Building Your Creative Business with Podia: Behind the Scenes with Nicola Wynn

Lyric Kinard (00:01.142) I forgot to ask you the right way to pronounce your name. Nicola Win. Okay. Nicola Wynn (00:04.687) Nicola. Lyric Kinard (00:09.538) Hello friends, are so happy to have with us a representative from Podia. Nicola Nguyen is, I'm gonna start over. And from now on, and if it glitches also, just keep talking because it records on either side independently. So we should be fine. Nicola Wynn (00:34.329) Do you want me to type out my title and stuff for Podia? Is that helpful? Or does it matter? Lyric Kinard (00:38.918) Nicola Winn. I don't think it matters. We'll be fine. Okay. Hello friends. We are so happy to have with us Nicola Winn. She's from the Podia platform, an online course platform. I personally have on-demand classes on that platform. So it's always fun to get behind the scenes of a business that you're doing business with. So Nikla, I'm so happy to have you. Why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you come to be where you are. Nicola Wynn (01:12.279) Yeah, hi, it's so great to be here. And it's always so fun to talk to someone who's used the platform too, because I feel like there's just that extra level of understanding and questions we can get into. So my name's Nicola Nguyen. I am on the marketing team at Podia. I have been at Podia for three and a half years. And before that, I actually was a teacher and a creator myself. I was making printable things for my classroom. And I started to look into how I could sell them online and maybe help other teachers. So even before I worked at Podia, I was a fan of Podia because I found Podia and I was like, this is the place I must sell my things here. And I loved like how simple it was and how beautiful the app was. And so when, when I had the opportunity to join the team, it just felt like the perfect stars aligning moment. yeah. Lyric Kinard (02:05.824) Interesting. So you didn't come on saying, I'm going to build a full on course. You were selling printables on Podia. How does that work? Nicola Wynn (02:15.203) So yeah, my background with my entrepreneurship journey was mainly printables and digital product based. So I tried pretty much every platform there is, as I'm sure some of your listeners might have as well. And I tried, I made the PDF downloads I wanted to sell, and then I tried selling them all over the place. And then when I found out about Podia, I realized, Trying to cobble everything together with a million different tools is really complicated. So moving forward now, everything I have, I don't have anything I'm selling right now, but any products or freebies or email things I do now are all on Podia and Podia has the ability to offer digital downloads. You can do courses, webinars, coaching, downloads, all kinds of products. And then you can also charge for them or make them free if you're at a stage where you're growing your list. So it was kind of the roundabout way of learning where I got to go through the very common creator experience of trying 15 different tools and then they're all not talking to each other and they're all very expensive. And then when I found out about Podia, I was like, this is the way for creators, which is what made me so excited to get to be part of the team. Lyric Kinard (03:31.534) Very nice. And we're talking specifically about digital products, about things that you can send that you don't have to get a shipping address and package up and send through the mail. For some reason, none of the online course platforms do that. They are totally different kind of animals, I think, which is totally fine. But it's awesome that you found that for an e-commerce kind of business. Nicola Wynn (03:35.828) Yes. Nicola Wynn (03:42.676) Exactly, yes. Nicola Wynn (03:54.689) Yeah, yeah. Lyric Kinard (04:01.356) Tell us a little bit about the company. Give us kind of a backstory. What is it about? And then we'll go into some of the specifics of Podia and what it has to offer online creators. Nicola Wynn (04:05.964) Yeah. Nicola Wynn (04:18.517) Yes, so Podia is an all-in-one platform for building a business and it's really for the small creative entrepreneurs, the solopreneurs, the teams of one, the people who are out here making what they love and they just need the tech to kind of support that and it's technically you can do quite a lot with the platform. You can do, you can make your website, you can make a blog, you can make landing pages and all kinds of digital products. You can also run your email marketing, your affiliate marketing. You can keep track of all your audience information. You can send live chat messages. There's tons of features, but the real kind of core of the product is giving people a way to get started in their online business and then grow however their business grows. Cause I think anyone, anyone who's gone on like an entrepreneurial journey knows that there's a lot of twists and turns and you don't always know what. what it is you're gonna need and what tools you're gonna need. So we've put them all in one place so you are free to just explore and figure out what it is your business is going to turn into. And a big part of that is also keeping the community you build as an entrepreneur right at the center of all of that. So Podia has a community feature and then there's also, like I mentioned, the email marketing as well as a lot of just little kind of details. For example, you can turn on like a discussion area in any one of your products. So if you have a course, anyone in your course can go ask a question in the discussion and other people can answer, you can answer. There's this opportunity to build these communities within the products that creators are making. And I think that's something that makes it really special because you're selling things online that you've made, which is amazing, but the backbone of that is your audience who you're helping. And when you can... email them and chat with them and make things for them