Episode 125. The Cheryl Theory 2.0

On the last episode, you would have heard a replay of our past webinar, the Cheryl Theory webinar, which I delivered way back in November of 2021.

The Cheryl Theory, at the time, was centered around the notion that you CAN create a successful coaching business and still excel in your career and make time for what matters the most to you in life, by doing the bare minimum in your business, but doing it really, really well.

As of recording this, in May 2023, 1.5 years has passed since the Cheryl Theory 1.0 framework was introduced to the world.

While the premise underlying the Cheryl Theory Framework has not changed, the way I apply and implement the framework has evolved and shifted.

In this episode, I want to introduce you to the new Cheryl Theory 2.0 Framework and explain what this looks like in terms of application and implementation.

In This Episode:

Cheryl’s story and what led to the Cheryl Theory 2.0 Framework

I’d love to start with a story to set the stage for today’s conversation. Let’s rewind back to March 2020, when I first restarted my business after taking a legit break for 7 months.

For those 7 months, I literally deleted everything off the Internet and deleted social media from my phone because I was so burnt out. And I didn’t know if I was ever planning to build an online business ever again.

Well, I did.

After taking months to rest and reconnect with the work I wanted to do in this world, I decided that building something of my own was part of the vision I had. So I decided to reinstall social media and reactivate my Instagram account. 

At that time, I had really low self confidence. I was terrified of what people would think of me after quitting for 7 months. I was also experimenting with new niches and offers.

Despite all of my own insecurities and fear of judgment, I really took that period of time to help me rebuild my confidence and realign with the way I want to help people.

I sold some low ticket offers throughout March to August 2020 because I felt too incompetent to charge any more than that. But that was okay.

I focused only on two things at the time. Rebuilding my confidence to share my thoughts and ideas via Instagram, and rebuilding my confidence in my ability to help real people and help clients create results.

Because I spent months focusing on only these two areas, by the end of August 2020, I felt confident to raise my prices. 

However, between August 2020 to November 2020, I signed zero clients. I made zero dollars. Keep in mind, at that point in time, I was still side hustling.

But despite having no clients for months, I found that I really embodied this sort of “I got nothing to lose” energy. Seriously.

I thought, “Okay well, if I’m not even signing clients anyways, I’m just gonna create the most amazing free content on Instagram ever.” And that’s exactly what I did. 

I kept focusing on creating the best free content possible on Instagram, up until October 2020. Even though I was not making a single dollar. I had no sales calls or new clients.

Despite that, I still felt so compelled to create even more amazingness. So much so that the Side Hustle Club podcast (now Thought Leader Club podcast) was born in October 2020.

I kept going with both Instagram and the podcast for the rest of the year. The incredible thing that happened was that we created a 10K sales month in December 2020. And another 10K sales month in January 2021. And in 2021, we created our first 6 figure year.

So what does this story have to do with the Cheryl Theory 2.0 Framework? I looked back to evaluate what I was doing to create the results in my business, on top of building my career and other life things, including the thought processes behind what I was doing. I was then able to put together the Cheryl Theory Framework based on this.

Now, let’s unpack the Cheryl Theory Framework.

What to do: Making decisions on your bare minimum plan for your business

The first part of the Cheryl Theory 2.0 Framework is to be able to make decisions on what you want to do in your business.

Specifically, make decisions on your bare minimum business plan for the next 6-12 months, and make sure that your plan is something that you will actually stick to and want to commit to. Because the best plan of action for your business is truly one that you’ll actually follow through on. 

For coaches who are working towards their first 6 figures in their business, the general action items I suggest are:

  • Building a body of work (i.e. content) on one or two platforms that showcase your thought leadership and soft launches your offer → Create applications or sales calls booked for your coaching program 
  • Have ideal clients say yes on or after a sales call
  • Helping ideal clients create results inside your program → More marketing and social proof

When I was side hustling and growing my 6 figure business on top of my PhD, my bare minimum plan essentially comprised of:

1) Creating original content for Instagram stories: 30 minutes x 7 days = 3.5 hours

2) Repurposing your favorite Instagram stories that week into 4x Instagram feed posts: 15 minutes x 4 posts = 1 hour

3) Creating 1 weekly podcast episode = 4 hours

TOTAL = 8.5 hours more or less

For those of you who are working with clients, that will then be additional hours each week outside of the “working on your business time”, which should ideally be no more than 8 to 10 hours a week.

This is very similar to the capacity of most of our clients, including both side hustlers and full-time entrepreneurs.

