Why Your Beautiful Brand is Costing You (And How to Fix It) with Nadine Hanafi

0:01 Welcome to The Coaching Equation brought to you by Empire Partners and hosted by Ryan Lang and Brooke Bishop. Our mission is to help you build a profitable and impactful coaching business by cutting through the noise and all the expert advice to deliver tried and true actionable insights that you can deploy in your business today. Each week, we bring on expert guests, unveil cutting-edge tactics and strategies, and share the secrets and stories that we've gathered from working with the most successful coaching companies on earth. Welcome back to the Coaching Equation Podcast.

0:41 I'm your host, Ryan Lang, CEO and co-founder of Empire Partners. And I've got a very special treat for you today. I've got my good friend and colleague, Nadine Hanafi, in studio in this episode. And if you've ever been curious... about why you should worry about your branding, how to get your branding right, and most importantly, what you need to do with your branding in order to actually stand out and attract your ideal clients and customers. This episode is a no-brainer. Nadine cuts through the noise with business-driven approach to branding. It's one of the things that I love about her. She's not just about the aesthetics. She wants conversion. It's not just about looking good.

1:23 It's truly about being seen. And at the end of the day, let's be real. It's about getting paid. As the creator of Digital Brand Kit, the world's first full-stack marketing execution system, she's redefining how coaches, consultants, and speakers build powerhouse brands that attract premium clients and drive real revenue. A seasoned branding expert, Nadine has worked with TED speakers, best-selling authors, and Fortune 500 companies like Disney, Verizon, and Hilton. After seeing too many entrepreneurs stuck in branding limbo, she launched DBK in 2019 to dismantle the outdated, overcomplicated branding process and help business owners execute their brand with confidence fast.

2:10 Nadine's work has been featured in Fast Company, HuffPost, Entrepreneur, Time, Inc., TED, and the Harvard Business Review. She's been recognized as a top 100 US entrepreneur under 35 by the United Nations and one of the 100 most powerful Arabs under 40 by Arabian Business Magazine. This is an episode that I've been waiting for for a really long time. So I don't want to waste any more time. Let's dive in. It's Nadine Hanafi right here on the Coaching Equation podcast. Welcome back to the Coaching Equation Podcast. I'm your host, Ryan Lang, CEO and co-founder of Empire Partners and Brooke Bishop, not in studio. I've got an amazing guest with me today.

2:52 Nadine Hanafi. Kyle, how are you? Hi, I'm great, Ryan. How are you? I am stoked to be doing this. You know, this is, I feel like, long overdue for you and I. We've known each other for a while now, and I've been itching to get you on the show, and I'm super excited to dive in today and pick your brain on all kinds of things. I would love to kind of start with... What was it that... got you on the road to design, branding, you know, all of that kind of stuff? What, how did that happen?

3:33 Because I feel like I remember you initially telling me this story. Um, and it's been long enough now that I really want you to not just tell me again, but tell everybody else again, because I remember it being a really unique story. So what got you there in the first place? Yeah, so I'm self-taught. I did not go to graphic design school. I went to business school. But while in business school, I fell in love with a little tool called PowerPoint. And I just found so much joy in creating presentations for my classes and making them really artistic and fun and colorful. And so that was just my kind of hobby in college was just making beautiful presentations.

4:17 And then that hobby served me really well in my first job out of college when I worked in the marketing department of this company where I would make these presentations for myself. And then other departments were like, oh, can you help us make presentations? And so I just became known as the PowerPoint girl at this company. And what I loved about PowerPoint is that it allowed me to do beautiful design without knowing like Photoshop, right? Yeah. I tried to learn Photoshop, by the way. I went and took one of those courses on lynda.com at the time. And about five minutes into this Photoshop course, I zoned out and I was like, nope, not for me. This is not for me. Not doing this. So instead of learning Photoshop, I just went through the other courses on lynda.com and learned design.

5:02 just the basics of design and formalized my, my skill that was really just raw in design. Long story short, after, you know, getting really good at designing amazing presentations for this company, I felt called to go out on my own and do this, like build a business around this and create it for other, other businesses. And you know, Slow start, but eventually the big clients started rolling in. I got some really amazing exposure on Fast Company. And then I started landing clients like Disney and Verizon and Liberty Mutual. And yeah, I mean, Universal Studios, all these companies were, you know, hiring me to help them with their PowerPoint presentations.

5:44 And it's been, it was an amazing journey. That was 12 years ago now, dating myself. But that was really how I got into the design space. And then there's a story of how I then built my current business, my new business, which is Digital Branket, from that. I'm happy to share that story. Yeah. I want to hear that. Before we go there, I'm curious, and this is interesting to me, what was it, when you think about presentations specifically, what did you notice? Because I think a lot of people would be wondering this. What did you notice in terms of the difference of outcomes that you'd find between like some kind of thrown together, half-baked presentation, you know, by somebody who really didn't know what they were doing And somebody who had just an unbelievably gorgeous, buttoned up, really, you know, well done presentation.

6:38 Night and day. Like night and day. And not just for how your message is received, but how you actually are able to communicate your message when you're the one presenting. And I have this saying that I like to share, which is that branding doesn't just change how people see you. It changes how you see yourself. Ooh, I love that. Yes, it changes how you operate. It changes the energy with which you show up. And so what I've noticed is that the people that took the time to invest in creating better presentations delivered better presentations in terms of how they walk through the workflow of, you know, the ideas and how they shared things.

7:21 And that was the confidence that came with that, right? So in the delivery of the presentation, the design of the presentation made an impact. And as I like to say, it's like you're tangoing with your presentation, with your slides, right? For a lot of people, they use them as a crutch or that's the main character. No, you're the main character. They're your Robin, right? They're there to support you. And so when Robin is amazing, Batman is even more awesome, right? That's right. It's Batman and Robin. I'm not good. Yeah, you nailed it. But also how your message is received.