and hang out with them all in one spot. That's a really, that's a really powerful place to be as a creator. You have a lot of control over your business in that scenario. And that's, that's kind of what we want. think there's too many stories of creators who like build this awesome business and then the platform algorithm changes and it's gone and it's tragic. So I think like giving people a way to have everything they need in one spot so they can just follow whatever. Nicola Wynn (06:42.029) whatever direction they're gonna take and we're here for it. We love to see it. It's one of the best parts of my job is getting to see all the businesses people make and truly it boggles my mind how creative people are and just the ideas people come up with. I feel like every day I'm like, wait, I wanna take that course. I wanna join that webinar because there's so many cool things to learn. Lyric Kinard (07:01.39) you Lyric Kinard (07:05.378) Right. So. Nicola Wynn (07:06.627) So that's kind of like, yeah, that's the, I guess the technical, also more of the philosophical. Like it's a place where you can bring your people together and you can build what you want. And it's gonna be affordable and not super hard. It's easy, it's beautiful, it's simple. Like it's a place where you can come and just see where your business goes. Lyric Kinard (07:25.708) Every time I talk to another course platform, especially the ones that I use, because I do have my classes, some of my on-demand classes on Podia, I'm thinking, huh, I didn't know it could do that, huh. I should probably spend some time digging in and figuring out how it can do that. Because I think I just use the bare minimum. My journey with Podia was the... Nicola Wynn (07:38.712) Ha ha! Nicola Wynn (07:49.443) Hmm. Lyric Kinard (07:54.03) platform that I was on was the people who ran it had been doing it on their own for like 15 years and they were just tired and nobody wanted to buy it. So they gave everybody a good solid year. You know, probably was a really long year for them, but it gave everybody time to migrate their courses. And of course I waited too long until it was like, Ugh, I have to do this. And the thing that hooked me into Bodhiya was that you transferred all of my classes. I could just say, here are my other classes, put them up for me. And somehow you did. And it was a lot of work, a lot of classes that probably took them a good month because I like 15 courses with lots and lots of lessons and videos and all kinds of things each. So that was a... That was a godsend. That was so good to have Podia do that. And there are other platforms that do that, but often it's only from other certain platforms that they will. So I was surprised that that happened for me. You know, one of the huge extra benefits. Podia also, the price point for entry is a little more accessible than some of the other main platforms that we're on. Nicola Wynn (09:26.233) Yeah, for sure. So we have a 30 day free trial and that lets you try all the features. And then the mover plan is right now $39 a month and $33 a month if you pay annually. And then there's the shaker plan, which is $89 a month or $75 a month when you pay annually. So we do keep the prices. It's because the platform is for independent creators. know, most of our users are teams of one wearing a lot of hats or just getting their business going. And it's important to have a tool that is accessible when you're getting started out and as you grow. And then both of those plans, any paid plan, the mover or shaker, monthly or annual, all come with the free migrations. So if a creator is using another platform and they do want to move over, I can definitely see how that would be a big overwhelming project. And luckily we have. We have people who can handle that for you. that's, again, that's free with either of those paid plans. And then we can also move email for you as well, like your email list subscribers, if they're on another platform. And that's, there's, if you sign up for a paid email plan, then there's email migrations as well. So you could potentially consolidate several tools into one tool and not have to actually do the technical transfer, which is so nice. Lyric Kinard (10:48.43) Tell us about Podia's email services. For instance, if I've got students in a course, can I easily email just the students in that course? Nicola Wynn (10:56.076) Mm-hmm. Nicola Wynn (11:00.105) yes. Okay. I want to like pull up my screen to show, to do a, I'll show you a demo. I'm very much a Podia nerd. but yes, you definitely can. So anytime someone buys a product in your shop, whether it's a free product, paid product, course, webinar, coaching, whatever, they are automatically added into your audience. And then when you go to send an email, you can customize who gets that email using audience filters. And that's all built in. You don't have to set up any tags or segments or anything. You can, but you don't have to. So you can click, for example, this customer has this course and it'll only send to that group. You can also do the opposite where you say this customer does not have this course and only send to that group. So that makes it really powerful when you're trying to target your email marketing. Like if you were running a Black Friday Cyber Monday sale and you wanted to offer a coupon for a product, but you didn't want to message the people who had already bought that product, that's an easy filter you can do. And you can also, you can get more granular. There are filters based on if someone's opened an email of yours in the last certain timeframe. There are... when they were last seen in your course. So you can message people who are maybe going in active, they haven't checked in in a while. So there's a lot of functionality there and that's all built in out of the box because Podia is keeping track of your audience for you. And then of course you can add as much segmenting or tagging as you want on top of that, but you certainly don't have to. Like I have a newsletter on