SPI 867: How to Build a 7-Figure Business in a Boring Industry (And Have Fun!) with Sam Vander Wielen

SPI 867: How to Build a 7-Figure Business in a Boring Industry (And Have Fun!) with Sam Vander Wielen

Pat Flynn: Some of my favorite success stories are ones where people, they struggle a little bit in the beginning and they find the thing that works, but even in the beginning of that new thing, they’re not quite sure, and then boom, things start to take off. And that’s exactly what I’m happy to share with you today.

Today we have Sam Vander Wielen, who was an attorney doing her thing. The moment she sat in her chair after getting that attorney job, she hated it, despised it, and wanted to turn things around and it didn’t happen right away but now she has a seven figure business, and in this episode she tells us how it all happened.

She tells us a lot of the things that we should be doing today that most entrepreneurs aren’t to stand out in a crowded and potentially even boring space. She also tells us a little bit about her email funnels and things that are working too. She’s written a new book called When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy? With a question mark at the end.

It’s a little sarcastic, in fact, because she brings a lot of truth that a lot of other people do not about the world of entrepreneurship and actually what it’s like. I very much resonated with this conversation. She and I both are gonna be speaking at the Craft and Commerce event in Boise, Idaho, which is an event run by Kit, and I won’t make you wait any longer.

Here she is, Sam Vander Wielen from SamVanderWielen.com and all the other good things. Oh, she has a podcast too that you can subscribe to after this, On Your Terms. Anyway, let’s dive in.

Sam, welcome to SPI thank you so much for joining me here on the podcast.

Sam Vander Wielen: Hey Pat, thank you so much for having me.

Pat Flynn: I’m excited. You know, we have switched our podcast here from a primarily interview-based podcast to now more solo episodes where I’m going pretty deep on some topics. However, every once in a while I wanna bring people back on who know exactly what they’re talking about and relate to what part in the business journey people are in right now.

And I think it’s very perfect for you to come on the show right now for a few reasons. Number one, you have this book that’s just come out, which is super inspiring and we’re gonna talk about that in a sec. But you also started out like many people who are listening, started out, which you had a nine to five, or a nine to nine, however you wanna call it because you were in law.

Tell me about where you were before you started business and kind of how you transition into what you do now.

Sam Vander Wielen: So I became a corporate lawyer at the ripe old age of 23. Had no idea what I was doing or what I was getting myself into. And literally from the moment I sat in that like cheap office chair in this high skyscraper in Philadelphia where I’m from I thought, oh no, what have I done? And I, I don’t know if anyone else can relate, but like sometimes you do these things in life where you work really hard towards something and you get there and then you’re like, wait, why did I actually want to do this? I’m not really sure. And I wasn’t. Into any self-development work at the time, didn’t even know anybody who was.

And so unfortunately I spent the next, like five, six years as a lawyer in this very victimy place of like, why did this happen to me? Why did the universe force me to become a lawyer? This is so miserable. Everything sucks. Everybody sucks. I, I just hated it. And I literally got to the point where I could not stand.

Like I started to hear myself speaking and being like, I’m annoyed by what I’m hearing coming out of my mouth. It was actually a very scary plane incident on the way home from Amsterdam that just literally, literally shook me into being like, what are you doing with your life? You have to make a change.

Pat Flynn: That’s great. When you think back to your decision to even start down that path, can you remember why you chose that in the first place?

Sam Vander Wielen: Yes, absolutely. So I talk a lot about this actually in my book.  When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy?, but I had a very traumatic upbringing, very violent childhood. And for some reason, I don’t know if I just watched too many episodes of Law and Order or something, but for some reason in my mind, being a lawyer was like the fastest way to safety for one.

That was like, if I go become a lawyer, I’ll be super independent. No one, I’ll be financially secure. That’s a very serious job. Like it just felt very safe to me, but I never stopped to think about whether that was something that would make me happy or was even like in alignment with my personality at all.

Pat Flynn: And then the moment you sat in that chair, you just, you just felt something. I, I feel like that’s really common for a lot of people. ’cause we have these dreams and aspirations and it’s like once we get there, everything will change and then it doesn’t. Right. We feel that way when a person, you know, becomes a millionaire.