8:02 There's a lot of things that go into explaining why your message is received better. There's obviously the concept of reciprocity, right? Yeah, yeah. especially audiences that have to sit through a million other presentations at a conference or in a meeting or whatever. When you when they see that you invested time and effort into creating a amazing visual experience for them, And taking the mental load off of them to read through your bullet points and decipher your confusing side. When you take that mental load off of them, they pay you back with attention.

8:42 They pay you back in good faith. They pay you back... with just so much more responsiveness to what you have to share. And so that's really the mechanics of how I have found that better slide design helps you become a better presenter, more effective communicator, and just a much more popular person in the room. Yeah. I love the distinction between using it as a crutch and really using it as your true sidekick. Yeah, that's huge because I agree with you. I think most people really do use it as a crutch. And I also think too, when we think about marketing in general, I think that one of the things that we've got and branding for that matter is we've got to be clear that when somebody walks in the door, you know, the door that they're opening to walk into the house matches, so to speak, right?

9:39 Yes. So if... One thousand percent. One thousand percent. I love this in terms of the way that we are making certain that if we're selling a premium service, if we're selling anything that's a higher ticket program or service or item, having those really visually rich presentations that aren't super cluttered and really do appeal to people is so key. I love that. That's such a great distinction. When you got to the point where... You had done this for others.

10:20 One thing that I'd love to hear before we kind of get to DBK is what was it that kind of gave you the gumption in the first place to say, hey, I know I've been doing this at a high level, you know, in somebody else's company, but I really think I can do this on my own. What caused you to make the leap? Well, I wish I could say it was an honorable, you know, like call of duty and a higher mission. It was literally me having a boss who was an absolute bully and, you know, being very miserable at my job and realizing that, oh, my gosh, I never want anybody to make me feel this way again.

11:06 Yeah. And entrepreneurship was actually my, it was an escape route. It was my escape from just being in a bad place. And I didn't want to go get another job because I was afraid that what if this happens to me again? I was like, well, I mean, ever since I was a little girl, you know, I always kind of felt like, oh, I need to have my own business. You know, I started a little business out of my backyard when I was like eight years old. I was just a summer school for children. It was free, so I didn't make any money. But I got a lot of kids in my backyard all summer. My customers, the parents were very happy to have their children out of the house.

11:46 So it was a very successful business in that sense. But I just felt a calling to just go out on my own and do this. And so, but it was really inspired by just a deep desire to not be bullied and not be put in a situation where what was happening was that I was shining in my work. And it was actually... working against me. And I'm, you know, my emotional HQ or HQ at the time, I was not great. I was just, you know, not not one to play office politics. And so I realized, okay, well, I'm a bad employee, maybe I'll be a great entrepreneur. I love that.

12:27 And some, you know what, a lot of times I think that's how we're born as entrepreneurs is realizing like, man, I suck at working for people. Yeah. Maybe I ought to take notice. I'm the same way. I mean, I just, I feel like I'm being suffocated. Yeah. It just doesn't work for me at all. What was I'm curious, taking that lesson of, you know, now you many years later as a business owner, having been doing, you know, having done this for a while. How have you taken the lesson that you learned about the way that you felt and the way that your boss made you feel and and use that in your interactions with your team and other people as a leader?

13:08 Oh, my goodness. Yeah. Well, funny enough, that interaction is what held me back from building a team for a long time. Wow. Really? How so? Well, I didn't, I mean, hindsight is 20-20. I didn't realize it in this until later. But once I got to a point where I needed to build a team, that's when all these fears of not being a good leader started. started surfacing. And that's when I realized that I was kind of quietly, suddenly sabotaging myself and not letting myself build a team because I was afraid I was not going to be a good leader. And so I did not want to deal with the drama of having a team is what I was seeing because I'd being a part of a team, being in a dramatic situation.

13:57 Yeah, yeah. Bad situation. And so I had to shed a lot of that in order to really grow into, you know, the leadership role I've had to take with my team. Now, I, the way I run my team today is something I'm proud of. It's complete opposite of everything I've experienced before. I am very close to my team. I talk to them about everything. Life comes first before business. And I just love to have fun in my work. I'm not very business-y in the business. world.

14:38 And I love to give them creative freedom. I love to trust their instincts. And just, I try every day and I'm learning and I get better and I make mistakes just like everybody, but I try every day to just be the best leader that I can. And yeah, like definitely the fact that I did not have a good example of leadership in my past held me back from my becoming a leader, creating a team around myself, which also held me back in business for a long time. So that was definitely a hard learned lesson. I'd love to touch on that for just a sec. We got a lot of people that listen to the show. And I think that entrepreneurs in general, most of us wait too long to build teams, most of us.

15:24 And I'm curious for you, hindsight being 2020, what do you recognize looking back about how long you waited or the way that you built a team that you would do differently if you started a new business from scratch today? Oh my gosh. I would have, I would have hired my first team member way sooner. It was hiring. My first team member was the linchpin for all of the growth that I've experienced in the years that followed. Like it just, it's a game changer. It changes the dynamic of how you run your business. I'd only known, um, running a business as a solopreneur, right? And I could just be a freelancer and being a freelancer is easy.