When I was a side hustler, I used to also allocate around 16 hours a week to my business, which included coaching calls with clients. Coaching calls with awesome clients will of course depend on how many clients you work with. But this usually looks like 1 hour of coaching per client, and maybe some in-between-call support. This is what doing the bare minimum can look like.

Doing the “bare minimum” can lead to your first 5k month, 10k month, and even 6 figure year. Doing the bare minimum, works.

But more often than not, early-stage coaches get impatient and bored from doing the basics and making small improvements, over and over again. So please, stay focused on letting these small 0.001% progress compound into bigger wins.

The truth is: There are hundreds of effective ways to create your first 6 figures in your coaching business. Every 6-figure entrepreneur will have a different journey or process, and it all worked for them in order to get to where they are now.

But a lot of entrepreneurs give up when they try to follow a business plan or strategy that they aren’t able to stick to. And if you aren’t taking action, there’s zero growth.

It also takes time to build up your ability to stay committed and stay consistent at a series of actions, just like how it will take time to build your own confidence in what you’re doing.

What also often happens is that we start to doubt and question our action plans. Then we start to change up the plan or scrap the plan entirely.

But if you really believe that the plan will work (For example, you believe that it is going to help you sign clients or create your first 10k month, etc), you’ll be much more committed to doing it no matter what, week after week.

Hard work, commitment, being of service, taking responsibility, problem-solving, creativity, and resilience. These are all required to grow your business to its first 6 figures and to everything else beyond this milestone.

How to think: Managing your thoughts and emotions, and your entrepreneurial identity

In addition to the marketing or sales action items you may be doing, it’s also highly relevant to think about what you’ll do to manage your unhelpful thoughts, take care of your energy, process any negative emotions, and manage your time.

This is exactly what the second component of the Cheryl Theory 2.0 framework is all about.

Because once you’ve made a decision on what you want to do and take action on in your business over the course of the next 6+ months, you have to actually go implement it and keep working on it, week after week. Repetition. Over and over again.

More often than not, people struggle to stick to their plan for more than a few months, or maybe sometimes even a few weeks, because they start feeling stressed, overwhelmed, self doubt, comparison and jealousy over other coaches who are farther ahead. They doubt whether people even want to work with them or if they like them, and so on.

Essentially, a lot of unhelpful thoughts about ourselves and our business will often arise as we’re taking action.

The truth is, throughout your journey as a coach and entrepreneur, expect your brain to have spinouts and mind drama. Expect that there will be days or even weeks where you feel discouraged or in a slump, and hence don’t feel like working on your business.

Expect for there to be inconsistent results. For a lot of us, we have very high expectations of ourselves, and as a result, we also naturally feel discouraged when we aren’t meeting those expectations or we get frustrated when things don’t go the way we expect them to.

In your business journey, there will be many, many times when things don’t go your way. This is okay and a completely natural part of the experience. When these times are happening, I encourage you to get coached, and equip yourself with both the mindset and practical energy tools to help ease the experience whenever things aren’t going your way.

Managing your thoughts or energy is going to look different for everyone. Here are some examples from our clients (but not limited to):

  • Exercising and movement
  • Eating foods that nourish your body, rather than drain you
  • Self-coaching and getting coached
  • Going to therapy
  • Putting on a nice outfit and doing your hair in the morning rather than staying in your work-from-home clothes
  • Creating an aesthetic workspace in your home that’s dedicated to you to work on your business
  • Daily walks and getting fresh air
  • Drink ice water instead of room temperature water, or drink hot boiling water instead of luke warm water
  • And so much more

Besides managing your thoughts and energy on a daily basis, being an entrepreneur also requires you to believe that you are entrepreneurial and continue to strengthen your identity as an entrepreneur.

According to the Britannica dictionary, identity is:

  • who someone is
  • the name of a person
  • the qualities, beliefs, etc., that make a particular person or group different from others

Perhaps phrased another way, your identity can simply mean, “Who are you?”

Here’s why your identity as an entrepreneur matters. When you don’t know who you are, it’s a lot harder to make confident decisions → And when you can’t make confident decisions, it’s more difficult to stay focused and committed to a plan → And when you can’t stay focused or committed, it’s harder to create the results you want in your business.

And this leads to questioning whether you can create results (or create results again), constantly feeling like you need to do something bigger / better / faster / etc to get results (For example, you keep looking for another strategy to try because you don’t think what you’re doing right now is working), continuing to look at what others are doing to validate what you’re doing, and so on.