They’re like, okay, I’m a millionaire now. And life is just as bad as it was before. Like, that doesn’t change anything. When did things start to change for you? Was it in fact when you started to think of your business?

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah, so I think two things happened. One was that, and the firm picked up on this pretty early on, even though I was super young and this was not normal for a young lawyer, I started going out and bringing in all kinds of business.

Like that was a lot more fun to me. I would go out and find clients. I would mingle with people and be like securing these like really, really big accounts, and they would be like, you got this person to come to the firm. I was so young and so inexperienced that I couldn’t even service the clients that I was bringing in, I would have to hand them off to senior partners who would be their lawyer, but I got all the credit in the firm, so that sparked this little like, oh, I like the business side of this.

I don’t like so much like sitting here and billing and looking at documents all the time. So that started to happen. And then I think the more miserable I was as an attorney, I started looking for ways outside of work to feel more fulfilled. So I started getting more and more into like health and fitness and travel and doing all this stuff, which opened me up to this world all of a sudden of like, wait, there are people out there doing like coaching and selling online courses.

And I started reading blogs at the time was, you know, more popular and so. Yeah, I just kind of fell into this world that I little corporate lawyer me, had no idea existed.

Pat Flynn: Oh yeah. I’m so curious about this because it’s that moment of that spark that ignites you and you start to sort of open your eyes to all the different possibilities.

I felt that in 2008 after listening to some podcasts, and that changed my life. But I also remember when I started thinking about things outside of my architecture work that I grew up doing, I was like, okay, I could go in a million different places. I’m gonna try everything. What, what were some of the things you did initially to try to explore this new world that you were entering in?

Sam Vander Wielen: The very first thing I did was start a food blog called Barristers Be, which I was like, be, let’s go a food blog. That was awesome. In my first recipe was first, this is so embarrassing. What’s first? Deal cut oats with apples that were like sauteed in coconut oil and cinnamon.

I’ll never forget it. The pictures were horrible. Like I cannot even believe it. And I remember just like somewhat random person commented on one of, not that recipe, but a different recipe. And I remember running out to tell my secretary, Colleen, like some random person on the internet, like saw my content and yes, that was so exciting to me.

But I also, I don’t know if you felt this way, I think at that time it really unlocked for me this idea that. Maybe I am creative because, you know, I thought being creative men, I had to sit and draw pictures, which I cannot do still to this day. But when I started like, oh, I can take pictures and I can write, and I like designing things on Canva at the time, and you know, things like that.

I thought maybe I have a little bit of a creativity spark in me that I didn’t know existed.

Pat Flynn: Yeah.

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah. So I did that and then I started a health coaching business.

Pat Flynn: Oh, a health coach. So, okay, so food, health coach. Yeah. There’s something about. How quickly you can create right back in blogging. It’s like you write something, you post it and it’s like it’s out there and it didn’t take years.

Like it takes, I’m sure with clients to get to the end goal or with architecture, it was like years to build these buildings and draw up these plans. But you know, I could write a blog post and post it out and then I could do another one tomorrow and I can do another one tomorrow. And it’s like every day was like a renewed energy in this creation and, and I still feel that.

So you went from food blog to health, kind of just like talking about the things you, you were kind of doing already anyway, did those things take off like you wanted them to and how did you land into the one that actually started to work for you?

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah, so I started the health coaching business and still ran that while I was still working as an attorney.

And then I actually negotiated with the firm for me to work halftime but keep my full-time salary, which was something else, and I don’t know how. That’s awesome. Did that, but I did.

Pat Flynn: Yeah, there’s a book right there.

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah. If you bring in enough business, they’ll kind of look the other way. So that was helpful.

But I wanted that time to kinda build up some capital and get the coaching business. So I had some clients here and there, but actually a funnier thing happened, Pat. I was like, okay, well when I stop being a lawyer, because I was still blaming everything on being a lawyer, everything was legal’s fault and my boss’s fault and all of that kinda stuff.

