99. Why Marketing Feels Hard for Virtual Assistants & OBMs (And It's Not Your Fault)

In this episode of Soulpreneur Scaling Stories, I'm diving into why marketing feels so hard for VAs, OBMs, and service providers, and why it's absolutely not your fault. 

If you've ever stared at a blank screen wondering what to post, felt guilty about not being "consistent" with content, or wondered why marketing advice never seems to work for you, this episode will change everything.

I break down the three major reasons why standard marketing advice fails service providers: wrong business model assumptions, wrong personality assumptions, and unrealistic time expectations. Most marketing advice is designed for coaches and course creators who ARE the product, not for service providers who are busy actually doing the work for clients.

You don't need 10,000 followers - you need 10 amazing clients and solid referrals. Your marketing should be relationship-based, not audience-based, and it should honor your natural personality instead of forcing you into an extroverted box that feels awful. 

If you're tired of feeling like you're failing at marketing when really you've just been using the wrong strategy, this episode will give you permission to stop beating yourself up and start marketing in a way that actually works for your business model.

Key Points Covered:

✨ Why most marketing advice assumes you're a full-time content creator

✨ The personality mismatch making "show up everywhere" advice feel terrible

✨ Why relationship-based marketing beats audience-building for service pros

✨ The simple two-platform strategy that works for busy VAs and OBMs

✨ How to stop forcing yourself into marketing approaches that don't fit

✨ Why one meaningful conversation trumps 100 random likes

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Andrea Elibero: Andrea here, your host and passionate business coach and scaling strategist for soulful service providers and coaches. Welcome to another episode of Solepreneur Scaling Stories. Have you ever wanted to look behind the curtain of your fellow entrepreneur's business to see what actually went into scaling it?

[00:00:22] Well, you are in for a treat 'cause that's exactly what we are doing here. In each episode, we will be uncovering the truth of the lessons and the stories behind what it truly takes for sold entrepreneurs to scale their businesses intentionally. I'm hoping that their stories will help you to unlock the true potential of your business so you can create your own soulful, abundant, and aligned laptop lifestyle through intentional scaling.

[00:00:46] So whether you're just starting out on your scaling journey or you're a seasoned entrepreneur seeking inspiration, this episode has something incredible in store for you. Are you ready to rise, grow, and create a business that fully supports your dream life? Well, let's dive in. [00:01:00] Before we begin, make sure to hit that subscribe buttons.

[00:01:03] You never miss an empowering episode filled with real stories and soulful insights.

[00:01:10] All right. This one is for my BA's OBM service providers who say and have said on multiple occasions, marketing is hard. Marketing feels hard. I need you to hear this. You are not bad at marketing. You are not. Failing at marketing, you have just been following advice that was never designed for you. So welcome to So nurse scaling stories.

[00:01:35] Today we're gonna talk about why mar, why marketing feels so hard as a service provider and why it's absolutely not your fault. So let me guess what happened the last time you sat down to quote unquote do marketing, right? Then you opened up your laptop. In between two clients that you had, like client calls that you had with some good intentions, you had a one hour block, let me get consistent finally on Instagram, [00:02:00] and then you got interrupted by something and another client needed a thing, or you just sat there staring at your blank laptop screen and maybe you managed to create like one post and you don't even like it.

[00:02:13] You're not even sure it was the right thing to say. Or maybe you are like a client of mine who had told me, I see other VAs posting every day sharing client wins. I seem to have it all figured out. And meanwhile, I'm sitting here staring at my laptop wondering what could I possibly say that anybody cares about?

[00:02:33] So if you're nodding your head to this, if you're like, oh, is she sitting with me in my office? You know that. You need to market your business, right? But every time you try to do it, it either feels forced, overwhelming, just wrong, or maybe you feel like you don't even have time to market how you quote unquote should.

[00:02:54] And then what usually happens next is that you have these feelings about yourself. You think like, oh, I'm just not good at [00:03:00] this marketing thing. Or, I've been in business for two years. I should really be better at this by now. Or maybe I'm just not cut out for running a business. Maybe I just go back to my nine to five.

[00:03:10] Right. And here's the thing that really, really gets me, is that. You start to look at other service providers, and they seem to be crushing it on social media

[00:03:16] posting these perfectly polished carousels about their business wins, and you think there's something wrong with you.

[00:03:23] What if I told you that your struggles with marketing have nothing to do with your business skills, your intelligence and everything to do with the fact that you're trying to use a screwdriver as a hammer? Yes, you heard that correctly because that's what's happening when marketing feels impossible for you as a done for you service provider.

[00:03:44] The first thing is that you're working with the wrong business model assumptions, because most marketing advice is for coaches, course creators, like people who, like a giant chunk of their business is literally dedicated to marketing. So the advice [00:04:00] assumes that you have hours every day to create content to whatever, to do all of these things, right?

[00:04:05] Because again, it's designed for coaches and course, course creators who are the product you're not selling. Yourself as a lifestyle brand, right? You don't need to grow an audience of 10 million people. You're selling your services. You just need a few clients at a time, and you'll be booked out and it'll be amazing, right?

[00:04:21] You're actively. Doing the work for your clients. When a coach creates a post about mindset, that is their work. When you create a post about project management, that's you taking away time from actually managing projects for your clients to create that post. Right? So hopefully that makes sense, right?

[00:04:40] Like part of a coach's job is to market and show up. So they need space to do that at a much higher volume than you do if you know how to market strategically and do it in the right way. And here's something that most marketing people are not going to tell you. Again, you don't need 10,000 followers, right?

