinking that? And that s when they feel really, really connected with you. And I have a flow that you want to write when you are writing s or even doing videos or anything, and this is why I affectionately call this the Netri Process. That s because somebody said to me, Like you should name that. But here is the 17

18 flow, and the flow is this: the flow is them, them, you, your offering and a call to action. So like I see sometimes people s websites will be like, Hi, my name is blah, blah, blah and I do this and here is my story. And I m like, You ve already lost them. When people go and they want to find out about you, they want to hear about themselves first before you even talk about who you are because that s what has them connect with you. It s a headline that address who they are, what challenge that they have and what desire that they are looking and then being able to say things like in the beginning of your copy, whether you are on a website or an or whatever, like, Is this something that you are experiencing? Like do you feel like this? Is this a circumstance that you are having in your life? Is this a challenge that you are having? Because people read that and they go, Oh my gosh, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And they are going to keep reading, and then you talk about who you are and why you are doing what you do and your offering could be a simple as, Here is my free gift. Put your name and address then. There is your offering and a call to action. So yeah, let s see, I lost my train of thoughts here. Okay, talking to one person and not a group, and then relating with them on the challenges that they are experiencing is a huge thing that will connect you instantly with your clients. It will instantly connect you. When they feel like you understand and you ve named and you understand their challenge, not only their challenges, but their desires. what is it that they want? That is something that is going to instantly connect. My third tip is what s going to really make them take that next step with you, whether it s to opt in to your mailing list and start to build a relationship or sign up for your program or whatever is, are the outcomes clear? Are the outcomes clear? And you all see now like how this fits into knowing who that person is. So when you know who that person is, what challenge they are experiencing, what their desires are, when you are saying, You know, sign up with my coaching and my coaching will help you do this, and it s speaking in outcome-based language. Like 18

19 instead of I work with you on a process of organization, change that to Get five more hours of free time per week. Does that make sense? So it s just being able to speak to, not the process, but the outcome. PJ Van Hulle: Can you give us some more examples? Anastasia Netri: Yeah. Like let s see, what are some examples. I m going to like look at my own notes here because there are something. Yeah, so let s see, Attract more of your clients that are highly committed and invested, instead of working through, We are going to figure out your offers, so we are going to do this. So let s see, Set up your six-figure business pipeline so that you will see how clients will flow into through practice, I mean, this is kind of a different way of talking about how to set up your business model so that you know exactly where people are coming in and what they are flowing through to. I ve got on here, Design a group program to work with several people at once to make more money and expand your reach and impact. So that s pretty clear, which is PJ Van Hulle: Cool. Anastasia Netri: Yeah. So serve more people in less time and get more leverage, that kind of thing. If we have more time I can think of a bunch more. Yeah. Anne Cleveland: I am wondering about your third point about what you need in place to choose your niche and how to get started to take your business wherever it s at to the next level. Anastasia Netri: Okay, good, good. So this is what I would suggest, listen to that visualization that I ve got because it s going to open a few doorways for all of you, and then when you start to center in on something, you are saying like this is a group of people that I feel drawn to that I would like to help. This is the challenge that they are experiencing and this is the desire that they want. Think of a few people in your circle of friends or people who are experiencing similar things. 19

