Link Building Strategies To Avoid Burnout w/ TaVona Denise

This transcript has been machine generated and has not been edited for errors

[00:00:00] Brittany Herzberg: Hello. Welcome back. I'm super excited. If you can't tell, if you can't see my face, I'm just really excited. Crystal is back and then we have my friend Tavana, who I actually will get into the story, but say hi ladies. 

[00:00:11] Tavona Denise: Hello. 

[00:00:12] Crystal Waddell: Hello. 

[00:00:13] Brittany Herzberg: Tavana, let the people know who you are and what you're all about and where you're living.

Cause that's part of your really fun story.

[00:00:18] Tavona Denise: Okay. My name is Tavana Denise. I'm a former physical therapist turned master certified life coach and trauma informed business coach. And I primarily work with women who have a background in healthcare and helping them to transition over into the online world of business, using their Interest and expertise, which does not always mean that just because you were a physical therapist, you do health coaching.

So that's what I do in the world. And also of course, making sure that you are creating a business that fits your lifestyle, because what was the point of leaving the job that maybe was burning you out or you were bored with to jump into a business where you have all the responsibility and then you [00:01:00] become an awful boss to yourself.

That's what I'm up to in the world. And where do I live? I live in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, the country, not New Mexico. 

[00:01:11] Crystal Waddell: Whoa. How did you get there? Do you live on the beach? Do you go to the beach every day? What is your life like? 

[00:01:17] Tavona Denise: No, I do not. I moved to the quote unquote, local side for about a year, almost a year and a half.

I lived near the beach where I could smell it. I could see it. I could hear it from my balcony. And it was amazing. And then after a while, I was like, okay, I feel like I've been on vacation for a year and a half. 

It's time to really immerse myself into the local culture. So that's how I'm on the local side, but how I got to play a little Carmen Mexico was because we were in a pandemic and I was just like every, many of us were stuck at our desks in our homes and I decided if I'm going to be stuck at my desk in my house, I should be stuck in my desk.

near somebody's beach. And so that's what I [00:02:00] decided to do. And I've always been, I've always had a dream to be fluent in Spanish.

So I said, let's come to Mexico. And I had a friend who lived here for three years prior to the pandemic. And so I figured if she's from. Birmingham, Alabama. She still barely speaks any Spanish. I think if she can do it, so can I. And so that's how I got here. 

[00:02:20] Brittany Herzberg: Oh, wow. Okay. So I to bring this in for like, why Tavon is even here. I heard her on Rick Mulrady's podcast and I didn't even make it through 15 minutes of the episode. 

I was like, I love this woman. I need to talk to her. So I found her on Instagram and I made her be my friend and we just got to talking and she fast friends, right?

Like she totally is my people. I love everything she had to say. 

The things she was talking about in that episode were about the way that my massage therapist brain broke it down was nervous system and business. 

And with me having a foot in both worlds, I was like, can we please talk about this? 

Because I know I relate to that.

I know some things in [00:03:00] crystal story. Like I'm sure you like you're nodding. I feel like you can relate to that too. 

And one of our first episodes was about SEO and mindset. 

So I for sure would love for us to get into that. 

But I want to talk about you and your business and how you help people.

But before we get to all of that, my favorite question to ask people is, and there's no wrong answer. It's just literally whatever comes to mind. 

What do you think of when you think of SEO and, if someone asks you about it or if you hear it in a conversation, what pops to your mind?

[00:03:28] Tavona Denise: blogging. That's what I think immediately. Yeah. And google analytics. 

[00:03:34] Brittany Herzberg: I love that you know the place you're like Google analytics, like there's something going on over there. 

[00:03:39] Crystal Waddell: You said that you're like the worst at SEO.

So is that saying that you think that you're the worst at keywords and blogging or why are you so hard on yourself there? 

[00:03:48] Tavona Denise: Probably I'm the worst because I am not intentional about it. 

People find me all the time through my website or through where I've been a guest blogger on someone else's blog, and then they [00:04:00] find me that way. 

[00:04:01] Crystal Waddell: That's intentional. That's called off site sEO. 

[00:04:04] Tavona Denise: That was definitely very intentional, but it's not something that I put a lot of time and effort and energy into. So that's why I say I'm the worst at that. 

[00:04:13] Brittany Herzberg: So many people in that, we have mutual friends.

I've been finding this out every week. It's Oh, Heather. Oh, this person. So yeah, 

[00:04:20] Tavona Denise: I'm like Kevin Bacon. I'm like the Kevin Bacon of the internet.

[00:04:23] Crystal Waddell: Five degrees of separation. 