16:07 You only have you to answer to, you don't have to talk to anybody. But there's also not a lot of growth that happens there, you know? Yeah. And if you're okay with that and you just want to keep taking freelance gigs, then that's fine. But if you're going for growth, which is what I wanted, you have to build a team. You need to surround yourself with people. You have to leverage your time better. You have to delegate the things that are keeping you busy, too busy, too busy to go and talk about your business and be out there. And so best decision I've ever made. And I wish I did it sooner. But, you know. um divine timing is i wish i had hired my first team member sooner now the flip side of that uh is you know not hiring too fast not hiring too many people and sure acing yourself and how you grow your team but definitely going for that first team member that is a game-changing moment in your business at least it's been for mine I would agree with that 100%.

17:08 And it's such a perfect way for us to kind of segue. So you go off and do this on your own. You're creating amazing designs on your own. And then you kind of reached a bit of a tipping point, turning point. Tell me about that and how we got to Digital Brand Kit. It's a little thing called burnout, Ryan. I don't know what you're talking about. Are you familiar with this? I am. No, it was really the realization that I built a golden cage for myself because my amazing skill in building these amazing PowerPoint presentations was a blessing and a curse.

17:50 It was a blessing because all these people wanted to work with me. It was a curse because I was the only one who could do it. And my first attempt was actually hiring people that I could train to make presentations like me. And that did not go so well because our clients could see right away, like, oh, that wasn't made by Nidhi, was it? They could tell when something was made by me versus somebody that I had trained. And so I had a hard time scaling. And really the impetus for Digital Brink, it was me working. just really trying to figure out how do I scale me? And my initial attempt at scaling me was an absolute failure was me trying to create a course, um, of how to make better presentations.

18:39 And so, uh, I went on this mission to create a course. I'm going to teach you how to make better PowerPoint presentations. And I went all in and created the course and launched it and then crickets, which was very hard for me because I, you know, I'd gotten very successful very quickly. Yeah. In my first business, we are visual. And so to not get a positive response to this new thing I was launching was just, just like gut, gut wrenching, just, you know, but after, um, you know, depressed, being depressed for a month or two and, and wondering what happened, um, my husband, who you know, Eunice, me, Hey, Nadine, did you ask people if they wanted a course?

19:24 Oh, yeah. And I was like, no, they need a course. I was very, I mean, I was a little bit hardheaded and I was like, they need it. And that was when I learned one of the biggest lessons and the biggest slice of humble pie I ever ate was food. You're not in the business of creating what you think people need. You're in the business of creating what people tell you they need. And so he said to me, well, why don't you survey, send an email, survey your audience and ask them, well, what do they need? And I sat on that for a while and it was hard. And I was like, okay, I'm going to do it. And so I sent out the survey and clever me. I was like, you know, what is the best way for me to support you with what I know and blah, blah, blah, et cetera.

20:09 And then I gave them this, you know, choices. Um, a, you know, me actually doing it for you. B, me teaching you how to do it. C, or it was something else. And then D, all the way at the bottom was templates because mind you back then I loathe templates and I would talk crap about templates all day long. Oh, templates are generic. You have to do custom. You have to be original. You have to be this. So I put templates at the bottom of the list. Survey results come back. Plot twist. Yeah. 78% of people said they wanted temple. No way. Wow. Wow. And I was like, oh, excuse me. What do you mean? But what was nice is a few people took the time, extra time to email me and tell me why they chose templates.

20:55 Yeah. They said, you know, that there was a way for them to be able to get access to my talents and my skills without the high price of what I was charging for client work. But also they're like, hey, give us a templates, but then teach us how to use them. How to use them. Yes, yes. I don't want to build from scratch. I want to build with a foundation and then just, you know, show me how to use it. So that I took that to the bank. I took it to the bank, right? And I was like, all right, well, if I'm going to do templates, I'm going to make the best damn templates that I've ever been made. Okay. I'm not going to make the templates that everyone's finding on Etsy and creative market and all these other places.

21:36 I'm going to make some really awesome templates. And that's how digital brand kit was born was me saying, how can I make the best templates ever? And it wasn't just from a design point of view because design is subjective. I wanted them to be beautiful, but I wanted them to be beautiful. super useful. And in that sense, I wanted them to be strategic. I wanted them to have copy in them because what I was seeing out there in the market was Laura Mipsum templates that have random text in them. But then when you're actually going in and putting your actual copy of what you're going to put in there, then it looks nothing like the template and you have to read it around and make it fit. Yeah. Yeah.

22:16 And also it doesn't tell you what should go on this page, what should go on that page, what to say here, what to say there. So I spent 18 months building this product suite of all these templates. And initially it started with just slides because that's what I knew really well. And then workbooks. And then I kept, you know, I kept listening to the market. I kept listening to my customers and what they were asking for. And I would seek them out and say, hey, what else do you need for your business? And they would tell me, I need podcast covers. I need social media graphics. I need this. I need email. And whatever they said they needed, I took note and built my product suite around that.

22:59 And that's the best thing I've ever done, Ryan, for my business is actually listen to what people want and build the product they ask for. You know, I love what you're saying here. Two things. Number one, similarly, like I've made plenty of mistakes in business where I was just like, no, I know what you need, you know, and crickets bomb. Yeah. Yeah. So you know what I'm doing. I do. And, and, you know, it's funny. Like I, I wish I, I, I don't know if you're familiar with, with Ryan Levesque and ask methods. So I like, I can't tell you how many times I've gone. Golly, why didn't I get ahold of that book way sooner?

23:42 It was one of my favorite books back then. And yeah, I learned a lot about asking. Yeah. Yeah. Would have changed everything. But, you know, one of the other things that I love that you're talking about, and I want to hammer this home for people that are listening right now, is, you know, I had an opportunity. I think it was, I think this was probably about... five or six years ago, I was at a conference. I think it might have been Funnel Hacking Live or something like that. And I listened to Kaylin Poulin talk, who's the founder of Lady Boss. And she kind of just talked about the fact that, well, you know, she started with...

