Coffee With Dan

Simple, but so fucking easy to talk complete and utter shite to ourselves isn’t it?

😀

So how DO you do the things you say you’re going to do?

Well I have figured out 4 areas you need to cover to achieve more from life

1. A goal

Simple but most people fuck this up; they either come up with some crazy-assed goal that they don’t achieve and get crushed, demotivated and tap out…

…or they totally lowball it and achieve what at best can be filed under ‘meh’ and wonder why they don’t achieve X or why and again

Tap out

So when it comes to setting a goal; make it simple;

Something that you COULD achieve IF you stretched yourself 5-10%

That’s it

2. Social Accountability

There are but a few folks who are disciplined enough to do what they say

I wasn’t

On some areas of life I am less so (and actively working on it hence *this*)

However this does take time and for most people social accountability is extremely powerful

Yes you can tell a friend or partner

A coach or mentor is another viable option

However I find posting things on social media and saying what I’m going to do is best because:

a) if I don’t keep my word it makes any subsequent sales or marketing activities less impactful

b) I don’t want to look like a twat

So today we are going to leverage social media – because you don’t want to look like a twat, do you?

😘

3. Specifics/deadline

– What is the thing you are going to achieve
– When are you going to achieve it by

Simple

4. Emotional attachment to the goal and NOT the outcome

Now you will have heard me – and others – talk about ‘not being emotionally attached to the outcome’

That, is still true

(And coming from a hardcore corpse sales background, this was HARD)

However you DO need to be emotionally attached to the reason WHY you are doing the thing you are doing

Make sense?

Even simpler – WHAT IS YOUR WHY’S (plural)

– What is the altruistic reason you want to achieve the goal (family, spouse, charity etc)
– What selfish reason do you want to achieve the goal (looks, treats, holidays, status, etc)

If you define those four and DO THE WORK

You’re good to go

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If you are looking to come out the other side of all this craziness ahead of the game – now is the time to go all in on organic social media.

Why?

Everyone is online.

Everyone is bored.

Everyone is scrolling away.

All looking for something to plug into.

If you can take the time now to go hard and capture that attention

Even if you’ve had to put the brakes on your business due to shut downs you can get yourself positioned for re-opening and be bigger and better than ever before.

Already selling lockdown-friendly products and services or pivoted what you offer so you could keep going?

They aren’t going to sell themselves if you don’t talk about them.

It’s really as simple as that.

If you choose now to show up consistently for your audience.

Be the steady voice.

The place they can trust.

Inform.

Entertain.

Take their minds off some of the crap that is weighing them down, it’ll pay off BIG TIME.

Not really sure what you should be posting, how to post it, where you soul,d post and why the fuck people would even want to pay you attention?

You’re in luck.

If you want to build a solid fan base who loves you and what you do, social media is one of the best ways out there to do it.

Especially if you have more time than money which is a situ a whole lot of people are finding themselves in right now.

This whole Planet Dan “thing” has developed through social media.

Completely organically.

Over the last 6 years, my ad spend has been £0.00

Will that change in the future?

At some point I’ll possibly run some ads.

For now? Nope!

Coffee With Dan has over 16,000 people in.

16,000 GOOD people.

People who engage, share, support and inspire.

People who – beside the occasional rare numbnuts – don’t spam the fuck out of the group and cause trouble.

People who I enjoy spending time around.

From CWD’s small beginnings has developed a 7-figure business, a thriving membership community that takes things to a whole other level, book sales in the hundreds of thousands, courses that have transformed peoples lives and businesses and so many great opportunities.

All through organic social media.

I’ve earned my stripes for sure.

This…it’s taken time.

It’s taken graft and genuine care.

I’m not gonna promise that you can go from zero to achieving everything I’ve achieved in 6 weeks.

Or am I going to say you’re going to have just an easy time of it as I’vew had it.

Let’s face it, there are BIG changes going on in the world right now so it would be disingenuous for me to make big promises based on my experience.

There is going to be a different trajectory in the growth of your reach and the income you generate from it.

Depending on how things go and what industry you are in, things could go faster or slower.

What I have found is the best ways you can create a MASSIVE impact online.

The SOLID principles that never change.

Because people – at their core – are human.

So no matter what is going on in the world.

You can always rely on humans being human.

And if you know how to work with that, connect with them and serve them well?

You have the power to influence and create a positive impact in this world.

I’m not gonna show you any sneaky tactics.

I’m not going to tell you how to hack the system.

I’m sure as shit not going to tell you to schedule and automate the fuck out of everything.

Because all that sneaky bollocks and techie magic only screws things up.

You get ahead for 5 minutes till you get caught out and shut down because you’re playing in someone else’s sandpit.

And

You spend so long trying to do it the easy way without putting the work in, you don’t build up that genuine connection with your audience, you don’t understand what makes them tick, they know you don’t care about them and they rightfully reject what you offer them.

As always, I’m here to share with you the shit that works…and keeps on working.

Wherever.

Whenever.

So you can succeed and profit for a long time to come.

Instead of jumping from bright shiny object to bright shiny object.

Here are 5 things you MUST do to dominate social media in 2020 and beyond.

1. Commit to consistency

Heard me talking about consistency time and time again?

Well I’m gonna keep on talking about it because it really is that important.

You NEED to be consistent in the way you show up.

For your productivity – because consistency creates a habit

For your mindset – because it’s harder to get started again once you stop and you get all those shitty self doubts

For your audience – because you need to be a stable presence.

You need to connect with them.

Show them again and again what you’re all about.

Expect them to only see a fraction of what you’re posting and be there at the time when they are ready, willing and able to buy.

2. Give a shit about your audience

If they are giving you their time and attention, you should return the favour.

It’s called social media for a reason so don’t expect to just blast out your stuff and run.

The added bonus is you get to really know who is in your world, what they need and what drives them so you can create packages and offers they actually want.

3. Be infotaining

You want a mixture of entertainment and information that you’re posting as well as the occasional straight up promotion

Too much of one or another and people tune out.

Dull, predictable, seen and heard it all before.

Plus have you seen the state of the newsfeeds right now?!