[00:04:25] Tavona Denise: For real,

[00:04:26] Brittany Herzberg: like no joke. And we talked about this in Instagram. She was like, I thought I was the queen of connection.

And we both have crowns as Queens of connection. We have decided. 

[00:04:35] Crystal Waddell: That's awesome. We need to get you a little digital crowns to put on your head. If this ever goes on YouTube. 

[00:04:40] Brittany Herzberg: Yeah, I would love that. 

[00:04:41] Tavona Denise: That would be awesome. 

[00:04:42] Brittany Herzberg: We need to make this happen. 

 The Facebook group, you want to tell us a little bit more about who's in there and how that came to be and like what your intention is in there? 

Cause I know you have an intention for that. 

[00:04:52] Tavona Denise: Since we're having a conversation and we're being real and honest and upfront here today, I have a really, a love hate relationship with [00:05:00] Facebook groups because I love people.

I love gathering people. And my jam is gathering people for like dinner or brunch or something like that. 

And then I just can't sometimes because I'm the queen, one of the queens of connection, there's so many people that I interact with at a time. 

So I'm like, how do we get them all together? 

Because I know a lot of amazing people and how do we help them learn and know each other?

So that really is part of the intention of the club for women, entrepreneurs and healthcare, that's the name of it on Facebook. 

And then somebody has got to manage that thing and keep the conversation going. 

So that's where it's a little bit like, ah, man. So that's what I would say there. 

The intention for me there really is to help have a place for these women who have the background in healthcare.

We can nerd out and use all of our healthcare lingo and all the acronyms and abbreviations that we want to. 

And really just look at start to unpack, unpeel, break, unlearn, maybe all of the mindset drama that we [00:06:00] picked up, probably from our backgrounds in healthcare, wanting to help people and be the martyr, wanting things to be perfect and follow the protocol.

Because that's why my old podcast was called breaking protocol, because so many people, especially women in healthcare, natural givers, natural helpers wanted to avoid failure because they had You know, done the work to get to a certain level of status in their business. 

And it's okay, when you start a business now, you're a beginner again, very few programs in healthcare are teaching people how to be an entrepreneur, how to run a business.

They're teaching people how to follow protocols and how to not. Harm people. 

And so there's a lot of unlearning and there's a lot of nervous system work that has to happen in there because you go from a place of quote unquote secure paycheck to you're responsible for, finding your food and eating it.

And you [00:07:00] also go from security in terms of I know exactly what to do in certain situations to Oh, you mean I get to do whatever I want to? There is no right way? 

Then how do I make sure I succeed? So that's, that was the impetus behind it. 

[00:07:15] Brittany Herzberg: Yeah. 

[00:07:16] Crystal Waddell: So what that makes me think is how does insecurity impact your nervous system?

[00:07:22] Tavona Denise: The brain is always looking for comfort. It's always looking for safety. And so if we feel insecure or unsure about something that Pings the brain, like danger, do not go there. 

This may be unsafe. It doesn't even want to go see if it's safe or not. It's this may be unsafe. So danger, don't go there.

And the challenge with that is like a double edged sword.

Like most people want the freedom. They want to be able to call their own shots, but they want somebody to go pave the way first. 

[00:07:55] Brittany Herzberg: Yep. 

[00:07:55] Tavona Denise: And it just doesn't quite work that way. 

[00:07:58] Crystal Waddell: Okay I 

want to share a story [00:08:00] really quick because this is probably why be thought, oh, yeah, you'll really connect with her on this.

Because. In 2020 I think it was before the pandemic I had a heart attack. I had something that was called Tacosubo cardiomyopathy and it's better known as broken heart syndrome. And so what happened was I was presenting in a group on zoom, just like this, my son was on the floor and a really touchy subject for me came up and it I felt in conflict, and I'm realizing right now that my brain wanted comfort and safety.

And in that moment, I felt probably the most uncomfortable I've ever felt in my life. And the most unsafe. And my heart almost exploded.

Literally. So it's just interesting to think that stress can play such a huge role physically, I had seen bits and pieces of it throughout my [00:09:00] life, like manifesting anxiety and all that type of stuff.

But I never had such a physical, like horrible physical response to stress. And I just, I'm like, wow, my brain was calling out for comfort and safety and just couldn't find it in that moment. 

[00:09:18] Tavona Denise: Wow, I'm sorry that happened to you right and what a strong survivor you are.

And we see this so often in something is as small as you get a sore throat or you get the flu or you get. The C word before a big presentation that you're petrified to give and so what happens is we don't realize what the 6040 to 60, 000 thoughts that we're having during the day, how many times we're like, I'm terrified.