So when I go and become a health coach, like clearly everything’s gonna be smooth sailing. Well, I start coaching and I do get some clients. Mostly lawyer related people, but I get these clients and I’m like, I hate this. This is not for me. And first of all, this doesn’t make any sense to me to do one-to-one time trade.

Like even as a business woman, I was like, this doesn’t, and I just didn’t feel like I was very good at it. So that’s when I started exploring things like courses and, oh, can I create a digital product? Like let me see what else is out there. And in doing so, I could not stop people from contacting me saying, Hey, I saw that you’re a lawyer and you also do this.

So like, do I need an LLC for this like little online business that I’m trying to start? Or what kind of contract do I need for selling a digital product? And I was like, why are you asking me? Surely there must be somebody who’s out there doing it, right? So I started poking around, started doing research, and I’m like, I see a big hole in the market, and that’s when I decided it was about a year into my health coaching business. That’s when I decided to start a legal templates business. And that took off right away.

Pat Flynn: Yes. And that’s what I know has blown up for you. What year was that Legal template shop sort of started?

Sam Vander Wielen: I started in the beginning of 2017,

Pat Flynn: 2017. So I mean, that wasn’t a long, long time ago when it felt like, okay, I have to be early in order to succeed. I mean, there were, I’m sure other resources I know like LegalZoom existed and other things like that. Why did yours take off? What was it that you did to get this in front of more people?

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah, so I felt very seriously about the fact that there needed to be somebody who was very chill, somebody who was laid back, somebody who did not use fear as the primary driver of their marketing, which is not my personality, and I’m kind of divorced from this whole lawyer thing. I’m just kind of like, Hey guys, this is what you need to do.

But like, I’m not like shoving it down your throat. I’m not telling you you’re gonna lose everything if you don’t do this. It’s just like, Hey, you wanna start a business, these are the three steps you need to take. And that’s it. And I was just very laid back about it. I was never in the business of telling people that they needed stuff that they didn’t need.

I think speaking a little bit of truth about some of the things I saw going on in the online business, like business coaches who called themselves millionaires, ’cause their business generated seven figures and they don’t even know the difference between like net worth and money generated in their business.

So I started talking about these things and I think what I heard resoundingly over and over in the beginning was, where have you been? This is what we’ve been looking for. Wow. Yeah. And then also just being somebody, I guess, who also had started a coaching business and then they were like, oh, you get it.

You get what I’m doing. You know what an online course is. I don’t have to explain it to you. Like LegalZoom, they’re not gonna understand what you’re doing with the podcast at the time, especially people didn’t really get it.

Pat Flynn: Yeah. I’m hearing two things that absolutely worked in your favor here. Number one, although the coaching business kind of failed or you did it and you realized you didn’t want to do it no more, it was still experience that has helped you build credibility and authority with those who were going through the same thing, and you were able to find out what those people needed by having once been one of those people.

And secondly, and more importantly I feel is you seems you brought your personality. Like it’s legal. It’s a scary for a lot of people. B overwhelming and just feels like, it’s just so many words. There’s too many words. I don’t know what’s going on. When you say that you were just like chill about it, how did that come out?

What did that look like? Was it blog posts that you were writing? It doesn’t feel like you just created like a Shopify store and were like, here are the templates. How were you showing up?

Sam Vander Wielen: So the very first thing I did, I built my own website through WordPress, but it created a WooCommerce site with all my legal templates.

I started studying SEO ’cause I was thinking off the bat, my kind of business is gonna be a very googleable business. People are obviously looking for these things. So that was one thing I wrote, 10 very SEO optimized blog posts off the bat that were pretty general, that led to lead magnets that were very specific to those blog posts.

So I accidentally took email list building very seriously early on. But I also thought about it from a like an image perspective. So I took this really seriously. Like I remember when I. Did all of my branding. When I started, I looked at all of the color psychology and I didn’t want any reds, any yellows, any orange, anything that signified fear or alarm.

