Episode 292
The Three-Way Win: Leveling Up Your Collaborations [Ep. 292]
Ready to level up your collaboration game? Today, we're diving into the nitty-gritty of what makes a collaboration truly work—spoiler alert: it’s all about the triple win! Yep, you heard me right—it's gotta be a win for you, a win for them, and a win for the client. We’re calling out the collab wannabes who just don’t get it, wasting time instead of creating magic together. So grab your favorite drink, kick back, and let’s chat about how to turn those collaboration dreams into a reality that benefits everyone involved. Trust me, you won’t want to miss these tips!
Transcript
Hey.
Speaker A:Hey.
Speaker A:All right.
Speaker A:I want to talk really quickly today about collaborations, right?
Speaker A:And how if you are going to collaborate, it needs to be a three way win.
Speaker A:A win for me, a win for you, and a win for the client.
Speaker A:All right?
Speaker A:And I know so many people talk about collabs.
Speaker A:Let's collaborate, let's collaborate.
Speaker A:And there's all this talk right now about collaborations, and so many people are freaking doing it wrong, and I'm sorry, sick of it.
Speaker A:Because it is such a colossal waste of time when done incorrectly.
Speaker A:All right, so you ready?
Speaker A:Let's dive into this one.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:Let's talk collapse, right?
Speaker A:So collaboration is kind of a buzzword, like, oh, let's collab, let's do this, or let's do that.
Speaker A:Let's try this, let's go live together.
Speaker A:Let's do all these things, right?
Speaker A:Like, people love to talk about collaborations, and I love collaborations.
Speaker A:But here's the thing.
Speaker A:And this is why people get sick of collaborating, because it ends up being a freaking waste of time.
Speaker A:Because we say yes to these things.
Speaker A:People invite us to do something, we think, wow, this sounds great.
Speaker A:Like, let's do this.
Speaker A:Yeah, let's absolutely do this.
Speaker A:And then it ends up being a total bust.
Speaker A:Or it doesn't really net anybody anything.
Speaker A:It doesn't really garner any type of results.
Speaker A:And so we just keep doing the things until we get burned out with it, and then we're like, meh, collabs don't work.
Speaker A:Here's the thing, collabs work beautifully when they are done correctly.
Speaker A:And I'm going to give you a perfect example.
Speaker A:This podcast.
Speaker A:I cannot believe how many people pitch me on this podcast.
Speaker A:Like, I would say I get probably three to five, maybe more pitches a day in my inbox for people that want to collab with me on my podcast.
Speaker A:Well, at the end of the day, what I have found is most people that guest on podcasts never share the episode.
Speaker A:And actually, like, I went to that podcast and we talked about this.
Speaker A:It was a big conversation around podcast guesting.
Speaker A:And they were saying, like, if you're going to bring podcast guests on, like, you've got to just stop.
Speaker A:You've got to bring the guest on because they offer something of really high value to your audience.
Speaker A:Not because you're expecting them to share their episode, because that just doesn't happen.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Like, most podcast guests have no desire to share the episode and get you in front of their audience.
Speaker A:They're simply doing it to get in front of your audience.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:I mean, in some respects, I can understand that and I can respect that in some ways.
Speaker A:Like if.
Speaker A:But again, like if.
Speaker A:Unless my audience is really highly benefiting, right?
Speaker A:And by benefiting, what I would consider a benefit is that if I brought in an expert into, say, the Focus Visionary versus my podcast.
Speaker A:But like, here on the podcast, I could interview experts all day long.
Speaker A:But again, then how does that position me as an expert if I'm never showing up as the expert, right?
Speaker A:And this is what happens with collaborations is that we do all of these things, but then it almost, sometimes for a lot of people, it diminishes their own expertise because all you're ever doing is showcasing other people's expertise, right?
Speaker A:So there's a very fine line with that, especially with podcast guesting.
Speaker A:But here's the thing.
Speaker A:Like, I bring in guest experts into the Focus Visionary accelerator program all the time.
Speaker A:And the reason I do this is because there are certain things that I do not want to teach.
Speaker A:I don't want to teach, I'm not an expert at, and I don't want to be known for.
Speaker A:So I bring in their experts.
Speaker A:Because here's the thing.
Speaker A:My audience is going to benefit.
Speaker A:The, the members and the participants inside the Focus Visionary are going to benefit.