24:26 you know, just online workouts for women because she didn't want to, she wasn't going to train anybody. She didn't want to be a personal trainer. She didn't want to be a coach. She just wanted to give an easier way to do it. Well, then people started asking, you know, kind of like they wanted some additional support. So she hires a coach and then, you know, they gave out a You know, once or twice they gave out some free swag and people freaked out about it and were asking for more. So they go and they start making clothes. Then they continue like serving their people. And that eventually gets into people don't know. Her clients don't know what kind of protein powder or protein bars to buy.

25:08 They go make protein bars and protein. That's right. And I think it's such a... What an elegant but simple system for building an unbelievably successful business to continually ask what people want and then find the best way to deliver it to them. Absolutely. But I do want to add a little caveat to that, which is that if you're going to do that, you need to also make sure that... you have a North star and you have boundaries around what it is that you're willing to expand into and where the red line is of like, well, I don't want to get into that business. So you, yes, let your customers inform your decisions of what you create for them, but also don't let yourself be pushed, you know, let the wind push you in any direction.

25:58 You have to make sure that How have you I'd love I'm sure everybody has a different answer to this, but how have you figured out how to answer that question for yourself? Like what's what's sort of the internal compass that tells Nadine like, yeah, I know they want this, but that ain't what I'm gonna do. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, it's a blend of a few things. One is I try to follow my instincts, my gut reaction to something, because I noticed that when I get a suggestion for something and it clicks in my head, I'm like, oh, yeah, that is a great idea. It works well. When I get a suggestion and I have a gut feeling that I shouldn't do it, but I still do it, it does not go well.

26:44 It's that simple. Sometimes it's the instinct, but it's also... I had to just become really clear with myself on what my bandwidth is and what is the business that I wanted to build. And so that I had a filter that I can put all these ideas through and test them like, okay, well, if I do this, what are going to be the repercussions on my lifestyle, on my time commitment in the business and everything? how many people I may need to hire in order to scale this. So I really think about how this is going to affect my energy personally, my business financially, and really weigh the pros and cons before, before I expand into something I've made the mistakes of mistake of expanding too fast into something and then going, Oh, you know, reel it back in.

27:37 So now I know where we're not to go. Trial and error. I love that. I want to go ahead and dive headfirst into the branding discussion. But before we do, I have one final question on this. It's so good. I think you are such a good example of somebody who has designed a business that fits the lifestyle that you want to live. Mm hmm. And that wasn't an easy decision because you were coming from a place monetarily of being successful, of working with a lot of, you know, really high powered companies and things like that. Yeah. I'm, I'd love to hear from you. First of all, how long did it, how long did you sit on wanting a business?

28:22 Yeah. that was different from the one that you had? And what was some of what you had to kind of overcome? Was it you I know personally I've done it. I've experienced a lot of guilt like, oh, no, but if I stop doing this and I'm not going to serve my clients the right way or, you know, blah, blah. What did you go through and what got you to finally say enough? I'm I'm I got to do this. That is such a great question, Ryan, because that's literally been my biggest battle over the last few years. So I started my first business, We Are Visual, in 2013. And Digital Brand Kit saw the light of day in 2018-19.

29:08 We're in 2025 and only about two years ago did I fully let go of We Are Visual. And I still kept doing, you know, secretly client work, you know, like one-on-one client work, high ticket clients and things like that because I had such a hard time letting go of that comfort zone, of this place, of the familiar, what I know how to do, what I'm really good at. And this place that is very exciting, but also it's a place where I'm a beginner, where I'm learning. And, you know, it's hard to be a beginner in public, especially when you've been successful at something else before.

29:50 Yes, yes. So letting go of all of, you know, all of these successes that I had as a foundation, which, you know, I want to share this real quick because what I was seeing, what I was feeling is that I needed to let go of this successful foundation in order to build something from scratch. And I don't remember who told me this and clicked in my head. I was like, well, that's that's still you. You're still bringing that foundation. You're just building on it again here, you know, and you're building stronger because you have that foundation. That past of all those credentials, everything that you, you know, accomplished before doesn't go away just because you're doing something new.

30:32 And that was huge for me because then I started thinking about like, well, how does all of, how do all of these accomplishments serve me here? How do all the lessons that I learned serve me here? And then I learned how to be really smart about leveraging that, you know, the credibility that I had built and all the things. But that was one thing. It was really just difficult to go from. doing one-on-one work where I could see the results right away and the people I'm serving to scaling myself from one-to-one to one-to-many where I don't have that one-on-one connection with people anymore. And I'm trying, I'm finding ways to recreate it now in our new business through our membership program so that I can really accompany people from the start and see them through, you know, the growth of their brand and their business.

31:18 But that was the, really the one thing that I had a hard time letting go of was yeah, that way of operating. Yep. One of the things that I love the way that you just laid that out is, I think so often in business, we think that we're going to make that decision. And all the things are just going to be perfect. And we're going to know all the things right away. And we never do. And I love, it's kind of like, I mean, to me, it's sort of like getting up in the middle of the night and no lights are on, you know, and if you're in a, if you're in a hotel room, for example, and there are no lights on and you get up in the middle of the night, first time you get up and you run into that half wall that you forgot was there.

32:05 It's like, Ooh, okay. I didn't know that was there. I'll remember that next time. Right. That's great. Yeah. Yeah. And I think I love the way that you adjusted, though, because I think a lot of times as entrepreneurs, we have to have permission to adjust and pivot. Like you saying, hey, I really do kind of miss that connection. And I know that for me, I need to find a way to weave that back into my business. It's not black and white like it's this way or it's that way. Yes. I love that. Yes, I've learned to make peace with the gray area, Ryan. Because I've always been very black and white. I'm like, oh, but this or that. And it's like, no, you can have both.

