Real Talk with Lisa Johnson: Trolls, Triumphs, and True Growth

Your Dream Business

In this episode of the Your Dream Business Podcast, I chat with Lisa Johnson—global business strategist and Sunday Times bestselling author. Lisa opens up about how she bounced back from online hate and went on to have multi-million dollar launches. We talk about how every business journey is different and why cookie-cutter strategies don’t really work. We also get into the real stuff—like dealing with trolls, what it’s really like to run a successful business, and how the online space is constantly changing. Lisa shares tips on growing your email list, running affiliate launches, and how her idea of success has shifted over time. If you're a coach, course creator, or membership site owner looking to grow, this episode is packed with honest advice and practical strategies. KEY TAKEAWAYS COVERED IN THE PODCAST

• Your path is your own – There’s no one-size-fits-all formula for success. Lisa’s journey proves that doing things your own way can lead to massive results.

• Resilience is key – Facing online backlash didn’t stop Lisa—it fueled her growth. Learning to handle criticism is part of building a strong, sustainable business.

• Strategy + honesty wins – From list-building to affiliate launches, Lisa shares real strategies that work—no fluff, just what’s actually helped her scale her business.

If you enjoyed this episode then please feel free to go and share it on your social media or head over to Apple podcasts or Spotify and give me a review, I would be so very grateful. LINKS TO RESOURCES MENTIONED IN TODAY’S EPISODE Connect with Lisa Johnson on Website, Instagram, Facebook Connect with Teresa on Website, (Grow, Launch, Sell), Sign up to Teresa's email list, Instagram, LinkedIn, or Facebook