Speaker A:And if I can bring in an expert, let's mindset, right?
Speaker A:If they, if their mindset, if they benefit from that and they learn and they can get into a better mindset, then that's going to allow them to execute their plan and stay focused on what they are trying to achieve, which is going to get them better results, which is a win for me.
Speaker A:Because when clients are getting better results, then my program is getting better recognition, right?
Speaker A:Like, it's a win, win, win, right?
Speaker A:The client won because they're getting their mindset set.
Speaker A:Like, they're getting their mindset worked on.
Speaker A:They're getting really clear on what they need to do.
Speaker A:The person, the mindset experts, getting exposure and potential clients.
Speaker A:There's a good chance most of the time when you bring in a guest expert, somebody resonates and ends up working with the guest expert.
Speaker A:And again, if it's an expert that helps them execute in my program and do better, then I win too, because then they're doing better, they're getting better results from my program, right?
Speaker A:So that's where I'm saying, like, they've got to be a win, win, win.
Speaker A:And you've got to look at it and go into a collab with that.
Speaker A:So the next time somebody asks you to collab, like, ask yourself, how do I Win.
Speaker A:How do you win and how do the clients win?
Speaker A:If you can't come up with three wins, I'm telling you, it's probably not going to be worth your time.
Speaker A:And I don't mean that negatively, but like, at the end of the day, time is one of our most valued and precious resources, okay?
Speaker A:And we cannot continue to do things that are a waste of time.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:So let's talk about what is a win, win, win.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:So I have an idea.
Speaker A:Back to my podcast.
Speaker A:And if any of you are listening and you want to partake in this and you want to collaborate, I am happy to collaborate.
Speaker A:But there's a.
Speaker A:There is.
Speaker A:This is going to be a win, win, win.
Speaker A:Okay?
Speaker A: second quarter of the year of: Speaker A:It's kind of like a evergreen summit.
Speaker A:I can't even believe I'm telling you guys this, because I haven't even told anybody this, but you guys are always the first to hear it, right?
Speaker A:But here's my thing, because I do see a ton of value in interviewing other experts, and I want to showcase other experts.
Speaker A:I do a hundred plus coffee chats a year.
Speaker A:I meet some of the coolest freaking people in the world, and I can't be their client, nor can I always send them a client, right?
Speaker A:And vice versa.
Speaker A:They're not always my client and they're not always sending me clients.
Speaker A:But it doesn't mean that we can't, like, really benefit from working and collaborating with each other.
Speaker A:So I want to have a platform where I can share these experts with my audience, with the people that I love, and like, knowing that other people could benefit from them.
Speaker A:But in return, I also want to benefit from their audience.
Speaker A:So I'm going to position this more like a private podcast.
Speaker A:Evergreen.
Speaker A:Kind of like a summit would be.
Speaker A:You know how like you people interview a bunch of experts into a summit and then you have to opt into it and you get to listen to all the interviews.
Speaker A:So the theory and the.
Speaker A:The process is going to be the same, except for it's going to be kind of weekly, so the content keeps continuing drift out.
Speaker A:So, like, it's like a private podcast where you're constantly getting a new expert, but each expert is sharing it with their audience.
Speaker A:And so their audience is opting in, which is a win for me because now my audience is growing, right?
Speaker A:They're opting into my podcast and they're growing, but everybody's audience is Winning because it's a captivated list of summit.
Speaker A:I've got their emails.
Speaker A:Like, I can send reminders, I can let you know, like, hey, by the way, if you're new here, you miss this expert and this expert.
Speaker A:We can do throwback episodes, we can do panel interviews.
Speaker A:We.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And it's this curated audience where it's like its own community that gets formed, but the people that are listening have to give us something in exchange, which is their email address.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:Like, and so it's a win, win, win.
Speaker A:Like every single person wins.
Speaker A:The audience wins because they're getting this massive amounts of knowledge from all of these experts.
Speaker A:And the expert gets exposure to all these other experts and audiences because the, the playlist is going to be by season and like, so people can binge it and listen to all the experts and opt into their list if they need it or want to.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:And then I also win because my audience is growing and my list is growing, right?
Speaker A:So like, there's ways to collaborate where everybody's like, that was such a tangent.
Speaker A:But I was like, I'm so excited about this.