I wanted all blues and greens and things that were calming and that felt very chill, and I was very adamant when I did my first photo shoot, for example, that I was wearing normal clothes, no lawyer stuff. Everybody tries to put me in suits and blazers. Every time I go to do a photo shoot, I’m like, that is the opposite because I wanna make sure that I’m connoting this is not it. I also tapped into what I knew my audience liked, and this has been a strategy I’ve used my entire, I’m still doing this, but I talk about other things that I know that my customers also enjoy. So I talk about food, I talk about travel. I have a dog. I share about ’em all the time.

I talk about my personal journey of what’s happened with my parents dying and me having brain surgery. So that stuff has pulled in. I’m a lawyer who has over 46,000 people on my email list. The fact that 46,000 people wanna get an email from a lawyer with legal tips, I’m like, you guys can do anything.

But it’s also because I have talked about and expanded these other things and the sales have only grown and grown.

Pat Flynn: Those personal things have played such a major role for you, and it has for me. I think everybody listening to this knows that I’m a huge Back To The Future fan. They were there when my son was born and when he came on the podcast and now he’s like got a deeper voice than I do now and doesn’t wanna spend as much time with me anymore. But that’s just what teenage life is. And so like even just by sharing that right now, right? I’m making a connection with people who’ve gone through that before or who understand it. It brings the human element into this, and especially for legal.

It’s no surprise that it, it worked for you. Absolutely. So combining the personality with what seems like really good internet marketing tactics. So you mentioned SEO, you mentioned building an email list. What else has been working for you to grow this business? And if you could share in any I. Way that you’re comfortable, like how big has this business grown?

Sam Vander Wielen: So it’s been a multi seven figure business every single year since 2020.

Pat Flynn: Gee whiz. How much did the template sell for?

Sam Vander Wielen: An individual legal template is $3.47. But my number one, and I think this is another thing that I would, another tip I would give to, to the audience of, of what’s led to this success is I only sell two things.

So I sell all my legal templates a la carte, but then I also sell this program called The Ultimate Bundle that gives people 14 legal templates and then all of these video trainings from me teaching them how to get an LLC, how to get business insurance, how to get their contracts in place, get trademarks and copyrights, for example, gives them community that sells like crazy.

We just had a $348,000 launch in four days, two weeks ago. And so yes, we sell a lot of legal stuff and I think that, I mean, a lot of the stuff we’ve talked about has helped, but actually there’s an email marketing strategy that I’ve been using for the past year that’s working really well, which is that.

You know, I’ve always been a freebies person and have lots of good freebies that people can opt into. I have a webinar people can watch, but I also knew that my email itself is really valuable. So just getting my email every week is a lot of value. I answer legal questions. I update an online business news every week.

It’s very similar to yours. There’s just if filled with like lots of valuable sections, and so I started marketing directly to the newsletter itself as the freebie essentially, and just made it super easy for people to get on my email list without going through this long funnel, and that has worked beautifully.

So that’s been going well.

Pat Flynn: And you’re using Kit for email?

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah, so I use Kit. I’ve used them the whole time and I have a podcast called On Your Terms. So that has worked. That has been much more of a nurture tool. I will admit. I originally started it as more of a lead gen for me has been a very big nurture tool, which is awesome and great.

And I’m on YouTube too.

Pat Flynn: How are you getting people to sign up to a legal newsletter and to have launches that big? It seems like you’d need either a lot of people, I’m still baffled by how you can, let’s get a little bit deeper on, let’s say you’re building this email list. How are you number one, getting in front of them and then convincing them to come over for legal advice that like are they in need of that and that’s why, or is there something else?

Sam Vander Wielen: I would say yes, most of the time it is why when I send out an email every single Tuesday, my inbox stings like crazy. And what I see Ruth replies and what I see again and again is like you are one of the only people whose emails I read. I love your email. I love your email. I think I have combined this personal element, so my email always starts with some sort of personal essay.

It’s usually some sort of lesson, like the guy I saw at the farmer’s market, for example, who would not like start his sourdough business, but kept telling everybody he was going to. That became one of my most popular emails last year and we did this like deep dive into why this guy would not start his sourdough business.

