If you’re ready to embrace a content marketing approach that’s aligned with your introverted nature and allows you to flourish because you actually enjoy it, this is an episode you’ll not want to miss!

Join content marketing strategist, Rachel Klaver, and I as we dig deep into content marketing introvert style:

– How we can sabotage our own content marketing.

– Why we should focus on platforms and content styles we actually like.

– Facing fears and giving new things a try.

– How you can go deeper with you content.

– Attracting your ideal client by being you!

– And so much more!

CONNECT WITH RACHEL

On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelklavercontentmarketingcoach/

On Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/iamrachelklaver

Website: www.rachelklaver.com

TRANSCRIPT: Content Marketing Your Way with Rachel Klaver

Well howdy howdy and welcome to the Unstoppable Introvert podcast. As always I’m delighted you’re here listening in and today I have a special treat for you I’ve got the bright and colourful soul that is the lovely Rachel Klaver on the podcast with me tallking about content marketing for introverts. 

Oh gosh, this was a juicy conversation. We dug into so much about what it’s like being an introvert in business, we busted some myths, we talked about facing fears and giving things a go, sabotaging our own content marketing, going deeper with your content, and finding your own way of doing content marketing that works for you!

I can’t wait for you to listen in, but before we get started, let me share a little about Rachel with you.

Rachel’s a content marketing strategist and coach who loves getting people excited about using their own voice, quirks and stories to cut through the noise and help them stand out. She runs Identify Marketing with her husband Rod, and provides both one on one and group training to small business owners who know they need to be seen to grow their business. She’s also an introvert – just a chatty one!

So without further ado, let’s hop into it!

Hayley Maxwell: [00:00:00] So I’ve got you on today to talk about content marketing for introverts, but first of all, I’d just like you to share a little bit about yourself and how you got to what you’re doing now in, in business.

Rachel Klaver: So I’m I now talk to my to help people that I’m a content marketing coach. One of the things I’ll often say is that As business owners, we evolve and change and I called myself a marketing strategist.

I still consider myself a marketing strategist and I do one on one work that’s in that space, but no one’s searching for that. And so one of the things I’ll always say, this is a content marketing thing is that we often want to define who we are. And that’s important, but when it comes to marketing, we have to define ourselves using the words that other people use, get too clever and fancy about it, you know, the more talented we are in the space we’re in, we’re often our worst enemy because we want to define our space and name ourselves something.

So I’m a content marketing coach. Most of my work. Split [00:01:00] between one on one and then also working with a group. I have a group called the content master web. And I help people develop content marketing strategies and then how to create that content. And I chose that as a niche and this is kind of like we were talking a little bit before we got on, but I chose it because I struggled for a long time of how I was a generalist and didn’t want to.

The platform specific or be like a really tiny space specific but wanted to still have like something that was consistent thing. So that’s where I’m really happily sitting and where I feel I found my little space really and love it. Absolutely. I love it.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah. Awesome. Yeah. I love that you love it so much.

And that just really comes through in all of your content that you share is just actually how much you love the work that you do. So you can definitely see that shining through. One

Rachel Klaver: of the biggest tricks or hack I give anyone in marketing. I’ve got a client and I use all the. I’m sorry, Kate. But I, you know, when she started joining us we had done a strategy and she had done it around the stuff that she felt [00:02:00] she had to do for her marketing around her experience, things like that, but not from her driving desire.

And when we went to do the content, she just constantly had blocks. Like she took three months in my program of her. And she will look at this moan and groaning. This is too hard. I don’t like this. This is horrible. I don’t want to do it. Okay. Okay. Kate, that was, that was a bit whinier than you, but you know, and.

And one of the things that was the problem was she hadn’t got her passion for her business and she pivoted. She suddenly did this crazy pivot and I’m just going to do horse photography. And the minute she did that, all the content stuff became easier. And I, and I think that one of the things we do is we don’t give ourselves enough credit to understand that we can’t, if we are.

You know, especially with introverts, because we are often quite, have quite strong values and quite connected in with who we are. We can’t actually talk about stuff that we don’t believe in ourselves, that we’re engaged with ourselves, that we don’t truly see the value of, or understand what [00:03:00] that value is.

And when that light goes on. Content creation becomes much easier. And I think that was for me for a long time, I struggled to really find my pace of what I would talk about. And then when I hit on my passion, it was like, this is easier. I can do this because I love it. And that is one of the biggest hacks I can give anyone.

If there’s a blog check first, are you loving it? Do you actually believe in it as it aligned with your values? Are you charging yourself enough? Like all those things are the things that stop us from creating the content. It’s often not the actual content itself.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah, I think that’s that’s so true like, particularly, like you said, as an introvert, you know, I think if you’re not, if you don’t fully enjoy what you do or that that kind of passion isn’t there internally, it is, you’re always going to butt up against against problems and that does make so much else in business that much harder.

And it does sometimes sound a bit, you know, cliche. It’s like, [00:04:00] find your, find your passion and, you know, find all of that kind of stuff and you’ll never work a day in your life. And it’s all about, but actually. It is really important because otherwise kind of business feels like such a struggle. It doesn’t flow as easily.

Rachel Klaver: Yeah. I think too, you know, like my block last year was one of them was that my model was wrong. So I had my one on one work. I had created this beautiful scalable. Design. And I had several other people working with me who are also strategists. And it was great. I was, we were making lots of money, you know, and it was very systematic.