Corona, conspiracies and lockdown galore.

People are uncertain, lonely, drowning in lonlieness and surrounded by crazy.

Bring some positivity, support and guidance into their feed and you can make a real positive impact – for them and for you.

4. Be YOU

You’ll drive yourself loopy if you try to be someone else.

Best you can do is a crappy second rate version of someone else’s personality that the whole damn world can see through.

Don’t get sucked into the need to copy “what successful people do” just because you’re scared and stuck comparing yourself.

Model what other people do and put your take on it for sure.

Just don’t try to be someone else.

It never works. If feels bad and you’ll only attract people you’d never get on with and wouldn’t even like you if they knew who you were.

Whatever personality you have – there are people out there who will love it.

Show up YOUR WAY and let the people who love you find you.

5. Share your story and your peoples stories

Storytelling is one of THE most powerful things you can do to grow a following that is truly connected to you and rooting for you to win.

It’s how we have communicated information since the dawn of time because stories stick in our minds.

Stories take ideas and concepts and turn them into something real and tangible.

They help us connect and they help us find the places we belong.

It CAN be intimidating to put yourself out there to start with but the more you do – the easier it gets and the happier you’ll be to be even more you.

Sharing stories of clients and group members you want to highlight is a great way to make your people feel seen and valued, and showcase how you help people too.

Combine these 5 things and you have a recipe for long term success whatever the platform.

Because you’ll have a strong audience that will follow you wherever you go and you’ll stay top of mind and top of their feed.

This ^^^ right there has been my advice for years.

And it will still be my advice for years to come.

Why?

Because it works.

It builds your following.

It maximises your reach.

It creates real connection and leads people to buying the things they want and need from you rather than anyone else.

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What goes on in our heads impacts EVERYTHING

You can’t escape your own head.

Believe me, I’ve tried.

(It was called ‘Grey Goose’)

The ONLY thing you can do is work with what you’ve got so that it fires you up instead of bringing you down and getting stuck in the cycle overwhelm, procrastination, limiting beliefs and self-sabotage.

First thing I’ve gotta say is no fucker is immune to this.

Not me

Not you

Not that motivational coach with the perfect life and a perma-smile

Being a human – it’s hard work.

Just because normal everyday existence of being a human isn’t punishment enough.

Some of us decide to become entrepreneurs

Lol

Crazy hours. Check.

Hard to connect with people not like us. Check

Opening ourselves up to massive criticism. Check

No guarantee of income. Check.

Daily battles with value and self-worth. Check

The list goes on.

No wonder most of us are tapped in the head.

Depression, ADHD, bipolar, suicidal feelings and more all effect a higher number of entrepreneurs than they do the general public.

That’s a fact.

If you’re going through things – know you are not alone.

Even at the lighter end of the scale

Stuff comes up.

We hold ourselves back.

We worry about what other people are going to think

We self sabotage every time we get close to our goals

And

The greatest tool we have – our brains

Is the one thing that truly works against us to stop us progressing.

With that in mind – here’s a few of my top tips for taking control of your mindset

#1 The power of the braindump

As I say, what is in our heads is what holds us back.

More often than not, we get so preoccupied with life and business that these thoughts start to fester away in the background without us giving all that much thought to them until they turn into massive monsters that blight up with procrastination, overwhelm, fear and more.

The first thing you need to do to tackle mindset issues is to get them out of your head and know what you’re actually dealing with

And

Regularly keep your head clear of all the junk and crap it picks up along the way.

You do this, with brain dum

Some benefits of doing regular brain dumps?

1. Ideas

I’ve had some epic ideas because (for me) I actually am present with my own mind
That and the looped music helps ‘distract’ my brain and my subconscious can do its own thang

2. Problem solving

Similar to above – I’ve been able to come up with:
– copy hooks
– solutions to business and personal problems
– rationalise relationships (stick or twist)

It’s been very useful

3. Less rage/generally a bit nicer

I’m simple less angry
Don’t tend to go from 0-100 much
As a rule calm
– for anyone who has followed me for a while, this is novel eh –

4. Less stressed/sleep better

I go to bed kinda ‘empty headed’ now and as someone who’s mind NEVER SHUTS THE FUCK UP….sleep has been a bugger
Less so now

Here’s how it’s done…

1. Do a FULL brain dump BEFORE you switch off, get that shit out of your head and LEAVE IT

2. If you have a problem or something you need clarity on? Write it on a piece of paper to take with you – look at it at points

3. Either NO phone or on airplay mode

4. Have either a looped song, movie score or something like natural sounds (I like thunderstorms) on music

5. Take a book – paper one – with you that inspires you or is of interest; something you WANT to read as opposed to HAVE to read

6. Go buy a a pen and notepad, and a bottle of water (clarity dehydrated is nigh on impossible) and take em with you; any ideas that come up and

WRITE THEM DOWN

Not on your phone, go analogue

Then either a) go to a location where you don’t speak to anyone (I have a special place socially distant…you have to climb a cliff to get to it lol) or get yo ass locked in a room

#2 – Knowing when to go #ballsdeep & knowing when it’s time to pull back

As I say – entrepreneurs are a special bunch

We will give it all we’ve got and then some on top

And what happens is we will keep going and going and going until we break.

And when we start to break we keep pushing harder to punish ourselves and catch up.

It takes some time to learn to recognise the signs.

I have broken myself plenty of times in the past

Me personally?

I’ll see shifts in how I’m working, how I show up and the content that I put out.

Over time I go from full on content machine to full on sillyness and everywhere in between.

And by learning what makes Dan tick, I’ve come to see where I need to ease back, take a change of scene, mix some more fun stuff in my life if it’s gone a bit work heavy.

This is something I can’t give you an exact image of because it loooks a little different for each of us.

Here are a few signs to watch out for that give a hint it might be time to pull back and change things up before you burn out

– You content gets massively serious and dry OR you can’t do serious content and it’s all fun stuff

– You’ve stopped things like going to the gym and date nights because you’re constantly busy

– Your sleep pattern has shifted and you’re suddenly crashing early or waking up in the middle of the night

– You’ve been doing lots of videos, webinars and lives till now but you just can’t face hitting the button

– You’re suddenly eating everything…or nothing

As I say, how this shows up is individual.

