89: Tracie Shroyer: Traveling the U.S. From Her RV Office
Tracie Shroyer: Launch Tech Specialist, Online Course Creator, Entrepreneur and Coach
Today my special guest is Tracie Shroyer. Tracie is a launch tech specialist for course, and membership creators, and she helps online entrepreneurs get past their tech blocks and launch their online courses, memberships, or other business projects. She helps people set up their businesses back end, connect all the dots and make a plan for their online course launch, all while living and traveling the US in an RV.
Episode Highlights
How an in-person event created a new business opportunity, all because people were seeking her out for her tech skills
Her online course, The Launch Tech Blueprint, walks people through the step-by-step process to activate their campaign launch
Why building an email list is the most important part of building a successful online course business
Tune into this episode as Tracie shares the exciting news of her One-Stop Launch Shop. Also, find out about her many offerings such as the resources tech roadmap, launch checklist, launch planner and more!
Mentioned In This Episode
Transcript:
Speaker 1 (00:01):
And today my special guest is Tracie Shroyer. Tracie is a launch tech specialist for course, and membership creators, and she helps online entrepreneurs get past their tech blocks and launch their online courses, memberships, or other business projects. She helps people set up their businesses back end, connect all the dots and make a plan for their online course launch, all while living and traveling the US in an RV. And Tracy, thank you so much for joining me. I'm super excited to jump into our discussion here today and learn more about your entrepreneur journey.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Thank you for having me. I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
So why don't you take a few minutes to kind of walk everybody through how you got started into online entrepreneurship?
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Well, when I first started, I didn't think that I was getting into online entrepreneurship so much. I am a proud family of entrepreneurs, and so I kind of knew I wanted to do something for myself, but entrepreneurship seemed like this big word with a lot that was involved. And I was just a mom staying at home with my kids and I needed a job that I could do from home. And this was in the late two thousands. So it was quite awhile ago, and I found this profession called virtual assistant and no one knew what a virtual assistant was back then. I had to explain it to everybody. I couldn't call it a VA because people thought that was the veterans of affairs. And so I learned how to set up things online for my clients. And it was sort of a learning process for several years.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
And while I was going through that process, we were also raising our kids and with our kids, we got really into, we got really interested in teaching them about money. And so we, a lot of people were watching what we were doing and they said, Oh my goodness, can you teach me how to teach kids about or to teach my own kids about money? And so we thought, you know, this is getting to be a lot of work. Maybe we should have a course. And so I started trying to put together pieces for a course. Now this was probably 2013, 2014. That was a really hard thing to do back then. The technology just was not there. I mean, I could do some of the pieces, but there were, there were a lot of pieces missing. And so we had to bootstrap and figure out on our own how to set up all of the different things we needed to do this course on kids and money.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
And as part of that process, I joined a pretty high end mastermind group on like, you know, setting up a business online and all of the pieces and doing launches specifically because now I had recorded a course and I wanted to release it to the world. And so I went out and joined this mastermind group on how to launch and I was in the group and it was not cheap. It was, you know, it was over a thousand dollars a month. I think we were paying and I had no money coming in at the time. And so it was a, it was a stretch, and the point of that is everybody that was in the group with me, was paying the same amount of money. And we got to our first in-person event and it was a very small event and, but maybe 50, 60 people.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
And I sat there the first day and realized that people did not know the basics of having an online business. They didn't understand why they needed an email list or how to set one up, why they couldn't just use their Gmail account. They didn't understand what a landing page was or a freebie. They didn't understand the terminology. And the thing that was killing me was we were six months into a year long membership that we were paying so much money for. And they didn't even know how to use the basic components of this mastermind membership group that we were in. They didn't for six months, they'd been paying all this money and been taking in the content. I had no idea how to implement it, but they thought they were the only ones, so they didn't want to ask the questions. So, as I was sitting in sitting at a round table at this event during our first break, I realized that the people around me had no idea.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
And I did as a virtual assistant, I had the background in how to do these things. And as somebody who had set up a course already, and so we went around the table and, and people were like, man, I, I feel so stupid. I don't even know what a landing page is. Or yeah, you think that sounds dumb. I don't know why I need an email list. And so I gradually started answering the questions just at my table. And by the time we got to lunch that first day, I had people waiting to talk to me because I was sort of the missing piece that everybody had been afraid to admit they didn't understand how to do. And throughout the course of the event, the person running the event was reviewing all of our, all the launches we had done. And he said, you know what?