20 One of the things that I like to say to start with to choose your niche is to start to do some interviews with people who fall into your thing that you are feeling drawn to. Find out like who they are. Find out what their challenges are. Hear it from them and then try out your stuff on them, like if you ve written up a website, ask them, Does this land? Do you understand this? Is this clear? Do you feel like you want to move forward with me, like you are interested, like you want to know more? That is actually one of, I think, the most important things when choosing your niche and getting started with your business is getting something up and getting it out there and asking people about it and getting feedback and doing interviews. I would suggest that once you start to narrow something down a little bit, get out there and do five interviews. Send out an and be looking to talk to these people, Would anybody want to do a 30-minute interview with me? And you could say internal, I ll give you a coaching session or something like that if you want to give an energy exchange. But that s one thing that I think is extremely valuable is getting out there and doing some interviews and getting feedback from people, a lot of feedback again from your ideal clients. So that s a good key to getting started. Really, I do want to say this because this is I think a very important point. I know you are going to have Sage here talking about this stuff because she is always my example of somebody that didn t even have a very specific niche and built a sixfigure business on it, and what she did was she got out there. You actually get more clarity through moving than you do from sitting still. Anne Cleveland: Yes. Anastasia Netri: So my biggest piece of advice is to just get out there with something, and again not to just pick something, but something that feels close to your heart and get out there and start moving with it because that is how you are 20

21 going to get a lot of clarity. It was through a lot of that trial and error that I eventually found my niche, and then of course, I developed something that helps people. They don t have to go through the fire swamp and have all that same struggle and drama that I had with picking my niche, but at the same time it s always getting refined. Mine just actually changed recently of working with people who are just starting out or transitioning out of their jobs to people who already had something in place and were looking to go to that next level because that s where I ve started to feel more drawn. So I would say just get out there, go out there and speak. Go out there and start doing calls, start going to events, networking events and things like that. Just anything that you can do to get out there and fully stand in it and you will start to get some clarity as you go. PJ Van Hulle: Yeah, I think that interviewing people in your niche is huge. In fact, we did that for this event. I sent out an to my list and I said, You know, when it comes to niche marketing what are your biggest challenges? What do you want? And we got tons and tons and tons of feedback and that s what informed us on how to put this event together and what topics to make sure that we are covered and what to put in our marketing copy and how to find out what people really wanted. One of the biggest things we found was so many people then were just struggling to get clear because they feel like they ve been working on this forever. I think one of the things that I ve discovered through this process is that discovering your niche is a process. Anastasia Netri: Oh my gosh, yes. PJ Van Hulle: It s not having this one 30-minute conversation, and boom, it clicks in. I mean, when that happens, that s great, but I think it s two processes happening simultaneously. One is the process of self-discovery, and so you are figuring out, What is it that I m really passionate about? What challenges have I been through? What challenges am I working on that I really want to focus on 21

22 healing and working through with people? And then secondarily, the process of interviewing people and finding out what they want and getting really clear on how that problem shows up for them and what they are looking for, and so I think when you just relax a little bit and realize the process and just put yourself in it. Start that process of self-discovery, start that process of interviewing people and getting to know them, it s really powerful and it becomes more and more clear. And then as you said, it kind of can shift and change over time as well. Anastasia Netri: So you see, I would love to add something to that really quick that I think is kind of coming up here, and here is something that I just want to make sure to say on this telesummit. A lot of times, finding your niche is not the problem. It seems like the problem because I meet a lot of people who are more clear than they think they are, like they are really, really clear, but it s settling into a choice. You are going to need to move forward. So really it s kind of having some awareness of that. It s, Is it because I m not clear or is it because I m not wanting to move forward? Because I think that that was definitely the case for me. That was what the real case was because when I was really ready, when I was moving forward, it just clicked. It just clicked right into place, and it had been there on the tip of my thumb all along, so I just want to say that to people. In whatever you want to do, just remember that we all have issues getting out and doing something new. But please if you have a desire inside of you, that is your people really calling to you because you are the one, you are the one that s going to help them. You are the one that s going to make the difference for them because that s where that desire comes from. So just an encouragement to listen to that and step into a full yes and you will be more supported than you know and you will definitely end up finding a lot more clarity. Anne Cleveland: I wanted to add something, too, because everything you are saying is so perfect and also that this process is something that is a perfect tool to get a hand on because it will come up over and over again whether you are deciding what new program do you want to do with it. 22

