156: A Glimpse Behind the Curtain: What Worked in 2023 & Plans for 2024
Want a behind-the-scenes peek into the world of several digital product businesses? In this episode of the Creator's MBA podcast, I walk you through the successes and challenges of our brands in 2023 and talk about our strategic focus for 2024.
From launching summits and Shopify stores to navigating major surgeries, I cover growth strategies, affiliate programs, and the power of collaboration.
Get ready to dive deep into the world of digital products and eCommerce strategies while I talk about the highs and lows of 2023 and our plans for 2024.
Mentioned In This Episode:
Our brands: HobbyScool, HelloContent, Destini Copp
Free Planner: Plan Your Profitable Evergreen Sales Funnel so you can sell your offers on autopilot without sleazy sales tactics
My 2023 Journey and Looking Ahead to 2024
Hello everyone! I'm Dr. Destini Copp, and I recently took some time in my podcast to reflect on my journey through 2023 and to share my plans for 2024. Let me give you an inside look at the rollercoaster of the past year and what I'm gearing up for in the year ahead.
My 2023: A Blend of Successes and Challenges
Last year was an incredible ride. We went all out, launching 14 summits and bundles and setting up two Shopify stores: HobbyScool and HelloContent. The hard work paid off — we sold 2,879 digital products, built 17 automated sales funnels, and connected with 1,543 paying customers. Our events attracted over 22,000 attendees, and we collaborated with about 330 business owners.
However, it wasn't all about successes. The workload made me rethink my approach for 2024. On a more personal note, I also had to navigate through two major surgeries in 4Q of 2023, which was a reminder of the need to balance work and personal health.
My Plans for 2024: Focusing on What Matters Most
This year, I'm fine-tuning my focus. I plan to scale back on the number of events to concentrate on the ones that truly resonated last year. I'm also planning some exciting enhancements for the HobbyScool's affiliate program and brainstorming new collaboration and sponsorship opportunities.
A big step forward will be the launch of a new membership program following a summit designed for those looking to turn their hobbies into profitable ventures. I'm really excited about this, as it aligns perfectly with our community's interests.
For HelloContent, I'm branching out to diversify our traffic sources. I'm delving deeper into blogging, SEO, and Pinterest, and expanding our affiliate program. This shift is all about reaching more people in more ways.
Personal Brand and New Endeavors
I'm also giving a fresh spin to my "Creators MBA Podcast," aiming to make it more engaging and relevant to our audience. Additionally, I'm upping my game in email marketing with some coaching from experts.
I'm refreshing our course offerings, including launching "The Funnel Cure." Plus, my Digital Product Accelerator program is set to provide personalized coaching for those who need it.
Community Engagement and Collaborations
I'm not just focusing on my own plans; I'm also setting up collaborative bundles focusing on sales funnels, digital products, and business planning. I'd love for you to be a part of these initiatives.
I'm genuinely interested in hearing about your experiences in 2023 and your goals for 2024. Feel free to reach out to me on Instagram, LinkedIn, or via email. Your stories inspire me, and I'm here to share insights and support.
Conclusion
Navigating through the ups and downs of 2023 has taught me valuable lessons in resilience, strategic thinking, and the importance of maintaining a balance between professional ambitions and personal health. As I move forward into 2024, my focus is on quality, community engagement, and meaningful collaborations.
P.S.: For more details and a deeper dive, make sure to listen to my podcast!
