Correctly categorizing your products and services.
Is what we're going to talk about today and I'll give you a
little story, a little anecdote.
Of what I recently had done to.
Re sort of categorize.
My Mindshare pro, which was, I think previously I'd kinda
considered it an advanced community.
Uh, membership.
And it included some content and some ongoing training.
And really what I realized was that the crux of the value was number
one was all the templates and.
Resources that I offer my kind of system, my suite of tools and
templates that I, that I offer.
For advisors particularly, but also freelancers and agencies
are getting use out of it.
And I think so there was sort of this one-time upfront value that mind share
pro members would get in the form of all these templates and resources.
There was some light ongoing training, and then there was a group coaching component
to it where you could ask questions either we would do in the beginning.
It was a, you would submit a question.
I would answer it either in the community or whatever.
And then it became, you could book a call with me 15 minutes,
which often turned into 30.
And now I'm kind of evolving it slightly.
So.
The point I'm making is that by labeling Mindshare pro as kind
of a, I mean, by categorizing it advertently or inadvertently, I.
I ultimately.
Basically kind of, it's kind of confused the value a little bit.
So the real true value is access is a sounding board access to me
for advice, feedback, and guidance on whatever your situation is.
So if you need that, At $99 a month, which is where it started out, where
it's, where it is now currently.
It's a no, it's just a no-brainer option.
It comes with I'm in slack and you can ask me questions and it makes
it easier to kind of communicate and get feedback on things.
So for people that are kind of stuck.
And don't mind asking questions and interacting in fact would benefit
would prefer to meet up with people.
In real life in real real time, we do this once a month with
the free Mindshare community.
We have about eight to 10 people that show up.
And we just talk about a specific topic, whether it's marketing.
Methodology.
Our business models, et cetera.
And if you're, by the way, you're not registered for that.
And you're in the community.
Uh, registered for that.
If you want to register for that.
And you're not in the community, email me, Kevin and kevin.me, and
I'll add you to the community and you can get access to those meetups.
But anyway, so we basically.
You know, we're adding some of those kinds of.
You know, conversational style group coaching, where we can ask questions,
talk on a topic, learn a few things, share ideas, give each other feedback.
And then, and then that's it.
So that's the current format because the group is fairly small.
And.
So I think just the sort of takeaway that I want to share with you is that
when you have a $99 membership, you know, I had someone telling me who
joined that they, they pay, I think 2 50, 3 50 for an annual subscription
to an association that they belong to.
And.
There are other kind of, you know, groups or memberships that they belong
to that are in that two to $500 per year.
Category.
Which makes sense for a membership.
And one day I might go back and do more ongoing training and maybe price it.
You know, lower.
As a membership because it's not about coaching.
It's about content.
And Bo connection and about the other intangible benefits of, of memberships.
But I think that's kind of core to what a membership is.
It's usually around content.
Maybe there's some light coaching involved, but typically it's a content
driven thing and it is designed to help you achieve a goal of some kind.
And there's often a community component to it as well.
So we've got a community as a category that that is free currently
and that's mind share.community and you can sign up and join for free.
If you're a marketing freelancer consultant.
Then you have the, uh, So no longer exists.
I knock out call it group coaching.
That's group coaching and it's $99 a month.
I can imagine that going higher, but I'm just going to keep it there and see
how it goes to get a few people in the door and, and work on that a little bit.
Now for $99 for a coaching offer, that is a significantly.
Different value propositions.
So now, now it's no longer an expensive membership.
It is an very inexpensive form of coaching.
So for people who are looking for a sounding board for looking for.
You know, T to get outside perspective on their situation.
Usually the ideal people in this situation are either plateaued or they're just
getting started and want some kind of light kind of feedback and, and guidance,
and just sort of perspective on their situation because it's really, we all need
this, in my opinion, it's really hard to see what the situation from, with inside.
Your own business.
You know, the, read the label within the bottle.
So that's why group coaching is valuable.
And so it's basically an over enterprise and then it includes
access to me and others.
And then there's a slack component and, and all the templates and
resources that, that come with, they used to come with Mindshare pro.
So it's sort of a repositioning into a group coaching versus a
membership model with a $99 price tag.
So instead of it being a really expensive membership and they say
really expensive with air quotes.
It's it's a, it's now a, the community is free, which is, should
be tremendous value, uh, in terms of the content and hopefully the
connections that you make and there's plans to make that even more robust.