I don't want to do this. I don't want to do this. I don't want to do this. I don't want to do this. And the body is or the brain and the body are communicating and saying, okay, you don't want to do this. We'll figure out how to make you not do this and save face. So if you tell somebody you're sick or you [00:10:00] can't talk, then you don't have to do the thing that you really didn't want to do.

And the another more subtle way that I think that this carries out into the day to day of our business is there are certain things that we need to do in terms of sales, in terms of visibility, in terms of all of these things. So there's a difference between, I don't know what to do and I know what to do, but I can't get myself to do it.

And so what I ask people to do is when they find themselves in that place, it's you definitely know what to do. 

And all of a sudden you get very sleepy or you feel the impulse to go wash the dishes or clean up the house, or somebody calls you and you're like, Oh yeah, I'll go do this thing that you normally would say no to. 

Anything to avoid the discomfort of the activity that you know, you need slash want to do for the growth of your business.

It's an indicator. Nothing's gone wrong here. It's just saying, Hey, instead of scrolling, tick tock or Instagram or whatever, this thing that we do for the quick dopamine [00:11:00] hit, how about we take a look at why we feel the need to eat, scroll, take a nap, whatever. 

Let's take a look at it. It's just an indicator.

And so when we can see it that way, it becomes less of a shame, blame, beat ourselves up. If that happens. 

[00:11:18] Brittany Herzberg: Yeah, some of the stuff you just talked about, like I did not even realize I'm like, Oh snap. I do that a lot. And I had not thought through that might be. 

It's just like a flag waving and Hey, you might want to dive in and what's going on here.

But I know that you said you're trauma certified as well. And that's one of the things that I've done a lot of digging and a lot of soul searching and a lot of working with some really awesome friends recently in the last I would say six months. 

Where I, this was the thing that you said on the other podcast, where I was like, oh my gosh, we have to talk about this.

We don't realize how some of those wounds show up in business and as I've been figuring out what the wounds [00:12:00] are, and that could be something like, I don't really want to share what mine are at this moment, but that could be something related to childhood, that could be something related to.

I guess most of them are childhood. You, that's your job. That's your zone. 

[00:12:12] Tavona Denise: So let me give you an example for a common example that people might recognize from their childhood without putting all your business out 

[00:12:19] Brittany Herzberg: at this moment, one day it will be out there, but 

[00:12:22] Tavona Denise: Once the nerve is a little settled down, maybe you may feel more comfortable.

But one thing that I see, because we have to be visible and a lot of us have to do some form of public speaking. 

If we're going to be online, if we're going to amass a following. And so if we've ever had an experience in childhood where you stand, the teacher asks you to read aloud and you stammer. 

For whatever reason, the teacher asks you to go to the blackboard and solve a problem and you don't get it right, or maybe you're in anything like that and the children laugh at you or the teacher shames you or you are [00:13:00] made to feel or you feel for whatever reason in that moment okay, I've done something wrong.

Then that situation, anytime you have to stand apart from the rest of the masses, whether it's a classroom, an audience the rest of the people on the internet, it becomes a It's a place of danger. 

And so remember when we were talking about the nervous system wants comfort and it wants safety. So it's always looking for potential danger.

And even though we're not actually physically in danger, the brain and the body connection is so tight that if we think danger and danger equals pain, then the body's trying to protect itself from pain. 

Even though it's all in the mind, technically, 

[00:13:44] Crystal Waddell: I have a silly kind of a silly example of this, looking back, it wasn't silly at the time, but I can barely remember what happened yesterday, let alone last week.

But I could remember when I was in kindergarten. I was the only person in my class that could read. And so I was getting [00:14:00] this. Special honor of reading a book to my class, but guess what? The book was called B U S Y B. And I was like, Ooh, what is that word? And I'm in kindergarten. I remember feeling like this.

I don't know what that word is. I think it's busy, but I don't know for sure. And I'm too scared to ask. 

Why? Like I, I traumatized myself in that situation because for some reason I felt like asking for help or asking for clarification. I don't know if I was afraid they would take away this special honor or what.

I think about those things, I'm like, why would I think that and why would I not just feel like I could go get some help, but as an adult. I know that there was times where I needed help, and I have the hardest time admitting that I need help, and I'm just as you're saying this, I'm like, oh my gosh.

What a parallel, [00:15:00] it's just crazy stuff. Okay, let's get to the part of like, how do you fix it? Like, how do you overcome something like that? 

[00:15:07] Tavona Denise: Ooh. , so a lot of times we talk about trauma being healed with other people, right? Because the trauma happened with other people.

And so it can be a process that you could take on by yourself, but I would just recommend to anybody's listening to find someone who is at least trauma informed because that there's a difference between trauma informed where I understand what trauma is. 