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Transcript:
Dr. Destini Copp [00:00:02]:
Hi there. In this podcast episode, I'm gonna give you a behind the scenes look at all of our different brands in 2023 and walk you through what I'm gonna be focusing on in 2024 based on our results. I know for me personally, I really love to get a behind the scenes kind of peek behind other businesses, because I wanna know that I'm not alone in my struggles and in my So I wanna know that there's other people out there that are going through exactly what I've been going through. So let me start with giving you kind of a behind the scenes look of 2023, what we did, what worked, and kinda what we're gonna keep focusing on. Now last year, we had a ton of different kind of initiatives and activities, and things that we were focused on. And let me tell you, we work extremely, extremely hard in 2023. So Here here are some of the numbers. We launched 14 summits and bundles.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:01:10]:
Now most of those were live summits. We opened 2 Shopify stores, so our HobbyScool Shopify store and our HelloContent Shopify store. We sold 2,879 digital products. Now that was through the summits, through our Shopify stores and just through my personal brand. We built 17 automated sales funnels. We created hundreds of digital products for our e commerce Shopify stores. And in 2023, we served 1,543 paying customers. We had over 22,000 attendees in all of our events across both brands, and we collaborated with around 330 business owners.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:02:05]:
Basically, helping them, you know, basically promoting their business, whether it was through one of our virtual summits or our bundles. Now that's a lot. And let me tell you, we work a lot of hours to make that happen, and we're not going to do that in 2024. And that's one of the things that we're gonna change in 2024. We're gonna take a step back and focus on, exactly the the events that worked well for us, and we're gonna double down on them. Another thing that I had happen in 2023 was I had two major surgeries at the end of 2023. So in 4th Q4 of 2023, I had 2 major sir surgeries. One of them being a total knee replacement at the end of the summer, which I, quite frankly, I'm still recovering from.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:02:57]:
So that was also extremely difficult. So not only do we have all of these events going on in Q4, I also had these major 2 major surgeries that I was recovering from in October, and then, that kind of bled into November. And then at the end of December, I had total knee replacement. So I'm kind of still kinda recovering from all of that, which is why it's taken me, quite frankly, some time to kinda get going in 2024. So last year, in 2023, our main focus was on growth, whether it was expanding our email list, spending our audience, selling these, you know, affordable digital products through the various channels that we had, whether it's through the Shopify stores or our automated funnels, and I'm not gonna I'm not gonna lie. You know, those strategies work. The strategies that we have in place in terms of the lead generation with The summits, the bundles, those definitely work. Now we had some events that worked better than others, but it was a ton of work, and it was incredibly demanding.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:04:07]:
So when I kinda took a step back and I said, you know what? I can't keep going the way I've been going. You know, we definitely have to stay back take a step back, and refocus our efforts, and really double down on what worked the best. So looking ahead to 2024, Basically, what we're gonna be focusing on is honing in on the events and the activities that basically, produce the best results from last year. So in HobbyScool we're gonna only be doing 6 major events this year. And we're kinda spacing them out throughout the year. But we took our events that we did, that we made the most money on, that we had the biggest, you know, attendee growth on, and those are the events that we're gonna focus on in 2024. The other thing that we're gonna be doing is enhancing our affiliate program with HobbyScool. So our affiliate program with HobbyScool is, you know, very well robust.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:05:13]:
We have over, I can't even I don't even have the number in front of me, but I know we have, over 200 affiliates or people who could be affiliates for our various events. And, actually, we get a lot of our sales for the summits from our affiliates. So we're gonna really double down on our affiliate program for HobbyScool. The other thing that we're gonna do is and we've already started working on this, and we have this on our website. We have outlined a lot of different collaborations trends in sponsorship opportunities, whether it's through our events that we're doing or just our email promotion. So just to give you a very specific example here, let's say that somebody, for whatever reason is not invited to be a speaker at one of our events, but they still want to participate, for the lead generation opportunity. So we have a way that they can sponsor, the summit at a very you know, basically at a a, you know, an affordable cost, a low cost, where they can still grow their email list. It gives them an opportunity to get in front of their ideal customer.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:06:22]:
They can still grow their email list by donating a product to to our digital back swag. So, you know, there's a lot of different opportunities that we have that people can collaborate with us in HobbyScool. The other thing that we're doing this year, which we didn't do last year, which, quite frankly, If I had known that that particular summit was gonna be such a big hit, I probably would have done something. But last year, we launched a summit where people can take their hobbies and turn it into a money making business. So we're doing the same thing in January of this year. We're calling it the monetize your craft summit, but we're also launching a membership program following the summit that's really focused on helping people who have these hobbies and they wanna turn these passions into a profitable venture. So I will definitely keep you updated on this launch and let you know how the launch of this membership goes, but that's another thing that we're doing differently this year. Now moving on to HelloContent.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:07:29]:
