Salome Schillack (00:00):
Hello, and welcome to episode number 135 of The Shine Show. Today, I have asked some of my team members, some incredibly smart women, who I'm sure wouldn't mind if I call them very geeky, we absolute geek out on all things funnels and Facebook Ads, and online course launching and marketing together, so I invited them to come on the show and share with us some of the predictions that they are making for how online marketing is changing in 2022.You're going to hear from Hana Abello. Hana is the Ads Manager inside our own agency. She is also in charge of all of the data and analytics in my business and for our clients.You're going to hear from Louise Griffiths, one of the most experienced launch managers in the world, I'm going to say. She is also my Chief Marketing Officer and she coaches students inside The Launch Lounge on their launch strategy.

You'll also hear from Amy Wyhoon. Amy is a Facebook Ad specialist. She is one of the coaches inside The Launch Lounge, and you will find her, if she's not finding awesome places where you can eat in Melbourne, then she is available at sugarpopsocial.com.au, where she has her own Facebook Ads clients.

And you'll hear from our very own beloved part of the furniture, Caroline Fenton, who is an Facebook Ad specialist. She is a funnels specialist, and she's a consultant who works inside my business, to help us really help our clients to fix their funnels and get the most out of their advertising, and she's also a content contributor inside The Launch Lounge, where she is responsible for making sure everyone always stays up to date with what's happening in Facebook Ads land.

Those are the four incredible women, Hana, Louise, Amy and Caroline, who have generously come on board and shared with us their predictions for 2022, so that you know exactly where to put your money, and what to do in terms of marketing, so that you can build and scale your online courses business successfully in the environment that is the online marketing world in 2022, enjoy the show.

Giving up your time and freedom to make money is so 2009. Hi, I'm your host, Salome Schillack, and I help online course creators launch grow and scale their businesses with Facebook and Instagram ads, so that they can make more money and have an even bigger impact in the world.

If you're ready to be inspired to dream bigger, launch sooner, and grow your online business faster, then tune in, because you are ready to shine, and this is The Shine Show.

Salome Schillack (03:15):
Hello, Hana, and thank you for joining us.

Hana (03:18):
Thanks, Salome. I am super-excited to be here on your show.

Salome Schillack (03:23):
Well, I'm very happy to have you here. I wish I could share ... if I can share just 0.01% of the magic that is inside your brain with the listeners, then it'll be incredibly valuable.

Salome Schillack (03:39):
So I wonder, can you share with us, what are your predictions for the way that we need to change our marketing in 2022?

Hannah (03:48):
Yeah, so this year with iOS 14 affecting Facebook's ability to track user activities outside of the platform, we've seen how much that had an impact on the cost results.

Salome Schillack (04:04):
Yes.

Hannah (04:05):
So it's definitely more expensive to achieve results in Facebook now, but more especially for people, brands, and businesses who were getting by with mediocre funnels and mediocre marketing, so people are now realizing that Facebook is less forgiving now to brands whose marketing funnels are not on point.

Salome Schillack (04:28):
Yeah. Yeah.

Hannah (04:29):
So now brands will need to, more than ever, look at what their marketing numbers are telling them, and they cannot keep ignoring their numbers now. So there's going to be a lot more focus on data-driven marketing, so that they can fix the gaps in their marketing, in their funnels, in their messaging, so that they can continue to make paid advertising a sustainable strategy for them, or to identify whether it's still profitable for them to keep running ads on which platforms and which channels.

Salome Schillack (05:04):
Whoa, there's so much in what you just said. I think that is so true. So winging it marketing is no longer working. The winging it, throwing spaghetti on the wall, is not going to work anymore, and you're saying the best way to know, well, a, we need to purposefully create funnels that convert, but the way that we know our funnels are converting and the way that we know what to do, is by having better data tracking.

Hannah (05:36):
Correct.

Salome Schillack (05:37):
Yeah. So what are some of the data that online course creators need to be tracking?

Hannah (05:43):
Definitely, they need to be tracking the numbers on Facebook, but also verifying those numbers on the back end. So it's not enough to just look at the data on Ads Manager. They need to back that up with data from Google Analytics, with data they're seeing on their CRM, so that they can make better business decisions.