I am looking for its appearance. When we're in, like I'm working with people on business now, and you have no idea how often trauma is in the room, even though the person is unaware.

And now I'm aware. And so we're looking for signs of that so that I can refer somebody out to give them treatment. 

I've been trained to hold the space for a person as we work through that, but the [00:16:00] Shorter answer to the question would be when you find those parallels crystal or anybody else.

It's okay, with the adults eyes, going to that situation and saying, Hey, little crystal, who's five years old, who has this wonderful award or gift or presentation or whatever. 

And she's afraid she thinks the word is busy but she's afraid to ask for help. 

What would adult crystal. Say to little crystal in this moment about that very situation.

[00:16:33] Crystal Waddell: Oh man, I would say it's busy. You had it right. 

[00:16:39] Tavona Denise: And she's what if she's what if I get it wrong, what if I don't say it what if it's bussy. 

[00:16:44] Crystal Waddell: I'd say everybody makes mistakes and now, I'm not even sure. 

[00:16:49] Tavona Denise: Yeah, it really is just like that because you said you have a child.

So the thing that I like to do is sometimes if we're having trouble is to take it off of [00:17:00] us and to put it with our own child or our niece or our nephew, or if we have students or, a little person that you would lovingly correct their perspective or point of view. 

[00:17:10] Crystal Waddell: Yeah, absolutely. I definitely want to reassure little crystal that, Hey, everybody has questions, everybody's learning, everybody's, trying to figure it out.

And I'm just so glad that you came to me, so that I could help you feel more confident about, actually the thing. 

[00:17:26] Tavona Denise: Yeah. 

And looking at what things you said about her fear about the reward, if you will, or that special privilege being taken away. It sounds like that is a huge, that was a huge barrier for her asking for help.

[00:17:39] Crystal Waddell: Yeah, it was. And I wonder what little crystal thought would happen if it was taken away, it's like, it was a referendum, I think, on how she thought of herself, and her worth. So it's very interesting. 

[00:17:52] Tavona Denise: Ding ding. You said the magic word, my friend. At the crux of it all, it's, it, [00:18:00] I can almost always get to get a person to the point where they find it's a matter of worth.

In just five, less than five minutes, we got down to, it was a matter of worth. 

[00:18:13] Crystal Waddell: Wow. Yeah, that's pretty accurate. That's pretty accurate. 

[00:18:17] Brittany Herzberg: That actually showed up a lot with my stuff too, like being enough, feeling worthy, and that's interesting to hear you say that's a big thing. If not, would you say that's the most common?

[00:18:27] Tavona Denise: Yeah, it's pretty much the thing. 

[00:18:30] Brittany Herzberg: The thing? 

[00:18:31] Tavona Denise: Like worthiness and enoughness and feeling valuable in that moment and sometimes the Someone bestowing this honor upon us, we often make it mean that means I'm special, I'm important, I'm good enough, I'm worthy. 

And then there's dangling in the back of your little crystal's mind of it could be taken away.

And so if that was giving me my worth and my value and it could possibly be taken away, don't do [00:19:00] anything to get it taken away because now this Special honor is associated with my worth. 

And that is the part that we have to start to unlearn and disassociate and unwind. 

[00:19:13] Crystal Waddell: First few years of my business, when I was making the wooden letters and numbers for collageandwood. com. 

I couldn't figure out why I couldn't pay myself. I've got so busy that I said, I need some extra help. And I started paying some friends to box up things for me. I'm like, wait a second, I'm paying these other people, but I can't even pay myself.

And one day I realized like I could not sell another thing. And make as much money as I'm making right now.

And I had to essentially crucify myself and just say, Hey, look, if you don't raise your prices right now, all you're doing is just wasting more time . And I know some people say, Oh, you didn't waste your time or whatever.

But that was the decision I had to come to. 

I was like, do I want to kill [00:20:00] myself for no reason? Or do I actually want to have a business? 

[00:20:04] Tavona Denise: Yeah. I agree that it's not a waste of time and there are two ways to get to it. You know how they say all roads lead to Rome. 

And so you can have a come into Jesus moment and talk to yourself like that.

And then you just okay, it's to the point where you're fed up and this is not going to happen anymore. 

Maybe more gentle. And some might say the more sustainable, long lasting approach is when you go back and you heal that, that trauma in effect, little t trauma where, okay, there's fear of this honor being taken away and it going back to worthiness.

Because every time I work with someone on their pricing, it always. And I don't like to use the words always and never, but in this case, it always goes back to value and worthiness. And I don't like the phrase where people say, Oh, you're priceless charge, what you are worth, because you are a human being, you are priceless.

