12 Sales and Marketing Mistakes That Keep You From Making Money in Your Business

Hey Friend!

Let’s talk about 12 sales and marketing mistakes that keep you from making money in your online business.

You could make hundreds of potential sales, marketing, messaging, connection, and trust mistakes that keep you from making money. These mistakes create what I like to call a leaky sales funnel—but we don’t want one!

We want to create an airtight funnel that brings people in through the podcast. Then, we want to nurture them, creating a happy, thriving customer with an incredible testimony on the other side.

So let’s tackle some of the most common problems and mistakes my students experience that keep them from potentially making money so you don’t make the same mistakes.

If you’re struggling with this, join my Podcast to Profit course. In step 5, I teach you how to sell your offer. I also have a bonus step called “How to Audit Your Sales Funnel.” You get a complete, comprehensive masterclass on how to fix your leaky sales funnel so mistakes don’t keep you from making money.

Becoming an intentional salesperson takes effort and practice, but you can grow into it. It is a skill you can learn, but it does take a lot of focus, and it takes something I like to call data over drama. (That’s not mine; I borrowed it from another leader.)

Allow yourself to look at the data about why your sales funnel might be leaky. Where can you improve, and what steps must you take to foster that growth?

So, grab a notebook and pen, and jot these down. We will then review the 12 significant sales and marketing mistakes that keep you from making money.

All right, friend…let’s dive in!

Reason #1 You’re Not Making Money: Lack of a Clear Value Proposition

What do you do? What problem do you solve? If I were to play some Jeopardy music, could you answer those questions in 30 seconds? You have a problem if your answer is no.

If your customers don’t understand your value or the problem you solve, they won’t buy, and you won’t make money. Clarity is crucial if you want your business to grow and flourish.

Lucky for you, that’s the first thing we do inside Podcast to Profit. We spent a few weeks on it, and we got crystal clear on your value proposition.

Reason #2 You’re Not Making Money: Ignoring Your Ideal Avatar

I often see my students building a brand around what they think they should do, what they are good at, or what they want to become.

That last one is usually what I see: “I want to become a business coach. So I will be a business coach for people, even though I don’t have a successful business.”

No!

Failing to understand your ideal avatar’s actual needs—their biggest problem, preference, wants, and desires—will result in you completely missing the mark!

You don’t want to create a brand, business, or vision around what you think it should be. You want to build it around what your ideal avatar believes their reality to be. What are they googling? What problems are they facing? How do they feel about those problems?

Ask them those profound questions and figure out what they believe they need. Be sure not to ignore what they say! That’s your million-dollar path, your million-dollar tip: take the words your ideal audience is saying and utilize them. Build everything around that.

Reason #3 You’re Not Making Money: Inconsistent or Unprofessional Branding

Inconsistent and unprofessional branding result from designing your graphics when that isn’t your greatest strength.

Look, I’m raising my hand. I am so guilty of trying to duct tape everything together initially because I wanted to save a few bucks. I’ll be honest with you. I spent so much time trying to do everything independently when I should have paid a professional instead.

This holds you back from making money. When people encounter inconsistent branding, they will be dissuaded from buying because they will judge you based on the professionalism of your brand.

I’m sorry, but I’m not sorry. You came here to discover why you’re not making money, and your marketing may be missing the mark. This is one of the biggest marketing mistakes.

Reason #4 You’re Not Making Money: Ignoring SEO Podcasting Keywords

If your business doesn’t appear in search engine results, especially in Apple Podcasts, you miss out on many potential listeners and future clients. Podcast to Profit offers full podcast SEO and keyword training to learn how to make your podcast found more easily and organically within the searches.

Reason #5 You’re Not Making Money: Poor Website Design

I addressed this marketing mistake when discussing inconsistent branding, but having a busted website hurts you.

Do you need a website if you’ve just started your podcast? No! But we will build one together inside Podcast to Profit that is simple, professional, and clean. You will follow my website formula so your website feels like a menu.

A cluttered, confusing, or handmade website can drive your clients away. They are going to judge you based on the cover of the book.

How many of you have driven by a restaurant and thought, “I don’t want to eat there. The paint is chipping, the door hangs off one hinge, and some homeless folks are outside. Let’s move to the next restaurant.”

That’s what happens when people hear your amazing podcast, decide to book a coaching call with you, and then see your less-than-lovely website. It’s a deterrent, and we don’t want that to happen.