And then you have the coaching, the group coaching, and then a step above that
is, is my one-to-one private coaching.
Now I had a mastermind program before and we ran one of those and it was great
problem with the mastermind is that unless there's a new cohort ready to sign up,
you then have this problem of, well, you know, people are on waiting lists,
waiting to sign up, or one more, two people get in the group and then there's.
Not enough.
Uh, To justify the price relative to the work.
And also the experience is not enough to justify a new group.
So it becomes very difficult to roll out without a big audience.
And I don't have a massive audience.
So, um, so essentially now we have an expensive one-to-one coaching offer.
We have a inexpensive group coaching offer of no brainer pricing on that one.
And then you have a free, a free thing altogether.
Now because some people would still, I can tell because a few people signed
up, got the dial, you know, got all the templates and then left within a couple
months after signing up for Mindshare pro.
And then having spoken to them, the content, the resources, the
templates and stuff were valuable.
And many of them are using them.
And some people it's mind blowing and some people, they they're able
to see things in different way.
Great.
Now I'm going to sell that as a product.
So you've got now knowledge products, and I don't know what I'm going to call it.
Maybe Mindshare toolkit or Mindshow system.
I'm sure.
Operating says, I don't know, but.
That's going to be sold as a product as a one-time purchase.
So you'll have all those templates and maybe, maybe
there'll be different versions.
So you buy at the current version and then version 2.0, will be something else.
Maybe you can upgrade, maybe you get access to it.
For free for a year.
I don't know.
There'll be some, some model with that, but that's a knowledge product.
That's a product and you purchase that.
It's a one-time thing.
So that way we're unpacking.
You know, those that need that, just the templates.
Uh, that's a categorically, that's an, a knowledge product that's
templates and training and resources.
Then you have categorically a membership, which is content and
community, or, sorry, I guess.
Yeah.
Membership it's free.
It's content, the community.
And then you have a group coaching.
Kind of program and that's where I'll be teaching stuff.
And also we'll be doing the interaction in real and real time and online with slack.
Uh, and then you have the one-to-one.
So what that does is it allows each category to be independently
viewed and not compared to.
Other similar kinds of companies or, or offers.
Within, uh, within the incorrect category.
Because what it does is it focuses the value in the wrong place.
So for a hundred bucks a month, once you've gotten the initial
content, it's not worth it.
Just to sign up for light.
Uh, additional training and content.
Uh, unless you, unless you get the coaching.
So just the content alone to me, wasn't, wasn't quite worth it.
And frankly, Now that I look at it in retrospect, I was looking at the
coaching as the true value, but if it's positioned as a membership,
then people see the content as the true value and, and, and what not.
So.
Uh, so, you know, so this is kind of how I'm just sort of viewing the world
and this can be applied in other ways.
So I don't want to just make this about me.
I just, I'm just wanting to share this as a thought process because because
many of us are in a similar situation.
And it can become very easy to blend.
You know, how much content do you include with your membership
or your coaching and whatever.
But I think if you break them into the discrete parts, the
content coaching, the membership.
Uh, and group coaching, whatever, then you can decide to access them together.
So maybe members of my private coaching get also access to the group, the group
stuff, as well as the, the, the, the product, the knowledge product, or end,
or the free membership to the community.
So maybe they get all that rolled into it as part of value
adds with their membership.
Uh, but those are options.
So you can kind of deconstruct it or bring it back together.
The alternative to this of course, is that you can just have everything
rolled into one big coaching program with a bunch of content.
And there's other styles of say group coaching or even
one-on-one coaching where.
It's much more premium.
Maybe it's cohort-based maybe it's fixed length.
Maybe it's ongoing.
Maybe it's training, maybe it's advisory kind of stuff.
Uh, Maybe it's one-to-one group.
There's lots of things you can assist.
Some people we'll package that into one main, big service and
charge a lot of money for it.
And that's another totally fine way to do it.
But at least you kind of know what category things are in, whether
it's, you know, a coaching.
Like a premium coaching service.
Or one of the other things that I just described.
Now, this can apply in a few different ways.
So, you know, in a lot of ways, every single service model or
product that you offer is its own little unique kind of business.
So yes, there is kind of an ascending ladder.
If you will, a product or service ladder where people can choose,
well, how much engagement do I want and how much do I want to pay?
And then there's value at all levels of the chain.