The clients were happy, but I wasn’t happy. It was a very systemized one session. I go away and do the work and then I come back, back and deliver clients, got good results out of it. But I didn’t feel like it was feeding how I wanted to operate. And I completely rejected it, changed it to six sessions. I don’t do any work outside those client sessions.

We write it across the period of time. And the moment I changed it, [00:05:00] the light went on and I wanted to talk about it. And so it doesn’t have to be even that the, what you’re doing is wrong. It might be the format is wrong or something’s not aligned. And I think that’s why I like when people work with you in terms of creating that brand messaging.

That to get to that stage, you have to have thought about all those other things. And we, there’s nothing worse than doing a post and then going, I hope this post doesn’t work and get me a client. Cause I don’t want that work. I mean, essentially we will sabotage our content because we know we don’t want to grow in that direction.

So we’ll do this work. We’ll do this better stuff because we don’t really want it to work. And then we blame the content marketing. It’s not the fault of the content marketing. It’s the fact that we didn’t really want it to work in the first place. Yeah,

Hayley Maxwell: that’s, yeah, that’s so true. Yeah. You can find the type of work that you want to do, like, and you can feel really into that.

But actually if the way that you’re delivering that work doesn’t feel aligned, you’re still going to stop [00:06:00] yourself from really. Going for it and just sort of going all in on it. And also that excitement level just won’t show through either, you know, and I talk about this a lot from, from my perspective around the energy that you’re bringing to your communication is.

A massive thing, you know, in terms of how people look at you and see how energized you are and how much you believe in what you have to offer. That’s a huge part of content marketing as well, isn’t it? Because if you’re, if you’re not feeling that inside, it’s never going to come across in your, your content that you’re excited about it.

And people pick up on that really easily. I think

Rachel Klaver: you can’t sell, you know, like it’s hard for anyone to sell, but introverts in particular, we can’t really believe in it because we’re already feeling uncomfortable about putting ourselves out there and pushing it through. So you’ve got to really sit in that.

And I’ll give you a crazy example. Earlier this [00:07:00] year, I put my prices up and I was so proud of myself. And so I didn’t announce it with, Oh, I’m sorry, guys. I’m putting my prices up. My literal announcement was, I am so excited to tell you that my prices have just gone up and I still feel that way. I was like, because I had done a mindset shift, I realized the value of what I was doing, I knew that I was going to deliver.

And I’ll tell you that since those prices went up, I haven’t had a problem filling any of my work. And I did before that, but it was because I. Was so proud of the fact that my prices had gone up because I knew that it was going to measure with what I did. And that’s that crazy thing of going when it’s aligned with your values and what you do, you don’t have to apologize for anything or downgrade anything.

Yeah, yeah,

Hayley Maxwell: it’s just about feeling completely aligned and really good about all aspects of your business and it just makes putting yourself out there that much easier doesn’t it. And I know that you mentioned it several times that you’re an introvert, and I know from the [00:08:00] outside looking at you. You wouldn’t necessarily assume that at first glance, not that anyone should ever assume anything, but at first glance, you wouldn’t look at that because you come across in that very confident way.

And we’re all stuck with these stereotypes in our minds about what an introvert is. So I’d just love to hear a little bit more about your introverted nature and how you have navigated business as an introvert.

Rachel Klaver: So the thing was, I got brought up being told I was an extrovert and I think that that creates a lot of social anxiety for me because extroverts love hanging around people love like they get energized and I never did used to get quite anxious.

And so for a long time, I would say that I had social anxiety and I was, you know, I had a lot of fear. I do I’m known for like, you’re known for your leopard print. I’m known for wearing lots of bright colors. I love floral. And I do definitely think that’s an [00:09:00] armor for me. Like I have in my wardrobe at the moment, I have work clothes and weekend clothes.

And, you know, I’ve talked to people like Emma Jane John, who’s a stylist, and she’s like, your clothes should be kind of the same all the time. Mine aren’t. I definitely have my work clothes are extroverted. They help me bring on an extroverted energy. And the weekends, my clothes are quite neutral. I don’t wear very bright colors.

I like blending in and just being invisible. And so I definitely have a persona that I put on. It’s not like a fake persona. I’m very happy in that place. But I, it takes a lot of energy. If me the day after I had a hangover from hanging out with people, if I’ve made the mistake of booking things difficult and really the only reason that I discovered wasn’t introvert is that my brother, who was definitely an introvert, I think he like you, my brother, but I think he passive passive aggressively gave me a book by Susan Cain called quiet for Christmas.

And I think it was for me to understand him more. And I read it and went, Oh, holy [00:10:00] crap. I’m an introvert. Like this book, I ever. I’ve read it and I was like, that’s me. That’s me. That’s me. And then I started going, Oh, maybe I don’t have social anxiety. Maybe I just am putting myself into situations that my body and my brain just don’t respond well.

And I’m pushing myself into it because everyone keeps on telling me I’m an extrovert. And one of the things I find really fascinating is a lot of people that are speakers and presenters, comedians, actors, people in the public eye, a lot of them actually say that introvert is, and. Just because we’re chatty doesn’t make us not, doesn’t mean that we can’t be introverted.

I’ve got ADHD. I’m always going to be an over sharer. I’m always, but I’m also going to be someone who just doesn’t energize myself up when I’m around. A lot of people. I’ve got a session next week. I’m going to Invercargill and I’m presenting and I know that the next day I will sound like I’ve got, I’m hung over.

I’ll have a, I’ll have a slur [00:11:00] on my speech. I’ll be tired. I’ll probably have a migraine if I don’t listen to myself. I’ll need to have a sleep that afternoon. And. Knowing that now has helped me understand that I will have peaks and troughs of energy. And that’s because of my introversion and I I’m so thankful.