So, stop wasting money and time trying to make it yourself. Come and take Podcast to Profit, and I’ll teach you exactly what goes on your website. I’ll hook you up with an awesome template from my graphic designer, and you will have an easy-to-navigate, simple, beautiful, and visually appealing website that will help you secure sales so you can start making money.

Reason #6 You’re Not Making Money: Lack of Content Clarity

What are you talking about on your podcast? Is it specific and pointed to your micro-niche?

This is going to help establish you as an authority. They’re going to look at you and believe in your expertise. They’ll be confident you know what you’re talking about. But you lose clarity around your content if you have a podcast about marriage, kids, and faith, but have an episode about your favorite shoes. Then your listener loses interest. Get super-niched in to avoid that!

Reason #7 You’re Not Making Money: Not Utilizing Email Marketing

Emails are so important!! I dissuade my students from using social media, but I encourage and persuade them to use email marketing. It is affordable, highly engaging, and highly open; no algorithm keeps you from getting read.

Email is a deep connection point; it allows you to be front-of-mind when your person is scrolling their inbox, deciding what they want to do. They see your email pop into their inbox, and they choose, “Oh, I want to go listen to her podcast,” “I want to check this thing out she sent me,” or “I want to read this beautiful little love note she shot me.”

If you do not build an email list, you will lose potential engagement and connection, and potential dollar bills. When we nurture our list, we have people who are radically excited to buy.

Let me prove this to you: in our last live launch, our email marketing sequence brought in $120,000 in revenue. Our email marketing did that!

So, you want to learn how to have next-level email marketing? It’s inside Podcast to Profit.

Reason #8 You’re Not Making Money: Mismanagement or Overuse of Social Media

Next on the list of marketing mistakes is consistently posting a hundred million things on social media. This wastes time because only 1% of your followers see your content. Posting on social media without a strategy or plan is also a waste of time. You end up posting random things that don’t point listeners back to your brand.

One of the tips I give my students is this: if your house is the podcast (which it should be for all my students), everything else you do and market to points back to the house. So, if you put something on social media, it will point back to the podcast—to the one place you know you will be for the next decade.

Be mindful of mismanaging social media, as this can hurt your heart, mind, spirit, and sales.

Reason #9 You’re Not Making Money: Neglecting Analytics

One very critical thing I teach in Podcast to Profit is what we track, how we track it, and how we use the information in our metrics. We do this in the key performance indicators sheet I provide and teach you how to use.

Without tracking and analyzing this, you will not know what’s working and what’s not. This is critically important if you want to grow in your sales game.

Reason #10 You’re Not Making Money: Failing to Test and Iterate

We’ve got to test different strategies, analyze results, and make adjustments. Sometimes, we have to slightly modify pricing or the promise we discuss regarding coaching or course offers. Some of my students and I end up tweaking the titles of their offers.

Not making money? We’ve got to test, and then we have to iterate. The first time you put something out into the market is probably not the only time you modify that offer. You’ll redo and revise as you learn more about what your person wants, needs, and says.

This is critical to increase your sales and get more students or clients.

Reason #11 You’re Not Making Money: Inaccurate Pricing

I often see people come into Podcast to Profit, and they have one of the following issues:

• Too many offers
• Tiny offers
• High-ticket, expensive offers

Small offers create a challenge because you have to sell so many even to make a dent. High-ticket offers are also tricky initially because your business has to meet the demand to support that pricing level.

There is a beautiful sweet spot where you should first price your coaching offers before moving to course and program offers.

If you fail to land within this sweet spot, you could be overpricing or underpricing your offers. That creates an opportunity to lose sales to competitors. Inaccurate pricing can definitely hurt you and keep you from making money.

Reason #12 You’re Not Making Money: Not Building Trust

You must connect with your listener, who will become your future buyer.

So how do we build trust?

• Show up consistently
• Teach and serve
• A professional website
• Consistent content
• Good messaging and marketing
• An authentic, credible, and trustworthy brand voice.

If you have all those things in your favor, people will be much more apt to buy from you!

I pray this blesses you!

APPLE PODCAST | SPOTIFY | YOUTUBE

---

---

LISTEN TO RELATED EPISODES:

7 Things That Made Me 7-Figures (as a Christian Business Owner)

Call to Action 101: How and What to Promote on Your Podcast

4 Tips to Be More Consistent with Your Content

---

WATCH RELATED EPISODES:

This is How Much Money a Podcast with 1,000 Downloads Can Make

Watch This Before Social Media RUINS Your Chances to Make Money From Home

10 Reasons Podcasting Is The Best Way To Make Money Online

---