So we can't talk [00:21:00] about it in that way, but you being able to value the worth of. the services that you're providing, the outcomes that your people are getting. That's the part that we have to clean up and is usually tied to some other decisions that we made back, a little bit further back.

And it could be, it doesn't have to go all the way back to the childhood. It could be the first time you decided to charge somebody for your service and they said no. 

And then you made it mean that means that it's not worth it. Or I'm not worth it. 

[00:21:32] Crystal Waddell: Right. And you mentioned with healthcare workers that there's often this sense of martyrdom.

Yeah. And I was a 

teacher, so yeah, 

[00:21:42] Brittany Herzberg: welcome to the club. 

[00:21:43] Crystal Waddell: We are helpers. We are teachers. We are public servants, so it feels unnatural to charge people for things. 

[00:21:51] Brittany Herzberg: And I'm glad you just brought that up because I was even going to say like money and healthcare providers and money and teachers like let's talk about that because I [00:22:00] know as a massage therapist.

It took me a hot minute before I was like, oh, I need to raise my prices and it took me getting burnout and getting sick to get to the point where I was like. Oh, hey, no, this isn't going to happen. 

And if I have people say no, thanks, that's too much. That's cool. I can respect that. That's totally fine. But I know that I had massage therapist friends and other friends in the healthcare field who were like, I could never charge that because fill in the blank of whatever the reason is.

So yeah let's talk about this. 

[00:22:26] Tavona Denise: The pricing thing, there's so many ways that I approach price and it depends on who's in front of me and what I see that's going on with them. Talk about the, I could never charge this. Can you tell me what some of the fill in the blank reasons are?

[00:22:38] Brittany Herzberg: I could never charge this because I'm not in it for the money. I don't, I know that was a big one. 

[00:22:43] Tavona Denise: Okay. 

[00:22:43] Brittany Herzberg: I'm not in it for the money. 

[00:22:45] Tavona Denise: Okay. Because that is the biggest bunch of hooey I've ever heard. If you weren't in it for the money, then just go ahead and coach or provide your service or whatever for free.

If you weren't in it for the money, you [00:23:00] wouldn't be in healthcare. You wouldn't be a teacher. 

You would just sit on the couch all day, provided like you, you are in it for the money and here's why you're in it for the money, because you like a roof over your head and food in your belly, period. 

Even if you live with the most austere, basic life, you are in it for the money.

Now you let's be really honest and say. I'm afraid of what it looks like or what people might think if I charge a certain amount of money. 

Or I also, because sometimes we think helper means. You can't be a helper or a good person and have a lot of money. 

And it's always this onion and this ball of yarn that we're detangling.

So everybody doesn't have the same belief. So I can't just come in here and say it's a blanket, one blanket statement or one blanket belief. 

There are usually a number of little things that we have to tease out. 

[00:23:55] Crystal Waddell: When you're selling something and someone who maybe is in your family or close to [00:24:00] you is I would never pay that much for that.

[00:24:03] Brittany Herzberg: Yeah. 

[00:24:03] Tavona Denise: Okay. 

So the family. We got to be careful talking about the people who are closest to us and here's why they knew us when we couldn't hold our heads up or feed ourselves when we're pooping in our diapers. 

So they don't have the same identity or they don't view us how we view us.

They don't view us how the world outside of us can see us without all the backstory, so one thing that you could do is just. You Don't talk to family. 

But if you choose to talk to family you have to be willing to say, Hey, ask yourself, is this person, even if it's not family, it could be friends, it could be colleagues.

Is this person, my ideal client for whatever the service or product is. Are they? And my definition [00:25:00] of an ideal client is a person who's ready, able, and willing to pay. 

So if they are saying, I would never pay that, they just disqualified themselves as an ideal client. Period. 

And I like to do math. I love math.

I don't know who, some people hate math. They're the creative folks that are like, we don't like math, but listen, math will calm down your nervous system sometimes. 

Because when we get into a scarcity mindset and we, when somebody says that to us, when they say I would never pay that, then we lump them in with the rest of the 8 billion people in the world and say, Oh my gosh, that means that nobody will pay this.

Then nervous system freaks out because getting paid is associated with roof overhead, food in the belly, basic necessities to survive, AKA danger if no one pays for this. 

This is how the nervous system comes back in. So I like to use math to calm myself down. Okay. What am [00:26:00] I selling? 

Okay. If it's only for women, let's chop it in half.

There are 4 billion women. 

Billion with a B. Women in the world. Okay. All right. 

I'm doing a one on one service. So how many people could I actually work with at any point in time? 