That's one way to look at it.
Uh, another way to look at it is, so let's say you were a web developer and so on
the one end, you've got a website support retainer, and maybe, or maybe you've
got hourly work, which ad hoc hourly.
And it's not the best way to run it, but maybe have some sort of hourly
rate for just independent tasks.
Maybe you've got a maintenance plan.
So you update and maintain the website.
Maybe you've got a support plans that you, and that includes maybe the
maintenance plan and some number of hours.
And that's your support plan?
And then maybe you've got like an advisory plan.
That's part of the support.
So you can be on.
Available to answer questions and stuff.
And maybe that gets packaged in as an add-on to one of your support plans.
But now you're basically seeing, okay, we've got maintenance.
We've got support.
We've got, we've got ad hoc hourly.
We, so that's just ad hoc.
Uh, we've then got, um, Access, you know, for.
For, you know, to discuss the project and to work on things.
And then you've got maybe productized websites and then
maybe you've got custom websites.
So there's a big range.
Now, any one of those could be independently viable as a business.
Some people have just maintenance businesses, somebody love maintenance
support and support businesses.
Some people have maintenance support and customer development, and some
people just do productize websites.
And so by knowing what category you're optimizing for and by pricing
it and delivering it according to the category of belongs to.
It allows you to be more competitive to be compared with the right things.
For people to see the value in what you're doing and not be
confused about where the value is.
So if I'm, if I'm buying.
A productized website.
I'm not expecting to be fully customed to my needs.
I'm expecting there to be some flexibility, but I'm expecting
the process to be efficient.
To be low cost.
And restrictive a little bit and constrained in terms of what
I'm able to do within, within the, the money that I spend.
Those are the trade-offs of a semi-custom.
Uh, productized website in that case.
However from buying a custom website.
I should expect it to cost more, take longer and be more suitable
to my exact specifications.
And then for cost more.
Uh, and if I'm looking for support, That's a whole different thing
altogether and different people buy support, that kind of stuff.
So I think it's really just important about how we categorize
things and therefore it tells not only the market, where to point
their, their value in their.
They're focused on where the value should come from, which is important.
And it allows you to position it against your peers and not things
in different categories because something is either a very expensive.
So-and-so or very inexpensive something else, depending on how you look at it.
And.
So as long as you have those clear delineations and allows you and
your, and your potential and current and prospective clients to know,
okay, here's where the value is.
I understand it.
I can compare what the right things and you, as the person who's running, it knows
how to design that product or service in alignment with the category of belongs to.
So it was group coaching.
That means it's not one-to-one coaching, which means the constraint is it
has to be done in a group setting.
If it's a private coaching, it's, it's private and therefore there's
going to be other demands and needs.
And it's going to be priced accordingly.
If it's custom.
Uh, you're also going to have a different process versus if
it's a productized service.
Oh, if it's support, you're going to have a whole other different workflow.
Uh, price point delivery model and maybe packaging of different
items, like access to you for conversations about their project.
And or maintenance and or reporting.
Putting all into one, one kind of support advisory retainer with some
number of hours, that's an option for you, but that's the sort of support
maintenance end of the spectrum.
So I think.
By having by understanding clearly where your categories are, it allows you to
create basically a, an infrastructure and a taxonomy with your services, your
products, and your intellectual property.
And that's just what I wanted to share with you today, because
if it's incorrectly categorized, people will get confused.
Relative to others in that category, you're going to look very expensive or
inexpensive, and that's not a good thing.
Necessarily, unless that's your strategy.
And it allows, it just allows people to better understand what genre is.
Seth Godin would say what category you belong to and therefore be
able to buy it with a little more certainty and a little more.
A little more, uh, care and understanding of where the value comes from.
So hope that helps.
It'll also help you to shape what you're doing.
So if you're kind of confused, if you're in the mushy middle between between
a product and a service and people, aren't going to get an understanding
where the value should come from.
It's maybe a positioning problem and maybe even a categorical positioning.
So I just wanted to share this idea with you and, uh, hope it helps.
And if you're interested in any of those affirmation products
and services, I'm always around.
Otherwise.
Uh, stay tuned.
I hope you join us for the monthly mind.
Share meetups.
Get in the community.
And if you're not kevin.me, Kevin, that kevin.me is my email.
And, uh, I'd be happy to let you in.
Thank you so much and i look forward to talking to you soon bye for now