So what happens if you are able to stay rooted in who you are?

  • You show up as someone who’s capable of creating results. You lead by example for your people. People can sense your energy and passion for what you do.
  • You stay committed to repeating your messages and sharing about your work, over and over again. You start training your audience to recognize the messages you stand for.
  • You stop looking at others and instead lean into your own unique thought leadership. You don’t sound basic and generic, like everyone else.
  • You focus on improving your craft and creating more value for your people, rather than feeling bad about yourself. Your focus is on service, not on yourself, because you know you’re damn good at what you do.

But how do you know who you are? You decide.

Remember, entrepreneurs thrive off of making decisions. It’s an overarching skill and mindset (not just when it comes to your specific craft/offer or what content to create) that you can apply in every aspect of your life.

When it comes to your identity (and also your business), there’s no right or wrong answer.

If anything, spending time trying to look for the right answer will slow you down.

To summarize, we took a look at

1) Knowing what to do and doing the bare minimum, and

2) knowing how to think, using energy and mindset tools, and identity.

The way I look at it, these first two components of the Cheryl Theory Framework are more like a way of being and a way of thinking.

Now, we’re going to layer on three practical skill sets that have helped me and my clients grow our businesses.

Skill 1: Thought leadership and 7 questions to explore to start honing in on your thought leadership

The first skill is thought leadership.

What exactly is thought leadership? The way I view a thought leader is someone who leads with their thoughts. More specifically, someone who leads with their thoughts irrespective of how much or how little external validation they get.

In the context of the coaching industry or online entrepreneurship, I see a thought leader as someone who shows up and stays committed to sharing their thoughts even if it’s dead silence from their audience or having others challenge their ideas and viewpoints.

A thought leader continues to stand firm in their thoughts, no matter what.

When you’re skilled in expressing your thought leadership, not only does this pave the way for attracting incredible clients to you, it also differentiates you from all the other awesome coaches in your niche.

Here are some questions to ask yourself to start thinking about what your thought leadership could look like. Let your answers to these questions guide the body of work you’ll start to build to really showcase and highlight your thought leadership: 

  1. If I were to give you one month to prepare for a TED Talk, what would be the key message of your talk? What do you want to speak about next month? The key topic or message of your TED Talk is likely a great indicator of what you want to build your thought leadership and body of work around.
  2. Why is this message important to you? What personal examples and experiences will you use to explain why you’re speaking on this?
  3. Why is this message important to the people you want to serve? How will this message change their way of thinking or benefit their life on a practical level? What will life look like before and after they hear your message?
  4. What are things you kind of want to say, but you’re not going to say it out loud to your audience or mention inside your content because you know it may not sound “good”? Or maybe you’re worried it’ll rub people the wrong way.
  5. For those things that you’re hesitant to share, how can you position it in a way that explains to your audience why this is a story, idea, message, etc that they NEED to hear? How will this benefit them?
  6. What are some most popular narratives (from your colleagues) that go against your thought leadership or what you believe in? How can you stand firm in your viewpoints and continue to share it relentlessly?
  7. How are you currently embodying your message, thought leadership, and work? Or, what would it look like for you, to really be a champion of your thought leadership? 

Please take some time to answer these questions, and start envisioning the body of work you can build that’s based on your answers.

When it comes to creating content and building a body of work, it’s not really about how to create more content. But rather, it’s about how to turn up the notch on the quality, impact, and potency of your content, and how to REALLY express your thought leadership in each piece of content you create.

Because if we can turn up the impact of each piece of content, then hey, you can turn down the frequency of posting or amount of work you’re doing. That’s the embodiment of what it means to do the bare minimum, but do it really, really well. 

I want to share an incredible client case study and what’s possible for you when you really tap into your thought leadership.

Thought leadership is the skill that helped our client, Betty, to make the transition to full-time entrepreneur and make back 2x the investment of our program in both rounds of working together. Even as a brand new coach! 

She started her coaching business from scratch and also made a brand new Instagram account. By the end of our two rounds of working together, Betty made the transition to full-time entrepreneur. She also made back 2x the investment of our program in both rounds of working together, even with less than 300 Instagram followers at that point in time.

Here’s how we did this. We worked on:

1) Showcasing Betty’s thought leadership even though she was basically starting her online presence from scratch

2) Building her brand new body of work and being highly intentional with it. We focused on quality over quantity.

3) Managing her energy and capacity. Because Betty was still side hustling during our coaching together, it was of utmost importance to not burn out.

