[00:00:00] Welcome to the Creator's MBA podcast, your go-to resource for mastering the art and science of digital product entrepreneurship. My name is Dr. Destini Copp and I help business owners generate consistent revenue from their digital product business without the need to be glued to their desk. 

I hope you enjoy our episode today. Welcome back to the show. I'm super excited about today's episode because we are talking about something I hear from service providers all the time, and that is, I want to create digital products, but I just don't know how to balance it with my client work. So if you're a consultant, a coach, a designer, a writer, or any kind of service provider.

Dreaming of having 

[00:01:00] more digital product revenue? In your business. This episode is specifically for you. Today I'm gonna walk you through a very practical roadmap for building out your digital product portfolio while still keeping your service clients happy. So let's dive right in. 

Let's quickly talk about the why and there are some compelling reasons to add digital products to your service-based business. The first is digital products give you income. Diversification. When your entire income relies on you trading time for money, you are very vulnerable. Once a client drops, there's a hole in your revenue.

Digital products allow you to scale your impact. There's only one of you,

 [00:02:00] but your knowledge and expertise can help hundreds or even thousands through the right products. They provide a different entry point for people to work with you. Not everyone can afford your one-on-one services right away, but they might start with a digital product and then upgrade later.

And finally, digital products can actually make your service offerings more valuable by creating a clearer client. Journey when you have both, you can be more selective about which clients you take on for your high touch work. But I know what you're thinking here.

Destini, this all sounds great, but when do I find the time to create products when I am maxed out with clients? So I wanna tackle that next. Here's the truth 

[00:03:00] that most people won't tell you. Building a digital product business online, your service business. Is essentially like running two businesses at once, at least in the beginning.

So that doesn't mean that it's impossible but it does mean that you need to be strategic about how you approach it. The biggest mistake that I see service providers make is treating their product creation as something that they will get to when they have the time. And then guess what?

That time magically never appears. Instead, you need to treat your product development as seriously as you treat your client work, and that means dedicated time. Resources and energy. It's not just a side project. It's a 

[00:04:00] core part of your evolving business model. So with that mindset established let's get into my step by step framework for making this transition successful.

And the first phase is all about growing your email list, and that's crucial for digital product success, but it's often overlooked by service providers. As a service provider, you've likely relied on word of mouth and client referrals and that's great for services.

But digital products require a different approach. You need a sizable engaged. Email list and you're gonna need it fast. So what I want you to do is start by blocking time on your calendar, at least five hours per week. 

[00:05:00] Maybe it's Friday mornings or Wednesday afternoons, whatever works for you.

I want you to treat it like you are meeting with your most important client, because in a way it's kind of like that. Next I want you to create a high value lead magnet that showcases your expertise. This is gonna be something that's quick to consume, that solves a specific problem for your ideal 

audience. So some of the things you can think about here are maybe templates, checklist guides, mini trainings, and then I want you to focus on leveraging other people's audiences to grow your list. Rapidly this approach is definitely more effective than trying to build an audience from scratch.

A couple things you can do here. Participate in virtual 

[00:06:00] summits as a speaker where you can share your lead magnet As a service provider, you're gonna have a lot of expertise so that's a really good option for you. Another thing you can test out and try is joining relevant. Bundles where your resource is featured alongside other experts.

You can arrange newsletter swaps with complimentary service providers. You can guest on podcast in your niche and you know, have your compellingly magnet offer and offer it at the end of the podcast episode. So all of these strategies help you borrow. Established audiences and convert them into your own email subscribers.

So for service providers like you who might be pivoting to more digital products, that's gonna be one of the fastest ways to. Build your email list. Once you have that, you're 

[00:07:00] focused on list building. The next thing that I want you to do is to build out what we call a trip wire funnel. And this is really just a basic funnel that's gonna help you to start monetizing your new email subscribers.

So this is how it's set up. You're gonna have your lead magnet, which is free. Then you're gonna have a low cost trip wire type offer, anywhere from like seven to maybe 97. Then you're gonna have an. Order bump on the checkout page. So that's a complimentary small offer that's added at checkout, and then you might have one to two strategically chosen.