I’ve got a very introverted husband. Who’s my business partner as well. He doesn’t, I’m the face. That’s the cost of this is on the face of the business. He’s not. And I love. I remember when we first met, he said, Oh, maybe I’ll be a bit boring for you. And I’m just like, thank God for the boring. Like, honestly, he’s given such beautiful introverted structure.

That means that I come into the week with a lot of energy because we’ve had this beautiful introverted time where we just don’t see people and I need it. Yeah. Yeah.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah. That’s. That’s amazing. I think, you know, I know that you do a lot of speaking events. I know a lot of the, you know, you’re traveling around New Zealand, doing a lot of those events.

And I think there is a lot of that stereotypical view that if you’re an introvert, then you, you know, that you would never really want to [00:12:00] be speaking in front of large crowds, or, you know, you might not be good at doing that. But I think that, you know, that’s, those are myths that I’m really. really want to bust because I think that’s not actually what being an introvert is all about.

It’s like, as you were talking about, it’s about how we recharge and about how we process our information. So a lot of that internal processing, it’s not necessarily about not being good at standing in front of rooms of people. And actually, I’d argue that often Introverts actually can make fantastic speakers because it’s that preparation prior to, and you’re not actually necessarily needing to be in the audience making small talk, which is what we don’t necessarily enjoy.

Rachel Klaver: But I also think that with an introvert, like we are very good at often at, and I’ve, I’ve got ADHD [00:13:00] too. So there’s like a. Bit of a blend here, but we’re often quite good at people reading because we’re very good at working out how to extricate ourselves from terrible situations where we feel we’re going to have to be.

We’re overwhelmed, you know, and I think, you know, if you find me, if I’m speaking at a conference, you won’t really see me a lot before that time. I’ll often either have my headphones on, I’m listening to music to kind of get myself in the zone. But my favorite place when I’m speaking is in the toilets because I can.

Close myself in a cubicle. I can sit in there. There’s no one else there. And I’m just doing this whole, get myself in the zone. I don’t want to talk to anyone before. And I, a few times when I’ve been at conferences, if I, if I know I have to do the networking thing, I will dress for that. Like I will physically dress and I will put a persona over, but the thing over the next day is just so much more worse.

If I’ve had to do that and the speaking. And so I tell people, you know, often say, you know, do come and ask me questions, but just be aware. Most of my energy has been used to speak. So if I’m a, I will, they always are so upset of [00:14:00] how boring I am afterwards, you know, because the energy, the energy push has gone and I’m truly, I’m a boring person to talk to.

Like I’m going to be quiet. I’m going to be, Oh, you know that is saved. That type of saved.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Gosh. Yeah. So I think it’s such an interesting part of us, isn’t it? Like from an introverts perspective, it’s that whole balancing that being able to have that kind of social fronting versus the energy that we’re Fending and yeah, how we balance that.

Rachel Klaver: I think it’s so interesting. I would say physical fitness has definitely helped me more like, because as I’ve got fitter, I’ve found that my emotional energy levels and capacities have got stronger. But I think also that I really have built a life wave, a very small circle of people that I’m interacting with on a regular basis.

And that gives me an opportunity to save my strength for talking to strangers, which sounds like, I mean, you know, but talking to people outside that group and, and things like this [00:15:00] helps to like zoom helps because there’s a barrier between you and other people. So you’re not feeding off that energy as much in the room and feeling overstimulated.

You can control your environment to a certain extent, which has helped me, I think, but more of capacity for when I go and do things and people with people as well. So it’s finding little techniques of ways that you can. Use some of the technology we have and just the routine and rhythm of our normal life, just to give us a bit more strength.

If we do want to do this, I think, you know, we haven’t mentioned shyness, but I would call myself an unshy introvert, just like you can have a shy extrovert or shy introvert. I think I’m shy introverts. We’re the ones that do the speaking and I feel really alive and at home on a stage. But if you ask me to do that same level of conversation one on one with someone, I’d find that really exhausting.

And so it’s actually just It’s the, it’s the message to the myth is, is a much easier thing for me to do than have an in depth conversation.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah, I think it comes down [00:16:00] to understanding your own, your own personality and your own natural tendencies, doesn’t it? And then working out what’s going to, To work best for you from a a marketing perspective.

And so I guess if we shift into talking about, you know, content marketing now, could you provide sort of a bit of a definition around what. The way that you approach content marketing, you know, what, what that means to you just to kick the, the conversation on that.

Rachel Klaver: So I think one of the things that I’ve learned about me, my clients and most, most women’s and I’m going to talk gendered a little bit here.

I think me probably a little bit better than this, but, and so it’s, if any men listening, please don’t be offended, but I think introverts, introverted men would be similar to women. So I think woman, we had an issue too, where. We are so fearful of like doing the wrong thing. So we’ve got this problem there.

And then you add introversion on to the mix and it’s like a nightmare. I, you know, [00:17:00] affectionism and attention to detail and all those sort of things come on, you know, I don’t, I can’t do it all. So one of the things that I teach is to build your content strategy from backwards. So We start with the things that you must put in.

So one of my clients actually, it’s Kate again, I have more than one, but she’s I had a session with her yesterday. She’s just graduated to being able to do all the fun stuff in marketing. Now she can do memes and she can do reels and stuff like that. That’s because she now has all the foundational work going on.