If those come up, evaluate what you’ve got going on and how you can mix things up before you take yourself down.

And if you do go down – take a think back to how you were working and if any sign showed up so you can add them to your personal list of red flags

#3 – Remind yourself you’re actually fucking awesome

It’s EASY to crack on when life’s good; posts flow, deals seems to land with ease, shit goes your way

Then life goes – ‘Hold my beer’ – and decides to fuck with you

That’s when you want to say ‘fuck it’

– quit making the calls
– stop making the pitches
– gives less fucks about yourself
– ditch the diet and training
– content no longer gets created

And so on

I know because I’ve been there in my past

Staring in the mirror

Looking at my reflection thinking wondering what’s the point of going on anymore

THAT is the make/break point

When every fucking fibre of you is saying ‘stop’ – especially when you have every right to

When you take a step THEN?

That’s when you reach a new level of resilience and tenacity that you didn’t think you had

You find a gear that may not be the fastest or the most efficient but it’s has power and it grinds you through the shitty terrain and on to smoother roads

I have consciously decided to spend a lot more time on my own without electronic devices, people or any form of stimulus and aggressively work on my thoughts

Everything from triggers to limiting beliefs to self-sabotaging behaviours I have gone through each and every fucking and examined why I do the things I do and ask one simple question

Does this serve me?

For starters I have learned that you can ALWAYS find a positive even if it FEELS negative, and you will get what you focus on

Now I mentally walk through and WRITE DOWN (this is key btw) all the positive things that have come from the encounter, issue, relationship – whatever it is

And when I find myself on a little negative feedback loop?

I have them on my notes on my phone and if I find something shitty bubbling up with regards to whatever situation it may be?

I just read the corresponding note

Another thing I have found is that pain IS temporary IF you take action; don’t get me wrong when life throws you a curveball you are allowed to feel crap and throw yourself a little pity party..

But ONLY a little one and ONLY for a little while.

After that? The KEY thing to getting over setbacks is ACTION

Sitting around feeling sorry for yourself doesn’t do shit, and as hard as it may be? What you need to be is DOING and NOT thinking in times like this. Brilliantly, the more action you take the better you tend to feel as time goes on

#4 – Have A Support Network

Think you can just go it alone?

That we should have it all handled because hey, everyone else does

On top of all that

We beat ourselves up and we put ourselves down and we just don’t think we’re worth it.

We don’t think that we are worthy of help.

We don’t think that we deserve to be cared about.

We don’t think that we deserve support

because

We think that’s our job and our job alone.

So it can be so hard to ask for help, share the load, and delegate.

We take on more and more and more

Carrying a bigger weight on our shoulders

and I’m telling you now

if you carry that weight

if you keep on adding more and more stuff without getting any help without having any support without having people to help you figure things out,

It is going to break you.

Some point somewhere along the line that way is just going to get too much and it’s going to absolutely crush you.

The alternative is getting a support network in place

Support inside your business and sport outside of business because both sides are just important

and both areas are areas where you’re going to have things come up.

You’re gonna have problems, you’re going to have issues

If you try and do it alone You’re an idiot.

Yet, it’s something that we have a habit of trying to do.

We try to just deal with our problems

We are the problem solvers after all

We try to find the answer & a way forward figure it all out.

Because if we don’t, who will?

We convince ourselves that it’s not a big deal

We can handle it

That other people have got bigger problems

And if we just keep on pushing will find a way

So we push and we push and we push until we break down

And none of that is necessary

The thing is

On top of thinking that we should be able to deal with everything.

That we should be smart enough to do it alone.

You NEED to have support in place to actually be provide practical help, smart guidance, emotional support and different ideas is key to seeing you through whatever comes up.

Combine support with your own tool box of times and tricks to help you recognise what phase your mindset is in and the kind of action you need to take to get the most out of it and you can really power yourself forward

Even during times when most other people would fall apart.

As much as I’m a practical Get Shit Done & fuck anything that’s gonna try and stop me kind of person.

Without the mindset part?

Game over.

There’s only so much a person can grind through whilst fighting their own head.

I know there are a lot of people struggling right now in the mindset department.

Even if business is operating just fine and works in lockdown, the whole isolation thing, fear for the future, missing family and trying to look after dependents takes its toll.

But

You got this.

And we

A.K.A. me and the Planet Dan Team

We got you.

And we’ll be doing as much as we can to bring you all the best of our knowledge and skills to keep you going, and getting the best results you can even through trying times.

All we ask is you let us know when you find things useful and go take action on them.

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Are you sitting comfortably?

Then I shall begin…

A few years back, before I was mega successful (lol), I was a strip club manager. A properly broke strip club manager too.

Now you might think that’s a cool job. It’s not. It’s a crappy job.

Literally.

One night I ended up dressed in bin bags (it was a makeshift ‘bio-hazard’ suit) up to my knees in ACTUAL crap. Yours truly was clearing out a blocked tank known as a ‘macerator’ that was full of, well, crap. (Have I said “crap” enough yet? Lol)

Why?

Because it needed doing and no one else would do it.

Sure, we could have waited til the morning and got a plumber in to do it

But

If it didn’t get done RIGHT NOW, the club was shut for the night.

And if it was shut for the night?

The dancers, the bouncers, the bar staff, me – basically everyone

Wouldn’t have got paid

Not a penny

And that couldn’t happen

We all NEEDED the money

So, I did it.

Not my best ever night.

And while I was wading around in other peoples used dinner, I started to question my life choices

Honestly?

I was about one turd away from walking out and saying “fuck it”

But I couldn’t. And I didn’t.

You see, at that particular moment in my life?

I was skint, like, my Mum and Dad were sending me food vouchers skint

I needed this job

Anyway – I eventually cleared the blockage, climbed out of the tank, binned the bio suit and got myself cleaned up.

When something unexpected happened.

Something I will never forget

One of the dancers strolled over to me and pressed a £10 note into my hand and said “Thanks Dan”.