Speaker 2 (04:51):
I hate to tell you this, Tracy, your Kids and Money Product, probably isn't going to work. And I only know that because I've tried to launch a kids and money product myself, and there's not enough pain. And there were a variety of reasons it wasn't going to work. But at that point I had so many people that wanted to hire me to set up their launches for them, but I had no problem letting go of the kids and money course that I had struggled with. And I switched gears and moved into helping people set up their tech. So that's kind of how the story started. And that was in 2016. And that's what I've been doing ever since. And I think the tech piece is unusual in that a lot of people are afraid to admit they don't know tech, and they're still convinced that they can never understand the tech. I'm not techie is what I hear a lot that they give up before they've even gotten started because they don't realize it's a skill that really anybody can learn.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
I love what I love a lot of the stuff that you said there, when you were going through it, I'm like, Oh, I want to ask her this and I want to ask her this. So I'm trying to figure out where do I start? I find it fascinating that you are at this mastermind in this high-end mastermind group where you're paying a thousand dollars a month. And that was back in
Speaker 2 (06:09):
2015. I,
Speaker 1 (06:11):
My goodness, and these, you know, the people in the mastermind group didn't know kind of the basics of an online business that, that just fascinates me, but I'm not going to go there. So in terms of the comment that was made about your kids and money product I also find it fascinating that somebody told you that that wouldn't work. Cause I know there's products out there. I know they even like Dave Ramsey has products related to this particular topic and I know because I've purchased them. So I think it's also fascinating that somebody told you that, or kind of gave you, gave you that guidance. So when you were at this event and you were talking to these people and you, you knew, Oh, I have a, there's definitely a market here and a market need for my services. Where did you take your business from there?
Speaker 2 (07:04):
Well, let me step back one second and say, I think in today's online world, absolutely. There's a spot for kids andmoney products back then, there wasn't people were not as savvy about being online. And parents in general were not looking to the internet as much to buy a course and learn online. That was where my problem was is that it was just the wrong time. I, I completely think I know that those programs are working today, but I was just a little early to the game and, and the, and the area that I was trying to do it in. So if you are trying to do a kids and money, product or financial literacy credit for kids, you know, don't, don't take what I said to heart, because I think that's that climate has completely changed. So I do want to say that I don't want to crush anybody's dreams or anything. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
I completely understand your point and where you're coming from there.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
Yup. Yup. So from there, I think what happened was I started, you know, I, I'm the kind of person, I'm an action taker, right. And so I, and I'm scrappy. And so one of the things that I knew really easily, how to do was to set up an opt-in page and, and I had lead pages at the time. And so at that actual event so I was told on Wednesday that maybe I should come up with a new idea. It was a five day event two days were the mastermind and then three days were this giant public event with a thousand people. And so on Wednesday morning, I think, or Wednesday afternoon, very first day I was told, you know, you know, very gently, very kindly and with great love. I just don't see how this is, how this is gonna work. I started thinking about all the people who were names I was writing down that wanted my help on their own launches and that, wow I gotta start collecting these?
Speaker 2 (08:48):
So I put together an opt-in form that they could, like, I could send them the link and they could give me their name that way. And that way I was, you know, complying with sending them email and things. And in order to do that, I put together like this little landing page. And then I thought, you know, this hotel has a business center. I'm gonna pop together some business cards. So by Thursday afternoon I had a landing page and I had business cards and I had a domain. And by the time the, the public events started on Friday, I had a following. I had people every break. It was funny because I, I never got to go to the bathroom the entire time that I was at the event, unless I missed a session because the minute the speaker would stop speaking word had spread.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
And I would get a lineup of people who needed help with this. And like I said, this was, you know, this was years ago when it, wasn't easy to set these things up. It is a lot easier now. And so if you're thinking, well, this is super easy. Now I understand why people were having trouble. We didn't have the ways to connect things or the options for the different services that we have now. And so by the end of the event, I had like a legitimate business with a URL and my husband was home with our kids. And so I was calling him and saying, can you look into buying this domain? Can you look in, you know, can you set this up for me? Can you set that up for me? And I'd go into a session. And so that was how that was how it was started. And I've kind of really never looked back. I mean, I've tweaked what I've done, but the general need for people to get help with those first few pieces in their business has not changed. And so it's been a valuable business for me for, you know, five years.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
So I know now you're part of a bigger group. Tell us a little bit about that group and how you found your counterparts and just describe it a little bit for folks, cause you and I were talking beforehand, so I know a little bit about it.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Yes. So once I, you know, when you're a part of a mastermind group like that, and the group, the mastermind itself had a hundred people in it, but there were probably 50 to 60 at that event, word spreads pretty quickly like, Oh, you need to reach out to this person. I, so I joined a lot of groups. I am part of a lot of the, like I follow Amy Porterfield and Jeff Walker and Stu McLaren. And I'm really active in those Facebook groups. And when you become active in a Facebook group and you focus on giving to people and helping people without any strings attached, people start to find you. And so I have a very strong social media presence in the groups that I'm in and word starts to spread. I've also in like some podcast collaborative groups where we help each other out.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