Salome Schillack (06:07):
Yeah, that's true. So instead of just going, "Well, Facebook said I got four leads today. My CRM is showing me that I actually got six," and so then they can make better decisions.

Hannah (06:19):
Correct.

Salome Schillack (06:20):
Yeah, and this is particularly true for big launches, right?

Hannah (06:24):
Right.

Salome Schillack (06:25):
Yeah. Wow. Okay. What else are we looking for?

Hannah (06:29):
So another effect of the increasing costs of advertising this year, is that there will be more focus on retention than acquisition. So we know from research that it costs five times as much to attract a new customer as it does to keep a new one, and so course creators and brands, or more especially course creators are going to be very interested in building and planning out their ascension models-

Salome Schillack (07:01):
I love that.

Hannah (07:02):
... so that they can increase their customer lifetime value and make the most of their marketing spend.

Salome Schillack (07:08):
I love that so much, and that's one of the things we focus on in The Launch Lounge is, once you have your course sold and you have it profitable, then you start building that ascension model building that backend membership, or the group coaching, or the next thing that comes after that, or you're adding in a low dollar thing in the front en, so that online course creators end up with multiple ... maybe, just one entry point into their world, but then multiple layers of sources of income. Is that what you're saying?

Hannah (07:48):
Exactly, yep.

Salome Schillack (07:49):
Yeah, so then do we then look towards ads more for lead generation than for conversion, so more for list building and bringing people into our worlds, than for actually making sales. Is that what you're saying?

Hannah (08:09):
Yes, and also using paid advertising as an extra touch point to get in front of your customers again and again.

Salome Schillack (08:17):
Oh, I love that, but can we do that with retargeting being more difficult? How do we do that now?

Hannah (08:24):
We need to make sure that we have a big enough audience to target, and definitely what will help is integrating your platform. So if there is a native integration of your CRM and you can connect it to Facebook so that it can add people automatically to your custom audiences, to your targeting audiences, then that will make your audience size, the audience size that you're targeting, bigger, and you can get your ads delivered and get them in front of the people that you want to get in in front of.

Salome Schillack (09:02):
I love that. And another way that we're hijacking that system a bit also, is by using more video ads, right?

Hannah (09:11):
Correct. So we're trying to keep people on Facebook more and getting them to engage with our videos, and retargeting them with our next level content.

Salome Schillack (09:24):
So smart. Well, Hana, thank you so much for your predictions. I am really glad you're on my team and I get to tap into your wisdom about data and analytics, and all these things, and customer acquisition and all the big tech words that Facebook Ads people throw out that us poor marketers don't always understand.

Hannah (09:50):
Yeah. I'm super-happy to be a geek on team seller with you.

Salome Schillack (09:54):
Oh, that makes me very happy. Well, thank you for your predictions, and I can't wait to see how this plays out.

Hannah (10:01):
Thank you.

Salome Schillack (10:04):
All right. Bye.

Hannah (10:05):
Bye.

Salome Schillack (10:07):
Hello, Louise.

Louise Griffiths (10:08):
Hey, how are you?

Salome Schillack (10:09):
I'm great. Thank you for coming on the show and sharing.

Louise Griffiths (10:14):
My pleasure.

Salome Schillack (10:15):
You are one of the smartest people I know, and I can't wait to suck your brain dry of all the things that you think are going to happen in 2022, and what marketers should be preparing for. So you and I were talking a little bit about SMS marketing or text marketing. What do you see happening there?

Louise Griffiths (10:37):
Yeah, I think that a lot of this has been driven by some of the challenges with some of the data that we're losing with all the iOS updates and things as well. But I think in general, it's like everything. If we think back, it used to be exciting to get an email and now we're completely inundated, and people are actually excited to be getting physical mail sometimes now too. And I think that's what I'm seeing mostly, is that people are really overwhelmed in their inboxes, and text messaging seems to be this ... there's just a bit more space, and people are more likely to connect, and more people are getting used to, I think, being marketed through text.

Louise Griffiths (11:18):
I think that some places have been doing it for a while and they've been doing it wrong, and they're very spammy, but I think one of the things with text messaging that's really coming along is the technology, and there's this opportunity to text to get updates and things like that during launches, so I think there's a lot more opportunity now as marketers to be able to use it effectively, to connect with people.