Speaker A:But I'll to be honest with you, like, I got pitched on a podcast.
Speaker A:Somebody pitched me the other day and asked me if she could be on my podcast.
Speaker A:And I said no, I don't accept guests on this podcast.
Speaker A:But if you want, here's my new thing that I'm going to be doing if you're interested in this.
Speaker A:But here's the catch.
Speaker A:You have to be willing to share it with your audience if you want it listened to.
Speaker A:And she never responded like crickets again, because where's the win, right?
Speaker A:The only win was for her.
Speaker A:There was no win for you guys.
Speaker A:There was no win for me.
Speaker A:The win was strictly for her.
Speaker A:Yeah, maybe you guys would have learned something from her.
Speaker A:But what I don't know, you know what I'm saying?
Speaker A:Like, that's my whole point is like, that is why collabs, like people position them as these big collaborations when in reality they're not.
Speaker A:They're like, most of the time they're very one sided.
Speaker A:All right?
Speaker A:And so you've got to be really looking at that.
Speaker A:So I would look at ways.
Speaker A:And here's the other thing with collaborations is a lot of people.
Speaker A:And we were talking about this the other day inside the Focus Visionary accelerator, which by the way, is still the best program in the freaking world.
Speaker A:And I don't know why all of you are not there.
Speaker A:Like, the shit that's going down in there and the results that are coming from that.
Speaker A:Like I'm telling you, like again, remember in this sales episode, I told you I was going to keep telling you, like, what your next step is, like legit.
Speaker A:Your next step is to go into the Focus Visionary or book a call with me and at least talk to me about it.
Speaker A:Like, let's talk about it and see if it's the right fit for you.
Speaker A:You.
Speaker A:Because, ah, there's just so many amazing things going on there.
Speaker A:But we were having this incredible conversation about collaborations and this woman, one of the women was saying, like, I have all these calls and people say that they're interested in collaborating and then they're like, oh, but what does it look like?
Speaker A:And I don't know.
Speaker A:We'll get back to you and let's talk about it.
Speaker A:Here's the thing.
Speaker A:When that starts happening, the let's talk, let's talk, let's talk, let's talk, let's pass some ideas around.
Speaker A:Nothing gets done.
Speaker A:Shit just does not get done.
Speaker A:All you do is go back and forth with all these ideas.
Speaker A:So it is up to you, right, as the business owner again, taking control.
Speaker A:You're going to start to see a lot of common themes coming in these episodes.
Speaker A:Taking control and saying, here's how I like to collaborate.
Speaker A:I have an email list that I'd be happy to do a freebie swap with you.
Speaker A:Like, if you have a high value, you know, freebie that I believe my audience would really benefit from, then I'm happy to put it out to my audience and I expect you to do the same.
Speaker A:But mind you, ask them what their audience is and ask them to show you what their open rate is.
Speaker A:Because if they have a list, I don't really care if they have a list of 200 people.
Speaker A:If they have an 80% open rate, well, that's putting me in front of about 120 people.
Speaker A:Great, thank you.
Speaker A:I'll take it.
Speaker A:But if they have an email list that's 10,000 and they have like less than 1% open rate, well, that does me no freaking good.
Speaker A:Have it in your mind of like, here are the ways I like to collaborate.
Speaker A:Do you have a group program that I could come in and speak at a yes or no, here's the topics I can speak on.
Speaker A:Or I would be open to going and doing a Facebook Live with you.
Speaker A:Or let's do a joint workshop.
Speaker A:I'm all for right now.
Speaker A:You're going to see right now.
Speaker A:Anything from me you got to opt into.
Speaker A:And I'm.
Speaker A:And I get that people are sick of giving up their email addresses, but there's so much like uncertainty in everything else.
Speaker A:Like, you cannot just rely on social media followers to be there.
Speaker A:Like, look at this.
Speaker A:I mean, we see it all the time.
Speaker A:Like, at least once a year there's some threat of you potential of people potentially losing their entire audience because something's happening on social media, whether it's TikTok or Meta or whatever, right?
Speaker A:And so, and the other thing is, is like, if you're going to do something for free, the least somebody could do is give you their email address.
Speaker A:Like, I'm sorry, I'm just not, I'm just not here for this.
Speaker A:Like, oh, my email inbox is so clogged up, I don't have time for it.