23 Anastasia Netri: Yeah. Anne Cleveland: What is the thing you offer? It s a really important tool. Anastasia Netri: Yeah, yeah. So just remember, stepping out and stepping into the unknown is not really that comfortable for any of us. We all have our little bells and our gremlins and things go off and say, No, that s dangerous. We don t know how to do that. And so as you are going through this and you are getting clarity, just remember you will be supported. I promise. I ve seen it. I ve seen it happen with my clients. The fact that you are all here listening to this is huge. It means that you really want it and I just want to acknowledge everyone for really just showing up and taking the time, like PJ said at the beginning of the call. Just really taking the time and taking this action and listening to all of these people and just getting little nuggets from each of us because who knows where your answer will come, but I just want to encourage you all to get out there with whatever you got and give it a whirl. PJ Van Hulle: Cool. And Anastasia, you said it was right there for you and you finally just decided, Yes, I m ready to move forward, and you stepped into it. Can you share with us like what happened for you? I actually don t know. What happened for you in your business? What opened up for you once you made the decision to move forward? Anastasia Netri: This is actually one of the most magical things that I did, and I didn t even know it at that time. It was really at the end of 2009, and I really had a lot of struggle that year, and I sat down in December of 2009 and instead of writing goals of things that I wanted to experience in 2010, I wrote about feelings that I wanted to experience. Things like: You know, I got this struggle thing. I got it. I learned a lot from it. I m ready to have an experience of a full practice working with people I love. I m ready to have an experience of having a big mailing list. 23

24 I m ready to have an experience of watching people run to sign up for my offerings. That is a feeling that I was looking to experience. It was something really amazing in setting that intention to have the experience and the feeling that went along with it that caused, I swear, opportunities to just like drop into my lap in the oddest way, the oddest way, and that s what happened. I didn t even know anything about telesummits at that time and I met somebody who mentored me and told me about them and suggested them and said, I ll help you, and I ll help you up with all these people and show you how to do it. And I said, Okay. And I just did it. Even though I didn t really know what I was doing, I learned through the process and I ended up by the end of the year having all of those experiences that I had intended. So instead of going for a goal or something external, go for the feeling that that experience is going to give you and things will just open up for you. PJ Van Hulle: Cool. Anne, are there any questions on the blog that you want to ask here? Anne Cleveland: Well, one person asked once again, when you have all these skills that are so different, that seems so unconnected, anything that you can throw in there? Because I know that probably 50% of the people just feel like, I have so many things I can do. But that was the question. Anastasia Netri: At some point during this process, it s really a matter of kind of going inside with each of those things that you want to do and checking in with how you feel. If you feel expansive when you think about it, if you feel shut down when you think about it, whatever really lights you up, I m inviting you to just pick one of those things that lights you up and step into it fully. Because it s that place of confusion that will end up keeping you stuck. So I mean, I would have to know like more about those skills to be able to give a more complete answer to that, but I do know that every entrepreneur that I work with to help get them clarity around this, we end up finding the things that lights them up and I say just go out there and 24

25 step into this fully and give it a try. So that s really the best thing I can say is just find something that lights you up and step into it fully, and just pick something. Pick one of those things that turns you on and move forward with it, and then you will see as you go that that is where you ultimately want to go or whether it will change. Actually, something else I want to say about that is I can guarantee you that it will change. So you never marry your niche, you only really date it. So don t get too attached on thinking that if I have to pick something, I m going to have to do this for the rest of my life, because every visionary entrepreneur I know is in a constant state of change and expansion. I actually heard this from a mentor of mine. She said the mark of a healthy business is constant reorganization. So you can change if it doesn t work for you, but you won t know until you just pick something and move forward with it, but again, make sure it s something that you understand and turns you on. PJ Van Hulle: Yehey! Cool. Well, we are going to wrap up this part of the call now and we will see you on the blog. Anastasia Netri: Yeah. Anne Cleveland: So thank you, Anastasia, so much for your wisdom and your sharing. Anastasia Netri: Thank you. It was fun. End of Audio 25