Louise Griffiths (11:42):
Imagine getting busy, and then getting a reminder that the webinar starts in five minutes. I think we're just more likely to see it now as a text message.

Salome Schillack (11:50):
Yeah.

Louise Griffiths (11:50):
So I think for me, that's one of the things I think is going to grow a lot next year.

Salome Schillack (11:54):
I like that. I like that, and you're right. There are so many people doing it so badly, that it does have a bad rap, but when people do it well ... I know my local GP, the local doctors do it really well, in that they sent me a text message with a link to an online booking for just regular flu jabs, and it saved me so much time and energy because it was so easy, and I was so grateful for getting that text message, and I shared it with a friend of mine the other day and she said she got a similar one from her dentist or something, and they also made it super-easy for her to just click a button and book a session and come in, because she'd been thinking about doing it, but because it involves either going online or phoning, she'd been procrastinating.

Louise Griffiths (12:46):
That's it.

Salome Schillack (12:47):
So she was really appreciative. So I can see how it works really well for local businesses and, like you say, for us, for webinars, for people to actually say, "Yes, please send me a reminder," that's a really good idea.

Salome Schillack (13:01):
Do you think it's going to replace email marketing?

Louise Griffiths (13:04):
No, I don't think so. I think there's always going to be a place for emails. I think it's always going to be that bread and butter of what we do. There's a lot that can be said in email that you can't really get across in a text message, but I think it's just that ability to remind people and update people. We've been testing it as, you can take part in this challenge and this launch and do everything that you want to do, but if you want to get the bonus content, then text this word to X and X, and you'll get texted the bonus content each day. And it's just a way to find those people that are the hottest people amongst your launch. If they're wanting the extra content and they're engaging with the extra content, then they're more likely to convert, and they're more likely to feel connected as well, so I think it's a really good supporting channel, for now anyway.

Louise Griffiths (13:56):
I don't think we're going to be moving away from email as such, but I think it's just one of those really interesting ones. I think that everything we dreamed we could do with savor marketing ads for example, that seems to be slowly disappearing as we lose pixel data, that ability to remind people and follow people, so it's just giving us another avenue to do that.

Salome Schillack (14:15):
Yeah, and I love what you say, that it's a way to build connection with our warmest people, because I think that's why it gets a bad rap, is because when it's used badly, it's used to push things on cold people that they didn't want, but if it's used to connect deeper with people who invite the connection, crave the connection, want the connection, have signed up for the connection, and have said, "Yes please, I don't want to miss out on this thing. Please send me a message," then it is incredibly helpful.

Salome Schillack (14:49):
And speaking of connection, do you think that's another big way that marketing is changing in 2022?

Louise Griffiths (14:57):
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. My theme words that I feel like I'm taking into the new year are community and connection.

Louise Griffiths (15:04):
I think for me, I'm seeing it across the board, that people are craving not necessarily bigger launches, they just want to feel more connected during their launches to the people that are in them. And we're moving into this phase, I think, with launching in a way where we're really craving that closer connection, we wanted to get to know the people that are in our launches and serve them as best we can, rather than going for the big numbers necessarily.

Louise Griffiths (15:33):
And I think that as every industry gets saturated, that's really one of the ways that you can stand out as well. People just want to feel ... I think that goes back to the text messaging too, is you want to get them deeper into your world and be connecting with you on multiple platforms, and I really feel like next year, especially now that everyone's not stuck at home on their computers anymore, it's going to be more important than ever to harness those connections, as people start to move around a lot more and things as well, and not on their phone 24/7, like they have been.

Salome Schillack (16:08):
Yeah. Yeah. You know, I think everything you say is so true, and I think it's also just an effect of where the world is at, how the world is changing, and I think COVID has really sped up this change from this very masculine, patriarchal system that we lived in, where hard work and grind and live launches, and these short, fast bursts of energy, which is a very masculine way of doing things, and we're seeing a trend towards ... which is so delightful, and it's new to us. We haven't seen evidence of this. We haven't seen examples of this much, but we're seeing more and more, it going towards the more feminine values of connection and community and relationship, and that's so nice because at the end of the day, selling something to someone should be a joyful transaction that adds value to both those people.