As you may or may not know, HelloContent is our Shopify store is tied in with my personal brand, the DestiniCopp.com brand, but it's called HelloContent. So it's HelloContent.shop. And, basically, what we have there, we have a ton of digital products that people can use in their online business. Now some of the products there, they can use as a lead magnet, or they can use as part of an online course or a membership, or they can just to use it in the marketing of their business. So we have social media files. We have email swipe files. So there's a lot of things that they we have there that they can use just to mark market, you know, their business. So what I have learned there is while I can email out to my email list about flash sales and promotions for the HelloConten store.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:08:21]:
You know, I run the risk of basically burning my email list out. Right? So what we're gonna do for HelloContent, we're gonna put a lot of focus in 2024 on blogging, SEO in Pinterest with the goal of really building that up to drive organic traffic organic search traffic to the HelloContent shop. So I'm really trying to diversify the traffic resources there, Traffic sources there, I don't wanna focus solely on email promotion. The other thing I'm gonna do with HelloContent is explore the potential of really building out the affiliate program for that store. We've started it, but we haven't put a lot of emphasis there. So that's another thing that, I want to do there. Now what I'm really excited about, and I cannot wait to tell you about this, is everything that we're doing in my personal brand. So the one of the things that we're doing is rebranding the podcast.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:09:24]:
So I'm gonna put a major focus on this podcast in 2024. So we're rebranding it from course creators MBA podcast to the creators MBA podcast. I really feel like that's a title that flex our audience and the people who are listening to this. Right? You guys are creators, whether you're, you know, you're creating digital products, maybe online courses, Memberships, you know, maybe low cost digital products, you are creators. So we're gonna continue to dive in, and really go deep into topics like boosting digital product revenue, mastering these automated funnels. As you know and you, I told you about we built a lot of automated funnels this year and also focusing on, building out savvy ecommerce strategies. So that's another area that we have folk, basically experienced in with our HelloContent store and our HobbyScool store, the 2 Shopify stores that we we have. We're gonna go dive deep into those ecommerce strategies.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:10:30]:
Now the other thing that I'm doing in my personal brand, I'm gonna put a ton of focus in email marketing. So with the podcast and with email marketing, I've already hired 2 different coaches to help us with that. So I've hired a a coach to help me with my podcast strategy, and I've also hired a coach to help me with my email marketing. The other thing we're doing is we're updating all of our courses. So we've already updated the course in a box program. It is updated with all the latest and greatest strategies. We're upgrading our evergreen funnel, and then we're launching a new course called the funnel cure that's gonna be focused on those tripwire type funnels and really go into details on those because I truly believe that every online business owner out there, You you have a lead magnet. I want you to have a tripwire funnel on the back end of that so you can gain those automated instant customers there.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:11:30]:
Now the other thing that I'm gonna place a major focus on in 2024 is our digital product accelerator program. So this is my personalized coaching 1 on 1 service. You get unlimited 1 on 1 coaching with it, weekly marketing audience, and I tailor all of the coaching to your own personal unique needs. Okay? So that's another thing that we're gonna be focusing on majorly in twenty 24. Now we do have some collaboration opportunities, in 2024 with my personal brand. If you recall last year, we did a lot of online learning virtual summits. Now we're not gonna be doing those this year. Did they work? Yes.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:12:13]:
They worked, but I felt like the bundle, that we ran last year was more in line with what I was looking for from these events. And what I'm looking for from these events is basically lead generation and collaboration opportunities. So we're gonna do 3 free bundles this year. We're gonna do 1 related to sales funnels, so automated sales funnels. We're gonna be doing 1 related to digital products, and we're gonna continue to do the one that we did last October that's related to business planning because it was a huge, huge hit. So that's our road map for 2024. I kinda walked you through what worked for us, kinda where we struggled. But I would really love to hear from you.
Dr. Destini Copp [00:12:57]:
What worked for you in 2023? What didn't work for you in 2023? And what are your goals for 2020 for you can reach out to me on Instagram, LinkedIn, I'd or just send me an email. I would love to know. And if you have any questions on what worked for me or what didn't work for me, I'm more than happy to go into more specifics. Just let me know. I'll be more than happy to answer any questions that you have, and bye for now.