So, so good!

This is why I am so excited for all of us to really zone in on our unique thought leadership and proudly build a body of work that encapsulates our thought leadership.

Skill 2: Soft launching and what this looks like in terms of content for your business

The second skill that makes up the Cheryl Theory 2.0 framework is soft launching.

This refers to learning to talk about your offer and how you can help your clients in a way that compels people to actually take the next step such as booking a sales call.

It’s about creating the “soft launch” content that people want and need to see in order to understand the value of your offer, right now.

Here’s why we still need to create soft launch content in addition to thought leadership content: I see too many coaches or entrepreneurs often create really thoughtful content every single day or week. But they aren’t talking about how they can help their ideal client. Creating thought leadership content and talking about your offer are two separate skills.

Inside our coaching program, we teach the skill of soft launching to help our clients sell their offers in a way that allows for both structure and creativity, without the pressure and mind drama of a traditional launch. It’s the perfect skill for side hustlers because it lets you build your business according to your schedule.

The reason why “traditional” launches are often described as “really stressful” experiences by coaches, is because of the pressure of signing clients during a short timeframe. This is why we teach soft launching.

Because doing a launch successfully and managing your thoughts and emotions during a launch, are two entirely different and much-needed skills. We opt to do soft launching instead to simplify your business.

By taking away the time pressure, we get to work on the basics first, such as:

  • Making offers
  • Sharpening your messaging for your offer
  • Creating impactful content that demonstrates your thought leadership 
  • Being that “dream coach” that your ideal clients actually want to work with 
  • Managing your thoughts and energy without the pressure of a time-sensitive launch
  • Doing all of this in conjunction with your career, personal life, etc

To help you to think about what soft launching content can look like in your business, I want to share with you the two types of soft launch content I teach inside our coaching program: 

  1. Content that addresses your ideal client’s questions, hesitations, and objections
  2. Content that showcases your offer as the “Dream Offer” for your Dream Client

For the former, I want you to start thinking about:

  • What are their questions, hesitations, or objections about your offer?
  • What are their questions, hesitations, or objections about you as the coach?
  • What are their questions, hesitations, or objections about themselves?

Please take some time to answer those questions and then create content based on your answers. And then, for the latter: 

  • How is your offer designed to facilitate client results? 
  • How is your offer designed for your specific ideal client’s circumstances? 
  • How is your offer different from other options on the market? 

Here, also take the time to answer each question and then let that inspire content you can create to talk about your offer.

Soft launching is the skill that helped our client Jennifer make back 2x the investment of our program in 3 months in 2023, after going through a long client drought period in 2022.

When Jennifer first reached out about working together, she was in a long client drought in 2022. This led to decreased sales and confidence in her business. In just 3 months, Jennifer had already made back 2x the investment of our program in 3 months and we’re still working together at the time of recording this.

How we were able to help Jennifer do this is that we worked on:

1) Soft launching and creating content that builds demand for her offer. Her calendar is now continuously filled with new sales calls.

2) Confidence in selling and making offers. After a long ‘client drought’, we had taken the time to rebuild Jennifer’s confidence in talking about her work.

3) Closing sales calls and also rebuilding her confidence and calmness on sales calls. She most recently created a 5 figure revenue month.

SO MUCH FUN.

Skill 3: Your brand and where are external influences unknowingly influencing the way you show up

Finally, let’s talk about BRAND.

Firstly, simply by leveraging and implementing the skills of thought leadership and soft launching, you’ll already be building a brand that is genuine and honest to you, and uniquely differentiates you.

I say this because both thought leadership and soft launching require you to be proud of what you’re saying and what you’re doing, how you’re selling, and so on.

When you’re truly backing what you’re saying and doing, people can tell. And this reflects positively in the overall brand that you create.

That said, I want to take it one step further and also say that your brand is an expression of who you are and what you believe about yourself.

For me, I view branding as an extension of my identity. While the skills of thought leadership and soft launching also help to cultivate my brand, I view branding as ultimately knowing myself internally and then expressing that outwards, externally.

This is especially relevant for us who are building a business and brand online because every touchpoint you make with your people (For example, your LinkedIn posts, website, a DM conversation, etc) contributes to your brand and helps to foster that relationship with your people. Your identity will inherently shape how you interact with your people through those touchpoints.

That said, often times, there may be external influences or surrounding norms that shape your identity (For example, your thoughts and beliefs about your offer, yourself as a coach, your audience, your clients, and so on) → These will inevitably reflect the energy that emanates from the virtual touchpoints you’re putting down.