And that “Thanks” meant more to me than my wages for the night.

See, the thing that makes me happy more than anything?

Is helping people

Helping people achieve things they can’t by themselves

Helping people get out of their own way and “do the thing”

It’s just what I do and it’s what brings me joy

Anyway, back to the story

That £10 note?

I’ve still got it

In fact, it’s on my ‘wall of weirdness’/library thats behind me as I type this.

Like I said – at the time?

I was skint

Broke

Bust

I was, essentially, a poor

Every night before work I’d hang around round the back of pret waiting for them to bin the sandwiches they hadn’t sold just so I could have something to eat

So 10 quid at that point?

Was massive

Could have made a real difference for me for a few days, It could have fed me for a few days.

But I decided there and then

“Fuck That”.

That £10 note was the last handout I’d ever take, if I ever needed to spend that, it was game over.

I’d forget any dreams of “making it” and go and get a 9-5 and live my worst life.

So I didn’t spend it, I used it as a reminder that however tough things got, I wasn’t up to my armpits in someone else’s shit, and cracked the fuck on.

And it was that day that drove me to do all the things I’ve talked about the last few days

All the things I’ve achieved? All the times I’ve pushed myself beyond what was sensible?

All because I was never gonna let myself get back in a tank of shit.

Since then? Again without sounding like a show off?

I’ve learned a lot

AND

I’ve helped a lot of people

And a couple of years ago I was reflecting on the journey.

All the things I’d learned, the mistakes I’d made

And I realised I wanted to build my ‘signature system’

I wanted to bring EVERYTHING I’ve learned together so it can help AS MANY people as possible

So that’s what I did

I built the “How To Be Fucking Awesome System”

And it brings together pretty much everything I know about business and life

Things like:

copywriting
social media
launches
tribe building
networking
content marketing
branding and positioning
product creation
sales
marketing
masterminds
creating a recurring revenue stream/membership sites
mindset
overcoming procrastination and overwhelm
growing a team
productivity
systems and structure
balancing the 4 pillars (health/wealth/productivity/connectivity)

I told you I learned a lot eh?

It brings together the best of what I know

Shit that works

Shit that doesn’t

And I left NOTHING out.

Over the years I’ve invested hundreds of thousands of dollars into my education and more importantly, I’ve spent 7 years actually DOING this stuff
Turning up day in and day out to GET SHIT DONE

And it’s all in this course

Honestly?

It’s the nuts even if I do say so myself!

Now, this hasn’t been on sale for about 18 months, but later on this week we are opening it up again so that you can (if you want to) benefit from the stuff I’ve picked up since “macerator day”

Wanna know more?

Good, coz I’ve plenty to tell you this week, right here.

TTFN

Dan

P.S. When The HTBFA system was last available – it turned out to be our most popular “thing” ever – So keep your eyes peeled over the next few days.

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This is the part that many simply don’t share

Every day – especially when you start out – is hard

It is hard for a while, longer than than you think, and utterly not straight forward

Pretty much every ‘blueprint’ or ‘business plan’ is a best guess – hopefully according to previous experiences

You have to do the work
You have to adapt it for you
You have to stay the course

The amount of time things take to achieve people massively underestimate

It’s quite fun having been around a bit

I remember seeing a post from someone who was a fitpro maybe a few years back with their ‘million dollar blueprint’ they were touting

They have not made a million dollars lol

Because if my hearings issues as a kid, I developed a RIDIK visual memory

I remember the things and stuff

What people day they achieve is often grossly over estimated

What I have now is (if you want to look at another way) slow and boring and at times tedious

Same things
Done daily
Improved over time
Repeat

That’s it

Of course life and business gets easier if you improve over time

But it takes time

And probably gonna take a bit more time right now with what we have going on globally

Hence maybe be wary of those who are relatively new on the scene of that aren’t open with their past

They may be good

But more often then not many of their claims are a little bit ‘glossy’ and their background a little bit wallpapered over

Look for those who have shown a steady degree of progression – it’s amazing what people say that do but can’t (or that they are shady humans masquerading as ‘doing good’ now…)

Yes you can achieve many, many of the things you want

Just understand that it’s gonna take a bit of time and effort

That’s it

It does get easier

Ya just have to do the work

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Earlier this year – 6 years ago – I opened my first **official** business

I’d been self employed/consultant/minor shareholder in previous biz before…

…but this one was all me, all in, zero fucking safety net

4 maxed out credit cards….

One loan…

Selling all my shit..:

#ballsdeep

My first venture?

A PT studio

That 500sqft little cube where it all started

I was 33 at the time

(And this is what I used to look like)

And if you would of asked me if I REMOTELY thought I’d be doing ANYTHING like I’m doing now?

I wouldn’t of laughed at you

I would of been quite confused and politely changed the subject because I would assume you were talking complete and utter shite

🙃

This next bits gonna sound a bit depressing thought – but bear with me

This (I hope!) isn’t one of those woe is me look at me now kinda posts

Just how it was

I’ve shared before – and I’ll share again now but I:

Never felt Good enough
Never felt worthy of love
Never liked (let alone loved) myself

^^^ all things I happily buried deep down

You would of met a happy and relatively (on face value) chipper cheeky chap

But was all a happy little facade I kept up as I didn’t want to be a burden – far easier to bury shit deep down eh?

For me I always thought if I achieve something with my life – be a somebody – maybe then I’d be happy

Fuck you Dan – you’re NOTHING was a regular musing

Therefore =

Work

If you work, if you achieve then MAYBE you will be. ‘Worthy’

^^^ that was my logic

So with pretty much zero clue how I was going to do anything

I started doing stuff

Each thing I achieved I thought I’d feel different

The first 10k month was a milestone I wanted to hit

So I did

Felt the same

Ok

Maybe a 100k month will make me happy?