Podia now and I just use the built-in features. I don't, I mean, yeah. Lyric Kinard (12:36.461) Right. Lyric Kinard (12:42.796) Nice. What are the limits on the numbers of emails that you can send or the members in your audience for the lower and the upper plan? I know there's like at some point, do you have to pay extra for a very large email list? Nicola Wynn (13:02.367) So email is free for your first hundred subscribers and that's all the features. You get the automations, the audience targeting, the email builder, you can make them look really pretty, which we all love. And all that is you can send as many emails as you want to 100 subscribers. And then after that, there is pricing that goes up in increments from there. Not sure off the top of my head what the... exact increments are, but I believe the first plan starts at $7 a month. So it's a pretty low price point compared to if you were to just buy an email tool outright in addition to a course tool. And then it's all right in there and you can upgrade and downgrade as your list changes. Lyric Kinard (13:40.429) Right. Lyric Kinard (13:44.62) Right, and this is in addition to your monthly or annual subscriber cost. Yeah, because it's an extra service that is nice and sweet. Nicola Wynn (13:47.565) Yes. Yeah. Right. Yeah, and you can use it. Yeah, and you can use it. And if you don't want to, we also integrate directly with several big email providers. So there's plenty of options available. If people have a big list somewhere and they really love that platform, that's awesome. You can most likely connect it. Lyric Kinard (14:10.582) Yeah, very good. What are some of the fun things you say you get to see all the classes, right? Nicola Wynn (14:18.573) I can see, it's so cool. People are so smart and so creative. It is very like inspiring to get to work with people making things all the time. Lyric Kinard (14:27.182) Tell us some of the journeys of some of your successful course creators. What do you see as a typical, here's where they started, here's the messy middle, here's where they've kind of settled in, and here's where they're going? Nicola Wynn (14:42.029) Yeah, yeah, there's some, I've got some, just off the top of my head, like there are some really incredible creators that we've watched and there are a few common threads. A lot of them keep their audience very front and center and they spend a lot of time really nurturing that core group. So there's one creator that I remember we spoke to a while back and she shared this example of when she was just starting out, she had a very small following and she actually reached out just on social media and said, hey, I wanna talk to some people about what kind of product they'd be interested in buying. She did a few one-on-one, I think maybe Zoom calls, just like we're doing now, and got to hear what people in her audience actually wanted. And then when she made that product, people were coming to her saying, wait, how did you know? It's like you read my mind. And she was like, yes, because you can make exactly what the people in your audience want. So that's one thing that I've seen work really well is just this communication bit. You can do this. on social media, can do this through email and this works if you have five people who follow you. You can reach out to those five people and ask them what they want and then you know the things you're making, you're not just gonna be throwing them out into the void. Yeah. Lyric Kinard (15:54.462) I agree. Some people come into teaching virtually and think, how is this going to work? I don't have an audience. I have like 10 people on my list. And for that exact reason, sometimes it's an advantage. You can have that one-on-one actual real face-to-face virtual conversation. And when you ask more questions, know, listen more than tell and capture those words and Nicola Wynn (16:02.135) Right. Nicola Wynn (16:08.921) Exactly. Lyric Kinard (16:24.162) really understand and dig down into what their problem is and what solution they need, you use their own words and you provide the solution they need. Nicola Wynn (16:34.519) Yeah, exactly. And I think that's so, so important, just like keeping, keeping your audience and your community at the center of it and responding to what they ask for and they want, because it is going to be a fluid journey and like things might change month to month in some cases, depending on what you're teaching. So being able to just hear like, Hey, this is what, what we're looking for. And then respond to that is really powerful. And, and it's also been really cool to see the different ways people like in the creative space, in quilting, sewing, crafting, art, like we see tons of people in this space and their businesses all look so different, which is amazing because like I can think of one, I know one person does just evergreen courses about quilting and they're beautiful courses and you can sign up anytime and you can sit there and you can work all the way through them and they're fabulous. And then another person has a membership where, Every single month they're releasing new patterns and people are trying them and sharing their images in the community area. So that's a little more of the group element. And then there's people who are doing webinars. We have one person who does like sketching webinars live for groups. And that's a whole different direction you can go. So it's really cool to see, you know, the personality of the person running the business, what then they gravitate to make. Like, what do you like to make? And to have all of those options so that you can kind of grow as you go is really cool to see. Lyric Kinard (18:04.866) Does Podia have webinar capability built right in? is there a mechanism within there that you can, you know, sell the link, people come in and they come into that place or do you have to integrate with your own Zoom account? How does that work? Nicola Wynn (18:23.799) Yeah, so the way it works is you can set up a webinar product in Podia and you