Speaker A:Well, you have time to scroll social media.
Speaker A:It's the same amount of time to clean up your inbox, like, get it cleaned up and read people's emails.
Speaker A:Because a lot of people send some really good emails, myself included.
Speaker A:Like, I just got an email back.
Speaker A:Like, your emails have been so good lately.
Speaker A:Like, keep it up.
Speaker A:So I'm just saying, like, everything for me at this point again, because what is the point in collaborating and going live if you have no idea who's watching it?
Speaker A:Like, what if people are like me and just lurk on social media and don't ever.
Speaker A:You know what I mean?
Speaker A:Like, yeah, maybe eventually I'll convert.
Speaker A:But if you have my email address and you see me clicking around or you see me, you send me a personalized note and you have a conversation with me, like, the chances of me converting faster are a whole lot better, right?
Speaker A:So rather than just doing like a Facebook Live, unless you have like a really engaged audience that will listen and watch and like, I can see like, wow, she goes live and she gets 285 comments every time she goes live.
Speaker A:Well, then, yeah, I'm, I'm all for that because I can go back through and connect with those people.
Speaker A:But if I see that you do lives every single week and there's not a single comment on any of them, like, what does that again?
Speaker A:What is this benefiting us?
Speaker A:How do people go back and watch the replay?
Speaker A:They got to go back on social media.
Speaker A:They got to go try to find it.
Speaker A:So I'm all for like putting things behind an opt in.
Speaker A:Like, it's free opt in.
Speaker A:If you don't really want to stay on my email list, then opt out.
Speaker A:But at least, like, then I can stay in touch with you.
Speaker A:I can send you the Replay.
Speaker A:I can answer your questions right?
Speaker A:If you want to just even opt in just to connect with me on social media and to only have conversation with me on social media, well, then so be it.
Speaker A:Like, that can happen too.
Speaker A:But it, you gotta give something, right?
Speaker A:Like, let's start normalizing that we are giving to each other a fair exchange of energy and appreciation and gratitude and like, hey, I appreciate that you're about to give me 30 minutes of your time.
Speaker A:Like going all in and giving me all this information.
Speaker A:The least I can do is give you my email address in exchange so that you can follow up with me and stay in touch and get to know me as a human.
Speaker A:Like, is that so hard?
Speaker A:Like, I just don't get it.
Speaker A:So anyway, that's something I would do is like, no, you can do a joint live or you can do a joint workshop.
Speaker A:It's not that hard to set up.
Speaker A:Like, you could literally use Zoom.
Speaker A:You can use Zoom registration and get people's to sign up and then, then they get the calendar link and whatever.
Speaker A:Okay, so there's that.
Speaker A:You can do like a guest expert spot.
Speaker A:I'm just saying, like, think of the ways that you like to collaborate.
Speaker A:So if they are bringing you in as an expert, maybe they have room to create a special offer that includes you, right?
Speaker A:So maybe it's a collaborative offer where they just add in like an hour of your time.
Speaker A:So maybe you charge 250 bucks an hour.
Speaker A:They're normal.
Speaker A:What they would Normally charge is $250 and you guys do like some type of joint collaboration and it's an offer and they get access to you both and it's like a 500 opt in or something like that 500 mini program or whatever, you know what I mean?
Speaker A:But like think about it.
Speaker A:Or maybe their, their program is $5,000.
Speaker A:Well, do they have enough margin to pay you 200 bucks to come in and be a guest expert for an hour, right?
Speaker A:Or whatever.
Speaker A:Like send you a client, something like that.
Speaker A:I call it white labeling.
Speaker A:I love to do that.
Speaker A:So my point here is that you have to create the win, win, win.
Speaker A:And you have to know what it looks like for you to win, for their client to win and for them to win.
Speaker A:And so I think it is worthwhile for you to like create your.
Speaker A:Here's the ways I collab, right?
Speaker A:And make sure.
Speaker A:And then sometimes with collaborations, it just takes explanation.
Speaker A:Like, I am fully aware that this whole Evergreen Summit private podcast is going to require explanation because people are going to be like, why do I Have to share it with my audience.
Speaker A:Why does my audience have to opt in to listen to this expert?
Speaker A:I'm fully aware that that's going to require like some education, but I've got it figured out in my head and I know it will work with the right people that are willing to do the work to share and actually truly collab.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:And that's the thing.