32:46 Find a way to, you know, create a hybrid. Duh. Love it. Love it. Well, this is what we learn along the way, right? It's what we learn. Yeah. So, all right. We got to definitely get into some branding conversation because I've got the... the superwoman of branding on my podcast here. So I'd love to start with this. Yeah. What do you feel like are the top two to three mistakes that people make in their branding? Oh, okay. Love this question. Number one, biggest mistake, getting too emotional.

33:28 Hmm. getting too emotional about their branding. Your branding is not about you. Your branding is not, it's not like an outfit you wear. It's a container for your business. It's a container for your business to attract the right people, communicate the right message and the right value, and grow your business. That's the functionality of your brand. Now, branding is also fun, right? It's also a place where you can express your personality and all the things. And yes, you should definitely be able to do that a little bit.

34:09 But when it takes over, when that takes over the business purpose of your branding, then it becomes a problem. And so what is that? Yeah. You want to ask me something? I was just going to ask, how do you know when it's taking over? When you spend two weeks deciding between two shades of green. I'm laughing because I swear to God. I'm going through this with a couple of clients right now. Your ears are burning, people. I know they are. Yeah. When you're just taking, when you're taking too long to make very basic decisions for your visual identity.

34:50 And I like to call it procrastinate branding. Procrastinate branding. I love it. Because it's a, you know, you can just like blame it on the, yes, but we haven't nailed it yet. You know what? You could have nailed it three months ago if you just made a hard decision that was informed by your business strategy and not your personal taste. Uh, yep. No, that's a, that's a quote. I don't sure how when it comes to branding, but that's, that's the truth. And I think more people need to hear that hard truth. I think there's, um, you know, I, I'm, I'm not here trying to disrupt the branding industry a little bit, so I might ruffle some feathers when I say something. Do it. Let's go. Straight up. But there are, um, designers and agencies who have a vested interest in keeping you stuck in the branding phase for as long as they can so they can keep stacking those billable hours.

35:40 Hmm. Yeah, let's do another round of visions. Yeah, let's get on another strategy call and talk about it. Let's help you figure this out. No, that's not what I'm about. Hey, let's figure out what your visual identity needs to be in order to support your business goals. Okay, here it is. Go. Go do the thing. Don't stay here. This is not a good place to be in. This is a place where you're not making money. You're not making progress. You're not doing the thing that you need to be doing. This is just a step. It's literally a little stepping stone of like, let's get your visual identity, you know, right. And then go. And so that to me is the biggest place where a lot of entrepreneurs are getting stuck is just way overthinking the visual identity piece.

36:23 And by the way, this is this is not a easy thing to figure out. I have struggled with this myself with clients and helping them get through this phase. And it was always the hump. It's like we start a project and then we get to this place where they have to make some hard decisions. And then we get stuck and we stay here for a long time. And I've, you know, I had I had a whole series of canned emails and my Gmail loaded up that were nudges of like, hey, so just checking in to, you know, have you made a decision on this? You got these fuckers on speed dial. Oh, yeah. Dude, I had like all these creative ways to open the conversation back up and be like, okay, and then nudge them in the right direction.

37:08 And frankly, Ryan, I got tired of it after a while. And I was like, I need to get these people over this hump and figure out how to break this cycle of people getting stuck at this place. Yeah. And so, and I will give you the other two, you know, big mistakes, but real quick, this is how I came up with, um, my, my process of the, the color cards. Oh, this is good. Cool. For helping people figure out what their brand colors should be. So what I realized is that, um, fonts me shapes me colors people get stuck on colors people have an emotional response to yes and a lot of clients i found would have all these stories around yeah but you know what my competitor over here is using you know yellow and so i really i don't want to have anything to do with yellow or uh you know This one color reminds me of something that I don't like.

38:03 So I don't want to use that color. Or look, my entire office is this beautiful shade of green. So I want this green to be in my branding, even though green makes no sense for my business. But that's okay because it's my color. So I was like, oh my gosh, there's so much emotional baggage around colors. How do I remove this emotional baggage? Well, I took the colors away. And instead, I put words. And so what are the color cards? The color cards are cards that have words on one side and a color on the other. But I don't show you the color. I only show you the words. And I show you 12 color cards with words on them.

38:45 And the words are the symbolic meaning, the energy, the, you know, yeah, the energy of the color, right? What it communicates. And I ask you to make choices based on the words that you see. And so we go through and eliminate a first batch of cards. We're like, well, my brand is definitely not that word. Boom, out. My brand is definitely not that word either. Boom. And then we narrow it down to your top seven. And then from those, we go, okay, well, what are the top three? What are the words that you want your business to communicate? And then once they have chosen their cards based on the words and all the cards are gone, all the other cards are gone, then we reveal the color behind them.

39:28 And they're like, interesting. I chose that color because I want my business to feel like blank. And now, not only do they have colors that are backed by psychology, but they also have this conviction of why they chose those colors. And when I introduced that into my process, I initially just did it for private clients, but it was so effective that I built an entire, you know, service around it called branded in a day where we brand your entire business in a day. using this color card system. And I can't tell you the number of testimonials that we have from people going, oh my gosh, finally, I was able to just this thing that I've been sitting on for a long time in one day in a 90 minute intensive session, I was able to get that behind me and move on.