That’s creating a content that’s going to get her the client. So I want to go through briefly what that looks like. So what I’m a real big believer in, which about this you know, both of us have talked about this. I used to be about fresh content. It’s great content. It needs to be the same, but actually there’s real power and repetition and repeating and particular in particular areas.

So I go, the first thing you always do is make sure you’re feeding your community first. So you always start with email marketing because. That’s where your email, that’s where your sales are, your sales in there. There’s referrals in there. [00:18:00] So if you’ve got an email list and you are busy on social media, you can get some time off social media.

You can quit for a month or so if you want, and just focus on building up patterns in your email list, because that’s actually the most important thing for you to have. If you don’t have that. Sort out a lead magnet lead generation. So you’re building that. So those are my first two steps. And then I always say, I want you to focus on your sales emails, your sales posts, the things that are kind of like what you’re doing at the moment.

I know this will come out, but later but when you were doing your launch, you know, for your your course, like having those really and written in place with a schedule of when they’re going to go out, but it might also be that you would have one for, if you were doing one on one work with someone what that looks like.

And you have. 20 percent of your content should be that proper sales content. Now that is something that I have only adopted in the last 18 months. Prior to that, I was known as the how to person come to me. Lots of advice. I have hardly any of that content in my structure at all anymore. [00:19:00] And my leads and sales have just massively grown and same with my clients.

So this idea that we have to give lots of how to content, especially in the age of chat GPT is so wrong because anyone can do shonky, chatty how to content these days. And I was interesting. Sorry, you got me in like a. Haley’s going to be like, can I even get a breath in for her to pause? One of the things that I saw yesterday actually was that Google has just depreciated the how to content that for years I’ve been saying put really great how to content on your websites and if it’s great we’ll index it and we’ll give it.

They’ve just said we are deprioritizing that because there’s so much chat GPT how to content flooding the, the internet. No one’s reading it anymore. And so I’ll say, so I know I’ll talk about how to run a minute, but I want you to focus on doing those promotional posts, spend energy, time, effort, really thinking about how you can promote your core offers and put, create those posts.

And in there also do testimonials.[00:20:00] I am very public on the fact that I hate sharing testimonials and reviews. I do them, so I, I value them and they’re so important, but as an introvert, I find it completely uncomfortable to share nice shit about myself. From other people. I do not like it. I don’t like sharing it.

I don’t like asking for it. I don’t like sharing it because it’s not because I don’t believe in myself. I don’t even like sharing unsolicited feedback. It’s because I just don’t really want to be like, look at me. I just don’t like it, but it’s such an important part of our marketing. And if I don’t ask you to do that stuff first and collate that and make that, and then schedule it in to be a regular part of your marketing, you’re never going to do it.

You’ll fill your whole life with everything else. So let’s do the uncomfortable bit first. That can be repeated. Those testimonials, you can have them on a rota. They can just be on like an auto list or repeated at white matter. It’s just capturing those people. And I think the [00:21:00] thing I would probably say to introverts is let’s do the stuff that we don’t like the most first.

Let’s get it out of the way and it set that foundation. So that would be my first thing that I would say is. That thing is the most important because also if that’s the only thing you post, you’re going to start getting so uncomfortable that that’s the only thing you post that you’re going to start posting other content on top of that to hide it.

Yeah. That’s going to motivate you to do more posts and content. Yeah.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah, completely. It’s, it’s almost like, what’s that saying? Eating the frog first or something like that, isn’t it? It’s like that, it’s like doing the

Rachel Klaver: stuff. Yeah. Yeah. And I hate it. Like I’ll, like, I, I do hate it. And you know, one of my clients, a couple of my clients have told me off this year, ’cause I’ve told them I don’t like doing it.

And they’re like, have you ever thought that we are offended that you don’t wanna shout our names from the rooftops and say, I got to work with this person. And I was like, oh, I hadn’t really thought about it that way. And they’re like, have you ever thought about the fact that we are really excited to shout out from.

You know, ’cause I wouldn’t even, like if someone on one of my [00:22:00] clients on LinkedIn posted something, I would go outta my way not to comment on their post of like, oh, I love, you know, this. Or, or say that I was, they’re my client because I’d be, I don’t want anyone to feel like I had to say that. Now I’m like, I’ll say, oh, you know, like one of my clients who just graduated a few months ago and I said, I’m really missing having you in my coaching group.

And I put that on a post ’cause it was about something we’d done together. And she said, Oh, I really wish I was back. You know, I’d love to do that. And I wouldn’t have done that a year ago. And I missed out on a whole lot of people seeing her say something nice about me. And that my work was good and it’s a push.

I think it’s the hardest push for introverts. Unless you are not like an introvert, not like me, cause we’re all different. Right. But I think for many of us introverts sharing our good stuff, sharing why people should work with us, that is the most important thing we have to make sure we put in now.

Marketing plan.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah. I think that’s, that’s true. It’s that sense of not wanting to be seen as a, you know, as a tall poppy almost

Rachel Klaver: as well. We’re not [00:23:00] showing off, you know, and you know, and people also assume that I find it easy because I do it. So I really want to say, I find it freaking difficult. I do it because I know I have to.

I do it because it works. I do it because it fits in with getting customers and clients from social media and leads. I do it for the one person who read my posts and needed to hear that, to make the decision to work with me today. I don’t do it because it makes me feel comfortable. It very much makes me feel uncomfortable.

And it’s uncomfortable. I don’t like this post. Every time they go out, I don’t like them. I like what I’ve written, but I don’t, I don’t, I don’t like, I don’t look at them. I do them all. I post them on days where I’m not around because they’re going to have this engagement anyway. So I post them normally on a Wednesday when I’m normally doing one on one all day and I don’t have time to look at social media.

