Want to Refresh Your Brand? 3 Things to Shift Each Year

Hey Friend!

Happy New Year!

I took an official week off for the first time in four years. I’m ready to dive in in a new and exciting way this year.

Today we’re going to be talking about what’s new for our company, three things I am personally shifting this year, and taking a moment to check out all this amazing new brand refresh we recently went through. There’s new podcast art and you can pop over to StefanieGass.com and check out the new and improved website. I am super excited and today is the day we step into all things new, not just in our businesses, but in all areas of our lives, because there ain’t nothing like a brand new year, a brand new month, and a brand new week.

3 Things to Shift Each Year for a Brand Refresh 

I’m going to be giving you a deep dive into what the business looked like last year, going through why I made all these changes, and the big audacious things and ah-ha moments that happened on our CEO retreat with my friends Chelsi Jo and Polly Payne. We’re going to be doing that in a round-up episode shortly, but this episode is what came out of that retreat.

I’ve been a full-time entrepreneur for 11 years, doing this specific business for four years, and I’ve learned so much. One of the craziest things that has proven to be true is that you’re never done building. You’re never done optimizing. You’re never done refining. It’s a constant evolution. As you get to know your person more deeply, the people that you serve, you get to experience success at new and exciting levels, and things change. You learn more. You grow more. And ultimately, your business has to evolve with you. 

What I’ve discovered is that building a God-centered business, means I’ve got to stay on God’s path, in my life and in my business, and in the choices I make. Often I find myself distracted and off of God’s path in this business. But this is God’s business. This is His. This podcast is His. I just pray to be a vessel. 

The reality is that sometimes I get distracted by what the world tells me to do. So the three things I’m shifting this year come from this immersion retreat that I do with my CEO friends every year, where we get together and dive in. I had no expectation when I went to this year’s retreat that so much would change for me. It was incredibly hard, but at the same time, so necessary. Coming out of it, I never felt more clear.

1. My brand refresh begins with shifting into new positioning

As I’ve worked with this podcast and grown my Facebook Community to over 9,000 people, you would not believe the amount of messaging we’ve collected as a company. We have over 4,000 lines of copy about pain points, desires, wants, wishes, and worries that each of you has submitted to us via the Facebook group, comments, and emails. 

I had so much data that I was completely overwhelmed and felt like I needed to go to five podcast episodes a week because my Lolas need me so much with all of these things. Also, I really felt all over the place heading into my CEO retreat and couldn’t quite put my finger on why. 

I knew my company was making money. We’ve been super successful as this is our most profitable year yet. The podcast is at the highest downloads that it’s ever been. Everything was working; so why was I feeling so confused and scattered? What was I supposed to be talking about and focusing on, and what did you actually need from me?

I sat down with my team and we combed through all of the messaging you submitted to us and we came up with six core things that you really needed. I decided I was going to completely reposition this brand around those six specific things and that’s it. Those things are:

• How to make money online
• How to grow a business
• How to grow an audience organically (starting a podcast)
• How to walk God’s plan
• Help with calling and niche
• Making money from home

More laser-focused branding

This podcast has a new TSO (Tactical Specific Outcome). If you’re new here and don’t know what that is, let’s fix that by enrolling in my courses because you need to be laser-focused on what your person needs. As you go through all the new branding and positioning of the company, what you’re going to see is a common denominator of Online Business for Christan Women.

The problems I’m going to solve for you are helping you grow your online business using podcasting; being able to do it in less time, being able to be free from social media and your phone, and not doing all the stuff that is not bringing you joy. Quite frankly, it’s stealing from your productivity, and I want you to know you have an option. You have so many other options, but I pray that this method, the way that I’ve grown my business to this incredibly successful level – with God – is also possible for you. 

The positioning of the company, and of the podcast, has just gotten more refined. Nothing’s changing. The same amazing content that you’re here for is still here. I’m not changing anything; I’m just getting more laser-focused and more niched-in on exactly who you are and what you are asking me for, and that’s all you’re going to find from here on out. 

Obviously, some new graphics came along with the brand refresh, all done by my incredible designer, Ale. If you need some website templates, podcast cover art, or any of that stuff, go to www.stefaniegass.com/graphicdesigner – she’s so legit!