Salome Schillack (17:14):
I think when we overly use scarcity and urgency and all the things that has traditionally been synonymous with selling and marketing and live launching, I think we're going to come into this phase where we're going to see a lot more launches, not launches necessarily, but courses and memberships. I think memberships, just the move to more memberships, is already more of a feminine thing than a course, and the sort of, when you're ready, you know where it is, come and join us when you're ready, and selling becomes more of a relationship. It's more respectful. It's just more of a-

Louise Griffiths (17:57):
Yeah, and I think in a way, that's why launches in general can get a bad rap, because it feels like it's this short burst of stress, and get more people in and that sort of thing, like you've been talking about, and I really want people to start thinking of launches as that connection at the end of all that list building and community work that you've been doing in the months before. It shouldn't feel like going into a launch is that huge burst that comes out of nowhere.

Louise Griffiths (18:26):
I think that going into next year too, just feeling that beautiful runway just flows so nicely into the launches that it becomes part of a connected experience, and that really goes back to what you've been saying.

Louise Griffiths (18:38):
I've been noticing the same with the move to memberships, and I think that just that model seems to suit a lot of people as well, and that really comes down to, I think, some people's desire to build more of that ongoing community in that way.

Salome Schillack (18:53):
Yeah, I love it. I think the whole landscape is going to change in a few years, but next year definitely, everyone keep your eyes open for more feminine ways of building connection, building community, and then using the technology that we have, like text messaging, to just take those people who are super-warm even deeper. Thank you so much, Louise.

Louise Griffiths (19:13):
My pleasure.

Salome Schillack (19:15):
Hello, Amy.

Amy Wyhoon (19:17):
Hi, Salome.

Salome Schillack (19:18):
Thank you for being here and for sharing your predictions for 2022 with the listeners.

Amy Wyhoon (19:25):
That's okay. It's crazy that we're already here.

Salome Schillack (19:30):
I know, I know, but I feel like it could not come any sooner. I'm ready to put 2021 to bed.

Amy Wyhoon (19:37):
Yeah, bring on '22.

Salome Schillack (19:39):
I know. Do you think it's going to get even crazier with iOS?

Amy Wyhoon (19:43):
Yes.

Salome Schillack (19:46):
How? In what way?

Amy Wyhoon (19:48):
I think that they're just going to ... Apple, I feel, are really going to try and monopolize things, and Apple Advertising, I reckon that's a watch this space.

Salome Schillack (20:01):
I think so too. I think so too.

Salome Schillack (20:05):
I'm glad you brought that up, because if you think about ... I have an Apple watch and an Apple phone and an Apple iPod and an Apple computer, and if I consider just the information my watch has on me, my watch knows my breaths. It knows how many breaths I take. It knows what time I get up in the morning. It knows exactly what I do. Even it's listening to us having this conversation right now, right?

Amy Wyhoon (20:30):
Absolutely.

Salome Schillack (20:31):
Yes, so on the one hand I'm like, "Oh, if Apple launches advertising, that is going to be fascinating and scary," but also I'll be the first person on that platform.

Amy Wyhoon (20:46):
Exactly, exactly. I just feel like they're still getting the information. Just because you're opting out doesn't mean that they don't have the information, so it's just a matter of time until they do something with it.

Salome Schillack (20:59):
Yeah, and the funny thing is that even though it's Apple that has brought in iOS, from Facebook's perspective and even other advertisers like YouTube and Google, it's impacting everything, not just Apple users.

Amy Wyhoon (21:16):
Yes. Yeah. It's just the way even people are using the platforms and the way advertisers are now adjusting to how they use the platforms.

Salome Schillack (21:26):
Yeah. But in a way it's nice, because we're going back to good old marketing principles and if you put all your eggs in an ad basket, you're going to struggle, but if you have diversified streams of traffic, and ascension models and layering, and if you've built your email list that's [crosstalk 00:21:47].

Amy Wyhoon (21:47):
Yes. Yes. I think that's a really big key, which is awesome for your programs, but I think it is. It's like that top of funnel, that's where it's going to come back to as well. Really building the email list and nurturing at the beginning, because that's where we can track.