can charge for access and Podia will handle the payment on that and also send out the link when it's time for the webinar. And you can integrate it either with a Zoom webinar account or with a YouTube Live account. So YouTube Live is free if you wanted to have the streaming link there, then when it's time for the webinar, people can go in and watch the stream. But then it also connects with Zoom as well, if that's the preferred method. But it's very easy, all in one shop. The payment's taken care of, so you're not chasing people for payment links after the fact. And then you also have that audience information. So you will know if someone attended your webinar based on the product they bought, and then you can continue your marketing to them after. And I think that's another thing that like... maybe isn't on the forefront of people's minds when they start a creative business is how important that email piece can be to really staying connected with your audience. Because when someone joins your email list, whether it's through a product or a lead magnet or a sign up form, they're saying, I want to hear from you. I'm very interested in what you're doing. And that's really powerful because now you can share value with them. You can tell your story to them. They're kind of like your main team in this journey. And when you have a product in the future, even if someone's just starting out and they don't have a product right now, if they have that list of people who's really interested in what they do, when they do have a product, they're gonna be able to say, here you go. And people are gonna be so excited for them. And that's awesome. Like that is so much more fun than launching to like an empty room, you know. Now you actually have nurtured these relationships with people. And actually there's another creator I've spoken to who... did their nurturing of their audience through Instagram. And when she launched, had been months of just sharing value on Instagram and before announcing a paid product. And it just goes to show it was a huge success when the paid product was available. But it took that consistency of talking to your audience and connecting with them and providing value. And you can do that through social media or through email or however you prefer, but. Nicola Wynn (20:38.731) It is so important and it's something anyone can do even at the very beginning, even before the course is built or you're not sure what you want to make, but you can start building that audience and then you're kind of locking yourself in for future success, which we love. Lyric Kinard (20:54.156) Yeah, it's all about making authentic connections and providing a service to the people who you're helping, to the people who you're bringing your joy and your creativity, giving them the same tools to have that joy and creativity. I don't think sometimes people realize how very, very important an email list is. Social media is fantastic for a lot of people, right? But also it's random and you don't own it and... Nicola Wynn (20:58.487) Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Nicola Wynn (21:15.609) Yeah. Lyric Kinard (21:22.284) You know, the algorithm could change at any time, but if you can get email in people into an email list, right, especially if you provide value and you nurture them, they chose you. They invited you in. So it's, it's a completely different kind of connection to the audience. Does Podia have the ability to create automated welcome sequences with emails? Nicola Wynn (21:34.275) Mm-hmm. Nicola Wynn (21:50.283) yes, absolutely. Yes, absolutely. And actually, you can even start a little bit before that because you can, I was thinking when we were talking about social media, I was like, you can actually make your link in bio in Podia too. And then you could put that there and then you could have your email list and your link in bio so your social media people come. But to answer your question, yes, you absolutely can do email welcome sequences and automations. Lyric Kinard (21:51.246) Tell us about that. Nicola Wynn (22:16.589) You can do these based on when someone joins your list through an email signup form. And that is usually something on your website or blog that just says, subscribe for updates. Or if you send like a monthly or weekly newsletter, you would give information about that. You can set up a email welcome sequence for that. And you can also set up an email welcome sequence for each of your products, including your free products, which is like kind of, I think the secret sauce here, because if you have a free product, so. a free pattern, free draw along with me tutorial, free something that's really good, but free and like a little bit, you know, don't don't spend like 10 years making it because you gotta we gotta get going. It's Lyric Kinard (22:59.116) No, the perfect lead magnet delivers a beautiful nugget of useful information, right? But it also builds desire for the paid product that you have. Nicola Wynn (23:06.509) Yes. Nicola Wynn (23:12.501) Exactly, exactly. It gives that first little taste of like, my gosh, this person can help me do exactly what I want to do. Like this is the person I've been looking for to go on whatever journey I want to go on. Like this is, you're showing them, hey, I'm not just, I'm not just posting on Instagram all day, or I'm not just out here saying I can help you. I'm showing you because you got this thing and you liked it. And it's amazing. So that. is your first step. And that's also something you can do in Podia. If you have a digital download, for example, you can make it free email delivery, which just means someone puts in their email address, we send them the product they added to your list. And then you can fire a welcome sequence from that. And this is all like, it may be sounds complicated when we're talking about it without a visual, but when you see it in the screen, it's literally like click here, click here, click here, and it's set up. So that we're talking like a handful. clicks and