I'm gonna be toast after 10 people, so I can only work with a maximum of 10 people at a time. 

Okay, so let's just even cut that down to 2 billion, because let's just say some 2 more billion people don't have money, for whatever reason.

10 over 2 billion equals whatever percentage that is. It's 0000000000, like whatever percent.

Can I find 10 people out of 2 billion? It's highly likely that I can find 10 out of 2 billion.

[00:26:50] Brittany Herzberg: I'm laughing so hard because when you break down the numbers, it's duh, but yet we build it up to be this whole big thing in our [00:27:00] head. 

Yeah, that's wild. I want to keep on this train, but bring in SEO, because one of the things that you've said when it comes to business is, stop avoiding the things that, are going to grow your business.

Pricing might be one of those things. Visibility opportunities might be another SEO can help with visibility. 

What are some of the things that you've talked with women in the Facebook group when it comes to maybe let's say visibility or even SEO? 

[00:27:25] Tavona Denise: This is how I got my little SEO going is I love being on other people's podcasts and I love being on other people's platforms.

And so when you network and when you get to meet other people or when you find the place where you can compliment other people's work, or you can fill in some gaps for them. 

They naturally want you to be a part of their world because the fact of the matter is we can't be all things to all people. 

And so if we already have a group [00:28:00] of people that we're serving and we keep seeing that they need X, Y, or Z, and you can provide it.

Why not present yourself as a solution or as a win to their people. 

And so when you do that, it becomes easy. I love leverage. I love being a guest on podcast writing guest vlogs and things like that, because then, especially as a new business owner or even a busy business owner you may not have time to do all the things, but if you put yourself in front of someone else's audience.

I call it borrowing an audience, then it becomes so much easier. You don't have to do all of the paying for ads. 

You don't have to do all of the individual coffee chats. 

If you're going to traditional networking and then doing coffee chats afterwards, it's a great way to share your expertise and provide value to that person's audience.

And it's just a win all the way around. 

And also, if you think about the whole Content [00:29:00] treadmill that one might get on in terms of social media. 

If you have A message that you want the rest of the world to know. And let's just say you take that show on the road. 

You don't have to come up with social media posts every day in three and five times a week, you figure out what your core message is and how you can support and serve other people's audiences.

And you take that one thing that you created one time and you take it to different audiences. 

It's like the easiest thing ever. 

And oftentimes those people have blogs and maybe they've done the SEO work and then they link to your site, which helps you have the inbound links, which makes your everything work better.

[00:29:46] Brittany Herzberg: It really does. And that's actually what I used to do before we started our podcast, because I loved it. I loved getting to talk to other people. 

Like you said, it was like. Pretty low hanging fruit, especially once I figured out my messaging. I'm like, Oh, I can tell more [00:30:00] people about this thing. Cool. Maybe I'll go over here.

Maybe I'll go over here. So for me, that kind of came naturally. 

I will say, I told Crystal this recently within the last five months, I have only then stopped what felt like blacking out. On a zoom. It was very overwhelming to me. 

I was the, I was little Brittany turned bright red hated being in the spotlight.

But, with Instagram, I got to the point where I was like, oh, what I'm saying is helping people. I got the messages. I got the comments. 

You know what, now that I'm saying this out loud, like right now in this moment, I'm like, holy crap, no wonder I hang out on Instagram. 

It's my happy place. I found that I was helping people over there.

Hot dog. Okay. 

But what might you walk someone through when they 

are, maybe let's say more like little Brittany, where it's scared, shaking. I don't know that I want to go talk to other people. I don't know that I want to do anything.

What is some of the work that you maybe walk through? 

I know that's a very broad question, but what is some of the work that you maybe walk through? 

To help someone get to the point where they're no longer [00:31:00] avoiding a certain whatever that will help grow their business? 

[00:31:03] Tavona Denise: Yeah, I always start in the present.

And I want to know what concerns do you have about going on this podcast or being in this spotlight or whatever? 

What are your concerns? What are you afraid of? What do you think might happen? And then we just start unpeeling, unraveling from there. Cause those three questions right there would give me all, pretty much all the juice.

[00:31:25] Brittany Herzberg: That's some good stuff that you can run with from that. 

[00:31:29] Tavona Denise: Totally. Cause there's usually there's the surface level. Concern or fear. And then as we start pulling back the layers, then we get to, okay, Brittany had an incident when she was in front of the teacher or did a play or something back in the day.

And this is why she's afraid of the spotlight. And then we go back and do the part that we walked through with crystal.

[00:31:50] Crystal Waddell: What if the big hang up is I believe in myself, but I want other people to be happy, and if I do this and they're not happy. [00:32:00] Now I'm not happy or whatever, how do you work through that?