And I turn this into a business lesson and then there’s a section about like a legal q and a where they can submit. Oh, that’s great. So. I have done, I think a good job with like the visuals of it. I share a lot about the visuals on Instagram, on my podcast, on YouTube now. Really pushing people to it, but I think we have some pretty quippy copy.

It helps. Yeah.

Pat Flynn: Yeah,

Sam Vander Wielen: That’s great. I love that.

Pat Flynn: Pulling these stories that are just happening in real life and and bringing a lesson into it. And that one I’m imagining that I haven’t gotten that email. I haven’t subscribed, although I will now. Tell me about that email in particular. You tell that story.

How does it lead into the business stuff that you’re talking about?

Sam Vander Wielen: This is like a perfect example. So I go, last summer, I go to the farmer’s market. Every single Sunday I’m waiting in line. This guy near me makes the best sourdough I’ve ever had. He’s an engineer turned sourdough, artisan, unbelievable.

This guy. So he bought a space in our little downtown and he has been telling people for like five years that he is gonna start a bakery every week. His line at the farmer’s market is wrapped around the block. He sells out every week and every person in line in front of you will just be like, Hey, Jeff, when’s the bakery opening?

And he’s like, oh, I’m getting there. I’m getting there. It’s coming along. And every week I’m just like, I cannot listen to this anymore. And so I was talking to him last summer and I said, what’s the deal? What’s going on with this bakery? And he is like, oh. Well, I come here, I sell the bread, and then I take that money and I turn around and I go pay for myself to go do the plumbing and learn how to do electrical and put in the sinks.

And I was like, oh Jeff, we have to get this bakery up and running and like you just can get started. You know, I started talking about like the MVP stuff I write about in the book of just get this product out there and this doesn’t have to be a world class bakery at this point. Let’s just get it up and running, get people in the door. In the email I tell the story and I turned it around of this careful balance between getting up and running and we can’t wait. And doing everything ourselves right can cost us so much more money. And I turned that into a call to action about how you shouldn’t try to do legal yourself. And I think we had a $12,000 day.

That’s amazing. Just from that email, which we weren’t in like a sale or a promo or anything like that. Yeah, yeah. It’s like a great analogy of like. You can keep trying to be your own plumber and your own electrician and all of that, and you’re gonna have a line out the door waiting, asking you, when are you ready?

I wanna give you more money and you’re not even ready to take it, so why don’t we get it up and running?

Pat Flynn: That’s great. That’s an amazing story. So that’s something that happened in your real life. Are you keeping track of these stories or how are you collecting them or how are you finding them? Because storytelling, I’m trying to preach it here at SPI, it’s, in my opinion, the number one most important skill that anybody can have nowadays as information just gets completely overwhelming.

You know, it’s all the same now. So it’s this, it’s how you wrap that information just like you just did. So, tell me your storytelling collection strategies. I guess you could say,

Sam Vander Wielen: this is my number one thing. I love it so much. I think of about it constantly. Every single thing I see when I’m out and about it immediately flips in my mind as to how that is a business lesson.

Everything I see at the gym, at the grocery store, every show I watch. So I do keep a note on my phone. I have a more serious list in Asana that I keep, you know, kind of running where I’ll develop these ideas a bit more. Some are nothing. Some I look back and I’m like, what was I talking about? I don’t, you know, or something like I thought was a good idea at the time, but I’ll tell you, people love it.

I, I was just on a podcast the other day. I joked that I think I could write about like a peanut in the grocery store and turn it into an email. Like, I just, I feel like you can take anything, anything that you see, think about like what is the metaphor here with the analogy and how can this be a lesson for my audience.

Pat Flynn: Gosh, you are speaking my language. I said something similar to somebody a couple years ago when I was talking about storytelling. How, you know, I just told ’em to point to something and I could just create some lesson around that. And I think it’s just the idea of consciously saying, you know what?

I’m going to have a more open mind, open my eyes a little bit more, open my ears a little bit more to everything that’s around me. It’s there like there’s an endless amount of content that you can create. Yes, there’s only a limited amount of information that you can share, but there’s an endless amount of ways to share it.