And it's, again, you, once a month, we get on a call with each other and it's not about, I want to be on your podcast. It's more, Oh, I know somebody that you should interview for your podcast. I have a pretty good memory for people and what they do. And I can't always remember which group I found them in. Sometimes I have to do some detective work, but at this point having been in these groups for as long as I have, and I love to go to a live in-person networking groups, which is really funny, cause I'm a complete introvert. I have to like really psych myself up to get there and get myself out there. But then I love them once I'm there. I'm very good at connecting people. And so I have become the person that people are like, you know, I don't know someone, but I bet Tracie does.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
And so, and there's no, there's nothing that I do that is monetary monetized around that. It's just that I kind of, I like people and I like knowing what people do. I'm very interested in people. And so that's kind of how I've built my business. If Facebook were to go away tomorrow, I would probably have a little bit of a problem. And so I've really, I really work on trying to get out of that realm, but with COVID and not doing live events right now, it's, it's a tough thing to do. So I'm always looking for new ways to, you know, broaden those networking experiences. But that's pretty much how I've, I've built my community.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
So tell us a little bit about how you moved in the online courses, why you actually decided to create some of your own instead of helping others with, with their portfolio. Tell, walk us through that process.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
So the reason I created a course called The Launch Tech Blueprint and what it does is it walks people step by step through. This is how you set up a funnel. This is your, like, if you're going, let's say active campaign. That's my all-time favorite. If you're going to set up active campaign and you need to build a list, you don't need to know how to do 30 things. You need to know how to do four these are the four things you need to know how to do, and this is how you set them up. And I show you step-by-step. And then I moved to lead pages. I don't offer all the, all of the platforms. I don't offer all of the steps to do a full online launch. I focus on what you need to do to get started because what I truly truly believe is that list building is where you need to start no matter what your online business is, because if you don't have an email list, it doesn't matter how big your social media following is.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
It doesn't matter. You know, how many hits you're getting on your website. And, honestly, I could go on about websites forever because so many people spend so much time and money on a website that very few people will ever see. But any of those things can come after your starting to build your email list because building an email list well takes time. And while that's happening, then you can go back and work on the social media. You can go back and work on the website, if that's what you want to do, or you can start working on your course. And, and the other part of that is I'm a huge, huge proponent of doing beta course launches, or they're also called seed launches. If you're in the Jeff Walker world and creating the course as you go, because I know from experience, I've created many courses around the kids and money products that did not sell and I've put hours and hours and hours and hours into those courses and then nobody wanted to buy them. So that was the first part of your question. And then I lost the second part.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
Well, I was just, I was curious as to why you moved into building an online course, did you?
Speaker 2 (15:08):
Yeah, Okay. Because, so, so I was getting a lot of people that just wanted those same steps, wanted me to help them set up those same steps over and over and over again. And I was actually doing it in workshops, like online workshops, I get, you know, four or five people on a workshop and we do it together. And that just did not work well because when you had a few people together, like one person got it immediately. And another person was like, I can't find the button to click, my computer's too slow or whatever. So I just put together a really quick course so that anybody can take it. It's, it's super inexpensive because in my heart, I remember in 2012, when I was putting together my first landing page and my email and trying to hook it all up, like I so clearly remember this, it could have happened yesterday.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
My kids were little and my husband said, okay, I know you aren't getting stuff done during the day, working with the kids. So I'm going to take them on Saturday and I'm going to give you a full eight hours and you can just do your business and get done what you needed to do, what you need to do. And I, I did, I was so excited. Like I had my special coffee. I was like, ready to go. And I worked super hard all day and I set up my landing page on lead pages and it was beautiful and I loved it. And I clicked the button to test it and literally nothing happened. Like I, you couldn't have even tell, I didn't even know. Did the button work, did I click the button? Did I not click the button? Nothing happened. And I was like, what the heck? This is eight hours of my life.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
Nothing happened. And, and I realized now, well, yeah, you gotta connect it to an email list. Like, what did I expect was going to happen? Like, that's second nature to me now. I was so non-techie back then. I didn't even realize it was more than one step to the process. I just thought it was magic. Like, I'm just going to set this up and click the button. And I'm magically going to like start collecting emails. And I realized now that that doesn't work, but I have a real heart for the people who don't know that, that isn't going to work and who don't have a ton of money to pour into this because they just need to get started so they can get to the point where they can start making money. And so that's where my heart is, and that's why I started offering this course for it's $47.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