this is built. But you can send as many emails as you want. You can add a delay. So this one sends after one day, after two days, after three days. And then you can customize those emails with whatever information you want to share. So that could look like a intro about your business. It could be sharing links to blog posts or other free resources and In my opinion, after a few days of providing value, it's a perfect time to offer a paid product and to say, look, if you liked this free thing, you're going to love this and really get those people right when they're so excited about your business. Lyric Kinard (24:49.206) It's so important, I think, to have that nurture sequence because people will click for the free thing. And sure, some of them will just get the free thing and leave. That's fine. That is not a problem. But some of them will then stay. And if you hit them right then with the biggest warm hug and a home-baked pie, of like, look, this is who I am. I love you. And this is how I want to serve you and help you. It builds a relationship right at the very beginning instead of just sign up for the email list and then wait three weeks and open a newsletter and they don't really know what they're going to get, right? don't. Having that immediate nurture sequence, it's worth taking the time to set it up because that's what makes them into more of a community instead of just, know, I signed up for this free thing and. Now I'm on an email list and I probably will never open it because I get too many emails. You know, show them right away how much you love them. Nicola Wynn (25:51.257) Thanks. Nicola Wynn (25:55.011) Exactly. I think that's the perfect way to say it. you know, this, really is. I think most people in, when you're making a business around something you love to share and some of your creativity and your passion, it's, it is about the people you get to help. It's, you know, like we're doing this because we care about other people and want them to enjoy the thing we enjoy. And so to be there to welcome them right when they first express interest is a really key moment, I think in this entrepreneurship journey. Lyric Kinard (26:24.894) is. That's very cool. So what what else could you tell us about Podio? What is one of your favorite things? I don't know how much you've looked at all the other course platforms. You know they all do amazing things for people, but what is it that you love about your company? Nicola Wynn (26:44.067) Yeah, yeah, it's true. mean, there's no shortage of great platforms out there. I think with Podia, we really are focused on the supporting the solopreneur, smaller creator who is trying to build an all-in-one home for their business. And because of that, we're pretty close. Like we are in the community, we are available. Our customer support team is incredible. Like I know all of them in person, so nice. Some of the best people you've ever met. And if you send in an email asking for help, you're gonna get one of them and they're gonna help you out and it's great. And we really just like taking care of our people. And we also have this active community where people are, other Podia people are helping each other and it's a really fun place to grow a business. And on top of that, Podia itself is very beautiful, simple, easy to use. You can hop in and set up a website in an afternoon. You don't need a- Lyric Kinard (27:17.773) Okay. Nicola Wynn (27:39.863) of technical background knowledge, which I think is really important because I've tried to build websites from scratch and it's always hard. And then you get so caught up in the actual building of the thing that then you're not doing the thing you want to be doing, you're building it. And that's a big barrier because that can get frustrating and we don't want people to feel that way. So Podia is kind of the opposite. It's very simple, very straightforward. You hop in there. you could have your website and your product up in an afternoon, easy, and start making sales. Like, that's the cool thing is you can actually, once you're press and publish, you share that link and you can start making sales right away. And I think that's, you know, that's a really cool piece of it that you don't have to spend all this time, like getting all the tech set up and connecting everything and making it all formatted the right way. And for me, I think it, gives more space to actually do the creative business you're passionate about, not, you know, manage a tangle, a tangle of tech. Lyric Kinard (28:39.746) Right. Right. Yeah, my experience has been in just like I said, y'all set up the classes for me. So I didn't even have to mess with anything. But I set up things and it's just plug and play templates. It's just it's set up this way. Do this. Push a button. Enter these words here. So it and my experience again is I have not spent hundreds of hours. Nicola Wynn (28:58.733) Yeah. Yeah. Lyric Kinard (29:11.65) Digging deep, obviously. I'm like going, hmm, maybe I should. Maybe I should look down in there. It could do more than I thought it could, because my tech stack is ugly. It is so deep. Go ahead. Nicola Wynn (29:16.695) I like, no. Nicola Wynn (29:22.379) Yeah. Well, and that's a, yeah. sorry. Go ahead. No, but that's a great point though, because, because the other thing is because we are spending a lot of time with, with customers. Like we, really do listen to what people are saying and we're constantly rolling out new development features, new tools, improving on things. Like our dev team is amazing and we have, it's been really, really cool. Just even in the time I've been at Podia to see all the new things that have rolled out. We've launched. email marketing and blogging and we've got other exciting things coming. So it's just like, get this, you get this, this tool that's like actually listening to what the users are saying and responding like pretty directly to what people want. And, and that's been really cool. So yeah, if you have tried Vody in the past or have an account