40:25 Uh, that's that I, I love this. And, and as somebody who has been, it's been a hot minute, but I've been through that process with you. And I remember going through that process and really getting on the other side of it and just feeling, I mean, I think that, I think the word that I would use is, was just very settled. Yeah. Yeah. Clear. Yeah. You know, at that point, that's and but you never told me how you developed it. So this is so great. That's the origin story. I'm branded in a day and the and the color cards. Yeah. And then so to answer, I'm going to give you the other big mistake. The other big mistake, I think, is really...

41:07 putting the cart before the horse when it comes to branding, some people jump the gun too soon on creating a visual identity before being really clear on what their business is about. You need to have, you need to have a really solid vision for what it is that you're building so that you can make firm decisions from that place. That place is shaky. then the color cards thing is not gonna work. And we've built in because we do have a lot of people that come to us on shaky ground. We built into our process, an initial phase before we do the color cards, where we help you really get clear on the strategy behind your business.

41:50 Who is your audience? Who are you going after? We need a very clear picture of that person. You know, what are your values? What are the parts of your personality that you want to showcase through this business, this visual identity? So you have to get really clear on the strategy behind your brand before you go and start doing visual identity. And I think too many people, because again, visual identity is fun and it's an art project, And they can go to the Pinterest board on a Sunday afternoon. They go straight to colors and fonts. No, you got to come back to this place, build a firm foundation, and then make informed decisions from that place.

42:32 I love that you highlighted this one because I, I, I think I, I really do think most people, especially, you know, we work with a lot of creative minded people. Um, and, uh, we've, you know, we've got like wooers and doers and both, but we got a lot of wooers for sure. And I think that's, I know what a doer is, but what's a wooer? Well, you know, people that are embracing the woo woo. Oh, I see. Yeah, you know, they've got they do something in their business that has to do with with, you know, connection, spirituality, you know, something like that.

43:13 So. But I think I see that all the time. People just think, oh, it's me. So I can just go and do this before I go do all the things that are harder, like defining my client avatar and, you know, all that stuff. When really all those decisions should, you know. But I'll tell you this again, might ruffle some feathers for the woo-woo people. But, you know, if you have the luxury of time and a full bank account, then woo-woo your colors away. You know, go away. Go on a retreat and do a meditation and, you know, maybe do a little ayahuasca and figure out what your colors should be. But don't do it if you need to grow your business and focus.

43:59 If you have business goals, then focus on your business goals. Don't make that a fun art project. Pick up a hobby. Don't make that a fun art project. It really is... It really is not the right place to spend money or time. I just want to say thank you for you saying that so that I didn't have to say it. It's like good cop, bad cop here. I love this. Nadine comes on my show and you'd be bad cop. I'm out here spitting the truth. It's awesome. No, you know what I appreciate about that, though, is I think that... I think that in reality, without going, we could, gosh, we could do a whole episode on this specifically.

44:40 But I think without going too far down the rabbit hole, one of the things that any anybody who, you know, appreciates or is very driven by spiritual alignment or very, very driven, ultra driven by creativity is. I think that I have seen this way too many times where people who are so talented and so gifted that way get their asses kicked in business because they just haven't been taught that like it doesn't mean that you got to like throw your creativity in the drawer or you can't be connected to all your stuff. It's not that. But here's the reality. Like while you sit and wait, your competition is whipping your ass.

45:22 Absolutely right. And look, the only reason that I can allow myself to give this kind of tough love to perfect strangers that are listening to me is because I was you. I was you. I am you. I have been in that place where I have let a lot of that happen. um, drive my decisions or delay me from doing things. And yeah, I got my butt kicked, you know, in business for, for doing that. And I learned that lesson the hard way and I'm still learning it because I'm such a creative at heart because I have such a strong emotional connection to my work and I pour my heart into all these beautiful templates. And I'm so much thought goes into everything that I create.

46:04 Um, And that's my superpower is that I put so much love and so much thought into everything I create. But I also have to make sure that I, in some areas of my business, I reel that back in because then it becomes a liability for my business for me to be that way. So you have to find the right balance between letting it be, you know, the thing that makes you unique and the thing that people love about you, but also not letting it get out of hand to where it then hurts your business. So I'm speaking from that place. And that's the only reason I can dish out the tough love is I give it to myself. I think, I think a lot of times we, we learn to teach the things that we most need to hear, you know, exactly.

46:46 Yeah. I love that. So, well, OK, so I'm I want to segue because what you just said kind of jogged something for me. You just recently told me about procrastinating on something. And I want to talk about the thing that you were procrastinating on that you recently decided to unveil. But before we do. I want you to just share real quickly. You can be cloak and dagger and hold back the idea for just a second. But suffice it to say you had it on your heart. You had an idea for a long time. You procrastinated on it. For how long? I'm curious.

47:28 The thing that I'm going to show you that I'm going to talk about. Months. Months. We're in September. I think I had the idea probably February of this year. And what was it that had you, what was the internal talk about why not now? Gosh, lots of noise, lots of second guessing, lots of perfectionism. I have this thing where, you know, it's like an internal battle with myself. I'm like, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to do it the best damn way that I possibly, you know, it's like, I'm a little bit ambitious. No.

48:10 I like to keep high standards for myself, but there's a place where those high standards become, um, perfection, you know, toxic perfectionism. And I was just, I was just sitting in a pool of toxic perfectionism for a few months. And then I was like, I'm done. I'm putting this thing out there because what I remembered is it's not about me. It's about the people that this is going to serve and they need this. And it's my duty to get it out there. And that was really what clicked in my head. Would you, would you, would you be willing to share the note that you wrote for yourself? Oh my gosh. Sure. Will you share it? Yes. Okay. This is a vulnerable moment, but yeah.

