Embracing Your Humanity in Marketing Ep. 01

Welcome I am both nervous and excited to be sharing this with you. I want to take a bit of time with this first episode to tell you about what this podcast and season is about and where it came from and a little bit about me. 

I’m going to start with the truth – I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve rewritten this episode or how many days recording the podcast was on the calendar and pushed to the next day.

I want you to know that I have templates and outlines and how much I’d like to “stick to the script” and “do it the right way.” And instead how I’m making my own way. Right now. 

So, you can expect this to be messy and dirty, a little disorganized, that it will maybe wander off to explore. Because I promised myself, “Amanda, this is a place that you can be you without having to pretend you’re something you’re not.” And I intend to honour that.

To that end you’re going to get some brilliance, intentionality and clarity along with some feral wildness, permission-giving, and humanity all wrapped around a centre of love, honesty, depth, nuance and care.  

For Reluctant Marketers

And I’m gonna talk about redefining marketing for reluctant marketers. 

I’m talking to the introvert, the intuitive, the empathic, the highly sensitive. The soulful solopreneur who is great at what they do, they’re amazing coaches or healers, they help create real change for the people they work with. And they don’t like the word marketing. And when it comes to marketing, they easily find a way to procrastinate, avoid, get overwhelmed or sink into self-doubt or struggle to find the right words to describe what they do. And it ends up holding them and their business back.

If that’s you: welcome! You’re not alone. I adore you and the work you’re here to do. If that’s someone you know make sure you share this with our fellow Not Marketers. Because there’s nothing quite like feeling having camaraderie and community to motivate and inspire new possibilities and even foster doing something new. 

Marketing Information

There are lots of good reasons you might have to be reluctant to market. Like not having enough time, not wanting to waste your time on things that don’t work, feeling like you need to know more, or being worried about how to keep up with demands of marketing without getting overwhelmed or burning out.

And you can find lots of “how-to” advice about

• Time management
• Writing engaging content
• Ways to repurpose content
• Building a lead magnet funnel

There’s no end to the technical how-to. And while those skills are helpful, I’ve discovered they’re also insufficient.  

You’ve maybe also discovered after following successful marketers and taking a few courses that even with a level of quality information that when it comes time to actually put something out into the world, you stagnate, get overwhelmed, start questioning whether it feels right, or spiral into overthinking or perfectionism. At this point it’s not a problem of having a lack of technical “how-to” skills.

You have access to the information. 

The general sentiment is that you should be able to “just do it” or the common refrain “feel the fear and do it anyways.” And this feeling like you’re somehow the problem might be compounded when you look around and it seems like nobody else is bothered or hesitant. 

So, you’ve probably wondered, what’s wrong with me? Why can’t “just do it?” Or “get over yourself?” Few people seem to have the interest or the patience or the experience of digging into THIS particular issue.  I’m here to explore the deeper levels of what’s preventing solopreneurs from sharing their message and their work with those who can benefit without becoming someone they’re not. 

Who is Amanda Jane?

Who am I to be doing this with you?

Just like the hair club for men guy from the commercial in the 80s: “ I’m not just the president, I’m also a client.” I’m the Original Reluctant Marketer. The reason why I can speak so clearly on this experience is because I know it inside and out and have used every trick in the book to be not marketing.

I spent the first nearly 4 years of being a coach and a solopreneur hiding trying to get it all figured out so that I wouldn’t have to worry about doing something wrong, saying something wrong, or being… you got it… wrong. It was a problem that kept my business a hobby for years

Because I was waiting, tip-toeing, and a lot of research and information collection, wondering if it was the right time, or if I had the right tool, or if I just learned enough, making decision after decision about things that really didn’t matter. There were spirals of self-doubt and perfectionism.  I figured that if I could learn enough then I’d know what’s acceptable and could finally be able to step out with confidence in my message.

That’s not to say I didn’t do anything, I tried LOTS of things, but nothing that I could sustain for any amount of time.

I took course after course, program after program looking for the secret (that they all promised) hoping it would help me. And as the failures stacked up I started to wonder what was wrong with me and what was I missing that everyone else knew. I couldn’t understand what was wrong with my plans or my business or with me that I couldn’t just do the thing that everyone said was simple and that felt as impossible as moving mountains.

Because no one else seemed to be struggling like I was and no one had any answers or support – it was so isolating. 

What Changed?