Speaker A:And some people won't get it.
Speaker A:And the reason they won't get it is because they're really not in it to collaborate.
Speaker A:Like I'm just saying.
Speaker A:So that is what I would encourage.
Speaker A:You have to have that in your head of, like, this is what it looks like for me to collaborate.
Speaker A:Here's what it, here's how I can do it, here's what I need in exchange for.
Speaker A:And here's how it is a win, win, win.
Speaker A:You have to be able to present the win to them, the win to the client, and the win to you.
Speaker A:That is what it makes a collaboration, a collaboration.
Speaker A:Otherwise it's just, you know, and not everybody wants that win.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:Like, like I said, sometimes, like with the guest expert thing, that is, like, sometimes I may just bring in a guest expert because like a legal guest expert, I have no idea about legal.
Speaker A:Legal is not my area of expertise.
Speaker A:So of course I want to educate my audience on legal, especially inside the focus Visionary, because I want to make sure they're, they're covered and they're protected and they're doing what they need to do to protect their business, that they're scaling and growing and you know what I mean, like, again, sometimes.
Speaker A:But again, that's a win, right?
Speaker A:And it's a win for them, it's a win for the client, and it's a, it's exposure for this, the attorney, whoever I bring in, you know, so in general, the win doesn't always have to be immediate.
Speaker A:I think that's what you have to also remember.
Speaker A:But like, again, like I said, eventually, like, if I brought in a mindset expert, that's not an immediate win for me and the people in my program.
Speaker A:But like, eventually, if their mindset is, if they've worked through some of their mindset blocks, they're going to get better results.
Speaker A:So like, down the line, it's going to benefit because they're, they're going to see those results.
Speaker A:So anyway, I could go on and on about this and I could, I love to like, brainstorm ways people could collaborate.
Speaker A:One of the things, one client recently that I've been working with one to one is we've been collaborating on ways that she could work with people that are in similar industries and serve similar audience, but they, they don't cross.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So she's like a personal trainer.
Speaker A:So she's like working with dietitians or she does a lot with pre and postpartum.
Speaker A:So working with those people and like one of the ways that we're collaborating and doing things is with those people is creating like special offers, like special cohort, like group type programs that are specific to their clients only.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So their clients again are feeling like they're super well taken care of.
Speaker A:This is such a value add to their service that they're already getting with this said provider.
Speaker A:She's winning because she's getting new clients.
Speaker A:Like there's so many fun ways to collaborate outside of the box besides just a, hey, can I be on your podcast and I'll never share it with anybody and you're going to gain nothing of it but a bunch of work because it takes a lot of work to bring a guest on to get the legally to do it.
Speaker A:Like to do it the right way.
Speaker A:Like it's a ton of work.
Speaker A:So there's just so many ways.
Speaker A:But just think about that.
Speaker A:So if you're like totally burnt out by collaborations, I get it and I understand it because I kind of was too.
Speaker A:But there's also so much power in it.
Speaker A:So a just make sure you're collaborating with the right people and just know that you don't need to do a million collaborations either.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Like you do not need to be participating in 8,000 collaborations.
Speaker A:A couple good collaborations is going to net results, especially like repeated results.
Speaker A:So find some really good collaborators and find some really good ways to collaborate and then just keep doing more of that, like figure out what works.
Speaker A:But like first and foremost you have got to decide what does it look like for you?
Speaker A:Like what is it going to do?
Speaker A:What's going to make it worth your while?
Speaker A:Okay, so that's your homework is to find and really brainstorm ways that you can collaborate.
Speaker A:That's a three way win.
Speaker A:Okay?
Speaker A:All right.
Speaker A:I love you.
Speaker A:I believe in you.
Speaker A:I'll talk to you soon.
Speaker A:Thanks so much for listening today.
Speaker A:But remember now it's time to take action.
Speaker A:My goal is to get you results.
Speaker A:So what is one action you can commit to taking this week?
Speaker A:Feel free to share it with me in my DMS or tag me on your socials.
Speaker A:Not sure what action to take?
Speaker A:Grab the link in the show notes and schedule a strategic power hour.
Speaker A:We can talk through it together and get you a strategic plan of action in just 60 short minutes.
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Speaker A:Thanks.
Speaker A:Talk soon.