I was proud but all I was was tired and exhausted

So each time I achieved a new level it was always

‘You ain’t shit you bearded fucking nobody, keep going you ugly fat fuck’

(Literally had that on my wall as an ‘affirmation’ once lol)

I kept ticking off things that I would never even of dreamed of:

7-figure business ✅

(Legit/actual) Best selling author ✅

(Legit/actual) #1 most downloaded podcast ✅

Headlining with Gary V and other ‘A-players’ ✅

3000+ individuals and businesses helped ✅

1400+ testimonials ✅

There’s more if you can be bothered to search

✅ after ✅ after ✅ after ✅

(I mentioned some of these last night)

Simply because I didn’t feel like I was good enough

I mean

Why should someone like me have X or Y?

I’d have little conversions with myself

🙃

Generally would go along the lines of because I’d tell myself I wasn’t worthy of anything like this

I’ll prove myself wrong – and those that doubted me)

(Never said I was normal or once tried to be)

Over time I learned that you can achieve a lot through pure willpower and spite and rage and ‘fuck you’ attitude

But it’s always been underpinned with helping others

That’s what made – and makes – me happy

A lot of what I have was born out of frustration and seeing shit not done right

So fuck it if no one else is gonna do it?

I’ll do it myself

With each time I level up (ugh) that’s my attitude now

More out of frustration at how the market is served or a need rather than a panacea for my own darkness made light via helping others

(There’s lots of you that use helping others to help yourself…it feels good eh)

Life now?

Less anger
Less rage
Less sadness

More fun
More connection
More bringing people together

And the most important thing:

I’m able to be there for my family over and over again

But I never ever once expected it to be that way and I never ever fucking once expected to be a ‘thing’ and when it sucked the deepest suck I’d ever get I kept going when I didn’t want to

– glad I did now –

I simply ‘dared’ to have ideas above my station; it’s kinda why I am not a fan of the privately educated, wealthy land owning, entitled connected posh fucks

I despise them

Because they will never have to worry about if they are eating or can afford to put petrol in their cars like many of us had to

Fuck em

🙂

I only have time for those who earned their stripes and earned their £££ through hard word

Those are the people I look up to and – I hope – inspire others to be like

And those are the people I learn from and I invest in

People who built empires and success from the ground UP

And whether or not you like me?

That’s cool

But I have made a difference and my life has purpose now – so even if you can’t stand me?

Me daring to be me has changed lives for the better – a lot of lives – and I’m proud as fuck about that more than anything Else

The point of this post is simple

If you’re a decent human
If you’re prepared to work hard
If you’re good at shit/getting good at shit
If you understand this takes time
If you invest in those who have walked the walk and do what they say

And the most important thing

Is if you think you deserve more or want more and prepared to work for it

You CAN get it

I had no idea where I’d be where I am now – and (give or take) no bloody clue where I’ll be in 6 years time

But as long as I keep going?

Shit tends to happen

So if you’re at the start of your journey stay the fucking course

And maybe one day being well y’all be writing a post like this

Do the work
Invest wisely
Keep going

Dan

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[Never give up hope]

A story of success that involves my Dad, a deadline and a single one pound coin…

Now before I go on I’ll pre-frame with the fact I may of shared this to some in my past, but it’s pertinent for many of you to read this story NOW

Hence sharing this with you today

So, many years ago my dad – aka the goat – was in sales and I believe at the time he was a sales rep for a UK stationary company

It was during the 90’s recession and yours truly was just a little boy

(I only learned of this story last year)

Times were tough

Even though my dad was, and still is, a fantastic salesmen

We didn’t have much back then

I was always loved
I was a happy boy
I was never hungry or without books or a dog or toys

But times for many – as they are now – were hard

My dad isn’t by his own admission isn’t academic – but he IS determined and he IS relentless

He is also a provider

Hence the thought of him NOT being able to provide was something I knew that drove him from our chats in the last years

Anyways to the story

My dad got a lead

A company that he had been chasing down for many, many months gave him a call

If he could get to Cardiff?

The deal was his

Now I live in Somerset, and if you don’t know we have a big old body of water called the Bristol Channel between us and and wales

You can go up and around but that takes a few hours – and he would of missed the meeting

So he needed to use the bridge

The bridge back then cost £1

Problem was, he didn’t have any money

Now i don’t have a family

One day, I hope to

And if I do, my mum and dad have provided me with – in my opinion – a ‘blueprint’ for what being a good mum or dad is

Mum taught me to be kind and empathic, to look out for those who can’t look after themselves and to not complain about your lot in life

But to simply crack on

Dad?

That’s where I get my tenacity, people skills (different from mums) and sheer bloody minded relentlessness from

Now I can’t quite imagine how that felt

Knowing that the answer to your problems…

To the deal that would put money in the bank…

And food – literally – on the table…

Knowing all your problems could be solved by one fucking pound that you didn’t have I imagine would of felt brutal

For many?

Hope would be lost

What he felt – is for him and him alone – but he didn’t give up hope

From what he told me he went through every drawer…

Every suit pocket…

Every nook and cranny in his car…

Looking
For
One
Single
Pound
Coin

After coming up blank, he started turning the soft furnishings literally inside out

And after literally removing the lining of true sofa

Nestled amongst she lint, crumbs and things you find in the crevices of sofas…

…was a single, shiny, golden £1 coin

With barely enough petrol to cover the journey he set off

– made the meeting with 4 mins to spare –

And closed the deal

Got the commission
Paid the bills
Was there for his family

He didn’t lose hope
He kept looking
He refused to quit

I’m sharing this now as – for many – at times it might feel hopeless

No idea what to do
No idea who to turn to
No idea if you’re going to be ok

If you let your thoughts run wild?

You will he paralysed by fear and you won’t do your equivalent of ‘tearing up the sofa’

Now if your are reading this and you are 100% fine, more power to you

But with everything I write, I’m always mindful there could be those reading this that are fucked

I say this having come from no material privilege

All I have?

I worked for and earned myself

Yes I’ve had help from others

But you know who got my ass out of the shut?

Me

When it comes down to to IF you have a few people you can TRULY rely on?