Transcript

Do you ever wish you could lift the curtain behind a very successful business where they are making millions and find out what it's really like to earn that money and to run a business of that size? Well, today that is exactly what my guest is talking about. Lisa Johnson is an online business og, and her latest launches bring in millions. However, Lisa has had her fair share of online backlash that she has had to deal with, including 16 pages of negativity on the Mom's net platform. How on earth do you deal with that? In today's very honest, very vulnerable, and. Quite frankly, amazing episode. This is what Lisa and I talk about. Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Your Dream Business Podcast. Now today's episode is an interview and with all the interviews that I do, I go back if it was like a little while, even if it was like a few days ago, unless I'm doing this. Immediately after the interview, I go back and [00:02:00] just scan through the interview and I went to scan through the interview and I ended up watching the whole thing, which is really weird when it's your own podcast because obviously I was part of it. But that should give you an indication as to how good. I think this episode is today I'm interviewing Lisa Johnson. For those of you who don't know Lisa, she's a global business strategist and a Sunday Times bestselling author who makes 90% of her money through passive income streams. She's very much in the online space that would sum that up. She passionately believes that every business owner's journey is unique and. The one size fits all approach that dominates the online coaching and mentoring world is fundamentally flawed, inspiring her to take a stand at the forefront of ethical and integrity driven business. Strategic advice, obviously, you know, I'm reading this and I hate reading bios and I'm rubbish at it. Lisa's been featured on numerous TV shows and has appeared in national papers, magazines like Telegraph, psychologies Magazine, the [00:03:00] Guardian, the Fast Company, and has had a Forbes article that's gained over a quarter of a million views in a week. Her podcast, making money online has been downloaded over 420,000 times and has reached number one in the business Podcast charts. In one launch alone during the pandemic, she made 3.8 million in a week earning 1.5 million in her first hour of sales. So she is an online business OG and is a UK online business og. And I'm a little bit annoyed with myself that I've never. Had her on before now, and I actually say that on the interview to her. This interview was awesome, really, really good. Like I said, I went to watch it to make notes to what I could say in this introduction, and I ended up watching the entire thing. And we talk about, so mainly we talk about a few different things. We talk about how the industry's changed because she's been in it as long as I have. We talk [00:04:00] about. Online trolls because if you know Lisa, you will know she has had her fair share of people saying stuff about her online. I'd say fair share. I'd say probably the lion's share of it. We have a super honest conversation about what that must feel like, what it's like to handle how she feels about it now, we then have an honest conversation about. Does that mean or is that one of the reasons she's more successful than me? Because more people know who she is and she gives an ex amazing, unbelievable figure of how much money she earned based off someone being controlled and saying horrible stuff about it. So it was, it was really fascinating. We then go on to talk about launching and affiliate launching. She's just had a very successful launch, but she again, tells us very honestly what it's like to have affiliates on her do her launch with her and what went wrong and what went right. It was just. It was just super, super honest. It was [00:05:00] really honest, really refreshing, and it really does give you an insight to when you see people's businesses online and you see how hugely successful they are from a financial point of view, what is it like to actually live in that business and be in that business? What does she worry about? What does she struggle with? And honestly. I really enjoyed this conversation. I thought it was awesome. I thought she was great, and I think you're gonna get so much out of it. And you're also gonna find out that it's not just about the money, and that was so reassuring and helpful to hear. So I hope you're gonna really enjoy this episode. I really would love you to, as always, show us what you think. Tag me in, tag Lisa in, go and find us on Instagram. Please, please do go and let us know what you think. But. I thought this was a great episode. So without further ado, here is Lisa. Lisa, welcome to the podcast. Thanks for inviting me. [00:06:00] I am very excited about this episode and about the conversations we're gonna have, and it's almost like, I don't know where to start or what things I wanna talk about. I think where I want to start is. Now we don't do intros. I've already done an intro on who you are, but you've been in this industry a fair chunk of time and you are successful in this industry. How has it changed and how has it changed you? Lisa: It's changed loads and, and it's really weird because I remember for ages feeling like a newbie in this industry. And now there has been a sudden switch, I think like, 'cause it's over eight years, there's this sudden switch of people going, you've been in in this industry. And one of the longest people, I'm like, I was new. How am I now suddenly one of the longest. But I think it's 'cause so many people come in and disappear. And I have been here all along. The changes have been immense, like. The changes in launching, you know, it's completely changed how we do things, the changes in our audiences and how smart they are. Like they're [00:07:00] really clued up these days. You can't pull the wool over their eyes, which is a brilliant thing. That nobody's really being taken in anymore by any kind of pyramid scheme or anything like that. And I used to talk about these things a lot, and then I realized recently I don't need to, everyone gets it now. Like everyone's clued up on all of it. Even all the kind of. Dodgy tactics out there. They, everyone gets it now. Yeah. You don't need to. It's lovely. So that's all changed. I think that the way people buy has changed completely. Like people don't care as much about a bonus or if the price is going up from 1, 1, 1 to 2, 2, 2 the next day, like no one cares. Yeah. They know. It's just a tactic. And I think what's changed is how. There's two things, two bad things that have changed. I think the first is entitlements changed, but we can't moan about it because we made it by giving away so much free stuff. Now there's like loads of entitlement and people just expecting you to do everything all the time. If you don't get back to them within. Five [00:08:00] minutes, then you're going to get like killed on the internet and be told you're bad. So entitlement has happened, but I don't blame the people for being entitled 'cause I feel like we bought it on ourselves. And I think the second thing that has happened that is not so good is that there are so many more people that believe that. That you can't debate with anymore. You can't have conversations with or have different opinions with online because it can only be their way. And yeah, things have changed in that arena. Like if you say something that people don't agree with, they can't just say they don't agree with you anymore. You're like, literally. They're trying to cancel you within five seconds. And I think that's a real shame about the changes that would happen because one of the things that I loved about social media was seeing different people's opinions and debating those opinions and seeing