Salome Schillack (22:07):
Yeah, exactly. You were saying earlier that you think it's going to be very important, what we do with our creatives. What do you think [crosstalk 00:22:17]?

Amy Wyhoon (22:16):
Yes, so in the last month or two, I've noticed a really big shift in the way ... like with Facebook rolling out the larger audiences ... so we really need to use our creative to attract and repel our ideal audience now.

Salome Schillack (22:34):
Ooh. Okay. There's so much in that one sentence you just said. So for those listeners who don't know, can you just explain what you mean when you say, "With Facebook rolling at larger audiences?"

Amy Wyhoon (22:47):
Yeah, so they've recently got rid of the little button that you could toggle on and off, which meant that you could define your audience or you could expand it, and they're saying, "No, you can only expand it going forward," so that is currently rolling out.

Amy Wyhoon (23:04):
And with that, it means that some of our audience sizes have gone from two to three million, out to 15 to 20 million, so it makes such a big difference in terms of how many people we can potentially get the ads in front of. So we need to really make sure that what we are putting out there, isn't just something random. We need to make sure that it is attracting the right people, the ones that we actually want in our courses or programs

Salome Schillack (23:36):
That is so true. That is so true. And then in combination of that, tagging them properly when they come into our email list, so that we can down the track, see if they actually converted into sales.

Amy Wyhoon (23:50):
Absolutely.

Salome Schillack (23:52):
So you were saying, because the audiences are now 20, 40 ... I saw a student yesterday with a 60 million audience ... because the audiences are so much bigger and we are relying on the algorithm to find the right people, it's even more important that our creative actually calls out to people. Is that right?

Amy Wyhoon (24:14):
Correct. Yeah, that's absolutely right.

Amy Wyhoon (24:16):
So those striking images that are actually connecting with our ideal person, and then the copy, making sure we've got the hooks in the right place, and calling them out, like what's our headline? I don't think it's like enough now to have, "Masterclass. Wednesday the fifth." It's just not enough anymore. You actually have to give them something, hook them in, reel them in, and then show them how you're going to change what it is that they're doing and make life easier for them.

Salome Schillack (24:47):
Yeah, and that is just good marketing.

Amy Wyhoon (24:51):
Absolutely. Absolutely.

Salome Schillack (24:53):
Yeah. Do you think it's important that we change up creatives regularly, or with those big audiences, do you think we can have winning creatives that runs for a long time?

Amy Wyhoon (25:07):
I'm seeing that you can sort of run creative for maybe a couple of months, and then you probably have to start testing new ones. They're not lasting as long as they used to.

Salome Schillack (25:21):
Yeah, yeah.

Amy Wyhoon (25:22):
Yeah. So constantly testing.

Salome Schillack (25:25):
Yes, and do you use a lot of dynamic creative? Dynamic creative is when we give Facebook lots of different copy options, lots of different image and video options, lots of headlines, and make them come up with lots of different combinations.

Amy Wyhoon (25:40):
No, I like to have a little bit more control.

Salome Schillack (25:45):
So managers are not control freaks.

Amy Wyhoon (25:48):
Not at all. Not at all.

Amy Wyhoon (25:50):
No, I take a little bit of that control, and I'll monitor it and test a few things at the one time, and depending on budget as well.

Salome Schillack (25:58):
That's wonderful. Thank you so much. I am going to take everything you said to heart, and I think we are going to spruce up some of our creatives for next year, and we look forward to seeing how it changes the way we create that. Thanks, Amy.

Amy Wyhoon (26:18):
Yeah. Thanks for me.

Salome Schillack (26:20):
Bye.

Amy Wyhoon (26:21):
Bye.

Caroline Fenton (26:23):
Hi, Shine Show listeners. It's Caroline here with my predictions for 2022.

Caroline Fenton (26:29):
So to start with, I think everyone's ready for a little bit of normality. The C-word that happened in 2020 and obviously continuing to '21, and then iOS in 2021 ... the last two years have really not been very normal in online marketing at all. So I think everyone's ready for a bit of stabilization and a bit of control coming back.

Caroline Fenton (26:49):
So I don't know if that's going to be accurate or not, with iOS 15 coming in, especially for email, but maybe a little bit more normal or a little bit more, at least stabilized, let's hope.