[00:04:57] You need like 10 [00:05:00] really amazing clients and referrals, maybe 20 like referral people. Like you need a community and relationships. So that changes everything about how you should be marketing as a service provider. The second thing is that there are wrong personality assumptions because as somebody who needs to market to a bigger audience, right, like they are the product, like maybe they love being on camera

[00:05:25] and love being the center of attention, but like most done for you service pro, my bas and OPMs are introverts who wanna be behind the scenes and just do their work.

[00:05:34] They don't necessarily want to be like front and center having to. You know, show up and in front of really large audiences and the this and that, like most of them, that's a nightmare, right? So like. Probably one of the reasons you are drawn to this type of work is because you love the behind the scenes.

[00:05:50] You prefer perfecting your craft over performing for an audience, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. We need that in business as a [00:06:00] society, but when you force yourself into. So like kind of like extroverted role where it's like, look at me, what I'm doing and these amazing vacations I'm taking, whatever.

[00:06:09] When you're looking at that type of marketing it and trying to do that and copy that, it's going to feel awful for you because it's not aligned with who you actually are, right? So your marketing should honor yourself and who you really are and not try to fit into a box. That's not you at all. Right? So the third thing is that time reality is completely wrong and doesn't fit you.

[00:06:32] Again, a lot of marketing advice treats people like they're full-time content creators. But you're busy, right? You're actively serving clients, you're deep in project management, handling somebody's launch. Creating content feels impossible when you're busy and it should feel impossible because your business model should be a relationship based and not giant audience based.

[00:06:54] You build deep relationships and partnerships with clients over time, and that requires a [00:07:00] different marketing approach than somebody who needs to constantly attract new clients. So let's reframe this. It's not you. It's the blueprint that you've been following.

[00:07:12] My VA is OBMs service providers who follow the standard marketing advice.

[00:07:16] It's like, again, somebody trying to use a hammer as a screwdriver. The tool is not broken, but it's the wrong job for that tool. So you don't need, also, thank God to become somebody you're not. You need to market in a way with a strategy that fits who you already are.

[00:07:35] So what works? What do we do for Service Pros?

[00:07:39] One is, again, like I said, deep relationships. So focus on relationships. Instead of trying to reach thousands of people, focus on building genuine connections with the right people.

[00:07:52] Consistent visibility over constant content. You don't need to post every day. You need to show up consistently [00:08:00] in a way that feels sustainable for you.

[00:08:03] Strategic focus over scattered presence. So instead of randomly posting on 17 different platforms, choose two and do them well. Those two should be, and this, this, I don't like to say should, but this is a should. One platform that is four, that's top of funnel, meaning that new people can find you. So this can be SEO based.

[00:08:29] This can be things like, you know, if it's content like TikTok, YouTube blog posts with SEO podcasts, guesting on other people's podcasts, there are a hundred thousand ways to do that. So one of those, and then the other one is. A way to nurture people you already have a relationship with. I've forgot.

[00:08:48] Networking. Big, very important one. Going to networking groups and meeting new people that way. Top of funnel nurturing, whether it be via your email list if you have one, or I'm thinking of setting one up, whether it be [00:09:00] be via your Instagram or social media posting and connecting with people that way. So there are many, again, many ways to have nurturing.

[00:09:10] Uh, as your secondary platform. So one top of funnel where people can find you. The second one, where you nurture them and develop deeper relationships. That's it, that's all you need to do. And finding the ones that align with you

[00:09:25] and then quality conversations over viral posts, one meaningful conversation with one person is way it's worth way more than one random post that gets a hundred likes from people who will never hire you.

[00:09:40] So think about that, right? It's all about relationships and staying in touch with people and building partnerships and just having these amazing connections. One client that you get in that way will can be your pipeline two and refer you to three others, and it can grow like that, [00:10:00] like. There are so many options for you where you don't have to feel like you have to be a full-time content creator posting all sorts of random things, right?

[00:10:07] So the good news is, is that there is a better way to do this. Marketing that works for service writers fits into your weekly schedule and does not take hours every day. Marketing that works for you in this industry uses approaches that feel natural to your personality and works with your client's schedule, not against it.

[00:10:31] So I'm going to dive more into this in upcoming episodes. Again, like, remember this one-on-one method for sustainable marketing, letting you stay visible without burning you out. And I'd like to talk about things and other important things is positioning as a premium expert, how to do that without feeling sleazy or salesy.

[00:10:50] Anyways, there is a lot to come in terms of marketing, but for now, this is what I. Want you to do, I invite you to one, stop beating yourself [00:11:00] up for struggling with marketing advice that wasn't made for you. That's like getting mad at yourself for not being able to eat soup with a fork. Hmm. Start looking for service provider specific approaches instead.

[00:11:15] And if you're listening to this or watching this on YouTube. I have a method for service providers, marketing specifically for you guys. So if you want to get ahead of this game, keep stick around. Keep following me. I have things coming up for that. So. This is it. So remember this, that your struggles with marketing, again, are not a reflection of your business skills or your worth as a VA, OBM or service provider, they're sign that you've been using the wrong map to try to reach your destination once you get the right map.

[00:11:51] Okay, one designed for service providers, everything becomes clearer. And so with that, please reach out to me 'cause I would love to know what [00:12:00] questions you have. All my links are below and I would love to chat with you more about marketing specific for you. I work with this with my clients in a couple of different ways, so please reach out, let's chat and hopefully this resonated with you.

[00:12:15] And with that, I will see you guys on the next episode. 

[00:12:18] Thank you so much for joining us today. I really hope you found inspiration and insights from today's episode. You know, scaling your business intentionally and from the inside out is a transformational process, but I'm here to support you every step of the way. Head on over to dancing leaf solutions.com/resources for free tools to help you do just that.

[00:12:43] And thank you again for being a part of the Solepreneur Scaling Stories community. Your presence and dedication to growth inspiring me every day.