So go and find those things that are relatable. And like you said, that bakery story is probably super relatable to your specific target audience, so that’s fantastic. Tell me a little bit more about the book. The book thing is interesting ’cause I’m in the middle of a book right now as well. So I number one empathize with you and everything that you’re going through right now leading up to the launch, and I wanna congratulate you ’cause by the time people listen to this, it’s probably out there already and the title is, When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy(?).

Sam Vander Wielen: I was being sarcastic.

Pat Flynn: Sarcastic. That that is sarcastic.

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah. There’s a little question mark. I don’t know if you’ve actually seen the cover. Oh yeah, I, but there’s a little hand drawn question mark on there. ’cause I wanted it to be like an upward inflection, like you’re asking a question.

Pat Flynn: I see it.

So tell me about the title and who this book is for and really what it’s about.

Sam Vander Wielen: We came up with this idea for the title because I wanted to dispel this myth. Off the bat, in the book, I have this chapter called Setting Expectations That. A business is going to fix your life that a business is meant to provide you with your happiness.

I feel like that’s been a big lesson for me where it was like, why did I ever think like it was my job’s job to make me happy? I hope my happiness comes from nothing to do with my job, and then my job is just my job and that’s okay. And I love what I do. That has nothing to do with it, but it doesn’t need to provide me, it doesn’t like owe me anything.

I mean, there’s still a lot that’s stressful about running a business. So I, I sort of wanted to dispel that myth both on just the practical side, but also because I know that new entrepreneurs, maybe people listening to this, are coming into the online business world and they’re getting hit with a lot of content from a lot of people who have motivation to sell them something and they’re not telling them really the truth about what it’s like to run this kind of business and really what it takes.

And so, I’m from Philly originally and I kind of can’t help it, but just like tell the truth and kind of how, how it is. And so part of the book was about that. And then a lot of people over the last eight years who have stuck around on my email list and elsewhere have been like, by the way, how have you built this kind of business?

Like you’re a lawyer does this and you only sell two things and you’ve had all these horrible things happen to you and like how are you able to do this? And so I really wanted to like give it all away. I taught my funnel building strategy. How I think about email list building, the way I turn all of these stories into content, it is all in the book.

Pat Flynn: I love it. So you share a lot of the tactical things in there as well, but like your email, I’m sure there are some stories in there that make an impact. I’m curious if you could surface one or two of those and why they’re relevant to us as business owners.

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, I talk a lot about how when I started this business I didn’t really think it would go anywhere.

I didn’t know, I wasn’t really sure, and it did grow. It’s obviously grown quite an audience over the years and how that also brought up a lot of things like how you might not think, one of the things you might be thinking when I start my business, I’ll be happy, but you might not consider the fact that when you start your business, you’ll feel a bit exposed.

You will have imposter syndrome. Even sitting here today, I have it all the time and I am still terrified to go do so many different things. I’m speaking at ConvertKit, I’m terrified to go do that. And, you know, all of these things still come up. So I talk a lot about, you know, these various moments throughout the years of that coming up.

I share a really fun, so my dad passed away and he was like my best friend. And so I share this cute story about how when I started this business, he, he didn’t take it seriously because I didn’t have a briefcase. And so he, he thought that like all serious businesses required like a person caring for you, and he was just like, I don’t get it.

Like, you’re on your computer. And like, that’s it. You know? He was a little older and so he didn’t get it. But it, it’s this like really fun chapter talking about how other people might not quite understand what you do and not looking to other people maybe for your approval of like what you’re doing or understanding and staying very focused on your target audience and consumer too.

Pat Flynn: Yeah, I love that. I remember my dad going to work with a briefcase as well, and I was wondered what was inside. I I, yeah. I never knew. I never found out, like it could have just been like, there’s lots of papers, candy, or something. I have no idea.

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah.

Pat Flynn: But yeah, I mean like now that we have. Laptops and stuff that’s essentially a briefcase to the world.