So I can’t say them. And if someone comments on them, I’m just like, Oh my God, why’d you comment? Now I have to see this post. You know, like I just, I find them, but they [00:24:00] work. And they work so well. And I think that’s the thing is you have to sometimes have stuff in your content marketing that works and do it the very best you can and make it the very best you can, but be aware that you still might find it uncomfortable to post it.

Hayley Maxwell: I think, I think that’s it and I think for particularly for a lot of introverts it’s actually thinking about the reason why you’re doing it and actually thinking about the potential that you can actually have a difference, no matter how big or small. By sharing that piece of content, because you don’t know who is going to read that and who is going to need it at that moment that they see it.

And it’s not just that piece of content that’s being seen in that single moment, as soon as they’ve posted it, it’s there for people to see in the long term. Yeah. And so I think always trying to keep that in mind when you’re posting things that might make [00:25:00] you feel a little bit. uncomfortable. It’s always thinking, well, what is the, the bigger purpose of this?

You know, what, what might not happen if, you know, I don’t share this, you know, so it’s, it’s basically saying to yourself, well, you know, there might be someone out there who needs to hear this information, who needs to, you know, feel like they understood. And so by not sharing it, it means that that person might, might miss out on that.

And it’s not always about the sale in the instant in that moment. No, it’s not.

Rachel Klaver: No, it’s building it over time. And chipping away at objections and. Barriers to work with you. So one of my favorite ones to do for this, the testimonials is one of them, obviously, but then I do these ones, which is like four ways to work with me, or here’s some in depth ones around my one on one work and things like that.

So I have different ones. I have about six of them and that carousel posts, they actually get to have a lot of information on them. [00:26:00] And one of my little delights, little delights and little, huh, is that I did them on LinkedIn and. People like them, people like them so much. They’ve started making their own.

So they don’t, people who haven’t even worked with me have said message me and gone, here’s my version. And so they are doing this thing. And I’m like, it, it shows you how powerful it is because these are people that haven’t worked with me who are watching my content and going. I was moved enough by that.

Like you moved a needle somewhere in me, maybe not enough for me to work with you, but enough for me to go, I need something like that in my business. That says to me that it is an effective way to do it. ’cause basically you, you know, you get a a one square to talk about who you are. One square to talk about your pricing, one about the process.

You get to actually do like a mini sales page of your core offer. With that parasail and you can use it on Instagram and you can use it on LinkedIn. And then it started to use it on Facebook, but you could turn it into a video if you wanted to, but it just gives that really lovely in depth how to [00:27:00] work with you.

And what it helps you do is really clarify. For yourself, what is that process? Like your messaging should be so consistent that that fits in with whatever you’ve got on your website as well. So it’s really helping to build out this beautiful whole picture of who you are. And I think, you know, that’s why I say take time to do those.

Don’t just slosh something up, make that something you do and really focus on it before you move to the other stuff, which we can talk about.

Hayley Maxwell: As well. Yeah, exactly. And so obviously we’ve talked a bit about that, the social media side of things, the email side of things, but obviously from a content marketing perspective, it’s also things like, you know, the podcasting or blogging and you know, those, those areas as well.

So from an introvert’s perspective, how can business owners really align their, their, their content marketing with. Then natural tendencies, the way they like to do things

Rachel Klaver: best. So I really like [00:28:00] that question. There’s two things in there. One is we naturally like things that we feel already comfortable.

And so one of the things I do in tech do challenge anyone and to fit or not is. There might be something that you like doing that you haven’t tried before, and maybe you haven’t tried it because you’re scared to fail because you’re I was listening to a really cool podcast about confidence this morning.

And one of the things that I was talking about, and he was talking about how everyone has the ability to succeed in pretty much anything to a certain. And he was saying, you know, and I agree with this, you can’t build confidence until you’re prepared to keep going and trying and trying things over and over again.

If you keep on waiting for the perfect moment at the perfect setup, you don’t get it done. So one of the things I do say is don’t feel that because you don’t have the capacity or the skills or the. The knowledge yet to do something. Don’t wipe that off as I’ll never do that. Like I look at some people who’ve said to me, I would never do the video because I hate video.

I hate the way I look. I hate the sound of my voice who are now doing [00:29:00] regular video and freaking nailing it. You don’t have to do video. You don’t have to do podcast. You don’t have to do a blog, but don’t allow a fear of. Imperfection and the fact that you don’t know how to do it perfectly be the reason you don’t do it.

So I think that’s one thing that’s really important. Give stuff a go. And like, say if it’s podcasting, try being a guest on someone else’s podcast and see if you enjoy that kind of interaction. Listen to podcasts, you know, my first podcast, which is not one that I share publicly. I can’t remember the name of what it’s called.

I did like five or six podcasts. I’d literally never listened to a podcast before I did that one, which was the biggest mistake. Cause I had no idea of what I liked, what I didn’t like. I hadn’t learned from how other people did things. And so. I really needed to understand what podcasts were. So think, take some time to learn those things.

Understand that what you’re doing on the first episode or the first blog or the first video is nothing to do with what’s going to be ending up doing on the hundredth one. You know, I think about how [00:30:00] easy it is for me now to edit a short video and take away all the extra breaths and, you know, work at how to change a clip around and going upsets where the hook is.