You’re lucky

There’s times – more than once – I’ve felt completely hopeless, a week or two away from ruin

I remember having to sneak into work early when I was 19 to have a teaspoon of cereal from the boxes the consultants kept on the kitchen shelf…

I remember hiding in a corner behind a skip waiting for the manager of Pret to throw away the gone-off sandwiches that I would happily harvest after he closed door and before the motion sensor alarm was activated…

I remember walking 6 miles a day in a summer heatwave in london with multiple shirts (that I had to change in McDonalds toilets and wash/clean/iron every night) and a bundle of CV’s I printed off from the job centre handing them out for sales jobs…

I remember it all – and many more – clear as day

How I felt is BURNED into my mind

Because as depressed, beaten and emotional battered as I was?

Like my dad all those years ago – I didn’t give up hope

Somehow, I found a way

Fuck, I’m only here now because I’m a spiteful little arse who refuses to stay in his lane and knowing that I have a duty of care to my sister in years to come

If you’re in the suck right now?

I implore you: don’t give up hope

Yes, it may not be easy – it might be far from that – it might be fucking brutal

But do what you need to do

Call in favours…

Swallow your pride…

Get up early and go to bed late..

Do
What
Needs
To
Be
Done

This won’t last forever and I’m telling you there ARE opportunities out there

They might not be exactly what you want

When I lost it all?

I certainly didn’t want to be working in a strip club being belittled and spat on (literally, more than once) by bankers

But I did what needed to be done until I could shift to what I wanted to do

I did the work
I got paid
I fed myself and paid my bills

Had fuck all else

But I got through it and it made me who I am today

You WILL get through this

No idea when, or how but if you don’t give up hope and you don’t quit

You WILL find your own £1 coin

Yes you’re gonna have to be relentless
Yes you’re going to have to do some things you don’t want to do
Yes it’s not going to be easy

But one day it will be!

You just have to grind through this

So send the pitch…
DM every old client…
Leverage your network..

Hit the digital streets and knock on those digital doors one by fucking one and don’t fucking quit on yourself

One day YOU will be looking back on this and you will be PROUD that you didn’t quit when every fibre of your being said

‘I’m done’

Flip the sofa cushions

One day?

You’ll find that £1

Good luck

And it may not feel like it..

…but you got this

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Selling Through This Shit Storm

It’s the last post from the peeps in my world, you heard from her other half (Martin) this morning

And now you hear from Sarah Jolley-Jarvis (who along with Martin Jolley-Jarvis I have been mentoring for newly 2 years now!)

She is all about SALES

The content is pretty simple but that’s the point

It’s not hard IF you keep it simple

Read and go do!

*********

Let’s face it, for some people their business has evaporated over night.

If you are one of those people I’m not about to tell you that you should be sell sell selling what you do…that would be dumb

But if you need (and want to) you can sell your skills during this crisis, some of the skills might need transferring

Or the internet favourite word at the moment ‘pivoting’

To make them work and still add value remotely right now…

but people ARE buying and there IS demand there for the right skills.

So what are the right skills and how can you package them?

I’ve done over 20 calls with people who are struggling to find a new direction…every single call without fail comes back to the same thing…

Who is your ideal customer?

what is going on for them right now?

What help do they need?

First of all let’s deal with the worst case scenario: your ideal customer still needs what you sell but you can’t sell what you do because it can’t be done under lockdown conditions:

that sucks…you might have to look for alternative income, what other sellable skills do you have that people might need right now?

As far as maintaining contact with your ideal customer how might you be able to add some value, enough to maintain your relationship and keep at the forefront of their minds?

I’ve seen great examples of this with sports therapists doing tutorials on how to self massage, nurseries sending out activities to do with your kids, adding value with zero expectation or ability to sell.

However if you can sell then do!!

If you have something of value then why shouldn’t you be paid for it?

Don’t devalue your skill set, or your profession by doing things that SHOULD be paid for free of charge: I spoke to a client who was super frustrated; she does online yoga classes and has been doing for over a year prior to this all kicking off.

Her local competition decided to go online and are doing a class every morning for free…you can’t be undercut lower than that!!

We worked through her approach to sell against this, fortunately she has a fantastic reputation, some great USPs and a back catalogue of over 100 classes to differentiate herself and justify her monthly subscription.

If you are faced with something similar, look at where you can differentiate and add more value to justify the cost.

The likelihood is that your ideal customer still has the same needs as before…but their priorities might have changed.

Speaking to past and present clients, understanding where they are at and how their needs might have changed can really help you to figure out how you can still meet your customers needs.

I spoke to one person who has a fantastic loyal following and is normally booked up for months in advance, since the lockdown began every single client has cancelled: they simply can’t prioritise the money right now to pay for his services.

With little time to organically target sectors who can afford to prioritise money for their services he went back to his audience, found out what they could afford to invest right now and provided a scales back version of their normal services that fitted their budget…they put the offer out and it sold out organically in less than 24 hours.

Understand what your customer needs right now…and provide them with a solution that meets that need at a price that they can afford and just as before this crisis began they will buy!!

Finally…you have an audience but you can’t sell to them what you would normally provide but does your market need what you can provide for a different reason? Can you meet their needs in another way?

For instance I spoke to a lady who runs a face to face tutoring business for children (mostly for exam prep etc)

Schools closed, exams got cancelled and demand disappeared. Quickly though enquiries started coming in for tutoring for kids who are learning at home: parents who didn’t want their kids missing out on learning. This wasn’t something she had done before.

But Was totally within the skill set of her tutors, she got them set up online and within day’s was able to offer appropriate tuition for kids of all stage of education in lockdown.

This was a simple ‘pivot’, she increased awareness of what she had to offer organically using social media; providing decent value content to her growing audience and within a week she was at full capacity and in a position to look for more tutors to meet demand.

If you are desperately searching for your next sale start by reconnecting with your ideal customer, understand how what they need and how your skills can help them meet that need…

And then don’t be afraid to let them know that you can help them: you are doing them a disservice not telling them if you can truly help them during this time.

Corona Crisis or not always keep your communication honest and authentic: don’t pretend to be someone you aren’t, don’t ‘put on a brave face’, be human, be you and you WILL attract and convert those ideal customers you enjoy working with.

Happy selling 🙂

*********

Back to Dan

How straightforward was that eh?