Upsells your trip wire product is gonna be some type of irresistible, low risk offer that solves a specific pain point. In most cases. A mini course works perfectly here. It's substantial enough to provide 

[00:08:00] real value, but small enough to create relatively quickly. So that's where I want you to start.

And then in phase three, step three here, you're probably looking at months four to five the first couple months have been focused on list building and setting up this trip wire type sales funnel. Then you are ready for what I would call an m. VPA minimum viable product for your signature offer.

Sometimes I refer to it as signature offer. Sometimes I refer to it as your. Perfect offer, this is pulling together a higher priced offer that's going to fuel your entire digital product growth flywheel. A lot of service providers might have more like a done. With you type offer here.

So it has 

[00:09:00] some digital products in it. You might have weekly Zoom meetings but it's kind of a stepping point into, a course versus you actually doing the work for them. So I love these type of offers because you don't have to build everything up front. You can just do the weekly Zoom sessions, and that helps you build your content out.

After running your signature offer with your first cohort, in the next phase, it is time to refine your program and scale your marketing efforts. In this stage, you're gonna be gathering feedback from your initial students. What did they love? Where did they get? Stuck what results did they achieve?

And you're gonna use this feedback to improve your program for the next cohort. You're gonna document and systematize your delivery process. So are there any templates 

[00:10:00] you need to create? SOPs, standard operating procedures. Where can you automate kind of looking at everything and figuring out what could you do there?

So those are the steps that I would suggest that somebody who wants to switch over from a full service based business and diversify into the digital product portfolio. That is how I would suggest that you start now let's talk a little bit about time management, because balancing service delivery and product creation is challenging.

The first thing you can do is batch similar tasks together, so you can have specific days for your client calls. Versus your deep work on your products. The other thing you consider doing is have like a client day model where you only take client meetings on certain days of the 

[00:11:00] week, leaving you free for other work like product development and internal work 

third, you can build systems and templates for everything in your business. The more you systemize these routine tasks, the more bandwidth you're gonna have for other growth activities. As your digital product revenue grows. You can consider gradually reducing your client load. For instance, you might take on 10% fewer clients each quarter replacing that income with the digital product revenue.

So let's talk about some mistakes to. Avoid, and I think a lot of us are gonna be able to relate to these. The first one is perfectionism. Your digital products don't need to be polished as your one-on-one work. I want you to know that done is absolutely better than perfect, especially for your early products.

Another 

[00:12:00] pitfall is under. Pricing. So many service providers dramatically undervalue their digital products 'cause they're comparing them to the price of their hourly rate. But really what I want you to do is price 'em based on the value your product actually delivers. To your customer. The third mistake is failing to leverage your existing client work.

I want you to look for ways to create products based on the work you're already doing. Can you create a template from that custom strategy you just developed? Could you record yourself? Solving a common client problem and then turn that into a tutorial. Many people create products without validating demand first.

Before you build out a comprehensive course or a membership, make sure that people actually want it by pre-selling it or 

[00:13:00] creating a minimum viable product version we talked about earlier, 

the first thing, like I said, creating digital products as a service provider, isn't about abandoning your client work? I know that a lot of you want to keep that client work. It is about strategically expanding your business model to create more freedom, impact.

And security. But here's the thing. This transition does not happen overnight. With consistent effort and the framework that we talked about today, you can successfully build a business that leverages both service and product. Income streams, remember that your deep expertise as a service provider is actually your greatest advantage in this digital product space.

You understand your client's problems. 

[00:14:00] Intimately, which means that you can create products that truly solve their pain points. Now, before I sign off, I'd love to hear what digital product ideas you are considering for your service-based business. Drop me a message, reply back to my newsletter if you're already on it.

If you found this episode helpful, please share it with another service provider who's looking to diversify their income. I would really appreciate it. Until next time, keep taking those small, consistent steps towards building your digital product business. You have got this, my friend. Bye for now.

Thanks for listening all the way to the end. I hope you enjoyed this episode today. If you love the show, I'd appreciate a review on Apple Podcast or your favorite podcast platform. Have a great rest of your day and bye for now.