And I put the end. I’m going to remember here. It doesn’t take me very long and it’s easy when I first did videos, I was leaning at the back of the room and yelling to the camera because I had no understanding. I hold myself and I didn’t understand how to make it work. The first time I ever did a Facebook live, I think I did like 14 attempts of start stop because I couldn’t work out how to turn it on properly.

You know, we’re going to make mistakes. And I think that that is key thing. And as introvert, I think we’re. Often so scared of public shame, the biggest fear we have is to be noticed publicly when we don’t want to be. And if you add on to that shame, it’s really hard to get over. The only thing I can say is that people are a lot kinder than we think they are.

I’ve just literally finished an article for stuff this week. And it’s all about what to do with trolls, you know, and you’ve got to think if someone stops and they’re [00:31:00] being horrible to you, it’s not about you because. People who don’t like, you’re just going to scroll past. And it’s really not about you.

If you’re getting like nasty, you have to remember that for every nasty comment, you’ve got 60 percent of people. So that’s one third, 60 percent of people are out there writing for you and think you’re amazing and great, even if they’re saying it. And so if we make a mistake, most people are just going to go, you do.

Hey, they’re not going to sit there and pull it to bits. And. If they do, and they as unsolicited, just tell them to bug off, you know, like you don’t have to. So I think that’s really important. Don’t, don’t meet a fear of perfection. Don’t need if I’m not knowing how to do it, be the thing that stops you just going.

So that, but the other side I’d say is follow your bliss. Like I, I don’t understand people who say things like, oh, you know, blogging is dead or. There’s too many podcasts or, you know, it’s too late to do anything on YouTube or it’s too late to do lives. Do the thing, do the thing that you feel most comfortable with.

As [00:32:00] a strategist and a coach, I, when I’m asking what their primary platform needs to be for their social media. It’s to make really shitty decisions for them. I’d go, look, you’ve got to use Instagram because your target market is woman. Her dad, and I’d be like, this is what you’re doing. And I don’t like Instagram or bad luck.

You’ve got to be on Instagram. Now I’m like, Hey, tell me which platform you feel most comfortable on. Which one you have the most skills on and it’s fine to see if those two are the same and if we’re going to find something that’s the closest because I want you to start creating a content on something that you already have a scaffold of some understanding and that you like if you hate Facebook and I say you have to use Facebook.

I’ve now created a barrier and it’s the same with all content. If you hate writing, let’s find another way. If you hate if you love podcasts, do a podcast. It doesn’t matter if only 30 people are listening to it because there’s 30 people are engaged and it will grow over time. I think [00:33:00] 75 percent of podcasts, if your first podcast was, was more than 30, um, was more than 30 listeners, 31 listeners, I think you’re in the top 50 percent of podcasts.

Hayley Maxwell: World boy. Yeah. That’s

Rachel Klaver: interesting. And that’s not many people. Yeah, no, that’s not many people. But

Hayley Maxwell: still it’s 30 people, you know, it’s 30 people know, doing your message and listening to you, you

Rachel Klaver: know, it’s in the room. Imagine those people in a room. Yeah. You know, like, and, and so like my podcast, my new podcast has got less, less, less listeners than my old one did.

’cause I know you just switched. You hit the same base, you switch it. I went completely new. I broke it. You did. And I, I was like, should I have done that? Heidi did this other thing I should have, maybe I should have done that. But I, but marketing, some might want to go back to it at some point. So I kind of kept it like I could go back into a series, but it’s really hard going from 500, 350 to 500, depending on the week downloads a week on that podcast.

I’ve got on [00:34:00] a good week on my one here, I’m hitting a hundred, you know, like that’s a big drop and. I’m on it for the long term and I’m in it, but the engagement on that podcast that I’ve got now is probably 50 percent higher than it was on the other one. So what am I really measuring here? So I think, you know, like do the thing that you want to do.

If it’s a skill or a fear face that and be honest that that’s why you’re not doing it. Instead of going on, I don’t want to do it because it doesn’t work. That’s not why it is. It’s because you’re making an active choice and do the thing that you want to do. Yeah. It’s the same with video. Like I don’t, I, I, I’m a big believer in video and video is very powerful, but you can build a successful business without ever doing video.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah, I completely agree. Yeah, I think it’s really about starting off and finding the thing that really works for you and you’re right in that if you’re feeling a resistance to a certain channel maybe or medium then you need to stop and you need to ask yourself what is the [00:35:00] real barrier here? Is it that I am scared of doing this because of what people might think, for example, or is it that actually maybe I don’t have the skills or I’ve not, you know, practiced it enough.

So it’s looking at it from that perspective and saying, well, what is the real barrier and how can I work through that barrier? Is it, is it going to help me to work through that barrier? Or is this kind of a no go area for me at the moment and am I better to focus my attention somewhere else? And then starting on that platform slowly but surely and getting really good and really consistent at that, at that one thing, feeling really comfortable and building up over time.

And you’re right, you don’t have to do video. Does it help your, your business? Definitely

Rachel Klaver: does. I believe it does from a trust perspective. We [00:36:00] absolutely

Hayley Maxwell: so much more easily build trust. When we see someone talking, speaking, we can see their natural traits shining through. It grabs attention more quickly and it builds that trust more quickly.

It

Rachel Klaver: makes things easier. Yeah. I think what I have learned is that with my coaching clients is that. If I take something off the table and say, we don’t even have to talk about video now. If I like going, I can’t do this because you’re talking about video. Cool. Let’s just talk about video. Cause what happens is if you create the structure, right?

