Today’s episode is all about the five pieces of automation software that I use in my business, and that you can use to save yourself time and take work off of your plate for good. I spent a week talking about this in my Facebook group, The Balanced Entrepreneur, which you can join for free. I post exclusive tips and resources for my community every single day, and you’ll be able to join me live next time I talk on FBLive.

Time Stamped Show Notes

• 1:00 – Introduction
• 2:30 – If you want to grow your business without growing your work load, and you want to know what to automate but you don’t know how to automate it, I am here to introduce you to five pieces of automation software that you have to know about.
• 3:00 – 1: Meet Edgar is a social media scheduling software that is about $49 / month. I use Meet Edgar to send traffic to my offers my posting about my content and my offers on my social media pages. I create my content in bulk and then schedule it once a quarter with Meet Edgar. It also helps to keep some of the social media accounts active that I don’t use daily.
• 6:20 – 2: Stealth Seminar is what I use for webinar automation. I have Stealth Seminar and a plugin for it that integrates with Infusionsoft. Between Stealth Seminar and the plugin, it’s $129 / month. I use this as my conversion system. I launch new webinars live first to my list using Instant Teleseminar. When they convert and actually make me money, I convert them immediately into an automated, evergreen webinar using Stealth Seminar.
• 8:40 – 3: AppointmentCore is what I use for scheduling automation. It is $27 / month. AppointmentCore is essentially the way I get people on my sales calendar. You just send someone a link to your scheduler, your availability is on there, and they choose. When you hire team members, you can even add them to your account and include multiple people on one booking link. It also integrates with InfusionSoft and can send automatic follow-up emails.
• 12:05 – 4: InfusionSoft serves as a traffic system, conversion system and delivery system. I pay around $300 / month. It is a traffic system because, when I get people onto my mailing list, I can send newsletters that promote offers. It’s a conversion system because, when people click on those emails, they buy from the email. It’s a delivery system because, when they opt-in or purchase, I can deliver the offers through email. The most important use for it is the email sequencing and automation. If you’re not techy, I do recommend having a VA assist you with setting this up. If you go to com/team, you can download a list that includes InfusionSoft virtual assistants.
• 15:35 – 5: AccessAlly is my content delivery system. It is $79 / month. AccessAlly is membership software that integrates with InfusionSoft. I use it to deliver my programs. When someone buys, they are added to my membership site and AccessAlly gives them their content. This is the most automatable and customizable membership software I have found out there. It also allows you to cross-promote your programs within the membership portal.
• 17:40 – AccessAlly is also extremely complicated, but there are certified partners who know how to use the software and can set it up for you. I used Ekcetera Design & Marketing. Again, if you want to download my vendors list, head to com/team.
• 19:40 – I want to address common fears with automation:
• 19:50 – “This is just too much money.” These five pieces of software are $584 / month, and that automates nearly every aspect of your business. If you think about it, you probably only need to make one or two sales to make your money back. If you have these systems in place, you will also have multiple funnels for making that sale.
• 21:45: - “This will take too long to set up because these tools are complicated.” It may take about 40 hours to put these processes in place. If you don’t use Meet Edgar, you will probably spend at least 30 minutes posting to social media a day – If you do that five days a week for 12 months, that will take you 120 hours. If you don’t use Stealth Seminar, you will have to manually redo every seminar. Between setup and promotion, that’s about 48 hours a year. If you don’t use AppointmentCore, that’s 10 hours a year if you only spend 10 minutes a week scheduling. If you aren’t using InfusionSoft, you have to manually follow up with your sales leads. If you spend one hour a week, that’s 50 hours. If you don’t use AccessAlly, you’ll have to send your course materials manually. If you run an eight-week program and each week takes you about one hour to deliver, that’s 24 hours. All in all, you’re saving about 152 hours per year (and that’s a conservative estimate).
• 24:40 – “It’s just too complicated.” If that’s the case, the truth is you just have to hire help. You can go to com/team to help you find someone who can help, and they’re people I have used and trusted over the years.

Resources Mentioned:

• Market Like a Nerd: Website | iTunes | Facebook Fan Page
• The Balanced Entrepreneur: Facebook Group
• My trusted vendor list: com/team
• Meet Edgar
• Stealth Seminar
• Instant Teleseminar
• AppointmentCore
• Infusionsoft
• AccessAlly
• Ekcetera Design & Marketing