48:52 I totally am putting you on spot. That's okay. That's okay. So I wrote this note to myself where I, when I got to a place where I was literally just, I hope I can say this, but I was pissed off. Yeah, you can fucking say whatever you want. Yes. Okay, great. Well, I was fucking pissed off, Ryan. I was so over myself. I was just so done because I sat down and I looked around me and I realized I was sitting in this pool of unfinished projects. Things I started but didn't finish. And I got really frustrated with myself that I was really good at starting really great ideas. Wow. but not finishing them. So this is what I wrote. I said to myself, you live in a graveyard of dead trees that are nothing but the ghosts of seeds you planted, but never watered.

49:43 Yeah. Let that settle for just a second. Let that sink in. I love that. That was a painful realization, but also a very empowering one. Yeah. I'm just thinking, yeah, Nadine, just go water those seeds, finish those projects. Yeah. Launch those things that you've been sitting on. Stop second guessing, stop perfecting. Just go out and serve people what they need. I love it. Well, with all that said, first of all, thank you for being vulnerable and being willing to share that because I think it's really helpful. I think that for any of us, the open loops are the things that kill us at the end of the day.

50:24 Those are the things that we regret, that weigh on us. And really, energetically, it's a huge weight, especially when they start to stack. Yeah. Living below your potential is extremely painful. I totally agree. Yeah. Yep. Well, with that said, I want to talk about what you actually went out and did now because I'm so freaking excited about this. Share with everybody what you built here because I think it is it's so timely. It's such a wonderful solution. And yeah, that's let's get into it. Well, the big thing to start with is that in the online business world, for a long time, but especially right now, speed is the name of the game.

51:08 Being able to execute and put things out there quickly is super important. And there's one thing that you need to be able to do quickly. It's getting your offer to market. It's putting your offer out there. It's selling your stuff. And what does that require? It requires a sales page. However, The traditional sales page, as we know it, is this very tedious, big project that you have to either DIY for a long time because it's massive, or you got to pay a lot of money for somebody to build it for you. And if you need to monetize fast, you need a faster way to get your offer to market. So I went into my creative cave a few months ago and built an amazing sales page template But what is special about the sales page template is that it lives inside a Google Doc.

52:00 Oh, shit. How did you pull that off? But is this just like text in there or what? It's text. I'm going to show you in a little bit, but it's really... me going in there and going, how can I pull all the little features that Google Docs allows you to have and create something beautiful with it? So I hacked the system, as I like to say, and I created this Google Docs sales page, which I'm going to share with you right now. This is super cool. So if you're watching this on YouTube right now, you're going to actually get to see this. If you're listening to this episode, you're going to want to check out the YouTube version so that you can take a look at this. Yes. Oh, wait, that's in a Google Doc?

52:40 Yes. This is a Google Doc. That's not a web page. This is not a web page. I mean, proof. There we go. Crap. Wow. Google Doc. Mm. And the entire thing is structured the way that needs to be with copy. You see, this is real-life copy. This is not lorem ipsum text, right? So this gives you ideas on what to say in each section. Wow. And all of this right here is fully editable. Like, you can literally... type in and change this. Oh my cow, so good. So if you've launched your offer and you need to go and make quick tweaks to your sales page copy on the run, you can just come in here and change it. And then all these pretty little graphics are designed inside of a Canva file that comes with this template.

53:26 So you go and customize this, add your photos or whatever, and then you just come in here and replace, upload your picture. Oh my gosh. And you pop it in. I mean, it is easy, but also beautiful. It is gorgeous. Okay. So basically, in order to use this functionally, you need to know how to use Google Docs and Canva. Pretty much. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And we give you all the video tutorials for how to do all of that. So it's super easy. But literally, if you can just type into this and upload a picture... You're done.

54:06 You're halfway home. Dang. That's incredible. Now, of course, as you know, I'm very ambitious. And I did not just to give people one little sales page. Why does this not surprise me? Yeah. You are such an over-deliverer, by the way. You over-deliver like crazy. I fried myself. I love it. Thank you. But the sales page... I don't know if I switched my screen if it's going to... Yeah. Oh, it's doing it. I'm seeing it good. Yeah, there you go. There is a mobile version of this so that your sales page is going to look just as beautiful on mobile than it does on desktop. Okay. That's incredible. So cool.

54:47 Mobile optimized, but just like the infomercials, I'm not done yet. But that's not all. That's not all. You also get a free call page, right? This is one of those pages that you I can't tell you how many people go, what should I use to design my call page? Should I have to build that on my website? Now you can just put it in a Google Doc, link it to your calendar or whatever scheduler you're using. Boom, done. It's live. But also, if you have different offers that you want to use this sales doc for, You can use these modular sections that you just copy and paste into your main sales page to have different offerings.

55:27 So if this is a single price product, you're going to use this section. If it's a low ticket with an upsell, you're going to use this section. If it's a two tier service. Wow. You're going to use this. If it's a three-tier offer, you're going to use this so you can let people compare the different packages. If it's an application only, you can use this and send this to your application process. If you're selling a retreat or an event, you can sell different tickets using this. Okay. I mean, come on, this is modular and it has legs. Like you can do so much with this. So all of these modular sections are copy pasteable.

56:08 You just take the section that you need and you paste it into your main sales page so that you can use it. And so you have a section for your methodology, additional bonus sections, all the things. And lastly, out of everything here. All right, go ahead. Keep going. Again, I pride myself on like, what haven't I not thought about? Let's add it. If you want this in a different color palette. So this comes in this color palette that you see here. But if you're like, those are not my colors, no problem. You can either. choose one of our pre-made color palettes and access any of these beautiful options from the color catalog, right?