I know I’m supposed to have a grand line in the sand moment, maybe that will be revealed, for now it’s actually a lot of tiny things.

I got inspired by the idea of courage and I started to deeply explore it as a way forward and uncover what was really holding me back. I also gained a new relationship with risk when my son got really sick and nothing was helping (he’s fine now by the way), but that helped me understand how much low-level risk I was constantly feeling when it came to marketing. 

And I decided rather than digging in my heels or trying to “overcome my procrastination” which I’ve decided is a myth, a fallacy, something that keeps us striving and not measuring up to. 

I started to see that patterns that I was following unconsciously, and one was fighting myself – making myself wrong all the time. Badgering and hounding myself to do more, to do better, to be more and to be better.  Not in a healthy whole way of like, “hey I think if I made an adaptation here this could be even better” No, no. More like a “Ugh, why are you so shit at this?” 

And I can look back and see that was what women were coming and asking for back then too – they were saying “How do I do more?” “How can I make progress and feel productive?” “How can I stop always feeling like a failure?”

A New Vision of Marketing

I started to get curious about these patterns and try something radically different – assuming that I was OK as I was, that how I was responding was natural and right and helpful. What if my defensive stance was natural and normal reaction to a business environment that was threatening and risky and dangerous?

In that scenario, maybe I wasn’t the complete failure, but that I wasn’t willing to participate in the toxic business and marketing culture.  In that scenario, maybe there wasn’t something wrong with me, but there was something wrong with the marketing landscape.

So, I’ve been in the process of curiously exploring this new way and what, if anything could change for me, if I decided to believe in this alternative.  It turns out… quite a bit.  

Acceptance

The primary one is that it has unlocked a new level of self-acceptance (which is actually quite lovely) and this comes from a person who had a really healthy self of how great she was before, so… yeah. What I’m noticing is that when I am able to validate and accept myself I’m no longer seeking that through my marketing. I’m not showing up in front of my audience like they’re holding a glass of water and I’ve been walking in the desert for 3 days. I can come with my own glass of water.  

Compassion

Related to that is that I can, with honesty and compassion, look at my failures and foibles and be actually kind of awed by the beauty of my own humanity. The reactions from people that used to shut me down feel less personal. And the shame doesn’t hit so deep or feel so fatal. I can process and recover within a couple hours what used to take me several months. 

Celebration

I’ve (begrudgingly) come to realize that I’ll never be perfect and actually that’s taken off a load of pressure .I’m learning that gentle and organic progress and a human pace and scale is a lovely way of journeying up this business mountain.  And I can celebrate that I’ve arrived HERE at this point, and isn’t that amazing. 

And I can honour the hard-won wisdom that I’ve earned through my experiences of dragging myself through the mud and can offer as a beacon to others, like you.  

What Does This Mean for You?

Because the other thing I’ve found is that avoiding marketing a business that is aligned with your purpose and mission, that you’re connected to with your heart. Not being able to express the work you’re here to do in the world is soul-crushing. It eats away at you. Avoiding and procrastinating and doubting the truth that’s in your heart is exhausting.   

Yet you know that mainstream marketing in a way that is out of integrity  is counter to your values or asks more than it gives will burn you out.

Instead let’s do Not Marketing. Let’s create our own way forward. Our own communication patterns that are built on honesty and transparency. That put meaningful, respectful and consensual relationships at the center.

Not Marketing is about sharing and connecting.

Where we don’t have to obsess over every last morsel of content and instead can lean into how we feel and the energy and intention we bring to what we say, write or share with one another.

Not Marketing is about truth-telling and it will be healing for your people. And the process of getting there and being able to stand behind yourself and your perspective and why you do what you do, and uncovering and allowing to share and connect in the ways you naturally do, showing up whole and sovereign – not as something you’re supposed to be, but bearing your scars and your softness and the realness of you and knowing deeply that’s enough – that is healing for you, too.  

What I Want You to Remember

Here’s what I want to leave you with today.

Please know that delivering this podcast to you is not easy for me, this is a feat of courage for me to sit down as I am in front of my microphone and tell my tale with my voice in this way. It is not easy, but nor is it terrifying anymore. 

And it has taken deliberate actions to get me here. So, know that it is possible for you too to build the courage and support to take on your next business or marketing adventure.

The Next Episode

In the next episode we’ll be exploring a new way to use procrastinating on your marketing for your benefit. I hope you’ll join me for that. 

Until then, 
Stay Courageous