If your honest, smart and act quickly you can crack on during these weird as fuck times

And if the idea of sales scares you?

That’s normal for some!

Sarah is a great sales coach (she also does sales training for corporates and groups as well)

Again lemme know if you want an intro

Right that’s it from me ‘leveraging’ my peeps, if you got something from any of the posts?

TELL ME

The guys and gals happily gave up their time to create it, would be nice to give them some feedback

Anyways that’s it from me

If you celebrate? Happy easter!

If not?

HAVE A DAY!

😘

Dan

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9 paid traffic tips that anyone (even me!) can use right now…

So we are coming to the close of the week of leverage (aka my team and mentees to write my posts for me lol…we allllllll need a break from Dan from time to time… even me 🤣)

Now Martin Jolley-Jarvis is one half of the JJ’s, aka my mentees for nearly two years

His other half – Sarah Jolley-Jarvis – is going to be here later with all things sales

Martin?

Well his domain is paid traffic

⁃ he’s rather good, hence the above image to show you coz it’s easy to talk le shite online –

Now this content IS epic and deeply actionable, there’s only one thing I need to give you a heads up on..

My man Martin – as you will see – LOVES an emoji…more than me!

Lol

Right over to the man himself…

**********

😲9 takeaways from $346,400 profit in 6 months with Facebook Ads.😲

The surprising truth you’re about to discover is making paid traffic work is as much about your business as it is the ads. 🤯

The reality is paid ads are a powerful way to scale any business, especially when you’re hitting mid 6 figures going onto 7 figure revenue.

Sure it’s a slightly different skill set going from $1000 a month to $1000+ a day in spend.

Yet the principles are the same…

These takeaways will help whether you’re at $1k, $10k or $100k monthly revenue.

Essentially my learnings and insights from a webinar and free book funnel build with facebook ads run at our agency.

✅Takeaway 1: Know your audience✅

Know your audience… Sounds like a basic marketing 101 💩.

It’s scary the amount of people who don’t know their audiences well enough.

For years they’d struggled to make paid traffic work. 😢

Like most they had a fair idea who they were targeting. Yet still hadn’t clearly defined it.

When we dug deeper it became obvious there were two very different avatars.

The guys who had loads of skin in the game, and were looking for the one or two gems that would really accelerate their businesses. 🤔

These guys had total belief, but thought they’d seen it all already.

OR

The beginners who were just looking to get started and need hand holding to make it happen.

These guys knew other people were doing well in the niche, but did not have the self belief or technical knowledge to make it work. 🤯

The problem was all their marketing had been aimed in between the two avatars.

Which meant that the advanced guys thought the info was a little basic and the inexperienced guys didn’t have the self belief or confidence to feel they could achieve it.

We totally reworked their messages having two distinct messages that spoke exactly to the avatar. Not pitching it mid-way between. This meant their ad CTR went from <0.5% to <1.5% average.

Yes it’s basic marketing 101, but amazing how many people skip this step…

Even businesses running multiple 6 figures in revenue.

Changing this allowed us to much better direct the copy on the sales funnel we built too.

✅Takeaway 2: Products✅

Get your products ready for scaling…

Don’t just build a thing and expect it to sell. Most successful businesses (and products) are iterations built over time and experience. ⌚️

To make paid ads work and any funnel profitable you need a good suite of products that sell! 🥳

From low price point entry level to high ticket consulting.

When we started working together they had the high ticket consulting and sales were good for offline activity (in person events etc). They just couldn’t make online work. 🤷‍♂️

Thing is with products, if you’re making sales organically and people are willing to buy, then you’re likely to make sales with paid traffic.

If you can’t sell a product to your market organically then chances are ads won’t improve that.

We knew people wanted their product because they were making sales. 😎

The problem with this client was they didn’t have any lower price point offers.

So it was a steep jump – cold traffic to $10k min, which they’d previously tried to bridge through local events.

So we work with them to test two lower price point offers…

➡️FREE Book (&P&P) Offer.
➡️Webinar To $127 Entry Level Course.

This dramatically dropped the CTA while bringing in money to pay their ads back and getting more people into the pipeline for their mastermind.

I see a lot with entrepreneurs starting out, they have a webinar to a single product.

If that product price is too low, it’s hard to make profit from your ads…

If it’s too high then you have to be a good high ticket closer.

Getting that balance is essential, especially having lower price points for entry level so you can recuperate some of your ad costs upfront.

✅Takeaway 3: Test & Measure Everything✅

It’s so important.

There’s lots out there about split testing.

Testing and optimising ads should be a given. If you’re not doing it then you’re literally letting profit slip through your fingers.

Testing the process is sometimes overlooked!

Not the pages (e.g. headline 1 vs headline 2).

I’m talking about the actual process.

We tested two distinct front end offers.

Free book VS webinar to $127 course

➡️The Free book killed it on CTA $15.83
➡️The CTA for the course was $150.60

On face value the book is cheaper 10x less acquisition cost.

BUT

Both were running at a loss…

The problem was getting people to convert straight off the book was more difficult. Jumping from a $4.99 book to an $10k package was a sizeable leap for most people.

Whereas the $127 course made a slight $25 ish loss.

Yet was STILL PROFITABLE

Because we had a $647 upsell which converted around 17% of people.

Meaning they were immediately profitable $86.99 per sale on average.😍

This was the principle component enabling us to fund scaling rapidly from $95 a day to $1080 in 3 months. 🥳

✅Takeaway 4: Retarget Like A BOSS✅

Most people retargeting and there are many different ways to do it.

Here’s how we do it…

We retarget the same offer (in different ways) across multiple audiences on the front end.

✔️All Website Traffic – (anyone who’s visited your site or funnel)
✔️New Leads – (anyone who’s given you their contact details)
✔️Video Views – (anyone who’s watched your videos)
✔️Add To Carts – (anyone who’s looked to buy or book a call)
✔️Completed Registrations – (anyone who’s bought or booked a call)
✔️Engaged Facebook Page – (anyone who’s engaged with your page)
✔️Engaged Instagram Profile – (anyone who’s engaged with your Instagram)
✔️Engaged Ad Or Post (Facebook)
✔️Engaged With Ads Or Posts (Instagram)

Not only that, we do it across multiple timelines 7-14-30-60-90-120 &180 days!