But you know, as far as what it takes to succeed in business. You just lightly touched on that. I’d love to hear maybe your bird’s eye perspective of, of all the things it takes, it sounds like in your opinion, it takes some personality and, and being yourself, you know, finding an audience and, and kind of staying narrow and who you serve and why you serve them and what you serve them with.

What else does it take to succeed in business through your experience?

Sam Vander Wielen: I think it takes creating a really good product that actually, or service or whatever, but that actually works and that helps people and that you are really good at quickly explaining to me like, what is this thing? Why has it helped me? Why should I care about it and what’s different about it than the other things that are offered?

Pat Flynn: It’s so funny you mention that ’cause it’s like, isn’t that obvious? Like, shouldn’t we sell something that works?

Sam Vander Wielen: I don’t think that, I write about this so much in the book about how, like, just come back to making sure you do a really good job.

Like I, I talk a lot about, in the book about how my product itself, not only like the ultimate bundle, for example, we have a little over 4,000 people in in. People love it. But then also I provide really, really good customer service. I still answer all of my emails. I’m in the community every day answering customers questions.

They then go out and tell lots of other people about it, and it’s the best form of marketing that I could possibly ask for. And so, yeah, I don’t know why we overcomplicate it with all these like tips and tricks and trends, and I’m like, my product is really good. I’m really good at explaining it because I understand what you need and what problem it solves and why that will help you.

And then I just show up and do a really good job with the product and instead of running off and creating 300 other products, I just focus on making this one better and then getting those same people to purchase additional things for me if I have other things to offer.

Pat Flynn: Yeah, that’s clearly laid out.

However, we are always battling with more and,

you know, bright light syndrome and this over here, this happening over here. How do you battle that? I mean, you had mentioned earlier you see business opportunities everywhere. You see stories everywhere. Are you getting pulled by other things and, and how do you stay in your lane?

What are some mechanisms you use to make sure you’re still focused on what you should be focused on?

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah, I think that’s one time when my dad had leukemia and I was taking care of him, and then he passed away and then my mom died. I feel like that helped me accidentally just really keep my head down. I didn’t have the ability, I’m sure a lot of people can relate who maybe have other more positive things going on.

Like maybe you’ve had a child or you have another job, like you don’t have the luxury of doom scrolling, you know, and that that wasn’t even on my radar. And that’s also what then pushed me to be like, how can I, I’ve heard about this thing called funnels. How can I create an evergreen funnel? And I went out and created that and bucked the trend of I never ran it live because I didn’t have time.

I couldn’t afford to, I needed to go straight to it. And so I think tuning into some of those things of like just keeping your eye on the prize. I talk a lot in the book about keeping your head down and eyes on your own paper. Very like school like rules. And I know for me, social media is such a, a vice, like where I get drawn into it sometimes and that’s when I notice that my attention starts to drift.

And when I can disconnect from that, I can tune back into like my email list is my money maker, any of my other lead generations or my money maker, I can just focus on that and let ads even do the work, for example, if I want to do that. But that seems to be like the worst thing for my attention.

Pat Flynn: That’s great advice.

Are you active on social? And when you are, how do you not get pulled into those rabbit holes that we often can get pulled? Those algorithms that are just like, they know us better than we know ourselves sometimes, like you’re engaged with your audience, but what do you do? How do you manage that?

Sam Vander Wielen: So I’m on Instagram.

I’m at @ SamVanderWielen and on Instagram, but I flirt with it. I spend too much time and then I will pull back. But my rule with Instagram or with social media in general, from day one, has always been if I’m creating content for this platform, the content itself at least is going to be evergreen so that if somebody finds this today or six months from now, it still has a call to action to my top of funnel, and it’s everything I do there is to pull in email list leads. So I’m not showing up there to talk about other nonsense. Everything there is going straight to my email list and I have as many Instagram followers as I have email list, and I don’t think that’s by accident because I have spent a lot of time there just being like, if I’m showing up here, this is what I’m doing and I use it to connect personally with some people, but yeah, frankly, it’s something I was, I spent a lot of the last several months thinking about if I had my druthers, I would not really be on it. I would just, and a lot of my friends will be like, why can’t you? I mean, you, you can, I think it’s, it’s more of a mental thing that I think there’s some reason I have to, but people I look up to like you for example, although you have a following, I know you are not personally there all the time, spending all your time there and you have much bigger fish to fry and so that’s more of the direction I’d like to go in moving forward. Yeah.