if I could learn from them and seeing if they could learn from me. That doesn't happen anymore, Teresa: Do you think? And such good points. And actually the phrase being canceled is literally like in the last few years and when I interviewed the last time I interviewed Amy Port [00:09:00] Field. I said, what? What, what are you fearful of now? Because obviously when you get to a certain point, everyone thinks that all your worries and your fears go and hers was being canceled, that she might say something or do something accidentally because no one, I don't think purposely tries to get canceled. But it wasn't even a thing like that was never even a saying. Whereas now it very much is, Lisa: and I think that, I think people do try and get canceled. Tate tries to get canceled because I think that if you, if in, if there's enough talk on you, then it doesn't really matter if it's to be canceled or not. You are always gonna get more people looking at you if you say something stupid Teresa: and I guess the world is so divisive and so divided that actually for every one person that wants to cancel you, there'll be just as many who go. Love what you do. Lisa: Because of that divide. And it's such a shame that there's that black and white divide of like, you are wrong. I'm right. This is the [00:10:00] right answer. This is the wrong view, because that's not real life. There's gray in everything. Everything. Yeah. And yet we've, we've lost the ability to see the gray and to see that we're all seeing things through our own lens. So of course, we're all gonna have these different truths and these different opinions that's gone. And that's a shame because the gray area is where the interesting nuances are. But we don't talk about them anymore because like, let's take. What's like a hot topic at the moment that everyone's arguing about, let's take immigration as a topic. Yeah, so if you talk about immigration, there are people that say that we, we shouldn't have drawn the lines anywhere. They're just lines that have been drawn on a map. Yeah. And actually everyone should be allowed in everywhere. And then there are the people that say, no one should be allowed in. It's our country. You know, like, let's draw a line. Don't let anybody in because it's not fair on our resources. Neither of those points are true. There is gray in the middle of that. There are good points on either side that you can come to somewhere in the middle. That makes complete sense, but you're not [00:11:00] allowed to say that because if you even veer away from one point by a tiny bit. You are bad and you're put into the other category. And so no one dares say what they really think anymore because they're scared that people will then see them as far right or far left or whatever. And actually there's nuance in the middle that we could talk about if we were open to it, but no one's open to it. Teresa: No, you're right. And you, and one of the things we've got chatting to before you hit record was you have. Had your fair share of people having very strong opinions about you and, and from an outward looking in, it feels that you are very strong to stand up to that and you don't mind batting that like or meeting it. Was that always the case and Lisa: no Teresa: is that still the case? Like Lisa: it is still the case, but it wasn't always the case. So if you think about when I first came in. I, when I first came online, I'd been badly bullied as a kid. My biggest fear was this, you know, being canceled or being bullied, or [00:12:00] people saying mean things about me online. But I've grown a thick skin because I, it came to a point probably in about year two or year three of being online where every, if I wanted to say an opinion about something or if I wanted to put out, an idea or a thought that wasn't the norm because sometimes my ideas aren't, I would get so much backlash, bullying, like everyone would be offended by everything I said and it, it got to a point where it didn't matter what it was. So like, I'll then test things. So one of my friends, Dan Meredith, put out a post in about year three. That I thought if I put that post out, I'd get killed for it. How is he allowed to put that post out with his opinion on it? So he said, no, wouldn't, you wouldn't, like you are right. People would agree with you or disagree with you. I copied the post and put it out and got slaughtered. I was like, okay. So it's not actually about [00:13:00] what I'm writing. It's me as a person. People are trying to find a reason that I, Teresa: isn't that even harder? Lisa: No. I get that I get it. I've been that person that looks up at people that are successful and I'm trying really hard and I'm not going anywhere and thinking like, why is she able to do this? And like that envy turned into not a nice feeling for me when I used to look at people like that. And it was only through a friend, Emily Williams. She said to me, when you feel that, like envy in that, oh, it's all right for her. Realize that it's just showing you what you want. That's what MV is. It's just showing you what you want in life. And so thank her because that's shown her that you can have that too, because she's got it. And that changed my whole perception. And so then I didn't think about people in that way anymore. But I know how it feels too. And so when people look at me and they wanna find a reason that I must be bad. Like I must be, you don't make over 20 million in seven years without doing something bad, right. 'cause that's what we've been taught. Which people are bad people. It's in every Disney movie. We've seen it. Yeah. And so I know what they're looking [00:14:00] for. And so of course they're gonna try and find any little thing and blow it up to be a bad thing. And the reason why it's okay that I'm not her. It's all right. I don't need to be like, like Lisa and have all that money because. The reason she's got there is she's done bad things that I wouldn't do, and they're trying to find that because it makes them feel better about the fact they're not where they want to be. And I totally get it. I get it. It's psychology and so I don't really dislike it when people do it. I understand it. Teresa: It must, does it not upset you? Are you? Lisa: Never Teresa: like, 'cause I just think I would sob. Lisa: I used to, like in year three, I'm Teflon now. Like nothing gets through. Like I'm fine and my, my husband isn't, my friends are, my team aren't, they're little sobbing in the corner about something that someone said about me, but I'm like, let's look at it logically. Like their opinions aren't gonna have an effect on my business. Because I think we worry about that, don't we? Like when if people say bad things about us and we get a bad reputation, it will affect our [00:15:00] business and we won't make as much money. Yeah. I have found that to be not the case. Yeah. So much so that I found it to be, I went viral on mom's net like a year ago. A year or so ago. Badly. Not in a very negative way. Because I paid too much money in a launch, and therefore I must be a con artist. And so that there were 52 pages all talking about me as a con artist. Teresa: Oh my God. I doubt Lisa: and well, I, at first I tried to do, I did a very stupid thing and I tried to, oh, I thought that reasonable people, oh, go on and have a chat to them about why they think this, and I'll tell them why they're wrong. Never play with the trolls. What a stupid thing to do. So don't ever do that. Just ignore it. Teresa: Because like, you know, having that conversation to me feels like a good thing. Like, well, let me explain. Lisa: Yeah. I explain why I'm wroong, yeah right. And why actually I call out the con artist, but it didn't work. It just made that they loved it. So I didn't do that again. But what happened was we made about 43,000 pounds extra just from...