The modern business owner utilizes tech to work less and earn more. But what if you do own a business but aren’t tech-savvy? Not to worry. In today’s episode, Kendra Perry walks you through her favorite tech tools that power her business. From the wealth of tutorials you can find online to the best tools to automate routine tasks, Kendra shares the software that you can use yourself to propel your business to the next level. Tune in to find out how to use tech to the advantage of your business!
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RESOURCES MENTIONED:
Loom
Practice Better
Later
Canva
Zapier
Asana
FG Funnels
ConvertKit
Stripe
Paypal
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Simple Steps To Dominating The Tech (Even When You’re Tech Illiterate)
I’m excited to be talking about a bit of a touchy topic, the tech. When you’re starting an online business, the tech can feel so overwhelming. It’s like you’re learning Chinese, Mandarin, or some crazy language that you’ve never learned before. I felt the same way when I started because I wasn’t very techy when I started my business. I had a laptop and knew how to use it, but I was starting from scratch, exactly where you are now.
Maybe you’re a bit younger. Maybe you’re in your twenties, and you’re like, “Kendra, I was born with a smartphone in my hand. I came out of the womb with a smartphone.” That’s great for you. The younger generation is probably going to have a lot more of an easy time with an online business. If you’re like me, you’re in your 30s, 40s, 50s, and beyond, you’re probably going to be a bit tech illiterate unless you have come from a previous career that required you to work with tech.
What I want to do is give you a few tools and skills that will help make the tech a bit easier and will help you figure out tech issues a bit easier. The first thing I want to say is the tech that you use in online business is a tool, and it’s there to make your life easier. It’s there to save you time and keep you more organized. It’s there to help you make money. These are all good things, but anything good usually requires a bit of effort. Tech is a skill that you can learn. You just have to commit to learning it and know that the more you do it, the easier it gets.
I’ll never forget trying to figure out the tech in the beginning. I was trying to set up a landing page. When I first came online, it was 2012. The tech was very different. It was way more confusing. It wasn’t user-friendly. There weren’t a lot of options, so I had a heck of a time, and I remember I could punch a wall. I was so angry. The good thing these days is things are way more user-friendly. They’re easier to use, have better customer support, and there are a lot more options, which is a good thing. That’s good for you if you’re starting. Where I’m at in my business, I’m good enough with tech that I can usually roll into any platform and learn it pretty quickly.
The good news is you don’t have to do all the tech in your business, which we’re going to talk about later. When it comes to learning tech and mastering tech, the first thing that we have to implement is mindset. You need to stop calling yourself, “I’m not very techy,” and you need to stop saying, “I’m so tech illiterate.”
Don’t call yourself that. It implies that you have a deficiency. When you’re learning to ski, mountain bike, or ride a bike, you’re not like, “I’m ski illiterate. I’m bike illiterate.” You’re like, “I’m learning.” You’re like, “I’m a beginner. I’m intermediate. I’m a novice.” Instead of saying, “I’m not very techy, I don’t understand the tech,” say, “I’m a beginner with the tech. I’m a novice. I’m intermediate,” wherever you are. That can be helpful. Once you learn a platform, you know it, and that’s a cool feeling.
The first thing I want to go through is one of the most common and simplest fixes for any tech issue. This is going to change your world. Sometimes on the web, you’ll pull something up, and you’re like, “Why does that look like that? That looks weird. That’s not loading properly,” or all these different things happen. The first thing you should always do with almost any tech issue is to delete the browsing data/cookies, close down the browser, and restart the computer. You will be amazed how often that fixes the problem. I would say 75% or more times this fixes the problem.
If you’re wondering, “How do I delete cookies and delete browsing data?” I’ll tell you what it looks like on a Chrome browser. That’s the most common browser. If you’re using Firefox or something else like Safari, google this because it will be easy to find in a Google search. From the Chrome browser, look at the top right of the page. There are three lines. You click on those. You go to More Tools and then Clear Browsing Data. There’s going to be a button that says Clear Data, and it’s going to delete all the cookies, all the tracking pixels, and anything that can be interfering.