that you haven't dug around in very much, you might have a lot of new stuff in there because there's a, there's a lot that's been rolled out lately and it's been a lot of fun. Lyric Kinard (30:20.738) Yeah, most of the, like I said, most of the people just love the simplicity. There's, and if you're looking for simplicity, that is, that's an ideal place to go. Not having to worry about learning huge amounts of tech to be able to even use the platform is, is a huge benefit because as creatives, we just want to get right to the making and right to the teaching, right? Nicola Wynn (30:25.952) Right, yeah. Nicola Wynn (30:33.027) Hmm. Nicola Wynn (30:46.189) I know. It's the jump right in mentality where you're like, I'm just going to jump in and do this. But then if it's too messy and confusing, it's so discouraging and like, that's sad. I don't want anyone to feel that way. So it's nice to have a tool that like is you want, it's not overwhelming. It's just very straightforward. You sign in, you do this, you're set up and you're off and running. And then there's plenty of time to add more as you go. Lyric Kinard (31:12.6) Right. So we talked about a few creators who started with a very small list and then were able to first launch their courses. What do you think are some of the biggest struggles that hold people back from continuing or building from that point? Because it is really easy. You have your class, you can create it, you can get it up, and then what? Nicola Wynn (31:18.936) Mm-hmm. Nicola Wynn (31:38.777) That's a great point. think then once you've got your product, then you're building this system where you're bringing people into your world, usually through an email list, and then you're letting them know about the product, usually through that email list. But you have to be adding people to the beginning of that system. So in marketing speak, that's the top of the funnel. And then you're selling down at the bottom of the funnel. So you have to be adding more people in and that's usually through free content. Like if you have a YouTube channel or social media, my personal favorite is blogging. That's just always been close to my heart. if you... Yeah, people still read... Vlogs are awesome. You should definitely start blogging because here is why. When people go to Google and they type in a question like, how do I... gosh. How do I paint a bird? Lyric Kinard (32:16.974) Do people still read blogs? Nicola Wynn (32:33.911) and they're wanna find that answer, now there's gonna be some weird AI stuff at the top. They're gonna scroll past that, they're gonna go down and they're gonna find there's gonna be websites listed that have the answer to their question. Yours can be one of those if you have a blog. If you have a blog post that answers that question, you can get discovered that way. So, and you don't have to do anything. You write the blog, you leave it, and then people come and find you. unlike, mean, this social media and YouTube can work really well for this as well. But if you are answering direct questions, I always say blog is the best way to go because someone is going to literally type a question and if you have that answer, they are going to be like, my gosh, this is awesome. I love this website. What else is here? And take a look around. And if you happen to have a opt-in for your lead magnet at the bottom of that blog post, which you can add in Podia automatically to every single blog post in one click, then... wow, easy, done. You've got someone now on your list who is looking for you. You didn't have to go out and convince someone to care about what you're making. They came and found you. And I think that's what's really cool about kind of the blogging and search engine approach, because these are totally new people from outside your orbit. And they were like, I want what you are offering specifically. And to have the most success at that, I think answering questions in your blog post is a great place to start. So if you've got and you can just post to your audience, hey, what questions do you guys have about topic and whatever questions they send back blog post titles, go blog, blog it, answer it, publish it, and then just see what happens. Worst case scenario, you can use that content in an email newsletter or on your other channels if, if nothing happens. Yeah. Lyric Kinard (34:15.822) All right. Lyric Kinard (34:21.934) That's not even worst case. is developing one piece of content and then leveraging it in a really smart way in all the places you develop a blog post, becomes two or three newsletters, it becomes all of your social media for the next couple of weeks. So don't invent the wheel every time you sit down to do something. Make good use of it. I love the idea of one click and by the way, we also have this thing that you can buy at the Bob. Nicola Wynn (34:28.333) Mm-hmm. Nicola Wynn (34:38.423) It's amazing. Nicola Wynn (34:44.131) That is great advice, yes. Lyric Kinard (34:50.656) at the bottom of the blog post. Nicola Wynn (34:52.401) yes, yes, that is one of my favorite things to add to blog posts on Podia. can, with the website builder, when you have, like you'll have your blog post and there'll be a little plus button at the bottom under your content and you click the plus sign and then you can choose from a dropdown of your content, like your products, your freebies, your paid things. You can choose one of them and it will insert a little box with the title, the price, the description, the image, all that right into your post. So it'll basically... connect other parts of your website together for you. And it's very nice. Lyric Kinard (35:25.646) Very nice. Very cool. So let's go back to some of the blocks that people have and how Podia helps them overcome it. In my experience with my Academy for Virtual Teaching members, it's often they get really excited about creating the class, they get it up, and then the marketing might go there. Nicola Wynn (35:34.839) Yes. Nicola Wynn (35:54.904) Mm. Lyric Kinard (35:55.052) But