56:50 Or you can literally just put your brand colors into this and we show you how to do it in the video. So it's super easy and customizable in that way. And before you think that this is the only design that we give you, This actually comes in 12 different designs. So I'm not going to show you all of them, but this is from our grit and grace collection. We have 12 different collections at Digital Brand Kit. Which are all beautiful. Thank you. This is the Solon Style Collection. So different fonts, different colors, different vibe, right? But the structure, the wireframe is always the same. So this is the Flow and Freedom Collection. Again, different vibe.

57:30 This is the Bold and Brave Collection. different colors, different vibe. But again, every single one of these is going to come with color palette options for that specific collection. So all in all, there's hundreds, hundreds of different looks that you could unpack from this one template. This is freaking incredible. One of the things that I just want to say right out of the gates that I love so much about this is that, especially when we're in the early stages or we're launching a new program or product, you kind of said it's speed to market is everything. And... You know, it's so easy to get hung up when you're building a new program or service, trying to build out landing pages and all of the things.

58:17 And what I love about this the most, to be honest with you, we didn't even talk about this before we saw each other today. So I didn't know the beautiful connection here. But, you know, we we recommend a kind of a case study beta launch anytime you're doing something new. And we've always gone with a really simple process, you know, that allows you to deliver basically a sales page via PDF. And holy cow, this is a mega upgrade. I mean, this is insane. I love the alignment, the synergy there. So cool. Yeah. Yeah. This is a no brainer. The biggest reason why I wanted to create this is to give people a way to validate their offer first, is to beta launch something in a low-lift way.

59:01 This is a low-lift launch, right? And so you can put something together quickly. Um, literally you can do this in like an hour or two in an afternoon. You can have a sales page up. You can do it yourself. You don't have to hire anybody or pay for anybody to do it for you. And then you can go validate your product idea, get some sales rolling in. Once you validate it and you're making money, then go back and invest in that fancy sales page and with all the bells and whistles. But this is the fastest, cheapest way to get your idea to market and validate your product. I love we know what I love about this, too, is that we've got a lot of our people on on go high level. And if you want to get going quickly, what's beautiful is you can grab one of these quickly, customize it, be ready to go.

59:47 And then if you've got somebody who helps you build your stuff and go high level or some other page builder, you can just hand it to him as a wireframe. Gary, go build out the fancy. But this is so amazing. So how? First of all, all right, my big question. Yes, this cost. Wow, that's the best part. It's $195, but we're giving all of Ryan's people $100 off coupon. So you can get this Google Doc sales page for $95. It's our lowest price template. I mean, just go build that sales page already.

1:00:27 We're giving it to you and we're giving you the system. And by the way, this page is $95. When you go to our checkout page, you can also choose to add two very affordable add-ons to it that are going to help you get this to market even faster and kind of complete your funnel. So there's an instant copy kit, which is our little catching powered system to help you write your sales copy fast. Oh, hell yeah. It's really complete because it's going to take in your brand voice, your brand personality, your story, and then all of your offer details. So you just feed it all of this data about your offer and you. And then it spits out the sales page copy. So you can literally just copy paste it back into the Google Doc.

1:01:07 So that's really nice. And then the checkout page templates. So we have amazing Thrivecart checkout pages that beautifully match the design of the sales page. There's a seamless experience between the two. And so you can add those to your order as well and create your full funnel. Dang, man. I mean, I feel like you just put a lot of people out of business with it. Put this, Nadine. Holy crap. And I don't mean my clients. I mean, a whole lot of other people in the marketing space. This is insane. And this is by far, I mean, this is by far the simplest, best, lowest cost solution that I've ever seen to launch a new offer ever.

1:01:52 And I mean that wholeheartedly. And I've seen it all. Thank you. That means a lot. I'm a freaking king of sales. Hey, I would not bullshit you on this. I wouldn't. What? Okay. So how do we, first of all, we'll have, we're going to link up a, we're going to link up the web address in the show notes. So make sure to go there to grab the web address to, to go get this. But once they do, we have specific instructions to get that, that hundred off. Yes. So they're going to use, you guys are going to use the code Ryan100 to get your $100 discount on the Google Docs sales page. Yeah. That is awesome. Okay. So really quickly, if you want to get this, and by the way, you need this.

1:02:36 So anybody who is not like really quickly right now, feverishly trying to get to this is crazy. Just go to coachingequation.com. Okay. Grab Nadine's episode in the show notes. You'll see the link. Click the link and then use code RYAN100 at checkout to get $100 off. It's a $95 solution to one of the biggest problems that you've got in your business right now. Nadine, this has been freaking incredible. Before we finish up, Gal, I just want to honor you. You are such, number one, you're such a woman of integrity. You care so deeply about people and serving people at the very highest level.

1:03:20 I see it in everything that you do. And I love who you are. I love what you're about. I love the business that you've built. And I just want to say thank you for all the incredible work that you're putting out and all the ways that you're serving people because it's felt. And I think you're really closing a lot of gaps for people that need it desperately. Thank you so much, Ryan. Thank you for sharing that with me. And thank you for giving me a platform here to share that with people and allow me to share my story and my vulnerable moments and all the things. This has been such a great conversation. I've had a great time. I'm super excited for your community to get access to this. And please come find me on Instagram at nadine.hanathie.

1:04:03 We'll put that in the show notes as well. And tell me, tell me your Google Docs sales page when it's done. I want to see what you launch for. Oh, hell yeah. I love this. Let's do that. I dig it. All right, gal. Thank you so much. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Coaching Equation Podcast. Until next time, take care. Thank you for listening to this episode of The Coaching Equation. Please hit subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you got value out of this episode, we would be so grateful if you would share it out with a friend and leave us a review on iTunes or your favorite platform. To learn more about Empire Partners or to inquire about working with Ryan and Brooke, please visit www.empirepartners.io forward slash go.