It's just super, it's just enough to, and part of the reason I don't give it away is because when you give stuff away, people don't actually do it. And so I want you to have some skin in the game. I want you to take the course and learn the steps and implement them yourselves. And when you're done, you have this funnel, but I don't need to make a ton of money on this because I want you to succeed. I truly am a passionate believer in the idea that every person out there has something that they can offer. And I want them to not have tech get in the way of that. And for people who do, I'm getting, I'm just getting so passionate. I'm running out of like moisture in my mouth for the people who do say I am not techie, there is nothing less intuitive than learning how to ride a bike.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
You have to balance, you have to pedal, you have to steer, you have to like understand what's going on around you. And yet most people have learned to ride a bike or there's other examples. I'm sure I could come up with. And once you understand the steps, it's second nature. Like you don't forget how to do the steps. And once you learn that, yeah, there, it's weird. It's like, why would we ever learn to do all these three things at the same time? But once you learn them, you're like, Oh, total, like I've got this. And, and that is truly how I feel about the basic pieces of tech. Certainly there are things out there I don't even do in the tech world. But if you learn those basic pieces of setting up your email funnel and your lead gen funnel, then the rest is just repeating those same steps over and over and over again, until you get to the point where you're really wanting to level up. And by then, you're bringing in the money to help bring on the team or the experts to help you.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
So, Tracie, let me ask you this, you've done a great job in building your business via networking events, figuring out a need in the marketplace. You've been networking too in Facebook groups, but even you said that if Facebook went away, you know, that'd be trouble. And obviously the events with the last year with COVID have definitely stopped or slowed down. What do you see as next steps for your business, for the remainder of the year?
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Well, and interestingly enough COVID actually has made me busier than ever, because so many people have decided that they want to go online. But in terms of next steps for my business, what I've realized is that, yeah, there are people now in my realm who do want to go to the next level, they have their list. They've, you know, spent time figuring out what their audience wants. And that's usually the biggest. Once you get past the tech, the biggest hurdle is really finding out what your audience wants. If you already know what your audience wants, the tech was pretty, pretty minor. And you got you almost for sure, going to have a viable business, if you can give them what they need. And in my realm what people really want is okay, Tracie, I've been with you for awhile now I've got my funnel set up.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
My list is built. Now I want to take it to the next level. I know you, I trust you. I want you to do it for me. And so my, my course, even though the goal of it was to just get as many people as I could with their businesses set up online and do it in such a way that I wasn't having to do it over and over and over again for people. Once that happened, that, you know, it brought in a little bit of income, but what it really did is it increased my know like, and trust factor, which is huge in the online business space. That wasn't my intent, but in a way it's sort of become a kind of a gen. So I'm actually using that course, not only to help people, but also to start to build rapport with them.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
And the reality is the people who go through the course, they then have access to me. And so I have a tendency to like say, Oh, I'm all tough guy in my sales page. Like, okay, this is a DIY course, you're on your own. If you want, one-on-one help, it's going to cost you more, but I'm not so great at like, somebody reaches out to me by email and says, Tracie I'm stuck, I'm not the one to say, okay. You know, pay up. I help them. And so now that they have viable businesses, I'm moving into the one-on-one complete launch done for you. And I just am starting, I'm super excited about the name. I just came up with a new name for it and I have the domain. So it's safe, I can say it on line, but it's called the One-Stop Launch Shop. And that's like a higher end thing that is for someone who has a business, that's going and they have maybe a team or a well, it's just to help them, but they need a team specifically just for the launch part of it. And so that's kind of where my next steps are, I'm getting more into the one-on-one work, but it's a little bit higher end and just kind of letting the course be a course for people who just need to get going.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Okay. So you're, you're adding this one-on-one to your portfolio. Have you put together pricing around it, or how far have you gotten with it.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
So with the one-stop shop, it's super, super customized. And it, you know, it can be from and I always hesitate, you know, like money is such a hard thing to talk about sometimes. And because my heart is with the beginner, this is hard for me, but these one, these online launch or these one-on-one lunch packages start at $12,000 and they are, you know, the graphic design, the landing page design, the, all the automations set up, an active campaign, you know, all of the pieces that you need to launch. The video, the, you know, the editing of the video, which right now we're doing on zoom and, and we're shooting the video on zoom. And so, you know, it's, it's such a different market for me, but it is so fun to be able to really be with a launch from the very beginning, through the very end and have, you really develop a relationship with somebody because, you know, no matter how well planned a launch is a launch is a launch. Like there is something it's sort of like running a marathon. Like you can practice, you can do all your test runs. You can have all of your food figured out. Who's gonna meet you here and run with you. But the day of the marathon, you know, it's tough and that happens with launches. And and so it's kind of an adrenaline fun thing, but I really get to go deep with people. And I love that about it.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
So I, you know, I love how you kind of started in kind of doing the one-on-one work. You also have, the, you know, your course, and now you have this higher level type service that you're going to be offering. So I wish you the best in that. I love how your business has kind of transitioned over the years from where you got started as a stay at home mom. My closing question for you, you've been doing this since around, you know, 2010 or late, late two thousands. What advice do you have for other online course creators or entrepreneurs out there?