I don’t know how to explain these things because I don’t understand them, but there are all these little pixels and tracking tools, and they can mess up the way you’re seeing something or make something not load properly. You want to clear that data and exit out of your browser, not close it down. Go to File, quit Google Chrome or quit Safari, and restart your computer. You’ll be amazed about how often that fixes the issue.
Another thing you can do is to open up what’s called an Incognito Window. You’ll find that in the same place as you find the Delete Cookies in Chrome with the three dots at the top. Go to New Incognito Window. This is a clean window. It has no tracking, no cookies, and no anything. If you put the URL link into that, and it looks fine, you probably have a cookie issue. You just need to do what I told you to do. Delete the browsing data, clear cookies, exit the browser, and restart the computer. Seriously, you’ll be amazed at how often this solves the problem. You’re welcome.
That’s why I always start with that. When something’s not working or something’s glitching out, that’s a good place to start. There are things that happen where you’re learning a platform, and you’re like, “I don’t understand how to do this. I’m trying to do this one thing, and I don’t understand how I can do this.” The first thing to do is to check the platform Help Library. They have lots of tutorials. For example, if you’re in Practice Better, and you’re trying to figure out how to use it, first check their help box because they have a lot of tutorials. When I’m trying to figure out how to do something in Practice Better, ConvertKit, FG Funnels, I go through the tutorial library.
That’s what I always look at first because, a lot of times, I will find the step-by-step right in there. The next place to look if you’re not finding what you’re looking for is to use the world’s greatest and most intricate search engines called Google and YouTube. You can search it on Google and YouTube and see if there is a tutorial for that because a lot of people will make tutorials on how to do something, and they’ll walk you through it step by step.
If you find a help article, a YouTube video, or a Google page that shows you how to do something, save it. Copy that URL and stick it into a Google Document with the title of How to do X, Y, and Z. I guarantee you’re going to come back to do that thing, and you’re going to be like, “How did I do that thing?” Smart you will be like, “I’ll just open up this Google Doc, and I’ll find that help article.” It will save you a ton of time.
The next thing you can do is to reach out to the platform for support. They have a form you can fill out. They offer email support, or even better, some will offer chat support. Anytime you’re asking for tech support, you want to be as detailed as possible. You want to make sure to provide context. I always start with what I’m trying to do, and if something’s happening, I tell them, “This is what I’m trying to do. This is what’s happening.” I always provide a screenshot or a screen recording, and you can use something called Loom.com.
Loom is a little screen recorder. It’s a little plugin for a Chrome browser. It’s awesome. I use it every day in my business. You can show them what’s happening. Don’t send them a novel, just 30 seconds or 40 seconds, and show them what’s happening. As someone who gets tech questions, I get tech questions from my HD students, and they’ll be like, “How do I do this?” I’m like, “What are you talking about?”
First off, what are you trying to do? What’s happening? What are you seeing? If I can’t see what’s happening, I can’t help. I love it when people are like “Kendra, I’m trying to do X, Y, Z. This is what’s happening, and this is what I’m seeing,” and they send me a screenshot, I’m like, “Great. I know what’s going on.” It’s easier for me to answer the question because I have context and understand what they’re trying to do. The quickest way for you to get chat support or email support is to explain the problem in detail, tell them what you’re trying to do, and provide the screenshots or screen recording because that will get you a quick response.
Not all platforms have good customer service, but the ones that I use, like ConvertKit for example, have fantastic customer support. I was trying to figure out why someone wasn’t getting added to automation. They’d been through the automation before, and I was like, “Can they get re-added twice?” The woman gave me great advice. She’s like, “You need to do this,” and once I did it, I said, “Do you mind checking out this automation and clarify that I’ve set it up fine? I want to make sure.” She’s like, “Yes, I checked it over. You set it up perfectly. That’s going to be fine.”
A lot of platforms have great support. Make sure to utilize that. Remember, tech is here to make your life easier once you learn it. In the beginning, it’s going to take time, you’re going to feel frustrated, and you’re going to get stuck. Remember, you’re learning a new language. Have grace, be easy on yourself, and in the end, this is going to help you make money. It’s a good thing. I love the tech in my business because it prevents me from having to do everything manually. If you do everything manually in your business, you’re going to be working 80 hours a week.