One exercise I’d love for you to do is to literally spend some time to think about where external influences and norms (ex: culture, society, school, parents, the coaching industry, your specific coaching niche, etc) have influenced how you show up and what you post, and other decisions you’ve made in your business.

Meaning: What do you feel like are the “shoulds” of content, marketing, sales, and business? What are you “supposed” to do or be as a coach or entrepreneur? What are you “not supposed” to do or be?

All of your answers to the questions above are literally restrictions or boxes you’ve imposed on yourself, your business, and your brand. They’re literally imaginary and arbitrary rules we impose on ourselves.

Once you’ve gained more awareness of these “boxes”, you can then ask yourself who you really want to be, what you want to create, what you want to be known for, and hence build your brand and business from there.

This is exactly the work we did with one of our clients, Kim. Prior to working together, Kim was able to sign several clients here and there, but not consistently. Also, she was charging less than $1,000 USD previously.

Through building a uniquely differentiated brand, Kim signed her first 16x high ticket coaching clients!

Before we started working together, Kim was charging less than $1,000 USD. She was not signing clients consistently. Also, she was spending 29 hours a week working on her business, on top of her traditional full-time job. By the end of our work together, Kim signed her first 16x high ticket coaching clients.

What we worked on specifically for Kim include:

1) Cultivating a uniquely differentiated brand that is an honest and genuine reflection of her. Kim told me that her “CPA” credential stands for both Certified Public Accountant and Certified Party Animal LOL.

2) We also added more structure to her business and cut down her hours by half so she can actually have time to go live her life.

3) We helped Kim become a known thought leader in the financial coaching industry. She was even invited to speak on the Dr. Phil talk show.

We should not be building a business that feels like a second full-time job

To quickly summarize, the main components of the framework are:

1) Knowing what to do

2) Knowing how to think

3) Thought leadership

4) Soft launching

5) Brand

This framework is how I currently structure my own business and what I focus on. It’s also what I teach inside our coaching program.

This is the approach that has allowed my clients and I to create a successful coaching business AND still be able to excel in our career and make time for what matters the most to us in life. The approach is centered around doing the bare minimum in your business, but doing it really, really well.

I remember that a while back, a client was telling me why she was so intrigued by my message or approach. She knows I’m all about doing the bare minimum, but as a high achiever herself, she was very fascinated by the idea that high achievers could excel in multiple areas of life by doing the bare minimum.

She couldn’t quite wrap her head around both of those things coexisting at once, because she thought they felt contradictory. When she told me this, it made perfect sense. 

So many of us identify as high achievers, and more likely than not, we grew up in environments where we were told that there’s a correlation between hard work and success.

More specifically, it’s not just about the quality of your hard work, but we’ve been told repeatedly that it’s the quantity of your hard work. The more hours you study, the more likely you’ll get an A on your test. The more hours you work, the more likely you’ll achieve a specific indicator of success.

Especially for those of us who come from immigrant families. Let me speak from my own experience. 

My parents immigrated to North America and they hustled. They didn’t have the money when they first arrived and they sacrificed a lot to relocate to North America.

Like many other immigrants, they were able to rebuild their lives by working hard. I would argue that for earlier generations, there was a stronger link between how much hard work you put in and how much success you get out of it, over time. 

Because so much has changed, both technologically and economically and even pandemic wise, we are seeing more and more that the conventional link between the number of hours you log in and input does not necessarily correlate with the level of success achieved in terms of output.

If anything, we are seeing more and more evidence that quality matters just as much, if not more, than quantity. That is the principle I’ve been adopting to multiple areas of my life, especially in my business.

Now I’m very adamant about doing the fewest number of things possible in my business. But each touchpoint I create in my business, it has to be my best work. Because for many of us, we have other things going on in our lives besides just our business. Whether it’s family or relationships or a career or you just want to live your best life, those areas matter too.

That’s why I firmly believe that we should not be building a business that feels like a second full-time job. This is exactly the belief that underpins the Cheryl Theory Framework. Both the Cheryl Theory 1.0 AND the Cheryl Theory 2.0 Frameworks.

In order to build a business that allows you to balance it all and do it all, the key here is to learn to do the bare minimum number of things, but do each of them really, really well.

Lots to percolate on and think about. I hope this episode has provided you with fresh perspectives to consider for your business.

Sounds good? Awesome. Let’s get to work.

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