there's just always some point in the middle where you lose confidence or it gets hard and you struggle and you think, this actually going to work? Is this worth keeping going? Because I haven't seen the giant results. But when you're in the building phase, that's part of it. What journeys have you seen? Nicola Wynn (36:10.392) Yeah. Nicola Wynn (36:16.27) Yeah. Nicola Wynn (36:20.887) Yeah, well one one thing you can do that a lot of people will do is you can pre launch your course or set a wait list for it. And what this does is while you're building, you can actually start accepting payments. People can buy it while you're still building it. Or if you want a little bit of a milder version, you can set up a wait list and we have seen creators set up wait lists for products and then maybe share their idea on on X or on. TikTok and see how many people join the wait list. And that can be really encouraging because if you get a lot of bites, you know I'm on the right track. And if you don't, you can say, actually, I'm not gonna spend the time it would take to make this resource. Maybe this is not what I need to be making. So I would say if someone's in the building process and they're really excited, but they're starting to feel those kind of wiggles of, I don't know, I would set up a wait list and just see. who signs up and then maybe even reach out to them one-on-one and hear what they're excited about, what they're looking for. Another approach that people take is you can drip your course out over time. So if you make the first module and then let's say, again, you're not sure, you're a little bit, maybe, you can even launch that as like a mini course by itself and either add drip content to roll out over time, or even just sell the little course as what, sell what you got and see what happens when people buy it and get feedback on that. I think it's all about getting feedback because often a lot of the time people are gonna think, we are our biggest critics so often. And I would be willing to bet that a lot of people have a course that is awesome and they're sitting there thinking no one's gonna like it. And if they even like previewed the first session to people. Lyric Kinard (38:00.256) you Nicola Wynn (38:10.467) they would get so much great feedback and people would be so excited, it would help overcome that bump. So I think, you know, make a version of what you have envisioned and then either demonstrate it, give it away, sell it for a lower price point, let people see what it is and then talk to them and get a little more of that information or even simply start with a smaller product. start with something small like a download or a webinar. Maybe you want to teach a live session that's just a one-off and see what kind of response you get. The best way to test whether or not an idea has legs is to actually put it out there and see if people buy it. So I would just kind of try a lot of stuff. Yeah, and a lot of people don't start with a big grand signature course. There are a lot of people who make very good money off big grand signature courses, but... Lyric Kinard (38:50.68) Yeah. Beta test your offer. Nicola Wynn (39:04.311) You don't have to start that way. You can build up to that. You could start with something a lot smaller. You can even start with one-on-one coaching, like a consultation or a pick my brain session. If you offer, maybe if you are really talented, like, my mom is the best crocheter in the world. She could teach the world to crochet. And I'm like, you should make a podium. You can do a little one-on-one teach me how to get started session. That could be an easier entry point than trying to make a... Lyric Kinard (39:23.522) Cheers. Nicola Wynn (39:32.215) a master class in something. Lyric Kinard (39:35.278) Great. Yeah, and you can always record those things and they can become the basis for a course. What are some of the similarities you see at the other side, at the success, at the this is going well for a lot of your people? What does it look like when things are going really well? Nicola Wynn (39:38.521) Mm-hmm. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Nicola Wynn (40:00.921) That's awesome. That's a great question. So I think when things are going well, lot of our creators who have really kind of prominent podio businesses have systems in place. They have systems in place that are working behind the scenes because I mean, some people might have huge giant teams. I don't think anyone has like a Coca-Cola level team or anything behind their business. Some might, but for the most part, you have to have systems in place to... to keep your business running for you so you can do the actual personality bit and delivery bit. So that means there are automated email campaigns running. There are automatic welcome sequences. There are automatic upsells. You can build in upsells right into your products. One creator that comes to mind has a free resource. And it's a free, I think it's a month of content for social media. And when you download it, you're redirected to another page that has a membership where every month you could be getting this month of social media content. And it's right there and you've already got the free one. And it's, it's just like, it's so easy. I could just grab this right now. And then I'm in the membership and I'm making recurring money. So memberships are interesting. Some, some people have memberships, some don't. it is a little more work because you are. adding new content to it every month, but you know that might not be a bad thing for the consistency. But those systems, having those automations, those systems all working in the background are a common thread. Lyric Kinard (41:36.066) Right. So you get kind of get a machine running. You have the funnel worked out. You have the emails already built. You have the blogs that get written and that are up and it runs and you've tested it and tweaked it and you know what brings in the people and the system is built on the machine of the Podia