Pat Flynn: I found that with all the choices out there, pick the one or two that you’re gonna focus on, and I like to call it opt out of those other ones. Right? It’s not, I’m losing out on those opportunities I choose not to go there so that I can say yes to here and put more effort and time to there.

And for me in particular, ’cause I’m not great and disciplined when I’m on social, I give myself time, boundaries. I have this much time to create on there and maybe there’s a little bit of nonsense in some of those places from my end, but I know that at some point I’m done and then I can move on to the next thing that’s in my calendar.

These are really, really important pieces of advice and we could continue to talk for hours, I’m sure. And I’m looking forward to meeting you in person, Sam, at the Craft and Commerce. ’cause you’re gonna be speaking on stage there with me. Not at the same time, but like, you know, we’re on the same stage there.

I love that event. And by then I’ll be able to hear how your book is done and I’m really excited about that. And hopefully you can wish me luck on mine as soon as it’s just freshly released while at that event. But super happy that you’re here. I’d love to ask you one final question. You know, we talked about a lot of things.

If you could distill for the beginner entrepreneur who’s listening right now, the one most important piece of advice from your perspective to help them get to that next level, to help them move forward, what would that piece of advice be?

Sam Vander Wielen: To really tune into what your customers or the people you want to be, your customers are looking for, and to where we really have to step back and make sure we’re not creating content, products, or services that we want because we think it’s a good idea, but creating it really from their perspective and what they’re asking for, or at the very least, focusing all your marketing messaging on them. I work very hard to talk to customers, get tons of voice of customer research, and literally take exact words and phrases that they say, and you will see it every day in my content, in my emails.

It’s very, very intentional and I think that has been a big, big driver. So I would encourage you to get in touch with people, ask them to meet you on Zoom, get on a call, do what you have to do, ask their permission to, the lawyer and me will tell you, ask their permission to get, uh, the recording. And you can even use tools now that like track commonalities and phrases people use and, and really pay attention to that stuff.

The stuff is in the details.

Pat Flynn: And of course, I know the answer to, to this question, which is if you need some legal templates and figure out how to do this correctly, head over to SamVanderWielen.com and we’ll have the links in the show notes for everybody and check out the new book, When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy(?). Question mark. There’s a question mark at the end there. Thank you again for your time today. This was absolutely amazing. Where can people find you on Instagram just before you go?

Sam Vander Wielen: Yeah. I’m at @SamVanderWielen on Instagram. And then On Your Terms is my podcast, if you like listening to podcasts.

Pat Flynn: Yes. And you’re listening to a podcast right now, so go ahead and subscribe.

It’ll be very easy to go find that On Your Terms and, Sam, thank you so much for this. This was amazing and I wish you all the best with the book and everything else. Good job.

Sam Vander Wielen: Thank you so much. Thank you.

Pat Flynn: All right. I hope you enjoyed that interview and conversation with Sam Vander Wielen, and definitely check out our book When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy(?) question mark once again, and also check out our podcast, On Your Terms, since you’re listening to this podcast already. And if you need some legal templates, SamVanderWielen.com, and I look forward to potentially seeing some of you over in Boise at Craft and Commerce. Go ahead and check out that event.

Would love to meet you there. Would be happy to sign a book there for you as well, and I’m sure that Sam would too if you pick it up. So definitely check it out. Thank you, Sam.

Thank you for listening all the way through and we got an amazing episode next week about your energy and managing expectations and continuing to move forward despite things maybe getting hard sometimes. So if that sounds right up your alley or you wanna make sure you avoid burnout, definitely hit subscribe. I look forward to that episode and hanging out with you next week. Till then, cheers, take care. Thank you for all the amazing reviews coming in on Apple, and I’ll see you in the next one.

Bye.