702 - Creating Flywheels, Asking the Right Questions, and Reverse-Engineering Your Ideal Clients with Nathan Barry

Live In The Feast

Today’s co-host is Nathan Barry. Nathan is the founder of ConvertKit. Many of you know ConvertKit as an e-mail marketing platform, but there’s more to the story.

Nathan started his career as a blogger and creator before transitioning into building products. He also wrote several books and built a thriving solo business before launching ConvertKit.

Much of Nathan’s drive came from watching his parents struggle with money when he was growing up. He sees this as a defining moment in his life because he knew from the time he was 12 that he never wanted to have those same struggles.

He learned early on that making money wouldn’t just happen on its own. He had to work for it, and practice, and build the skill of making money. While working his way through college, he began seeing the internet as a way to do something he loved, and make money doing it.

Currently, Nathan is working on his hobby farm (and preparing for a new baby!), as well as continuing to grow ConvertKit and launching new features.

In this episode, we dive into identifying your ideal client, as well as some exercises that Nathan has used to figure out what types of projects and customers to work with. Also, Nathan goes into some questions you can ask that will help you create the life you want, as well as improve conversations throughout your business.

“If you’re earning a lot and I’m earning a little, then it’s because you’ve built skills over time. Just like if you’re incredible at playing this piano piece, it’s because you’ve practiced and you’ve built up to it over years.”

In this episode Nathan talks about:

• How he got into the world of digital marketing, and ultimately ConvertKit.
• Identifying your ideal client by knowing who they are not.
• How to define the ideal employee and the questions you need to ask.

Main Takeaways

• Sometimes it’s easier to figure out who you should exclude from your marketing efforts rather than include, as it allows the quality content to rise to the top. When you narrow it down by those criteria, it becomes apparent who you should focus on.
• Asking the right questions is critical. Ask questions of yourself and others that will help you figure out what your real goals are.
• Ask yourself: if this employee went to work for the competition tomorrow, how upset would I be? This is a great way to determine your ideal employee.

Important Mentions in this Episode

• ConvertKit
• The App Design Handbook
• Designing Web Applications
• Nathan on Twitter
• Authority by Nathan Barry
• Jason Fried on Twitter
• Good to Great by Jim Collins
• Flywheel by Jim Collins

For full show notes and resources

• Live In The Feast - Episode 2 of Season 7