If you focus on your emails first and build that community, you get your lead magnets, you growing the email list. You get those promotion posts. You start adding on other ones that build trust around maybe being a bit more. You know, talking a little bit more vulnerability, vulnerability about your own business journey or things like that.

And then adding in a few how to, or frequently asked questions and other things that you can do behind the scenes, a few of those things. And you’re still not showing your face on video. We’re not, I mean, that what happens is you start to get results and then you [00:37:00] start to go, this feels really good. What else can I do to get results?

And that’s when you go, you know what, I’m okay about doing video now or trying it because I don’t feel like I’m a failure at content marketing. I can give this a go. And I think that that’s the thing that I’ve seen so often now with my. I answered the thing that they felt was this terrifying thing.

They’re like, you’re going to make me do this. The only thing I make people do, as I say, they have to do a minimum of three posts a week because you can’t get traction with less than that. Yeah, so I make them, there’s some things I do make people feel more uncomfortable with or pushing through. But I would, I would never, I think I’ve really learned that they have to catch the trust that content marketing works before I get them to trust video.

And I think that’s where I’ve kind of switched because I love video, but heck I wear costumes and video. I dress up as a goat or a spider. Sometimes I’ve dressed up as like, I, I, I find, I find that I get to be my eight year old in a South as [00:38:00] a 50 year old woman, I get to play around and fool around. I feel more comfortable in front of a camera than I do people.

Cause it’s, it’s doesn’t judge me. It’s in there. Yeah. It’s showing all my bumps and lumps and, and weird facials and stuff like that. But I get to just be completely relaxed without feeling like there’s actual eyeballs on me. So I love video. I think it’s great for introverts because we’re just talking to one person down that camera and you can pretend who that person is and you’re talking and you can get to do that.

And you don’t have to think shit, you know, am I doing this or that? Because that’s saying everything anyway, a person in person saying that. So I love video, but if it’s going to be a barrier to even getting started, it can come off the table until we get started. And I think that’s the thing with any of these things, like, you know people who say things like, do I have to be funny?

No, you don’t have to be funny. You probably are funny. I find you funny, but we don’t have to push that funniness. If you don’t feel safe, do I have to share this amazing story? How do you feel about it? I feel sick. Let’s not share it yet. It should [00:39:00] feel a bit scary to share a vulnerable story, but if it’s something where you’re actually going, if someone says something bad to me, I’m going to have to like go to bed for three days.

Well, we’re not going to share it. We don’t have to do anything. We just, but we push, keep on pushing. Once you’ve got to a place of comfortable, we push into the next space. And that’s how we build that really effective messaging and get brave with it. Because bravery is what makes us. Stand out.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah, I really, yeah, I really love that approach.

I think that’s, yeah, and such a great approach for introverts. And just from the perspective of a lot of introverts really like to process information, obviously internally, but they like to go really quite deep into some, some topics, some subject areas over that kind of surface level content, for example.

How can introverts, I guess, use this This skill that they have around kind of the [00:40:00] depth of, you know, a topic that they might know, or the depth that they really want to go to with their content, rather than always having that sort of more shallow surface level

Rachel Klaver: content. I love this. Question because I think my whole format that I teach is so there.

So I teach a list of 10 principle. So one of the things that we talk about is we have, I’ve actually just changed the way I teach my book, be a spider. I had one way, but we’ve actually simplified it. So basically you’d have like a. Four different types of content that you’d share per offer. And one would be your promo posts and your promo posts and reviews.

One would be frequently asked questions that people ask in terms of obstacles and things like that, or how we work or questions I might ask you. And then one would be sort of like a, how, how, how you’d work with me kind of ways of working. And so that’s my, how to content would be. You know, either things you need to know before you work with me, things to need to know while you work with me or things that you should know after you’ve worked with me, that’s where our how to fits in.

But then I’ve got this last one and it’s called your [00:41:00] passion. And so you choose at a time, one of those at a time. So for you, it could be energy levels of introverts. It could be like, or in a managing energy of introverts and you go, I’m making a list of at least 10 things that really, I’m really passionate about in this topic.

And then what you can do is if you want to do, if you know you’ve got to do like a really shallow one, you can just list three of them. Here’s three, here’s three things that you need to be aware of or five or seven or whatever. So you can do that. But then you can take any one of those and go really deep on it.

And if you use that combo, if you do a one, three, seven, or nine combo of that, just 10, there’s actually 1, 038 potential posts you could do just going. On that list of 10 ideas from that one topic.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah, that’s such a clever way to do it, isn’t it? You can think about doing it as a series as well, so that you’re, you’re using it in that particular way or the in depth content [00:42:00] format for blog posts.

So as well,

Rachel Klaver: so beautifully podcast, like if you’re on a podcast and you know, that’s a topic you’ve got, that is a really thing that you’ve got these things. If you’re a bit nervous, if you’re speaking somewhere, you can use that list of 10 and what happens is two things. One, the audience knows that you become known for that particular topic.

So it becomes a real driver. The second thing is the algorithm starts to really identify that you are known for that topic, and then it becomes a way of it going, Hey, when people are looking for that stuff, I’m pushing you in front of a new audience. So it actually gives you both of those things. It gives you a better.

Following and it gives you a bit of reach. And so that works so well. I am, I find this a challenge for the ADHD and the reason I’ve limited it as I used to have 12 of these little babies around with my to teach with clients. And that’s great for an ADHD brain who doesn’t want to be curtailed, but it doesn’t work on an algorithm very well.