Tech helps you work 20 to 30 hours a week. How amazing is that? The next question is, do you need to do all the tech in your business? The answer is absolutely not. I believe it’s important to understand tech from a bird’s eye view because you want to know what’s possible and understand how things work. Do you need to understand all the nitty-gritty? It’s very valuable to understand that. For example, if everybody quits their business, I could still run my business. I understand all the tech in my business. If it’s not your strong suit, you hate it, it’s burning you out, and it’s making you drained of energy, you can outsource it.
You can hire a tech VA who has knowledge of the tech platforms that you use. When you’re hiring for this position, you want to be clear about what you’re using because you want to make sure that they know those platforms. If you don’t have the ability to teach them, they’re going to have to know them. Having a VA who can do all the tech in your business is a valuable thing. Are you going to have to pay for it? Yes, but that might be a very valuable investment for you if it’s destroying your life. I’ve mentioned this before, but I want to reiterate this. When you figure out something in tech, add the process to a Google Document so you can refer to it next time.
Use Loom to take a screen recording of yourself doing it or grab the link from that help article, YouTube video, or whatever so that you can refer to it for next time because you’re not going to remember everything unless you’ve done it a bunch of times. I make sure to include those in what we call our company manual so that we can always refer back to it. Let’s say you have someone who is a tech VA and they’re setting up the tech. I would have them put together a resource list of how to do everything in your business so that if they quit or something happens to them, you can easily bring someone else into the role.
The next thing I want to do is go through my recommended tech platforms. When you’re starting, it can be hard to even know what you need. You don’t want to spend money on things you don’t need. I believe in running a lean business but not a cheap business. If you aren’t willing to invest any amount of money in your business, your business is not going to grow. You don’t have any business running a business personally, but what you’re going to see is it’s not that expensive in the grand scheme of things.
The first thing you’re going to need is client management software. This is true if you are doing one-on-one or group. You want client management software, especially if you are taking a health history or you are running labs. You want something that’s HIPAA compliant. I’m a big fan of Practice Better. I know it’s not the only one out there. I know there are different ones, but I’ve used them. I love it. My students love it. Practice Better is great. In Practice Bette, there are a bunch of different tiers, but I always believe that you should pay for the tier that allows you to take on the clients that you want to have.
I think you can get Practice Better free for ten clients. I might be wrong on those numbers, but it’s a very small number of clients. You can use it for free. Let’s say you need six clients a month to hit your goals. Set your business up for that. I only believe that the universe gives you what you can handle. If you only have that level of Practice Better and you were to get twelve clients tomorrow, you wouldn’t be set up for that. It would be a disaster. The universe is not going to give you that. I would say expect to spend maybe about $75 a month.
If you’re reading this in the future, the times would’ve changed or the price probably would’ve changed, but the level that you would need for most things to set yourself up for success is probably around the $75 a month range. I love Practice Better. The next thing you’re going to need is landing page software. Landing page software is how you deliver your freebies. It’s a great place to make sales pages and that thing. That’s going to cost you around pretty much not going to get one for less than $100 a month. I’m a big fan of FG Funnels. It’s very similar to ClickFunnels if you’re familiar with that platform.
The great thing about FG Funnels is it includes a bunch of different things in there. Not only does it host your landing pages, sales pages, and opt-in pages, but you can host a course in there as well. You could host your program there. It has a calendar. You can schedule social media from it. You can do all kinds of things there. It’s a nice all-in-one software. The next thing you’re going to need is email marketing software because you can’t send mass emails from Gmail. It’s illegal. You have to allow people to click a button to unsubscribe. They need to be able to opt-out, or you’re breaking the law and you could get in trouble.
There are lots of options out there. I love ConvertKit. I’ve used it since the beginning of my business. No matter how big your business grows, it will be totally fine for you. It starts at $9 a month. They do have a free option but don’t do that one because you won’t get automation and you want to be able to do automation. Go with the paid. For 300 subscribers or less, you start at $9 a month, and it goes up with the more subscribers you get. If you’re brand new, $9 a month is nothing. It’s not a big deal at all. The next thing you’re going to need is social media scheduling.