Caroline Fenton (26:59):
So my predictions, I think obviously we're going to have a less visibility than we ever have had before, which is obviously just a new way for marketing. It's just a new era, and there's always changes going on.

Caroline Fenton (27:12):
I think we've just got to basically change how we use ads, which really comes back to thinking about keeping people on the platform. I've been thinking about it as like, there's still a secret garden that Facebook now is, with this walled garden around it, and anything you do on the platform stays on the platform. It's getting a lot harder if you go outside one of those little secret gates, it's getting a lot harder to track what someone does outside of that garden.

Caroline Fenton (27:35):
So thinking about what we can do to keep people on the platform, because once we have them on the platform, we can track them on the platform, plus Facebook likes us keeping them on the platform, because they're obviously there, and they're getting more money from us.

Caroline Fenton (27:48):
So I think number one is going to be video, and using video a lot more, basically, because you can retarget those video viewers, also because it's a fantastic way to connect with people, and this is going to be super-important next year. Also, because you can take advantage of the latest things like reels, especially organic video content, I think it's going to be really important, and related to connecting with people, it's building that relationship with people, really putting your personality out there, building that trust, and building those relationships, so I think video's going to be really important for that reason.

Caroline Fenton (28:22):
It's going to also be important because you can keep people on the app and retarget them better, so I think thinking about how we're going to really showcase why we're different, and putting ourselves out there, and using video to do that, is going to be super-important.

Caroline Fenton (28:35):
And then thinking about how else you can keep people on the app, so how we've used conversion ads a lot in the past, optimized for lead or for a custom conversion, we're now using a lot more lead gen ads, which means the forms are built inside of Facebook, people stay on the app, the data gets collected by Facebook, and they like that.

Caroline Fenton (28:53):
We're generally seeing lower costs. The jury is still out on the quality, but I do think this is going to have a bigger part to play in our strategies moving forward for 2022, because again, keeping people on the platform and being able to track them.

Caroline Fenton (29:06):
I also think that maybe we're going to go towards using video even further, in that we might not do as many webinars and things, or challenges. It might well be that we have more of a funnel, but it's on the platform, and it's like, "If you have viewed this video, 50% of it, then you see this video," and this video is a testimonial or this video is something else.

Caroline Fenton (29:26):
So thinking about how you build the funnel on the platform, rather than getting people to jump out to different landing pages, to be able to do that. So maybe shorter, more golden nuggets as such, and then also on the same sort of realm is, if it's getting so much more expensive for us to get people off the platform to be able to sign up for a webinar and things like that, then what are we going to do in terms of maybe making these paid experiences? So rather than being free, what master classes are free webinars, free workshops, what can we do to make them paid? So we've got a higher quality lead and someone who's more committed to you than they might have been if it was a free experience, and then seeing how we can convert from there.

Caroline Fenton (30:06):
So it is definitely not business as usual for 2022 by any stretch of the imagination, but yeah, definitely video lead gen ads, thinking about how you use that video as well, possibly to replace things like webinars, as we'd like to keep people on the platform even more, and thinking about maybe paid offers as well. And just making sure you have a really, really good strong offer and remembering your bigger picture, your bigger why, and the benefits of what you're offering people, because ultimately people buy from people, so we're going to have to do a lot more of, why is your offer different? What is so good about it? And being able to communicate those benefits out there.

Caroline Fenton (30:48):
Okay, that's my thoughts. Thanks, guys.

Salome Schillack (30:51):
Well, there you have it. Now you know exactly what Hana, our ads manager, and data and analytic specialist, Louise, launch strategist and chief marketing officer, Amy, Facebook Ad specialist, and Caroline, Facebook Ad specialist and funnel builder, has to say about what they think you guys need to know so that you spend your money where you're going to get the best bang for your buck, so that you build sustainable marketing systems that will help you grow, and so that you can set your business up in such a way that you grow predictably and run ads profitably.

Salome Schillack (31:34):
I hope that this has helped you. If it has, come find me on Instagram and let me know how this is helping you, and what you are going to do differently in 2022 to help you navigate all these changes.

I hope you have a lovely week and I'll talk to you again next week. Bye.

Thank you so much for listening. If you had fun, please come back next week, and remember to hit that subscribe button, so you never miss a thing.