And on TikTok I, I decided I’m going to go, I’ve taken a little bit from TikTok and I love TikTok but I’m going to go [00:43:00] all in with. Storytelling in the new year around this topic. And I did that for a few months and broke through the dreaded hundred sign. I was getting like quite viral posts and I posted a video about one of my clients food tour and went semi viral and completely broke it, which is, but I learned.

If you stay in that topic and you’re passionate about it, the cool thing is we can go deep. We can go as deep as like as introverts, because actually people want that. They are sick of the three things that you know, the three, three things I can get from a Google a chat GPT search. They don’t want that true insight.

They want to see your point of difference. They want to see your thinking. And that’s what changes and brings people to us because that’s the stuff that they can’t get from someone

Hayley Maxwell: else. Yeah, it’s really interesting that you just mentioned that because I just written a little note prior to that saying, I think there’s this almost like a myth that a lot of people think that people aren’t going to read content that is deeper.

And so I think it [00:44:00] puts people off wanting to spend time sometimes on writing posts, writing content that goes more in depth. Because they think, well, what’s the point? People are not going to read it fully. But I don’t believe that’s the case. I think if it comes across that it’s something that you’re really passionate about, that it’s sharing your unique perspectives, if it’s written well and engages the right people, then those people are going to want to read it, whether it’s long and in depth or whether it’s short.

So I think it’s, actually, people do read longer. In depth content. They just need to, it just needs to be the right people. And that’s, that’s always who we should be targeting anyway with any of our, our content, isn’t it? And I,

Rachel Klaver: I’ve got colleagues who are quite sweary and I’m personally very sweary, but I’m not very sweary in my content.

It doesn’t, it’s something, something that feels right for me. I think I’ve had too much, you know, education experience around working in [00:45:00] education and working in corporates. And so it’s not something I do. And, you know, I’m naturally going to attract people who don’t mind a bit of a swear, but aren’t super, super sweary.

I think what the introvert thing is that if we are really impassionate and engaged and we’re writing in depth comments, and that’s who we naturally are, that’s your natural impulse. You’re then going to… Attract people who are attracted by the way you communicate. So if you’re light and fluffy, you’re going to attract people who are attracted by light and fluffy.

If you are, and I’m not having a go at anyone’s, but I’m 52. If you are a beautiful 22 year old blonde person who does her presentations, I’m sorry for picking on blondes. But you know, blonde, beautiful, you know, the beautiful way. I mean, I’m just imagining that, you know, that beautiful way to hear, you know, that Dyson waves, you know, beautiful day.

And you’re wearing like you’re wearing a particular type of way that you’re wearing and you’re wearing stilettos because that’s how you feel most comfortable. And that’s, you’re talking, there’ll be a group of people that are attracted to that persona or the way that you look there. If you ask someone who is talking to [00:46:00] people who Budget, just focus on budget, budget, budget.

And that’s all you’re talking about. You you’re going to attract them. If you’re talking about money or, you know, one of the things that I told a client off yesterday, she had as one of hers, why is, is my, whatever, and she was so expensive and I was like, why are you talking about that? We’re not even gonna even raise that problem.

You don’t want to attract people where you’re trying to value that, but it’s because everything we say mirrors. To the person that we’re talking to. So if you want to go deep, you’re going to attract people who go, this person’s depth is exactly what I’ve been looking for. Finally, I found it. And you’re going to get those clients.

If you do shallow stuff, because you feel that that’s what you need to do, you’re not going to your ideal client because they are looking, your ideal client wants you, they don’t want. A, a facade of you. They want you. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that, you know, that was my breakthrough. ’cause with ADHD, we wanna be liked by everyone.

Like we wanna [00:47:00] be people, we are people pleasers. And so, for so long I kept on trying to be the person that I thought everyone wanted me to be. And it, and it was this, I had to get to rock bottom. And then I’m like, you know, stuff, I’m just gonna be my weird, kooky self who says I’m an introvert, but I’m loud on video.

It doesn’t make sense and I’m gonna do this. I’m gonna do that. It has been so liberating, but the best thing is I found my community, found the people that I can interact with. Like, you know, like you may, you may highly, we, we, we connected from a professional level, but then I also for my clients who loves the person I am and love that person and how awesome it is.

Cause I can then bring my best self to them. I want to give to them and to me, like, honestly, it’s such a gift.

Hayley Maxwell: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, I love that. And I was going to ask another question, but I think that that was just like a beautiful place to, to wrap things up because that is such a powerful message. It’s just really leaning into who you naturally [00:48:00] are, your natural tendencies and learning to release those feelings that you need to be someone else in order to attract people.

To you. So I think that was a beautiful place to, to wrap things up today. So thank you so much for chatting with me about this. It was so interesting. Oh, I so

Rachel Klaver: enjoyed it.

Hayley Maxwell: Where can people find you if they want to come and check you out?

Rachel Klaver: Oh, so you can come and listen to my podcast, the confident content. I normally fluff that up.

So I’m quite pleased that I managed to say it correctly. So so you can listen to that. Otherwise you can check me out on Rachel clava. com. That is clava with a K. K L a V E R, um, and otherwise stalk me on LinkedIn. That’s where I do my favorite talking. And then I often repurpose that content for other platforms.

And yeah, be happy to answer questions or or talk to you about content marketing, if you’ve got questions and otherwise just keep on learning and digging in deep with Haley’s content. Cause it’s so important for introverts to have someone who’s in their corner with [00:49:00] them. So it’s good.

Hayley Maxwell: Thanks so much, Rachel.

Rachel Klaver: Thank you so much. It was a pleasure.