If you go with FG Funnels for your landing page software, they have a very basic social media scheduler. It’s totally fine. It’s not fancy, but it works. You can go with Later.com. Later is what we use, and it’s somewhere around $9 to $10 a month, maybe as much as $12 a month, but not much. That allows you to schedule all your content so that you don’t have to post content in real time. You’re going to need a graphic design platform. Canva is the best one out there. I don’t even know of other ones. I’ve been using Canva forever.
Canva keeps getting better and better. There are millions of templates. You can get a free option. Do not do that. Get the paid one because the paid one is going to give you all the functionality and templates, and that is going to save you so much time, well worth $15 a month. Next, you’re going to need a payment processor, a way to accept money. There are lots of different payment processes. I use Stripe. I use a bit of PayPal, but not a massive pan of PayPal because it’s tough for bookkeeping and not my favorite.
I use Stripe. It’s free, but they’re going to take processing fees. I believe it’s 2% to 3% on a payment. You might feel like, “That’s so much money.” It’s the cost of doing online business. You cannot ask people to eTransfer you. You cannot ask people to send you wire transfers. That is not a way to do business online. People will have no tolerance for that. It’s the cost of doing business. The final one, which isn’t necessarily required but is highly recommended, is called Zapier.com. It’s an integration platform, and it’s amazing. This is what will give you so much more time in your business because you can make tasks that you would typically have to do manually and automate.
For example, when people enroll in HCA, and this is what Zapier does, it takes the information that was collected on their payment form and zaps or sends it over to them to our project management platform, which is Asana. It creates a card and a checklist. When people come into our program, they get 6 months of access to live support. After 6 months, they can continue by paying a monthly membership or they can cancel.
We have to track that manual. They come in, and we have to manually allow them access to the Facebook group. We can’t do that automatically. We have certain points where we check in with them. We have to remove them from the Facebook group if they don’t continue. It creates that entire list, so we don’t have to do it manually. It’s there automatically. My virtual assistant just goes in. She can see the checklist. She can see who enrolled. When she allows them access to the Facebook group, she checks it off. She moves their card. She can set a notification for six months from now where she’ll check in and see if they’ve paid to come into the membership. If not, she’ll remove them from the Facebook group.
There’s a lot you can do with Zapier. There’s so much automation that you can do with it that I highly recommend it as well. Zapier will be free. It charges you per zap or integration. Every time it has to send information to another platform, it counts it and charges you. It calls it a task and charges you per task. For example, I have a level where I get up to 2,000 tasks and I pay about $500 a year. There is a free version, but it will start charging at some point. If you have less going on, you might be able to get away with the free tool for a while. All in all, my friend, that is over $200 a month. That is nothing.
Think about brick and mortar business. These people invest hundreds of thousands of dollars of capital to start a business. Imagine you were starting an in-person practice. You would need space. You would need a desk. You would need furniture. You would need to decorate it. You would maybe need a person to sit at the front desk. You would need plants. You would need to pay rent. Imagine you were starting a retail store or a restaurant. You would need inventory. You would need space and staff. The amount of capital that goes into starting most businesses is crazy, and here you are, being able to start an online business spending only over $200 a month. It’s nothing, and it’s amazing.
You will need to invest in that. Regardless of whatever business coaching program you sign up for or whatever mentor you work with, these are the tools that you’re going to need for an online business. Expect to spend at least around $200 to $300 a month. It’s not much money. If you don’t have the money, get a business loan or a line of credit. Do something like that because you do not want to build graphics from scratch. You need Canva. You legally cannot mass market through Gmail. You need a ConvertKit. All these things are going to save you time and make the experience for your client a whole lot nicer online.
Thank you so much for reading this episode. If you’ve loved this episode, take a screenshot. Upload it to your Instagram stories and tag me at @KendraPerryInc. Let me know your biggest take-home. I love when you do that. If you want to go one step further to support the show, you can give this show a five-star review on iTunes. To do that, simply go to RateThisPodcast.com/wealthy. I will see you next time, same time, in the same place where I help you become wealthy AF.