platform. And then, right. Nicola Wynn (41:39.617) Exactly. Nicola Wynn (41:46.169) Mm-hmm. Nicola Wynn (41:59.555) Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah, you can build the whole thing. Lyric Kinard (42:05.442) Yeah, it's so important at some point to get to where the business is working for you instead of you working for the business all the time. Nicola Wynn (42:13.945) Mm-hmm. Nicola Wynn (42:17.623) Yeah, and I would say like, don't think, I think everyone, even the people at the very, very tippy, tippy, tippy top of success are still working in their businesses. There's not really a truly passive business. I mean, I know that's the dream, but it really is a system that you continually feed. But once you have the rest set up, it just works a lot better for you. think, and the other thing is no one I know that has a really successful podium business now did it on the first try. Lyric Kinard (42:27.584) Of course. Nicola Wynn (42:46.773) It is always so much trial and error. You're experimenting with stuff. Okay, let's try this course. Nah, it wasn't quite it. Let's try this offer. Let's try this landing page copy. Everyone is constantly shifting and updating and learning. And so if, if you launch something and it's not the big great success you hoped it would be, that's totally fine. You are in great company. And there's a lot you can learn from that experience. you know, I... feel like I've tried a million things in life and you learn so much from the things that don't go the way you planned and then just, so it's not a bad thing, so. Lyric Kinard (43:21.998) Exactly. You, you, you learn that. What you just said is like my favorite sermon. It's you learn so much, right? You learn so much from the things that didn't work. Instead of giving up, you look back and say, what did work? What didn't? What part of that thing was successful? What part? Nicola Wynn (43:30.391) Welcome to my TED Talk. Yeah. Lyric Kinard (43:48.44) Do I think I need to change and tweak and do better? And it's a constant kind of learning process that builds you towards that success. And yeah, friends, it's not easy. It's not always easy. There is always a part where it's just like, you know, can I keep, do I really want to, can I keep doing this? But yes, I mean, and it's easier than brain surgery. Nicola Wynn (43:48.515) Mmm. Nicola Wynn (43:56.952) Yeah. Nicola Wynn (44:13.155) That's true. It's a lot more fun. Lyric Kinard (44:13.358) It's a lot more fun for us creators, right? Just think of the joy we get when we get more time to create and more time to connect with our people because we have spent the time building these systems and doing these things. Nicola Wynn (44:30.123) Yeah. And your people are there because they like you. They're your fans. They're here on this journey not to watch you fall. They're here to encourage you and be that support system. So I think it's really important to lean on that community as you go and talk to them and use that kind of as your compass. Lyric Kinard (44:51.956) I love this kind of centric of the connection between the creator and the people that we serve. That's been a common theme through this whole thing. Nikla, it has been such a delight to have you here. I am definitely going to go back and dig in, spend a little time digging into the platform I already use and discover some of the things that I could be making use of better. It's always such a pleasure to learn and Nicola Wynn (44:57.623) Yeah. Lyric Kinard (45:21.422) to make connections. So thank you for your time. We're going to end with my favorite quick question. What is the last thing you made? Nicola Wynn (45:33.625) Okay, so a few days ago, I got a sewing machine. And I am embarking down a dangerous path and this is the first thing I made. Lyric Kinard (45:39.042) YEEEE END Lyric Kinard (45:47.156) Look at what you're holding up. So you are holding up a lovely little frock. It's gathered blue with beautiful floral binding around the armholes and the neckline and shoulder ties. A beautiful summer piece. And your first thing, is that the first thing you sewed? Nicola Wynn (46:03.427) Thank you. Well don't look at the seams, but yes, this is the first thing I've found. Lyric Kinard (46:09.486) Nobody cares about the seams. Who's gonna lift the thing up and look inside at the seams? Nicola Wynn (46:16.013) I Well, I read online actually from probably a creator just like the people in your network that when you get a sewing machine, you can't be scared. You have to just make something. You have to get in there and get started. so I did. And it was a lot of fun. And I learned so much. was like, I need a better way to measure. I need chalk. need that. So it's exactly like what we do at Podia too. It's like, just get in there, make something, see what you don't know. And then the next one will be even better. Lyric Kinard (46:44.622) Exactly. And boy, I can tell with the giant smile on your face that, oh, you're in trouble, girl. You are so hooked. It's such a fun thing, though, such a beautiful thing to bring something that came from kind of nothing, to make something with your hands and to be able to wear it or use it or, you know, look at it or love it. And it brings joy. Nicola Wynn (46:50.561) I'm in trouble! Nicola Wynn (47:02.968) Yeah. Lyric Kinard (47:11.842) Good on you! I'm giving you a big pat on the back. You did so good! I'm so proud of you! That's amazing. Well, thank you, Nicola. Thank you for being here with us. We've appreciated your time so much. Nicola Wynn (47:16.729) Thank you. Thank you. Nicola Wynn (47:27.257) Thank you so much. We really, it's been so great to chat. This is my favorite kind of conversation. I always leave feeling so inspired. I'm like, I have to go make something now. Quick, me fire up the sewing machine. Lyric Kinard (47:38.238) Exactly, my friends, keep creating, keep creating, keep creating, keep making, keep serving the people you love, bring more joy and creativity and beauty into the world. We'll see you next time.