2. I’m changing the way I do email marketing

I had this epiphany at our CEO retreat, talking about what actually matters; what’s actually growing the business. Two things:

• #1 is the podcast; that’s how we actually grow an audience. It’s how we organically expand our reach and visibility.
• #2 is the email list. If I am not going to use social, which I’m not because I already know it doesn’t work for me and wastes time, my connection point with you is email marketing. I believe in it. It has a long shelf life. It matters to you when you open and read your emails, you’re looking for value in there. And I have been failing you. Email marketing has been, “Oh yeah, I’ll just remind everybody that I have a podcast episode today.”

Over the past six months, I’ve watched my open rates decline. Maybe you’ve noticed I haven’t really sent any emails out lately. I’m completely rethinking what I want this beautiful, intimate conversation with you to look like over email. 

I’m going to be coming at you with some really amazing changes for this next year. I hope that you’re here with me for this transition as I go through this brand refresh and hope that you’re excited to open my emails knowing that there’s going to be something intimate, something authentic in there. There’s going to be something of real and true value each and every time that I sit down to write something to you. I’m going to put my heart and soul into it.

3. My brand refresh means letting go of all the extras and only focusing on what actually matters

When I looked around, I saw that some of the women I knew were blogging and had a whole blogging team. I said, “That looks fun, I should do that!” Then I’d look around and see that some of my other friends were doing reels and those reels were really exploding and doing amazing things for them, and I thought, “I should do that!” Even though I’m a huge advocate for not getting distracted by new shiny things, I got distracted by new shiny things last year.

I spent tens of thousands of dollars on things that I shouldn’t have been doing that were purely a distraction. I’m not upset about it. I’m not mad about it. I honestly don’t even regret it because every single thing you do in your business is simply a learning opportunity, and I am one million percent here for failing forward, trial and error, and testing.

While that was a hot moment for me, it was a lot and I had some really hard decisions to make. It feels really good now. I feel peaceful about the changes we’re making, so we’re letting go of all the extras. I’ve had to pare down my team. We’re reworking our internship program. It’s going to be so streamlined, so simplified. You’re going to be able to do a lot more behind the scenes of the business and learn a whole process from start to finish. It’s going to be so legit instead of chaotic. It’s going to be super clean and easy to manage from the backend.

A new backend process

We are completely shifting to a new operating system and I’ll have a whole episode on that. I was creating so much work not only for myself but for my team by not having the proper operating system set up. 

I’ve had to let go of some team members. We’re letting go of lots of the different advertising stuff we were focused on and I’m getting down to two simple, core things that grew this business. There were only two things that actually mattered here! It feels so good to know that I only have to do two things as the visionary and CEO of this company to scale this business to a million dollars in revenue. In essence, it is focusing on Podcast Pro University and Podcast to Profit. 

What do things look like now after my brand refresh?

Everything is even more simple and more streamlined than it already was. I already ran a super lean business in 2022. This year? We’re blowing it up, girl. We are letting go of everything that does not have an immediate or long-term ROI that makes sense. We’re letting go of everything that does not point to those two money-making, income-producing activities/programs of this company. We are letting go of anything that is inefficient. We are automating every single thing that is taking manual labor that shouldn’t. And we’re doing it and we’re doing it now. 

What can you expect moving forward? You can expect three podcast episodes per week (Monday-Wednesday-Friday). You can expect the same great business tacticals, podcast-focused episodes, how-tos, questions from the community, and faith episodes. I’m excited to help you grow spiritually as a Christian entrepreneur, as a woman of faith that has a calling over your life to create Kingdom impact, and to make serious money for the Kingdom of God.

Be encouraged that needing to do a brand refresh is not a bad thing for your business! You are going to grow over time and things will need to shift to keep up. Sometimes that just means small tweaks, but for me, this year that meant big changes! As long as you are following God’s calling for you and you are remaining obedient to His vision, He will bring new joy and excitement through your brand refresh and help you step into a new level in your business.

I pray this blesses you!

Xo,

Stef

P.S. Also, listen to podcast episode 553 for the full training on Brand Refresh, Who Dis? 3 Things I’m Shifting in My Business This Year.

APPLE PODCAST | SPOTIFY | GOOGLE PODCAST

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