Tame the Tech

Hey, everybody, it's Tara Bryan, and you are

listening to the Course Building Secrets® Podcast. Whether you're

a coach or a CEO, the success of your team and clients is based

on your ability to deliver a consistent experience and guide

them on the fastest path to results. This podcast will give

you practical real life tips that you can use today to build

your online experiences that get results and create raving fans.

Why? So you can monetize your expertise and serve more people

without adding more time or team to your business? If you're

looking to uncover your million dollar framework, package it and

use it to scale, you're in the right place. Let's dive in.

Hey, everybody, in today's episode, I want to talk about

taming the tech. So so often, the tech part of online

programs, online courses, online business, businesses, whatever

you want to call them, is the thing that stresses people out

the most. And I want to tell you why that is today. And then how

to change it. Alright, so here's the deal, is most people choose

a tool based on what somebody else is telling them. Right? So

you go out into the world, and you're like, 'Okay, what tool

should I use?' And people say, 'Oh, I like this one, you should

use this one, do this one, do that one.' And the problem is,

is that when you approach it from that perspective, you

actually are approaching it from the perspective of what do you

need, right? What are your requirements for running your

business. And so you end up most of the time, I would say, like,

99% of the time starting with a tool, you get into it, and then

you realize it doesn't do what you want it to do, or it's

clunky, or there's another tool that may be better. And so then

you switch to another tool, and then you switch to another tool,

and then you switch to another tool. And hey, like I am guilty

of this as well. However, I will tell you that the tech is

actually the least important part of your online program. And

because here's the reality is that most tools will do what you

want them to do, regardless of which tool it is, right and so

that the the place to start is actually mapping out the

requirements you have for what you want to do not starting with

a tool.

So in in the in my many years of doing an online business, and

creating online courses. The challenge has always been if you

open it, open a tool, whatever one it is, and you start with a

blank screen, you just sort of look at it and you stare at it.

Just imagine, I know you can't see my screen, but just imagine

like, just staring at a white screen and you're like, how am I

going to fill this with stuff. And that becomes overwhelming.

And then you start just like sort of filling it up. Because

we're just uncomfortable with the white space. And then what

happens is because you haven't planned what you what you want

to do, it'd be it becomes unorganized very quickly. And so

the biggest recommendation I have for you is like never start

with a tool. I was looking at a post somebody put the other day

and they were talking about how, you know, sort of clunky, this

one learning management system was because you had to build out

all of the things in a you know, an online builder and they're

like, well how do I know where to put the various you know, the

order to put things in and and how it's all structured and I

have so many topics at this just seems overwhelming to put them

all in there. And then I thought why? Why would you build it for

the first time in the tool? And because again, like people are

just uncomfortable with whitespace and so they go in and

they start filling things in? Well then it becomes a hot mess,

because you're just like throwing things in there and

there's no sort of plan or strategy or even learning

success path right like forget about just putting assets in and

how to organize the assets. There's no path or plan whenever

somebody says why 52 lessons and you know 100 videos I'm always

like wait timeout like that. That's way too many for one

course. And so that's the first red flag, the second red flag is

you want to externalize all of that, right? Like, I would never

recommend that somebody goes straight into a tool and starts

building, make sure that you map it out and you have sort of your

path and in the direction that you're going in outside of the

tool, then the tool becomes secondary. And, so when when

you're able to map it out and look at it, as, you know, the

path of like, how are you solving someone's problem,

right? How are you getting them from point A to point B, when

you map that out outside the tool, then what what happens is

you're able to see the pieces better, and it becomes less

overwhelming.

I had a client who was overwhelmed with emails. And

then again, what we did was we structured the emails and looked

at the emails that we needed, mapped those out before, she

went into her email, email automation system, and it became

manageable instead of going out there and trying to build emails

as, as she went. And so if you take this approach, and

honestly, like, you can use fancy pants, apps out there that

map everything out and in, give you all the things you can use

PowerPoint, you can use, you know, whatever, whatever tool

you want to use to do that, or you can use paper, right, like,

I have a sketch pad next to me. And so if I'm mapping something

out, that's a little bit complex, and I want to look at

how it's all going to come together. When I, I automate it,

when I create, can kind of the path in the tech, I do that on a

sketch pad with a marker. And so, you know, that's, that's a

solid approach to take, because it takes away the overwhelm.

Then you apply the tool that you need, based on the requirements

that you have, right? Like you've mapped it out, and you

need it to do xy and z, then, you know, you can choose the

tool that's going to do XY and Z.

And so my my lesson for you today in this is do not pick a

tool based on somebody else's recommendation without looking

at how it matches your requirements. And if you don't

have requirements yet, think about what your requirements

are, and then go out and ask the question based on what somebody

says because just because some gurus tells you that this is the

tool to use, just because your friend says this is a tool to

use doesn't automatically mean it's going to match your needs.

And so the next time you feel tempted to grab that, that tool,

you know that that piece of tech that you feel like that you need

before you grab it before you start paying for it monthly,

really identify whether or not it's the the thing that's going

to slide into your business and create that path, that

experience that helps your customers move forward. Alright,

there you go. That is my course building tip for today.