Speaker 2 (24:10):
My biggest advice is to really don't pay attention to the voices in your head that are telling you, you can't do it. You know, whether it's the tech or whether it's you think, well, I've got this idea, but I don't know how I'm going to make it work, or, you know, find, find a community there's so many even free Facebook groups out there where you can start, you can bounce ideas off of other people. You can talk with like-minded people don't, unless you're from an entrepreneurial family. And I am my entire family. Like when I was growing up, no one worked for somebody else. I came from a family of entrepreneurs. So I have an advantage in that. But even so when I try to talk, my family is 100% convinced that I have some kind of scam going on because they don't understand how I can be making money on the computer.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
Like they just don't get it. Like in my family, it's you are, you know laying sod, you're a landscaper or you're a home builder or whatever. Those were the types of entrepreneurs I had. If you don't have any of that in your family, don't even like, go there and tell them your ideas, unless you think you're going to get support because likely you are not. Find other places to get the support that you want. There are so many great communities out there where people will just out of the goodness of their heart and for networking, but also just because they're, they need, we need people. We need to share ideas and bounce ideas off of each other. There's so many great places to reach out and get to learn about others and have others help you. And so I think that the biggest mistake, the thing that I see the most is my family says, it's not gonna work. My best friend says it's not going to work. They laugh at me because I don't even know how to change my email settings on Gmail. How could I ever have a business online? It's, this is Marie Forleo's word, this is not my word, but everything is "figure out-able." And I truly believe that. And, and in this day and age, if you can't find it on a Google search, you can probably find it in a group. You can find the answers that you need. And so don't listen to the naysayers
Speaker 1 (26:19):
And I think that's some great advice. Tracie, can you let people know where they can find you? And I believe you also have some free resources for folks.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
I do. So my website is launchtechmade easy.com. Another little pro tip, next time, when you would think of your business name and the URL, think about how many times you're going to have to give that URL out.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
We'll make sure the link is in the show notes so people will know exactly where to find you.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
There is something to be said for it explaining exactly what you do, but when it's that long, it gets to be kind of a lot. It's launchtechmadeeasy.com. And then I have, I put together a resources page for your listeners specifically, and it has three different things on it. There's a launch, launch roadmap. It's all the things you need to know to launch roadmap, all the things you need to know to grow your list. It's a tech roadmap. And so it tells you, okay, you need an email service, you need, this is how it kind of maps out. And this is how these things connect. So that's called the tech roadmap. And then I also have it more in the launching framework, I have a launch checklist, which is just a super quick, like little checklist of the things you need to do. And then I have a super comprehensive launch planner, which is 27 pages long. It's a place to put URLs and to kind of track all of the launch tasks that you're managing. So all of those are available on our website at launchtechmadeeasy.com/mba.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
And thank you, Tracie. And like I said, I will make sure all of those links are in the show notes. And thanks so much for sharing your story. I loved hearing about it, how you are a stay at home mom and how your business has transitioned over the years to where you are today with launch, you know, with launching this new service, this new high-end service that you're doing. So thanks so much for sharing with us.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Oh, thank you. I had so much fun. I get pretty passionate about this and, and, you know, I gave you the resources page. There are a lot of articles on my blog as well, that can help people that are just starting out on setting up a lot of the steps too. So search around a little bit and, and I have a search bar on there. One of the keys to being good at, at an online business is knowing how to search for the topics you're looking for. So if you do a little search, you'll probably find some other articles on there to help you on some of the topics I touched on today, but couldnt go into in-depth and I, and, and if you have a question, reach out to me because I love helping people, particularly people who are struggling as they're first starting out.
Speaker 1 (28:47):
Thank you, Tracie.