[00:32:04] Brittany Herzberg: I love Tavona's smile. She was just like, 

[00:32:06] Tavona Denise: Oh man, that is a tough one because there are so many different ways I could approach that again, depending on the rapport I have with the person ...

when I'm working with somebody over a longer period of time, I started to. See and notice their patterns because how we do one thing is how we typically do everything.

And so depending on what's coming up for that person, we may dive into like, why does it matter or what exactly are you concerned about? 

What do you think they will say, because oftentimes we have these ideas of what other people may say, but it's really what's going on in our head because that person's never actually said it aloud.

How is our happiness intertwined with their happiness and where does that come from? 

That too is a source of safety [00:33:00] because if they're upset with us, then they may put us out of the tribe. 

And back in the day, we needed tribes to survive. 

And so there is a like a primal need and desire for many people to be liked, which is where people pleasing and lack of boundaries come into place, because if I put a boundary up and I say, if you do this, then I will do this to take care of myself, then there's that fear of separation and that becomes primal.

That is something that we would have to work through, like, how does that come up for this person and how do we get them to calm down and trust and know that they're still safe, even if the person gets upset. 

And how is it okay that this other adult human being can have their feelings.

When we take too much responsibility for how other people feel, then we neglect our own feelings and spend a lot of our lives being inauthentic and contorting ourselves and actually being manipulative [00:34:00] because we're contorting ourselves in order to create a response from them that's not true.

And it's exhausting because it's difficult to keep up with because you got to be one way with an and one way with Joe, and it's difficult to run a business like that. 

[00:34:15] Brittany Herzberg: That is so exhausting. Thank you for saying that.

[00:34:19] Crystal Waddell: So what do you do instead you just Be one way? 

How do you find that one way?

[00:34:24] Tavona Denise: You find what feels good and what feels true to you. And when you're making CEO decisions, understand the why behind the decision. 

And I like that because when you know why you made a decision that is separate and apart from anybody else, because Anne and Joe and Becky, they all have different ideas of what you should do, but you're running your business.

And so when you have the values and you know why you made that decision, you can make policies and procedures behind them. 

And what I often [00:35:00] find is You don't have to explain yourself to people because you become one of those people that nobody messes with but not from a a weird like she's an angry kind of person.

It's just like she's very grounded. We trust her. 

We don't like we don't mess with her decisions and in the unlikely event that someone does challenge you or ask the question, you can calmly respond because you already know why you made it. Isn't a knee jerk response. 

It isn't to placate. Or manipulate anybody else.

This is why we do what we do. 

[00:35:31] Crystal Waddell: I think that the way this fits into SEO it and maybe even copywriting is just by knowing like the type of people that you want to work with that truly appreciate what you bring and value you.

If that's important to you to work with people like that versus I'll work with anybody, you can really use language that will, repel those people That will make your life hard.

And use the words and the language and show yourself to the people who will, [00:36:00] be drawn to you.

So I think you were talking about messaging it's so important and SEO can help there as well. 

[00:36:05] Tavona Denise: Yeah, it's all about branding and positioning too, but I think most people think branding is about pretty colors or propping yourself up in front of a private jet. 

And yeah, maybe, but what feels true and what feels authentic to you, right?

Really being intentional and mindful of that, so that There are just certain stores that you wouldn't go in. I may not go in any store on Rodeo Drive, and I also probably am not going to the Dollar General either. 

So you just get to decide who are your people and speak directly to them.

[00:36:40] Brittany Herzberg: Yeah. And I was going to say two different things. 

One is that one of the training programs, the copywriting messaging programs I've been through is actually with Marisa at CCS. 

And the very first module is you. What are you all about? What do you like doing? 

No one had ever asked me that. Not a single person.

So I was like, you know what with any [00:37:00] of the training programs, because she makes a point of saying, we always think about our ideal client. 

We always create these avatars. This is the first thing that we do. 

That is not always, but it's typically that is the model that's taught. 

It doesn't matter because if we can start showing up as ourselves.

We feel good. We started attracting those right fit clients, those ideal clients. 

And then this was the second part that I was going to say is that I've actually seen, and she was actually a guest Brittany McBean. She has boundaries. 

And she actually tells you her why we don't work on weekends because we all have families because we are humans and because we need space to just be humans and live life.

So I thought that was really cool. I went through her training program. 

She's since become a friend. And that was like, so awesome to hear that because you heard these like. Boundaries these I'm putting air quotes rules and you were just like, don't mess around, don't mess with her on the weekends.

Don't send a whatever, or don't expect a response by a certain time. 

Like they will get back to you, but they give you the window. 