Here’s the thing…

We represented the webinar to page visitors who didn’t sign up for the webinar – this retargeting audience generated leads at $7.56 vs $10.38 on average for cold.

We retargeted all webinar sign ups with the $127 course as a limited time offer.

We downsold too…

If they didn’t buy the $127 course in the time allowed we down sold them to the FREE Book offer.

This simple retargeting downsell cost JUST $10 a day…

We attributed over $30k+ in high ticket sales from this book offer because of post purchase follow up sales calls.😲

✅Takeaway 5: Have a suite of ads….✅

If the foundations are right then your ads will be a success.

Assuming you follow the right process.

Hammering people with sales ads ALL the time is the fastest way to turn off your audience.🤦‍♂️

You want that will presell your prospects so they’re ready to buy.

⚠️We used a suite of ads ⚠️

➡️ Testimonial ads,
➡️ Customer story ads,
➡️ Product walkthrough ads,
➡️ FAQ ads,
➡️ Content lead ads

All designed to establish social proof and credibility
So when they saw the sales ad they were already bought in.

Meaning the prospect was WAY more likely to buy the course AND improved the high ticket conversion rates too. We don’t have exact figures on the increase – sorry.

It also means there were multiple touch points before purchasing.

As you’ll hear time and time again testing is SO important.
We tested hundreds of ads to find the ones that work best. 🚀

One tip for rapid testing is to use dynamic creatives (if you’re not already).

Facebook will test 5 headlines | 5 main body copy | 10 creatives and 5 buttons to bring you the BEST combinations.

It allows you to rapidly discover the ad combinations that are working best. 🙌

You can test a lot of creatives & copy at once for faster results.

You can then dupe the winning combinations out and test more variants around that theme.

Doing this meant we found winning combinations of ads that, once duped out, generated thousands of likes, comments and shares each! 👊👊👊

✅Takeaway 6 – Work On Writing Good Copy Or Hire A Copywriter✅

Copy with your ads is a very important element.

When you’re building funnels and pages then copywriting is an incredibly important skill.

Good copy does take a while to learn.

Over the last 2 years we’ve invested heavily in 1-2-1 training with world class copywriters and it’s paid dividends for our business. 😎

If you don’t have time to learn or writing isn’t your thing then hire one.

We tested straight to a high converting clickfunnels order form Vs longform page copy and the results were obvious.

High converting order form = 11.7% conversion rate
Long Form Sales Page = 23.75% conversion rate💥

That’s insane.

They literally doubled their money and returns from ads.

From this one subtle difference.

Making a HUGE difference to their front end ad profitability.

✅Takeaway 7 – Sales Follow Up ✅

Sales are the lifeblood of any business.

The ones that really do well with paid ads have a team of salespeople to follow up.

At a minimum if it’s just you, get good at selling, then bring on a sales person.

A good high ticket closer is worth their weight in gold. 🏆

This client had a team of 4 sales people, that could follow up all leads and purchases and upsell (even fastrack) to high ticket mastermind or private client.

⚠️ In the first month of running ads one person bypassed the entire funnel (after the webinar) and went from lead to private $30k client. ⚠️

This started with JUST one phone call. 📞

It’s a subtle mindset shift that I see with all clients, like this, who are really making paid ads work.

The ads aren’t the panacea to fixing your business sales problems.

They are a proven and scalable way to feed your business so you can make MORE sales.

Invest in sales training or staff so you can serve the leads that are coming in.

Ads are only ever as successful as your ability to close.🤷‍♂️

✅Takeaway 8 – Know Your Numbers ✅

Knowing your numbers is essential.

When we first started working together their numbers were um… a little sketchy.

Daily tracking of their ad performance meant that we could accurately assess metrics and predict the numbers using Geru.

Tracking & attributing sales was much more difficult.

They had money coming in from paypal, BACS, stripe, cash.

It was a nightmare to track. 🤦‍♂️

Worse… midway through they swapped CRM too, which further added the complexity of attribution.

We used facebook offline events to upload as much data as we could and attribute it wherever possible, including manually. But ONLY for the last 3 months (we didn’t do this before because we didn’t have access to the data.)

If this was an ideal case, the tracking of numbers could have been MUCH better.

The most accurate figure we can get on the back end according to their sales manager is 4.4x ROAR. 🔥

Which is a decent return on top of the front end profits.

Almost everything we could get access to was attributed.

Sadly we didn’t have visibility of everything. The figure could be a lot higher, we have no way of knowing. 🙄

The big learning from this is to use systems that’s easily trackable and one or two method of taking payment (your account might also love you or it).😉

Understanding the data is what drives decisions and when you’re scaling big numbers small decisions can have dramatic impacts on results.

✅Takeaway 9 – Learnings ✅

If I had to do it again, I’d definitely do a few things differently, the tracking above was huge learning.

The other key takeaway was hiring our own creative team. 👩‍🎨

It took longer than we wanted to get creatives off the client and so we hired a creative team in house to build us out more creatives for testing.

This allowed us to test hundreds of creatives rapidly without ever having to wait for the client to send stuff over. 😎

Allowing us to dramatically speed up testing and get results much faster.

This was a big win and we’ve kept the creative team on so we can test lots of creatives without constantly badgering clients in the future.🥰

That’s it…

Hope that’s been useful.

Martin

P.S. I was going to shoot for 10, but didn’t see the point creating one more takeaway just to hit a round number. 🤦‍♂️

**********

Ya know what?

I was legit impressed with that, my man MJJ knows his stuff

If you ever need a) paid traffic run for you OR b) you would like to know how to do it yourself?

Let me know and I’ll make the intro or just DM him

They ain’t cheap, but you really do get what you pay for in this space

Plus – because such things ARE important – he’s got a bank is screenshots of ad accounts for proof

No bullshit on this boy eh?

Right, last one coming later from Sarah JJ

Hope y’all enjoyed the week so far!

D

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