And it wasn't a feeling [00:38:00] for me as a student of reading that and going, I don't feel cared for that was me going. 

That is really neat. I want to be that business owner one day.

I want to have those boundaries. I know exactly what to expect. I know that she's got me, but I know that she's like being a human and a mom and a wife as well. 

So just to add that example and yeah, people, when you have boundaries and I'm saying this as much for myself, as anybody listening, Cause I'm working on this.

I have people pleasing and perfectionist and procrastination tendencies like out the wazoo. And when you put those boundaries in place, it's not telling someone no. 

Just like I like to say that niching down isn't saying no. It's just creating like your, I don't even know what I want to say, but it's just, it's giving someone like the lay of the land.

When they're in your world. Wait, what? It is creating a spot for the best yes. 

[00:38:48] Tavona Denise: Yeah. I love that. 

[00:38:50] Brittany Herzberg: Yeah. I love this. I'm so glad you came on here. 

[00:38:54] Crystal Waddell: Yeah. I'm like, I feel like I just had a therapy session and I apologize, but ....

[00:38:58] Tavona Denise: no, that's what I'm here [00:39:00] for. And very much Marisa, I think you said her name is that's where I always start with the person. 

Because like I said, in the beginning, what is the point? Of leaving healthcare, education, the government, wherever you worked before, what is the point if you're going to be a bad boss to yourself?

And so when we're in these, everybody's chasing freedom and everybody's version of freedom and success looks different and it all starts with you.

And so we're talking about the, why is like, why are you doing this? How much time do you want to spend on this? How much time do you want to spend on other activities just being a human?

What is your energetic capacity in addition to your calendar's capacity to serve people? 

That has to be the first thing that we talk about, because that's how we decide what kind of offers to put in place. 

That's part of the pricing conversation. How do we price something? 

Does the pricing that you feel comfortable saying, because if you can't say it, you can't sell it, Does that [00:40:00] match your calendar and energetic capacity?

If not, something has to change because we don't change the calendar. We don't change your energetic capacity because we're not in the business of burning out. 

So then that means we then need to go and talk about like, how do you value yourself and your services? And that's what we do the work on so that the price matches the lifestyle that you want. 

[00:40:23] Brittany Herzberg: Amen. I feel like I just went to church. I needed that. And I think it's a really great conversation to have and not one that probably most people would expect to see on an SEO podcast, but knowing myself, knowing Crystal meeting you, I'm just like, we have to have this conversation because I feel like I wanted to bring this conversation into the podcast.

And that's why we had that mindset episode in the beginning, but. 

Having you on here, I'm like, this is such a better executed conversation than what we had at the beginning. So thank you. 

[00:40:52] Tavona Denise: You're so welcome. 

[00:40:54] Crystal Waddell: I think sometimes we get it in our minds that things can only be a certain way for it to work.[00:41:00] 

And like, when I first learned about SEO, it fits into my personality of I want to control everything. 

And so SEO felt like it, gave me back some control in my business. And because it's oh, I can direct this right. 

But, hearing your ideas, it's uncomfortable for me because it's oh, it's going to take the control away from me and put it on the outside, but it's still very effective and in fact, it's might be a little bit more effective because I don't have to work so hard and I don't have to, hurt myself physically and in the stressful way or whatever. 

Because like you said, you can leverage other people's audiences. And so it's just it's nice to know that there's more than one way to do things.

And sometimes the best way to do it is the way that makes you feel the best, that helps you live the best. 

So that's my big takeaway. 

[00:41:59] Brittany Herzberg: Yeah. [00:42:00] Oh, this is good. All right, Tavana. Tell the people where they can find you so they can stalk you on Instagram like I did and be friends. 

[00:42:07] Tavona Denise: Yes, honey.

Yes. I have met a number of people in the DMs like, okay, so I've decided we're friends now. And I'm like, all right. And then it just really happens like that. 

So on Instagram, I'm at TavanaDenise and that's T A V as in Victor O N a Denise D E N I S E and Tavana Denise. com. If you're interested in going to the launch clinic, and that's just three days where we talk about how to clean up your past launch and make it not be so overwhelming and scary.

Yeah. 

[00:42:38] Crystal Waddell: Ooh, that sounds cool. Do you have that often or how often do you do that? 

[00:42:44] Tavona Denise: Right now it's on replay, so you can get instant access to the last one we did. 

[00:42:49] Brittany Herzberg: I've got the link for you, friend. Awesome. All right. So that'll be in the show notes. Yeah. All right, ladies, anything else?

No, this is incredible. All right. We will catch you next time [00:43:00] on the next simple and smart SEO show until then. Bye. Bye.