If you feel like your business only grows when you show up, you’re going to love this one.
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I sit down with Sarah Noked, and she breaks down how she built a system where her ads consistently bring in leads, nurture them, and turn them into buyers—without her having to be “on” all the time. We talk through what a mature ads ecosystem actually looks like and why her business depends on it to run smoothly.
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SPEAKER_00
So, you know how we talk about ads, and I talk about the necessity of running ads. Well, today you’re definitely going to want to pay attention because our guest to the episode next to me has a very well-oiled Facebook and Instagram ads ecosystem, if you will. Ads that are moving people onto her email list that are aligned with the offer that she has and the way that she serves her audience, and then giving people the opportunity to work with her in the various ways that her business offers. But she has a very unique reason where Facebook and Instagram ads are actually fundamental to her business. Her business must be running ads. And so I want you as you listen to this episode to take away or understand what a mature, well-developed Facebook and Instagram ads system could look like for your business, and also walk away with some strategies to think about as you continue your Facebook and Instagram ads journey. Sarah, welcome to the episode.
SPEAKER_01
I’m so excited to be here.
SPEAKER_00
Me too. I we share so much in common, including like our general view on traveling and living in foreign cultures. I won’t spoil where you live. My audience knows where I live in Mexico and I used to live in China for 12 years. Let me read your bio and then let’s talk about ads and your business and a bit about where we’re both at in the world, shall we? Perfect. Cool. So Sarah Nocked. And Sarah, I said that right, right? Yeah, you did. Wonderful. Sarah Nocked is the founder of OBM School, where she trains service providers to become skilled online business managers. She also leads an OBM agency that helps entrepreneurs find the operational support they need to grow their businesses with confidence and clarity. OBM School is a training academy for service professionals ready to grow into the role of online business manager. It’s CPD certified OBM accreditation program offers practical tools, mentorship, and a recognized path to professional certification in the OBM industry. And we met just a couple weeks ago because of a common connection with another lady, Gillian Perkins, that I had collaborated with also on this podcast. Sarah, it’s good to have you on the podcast. And I can’t wait to learn more about your business, what you’re doing on your side of the earth, and how Facebook and Instagram ads have been working for you.
What An OBM Actually Does
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, absolutely. I’m I’m excited to kind of spill the beans and share, pull back the curtain on my little OBM world and what I’ve been doing for the last 20 years. So, you know, I’m an open book. You can feel free to ask away.
SPEAKER_00
Well, let’s cover a very basic to you and me definition. What is an OBM? And why do businesses need one? And what stage do businesses usually realize or start to break and they realize that they need an OBM, then it will make sense as we talk about the various offers that you have and how ads support those.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah. So, you know, I’ve been working as an OBM for many, many years. I started back in 2009 in this industry. And back then, people didn’t really know what online business managers are or what we do. But I think now in the world of AI and a lot of different software as a service platforms, all those SaaS platforms that we work that we use, and the fact that in this post-COVID age, online business is more prevalent than ever. Even offline businesses have an online leg of their business that they run. And I think what’s really important to mention here is that when a business gets to a point or an entrepreneur, solopreneur gets to the point in their business where they can’t do any more. There’s not enough time in the day. And that, you know, you had asked me about that breaking point. You know, not everybody needs an OBM. Whereas, and I’m sure you’ve talked time and time on this podcast about virtual assistants, everybody can use a virtual assistant. Everybody can use somebody that’s implementing and getting things done in their business. But a business that is ripe for an OBM to step inside is when the entrepreneur, the CEO, the founder realizes that, geez, I don’t have any more time in my day. If I could get out and do those sales calls or write the book or build the podcast, I would be making X much more revenue. That’s when they realize, okay, wait a second, I need to bring somebody on who can, in many ways, be an extension of myself. And that’s why, you know, OBMs will often say that we partner with our clients more than we work for our clients. You know, we partner with them, we’re, we’re supporting them to reach their goals, be held accountable to their goals, and build their team in a way that makes sense for their business. And, you know, it’s been something that has been an amazing gift for me, kind of finding this career and being able to work it for myself from where I live in the world, I think is not miraculous, but it’s proof that no matter where you are, you can have a beautiful online business. And mine is such that it’s it’s few and far between where I get to meet my clients. I have met some of my clients along the years. It’s always been like travel to California, travel to Australia, which I love once in a while. But I really primarily advocate for, you know, I my my whole sort of vision for this business really started when I realized that I wanted to have kids. And I was like, wait a second here, like going to work and having kids. Like, how am I gonna be a quote unquote stay-at-home mom? And it just, you know, it wasn’t something that I I wanted to sacrifice. So where there’s a will, there’s a way. And back in 2009, I set forth on this journey and I’ve made it work consistently for myself all these years. I was like, if I can do it, anyone can do it.
SPEAKER_00
Right on. I remember the first time I ever encountered an OBM, it was also about the first time I learned what an OBM was. And I remember sharing with my wife how fascinated I was with the fact that the guy who I was working for, he had an OBM and she was running his business. And I was like, Jamie, that’s my wife’s name. I was like, this is this is crazy. Like he just shows up and you know, hops on calls, you know, coaching calls with the clients and the mastermind, and you know, plans out strategy for business growth and things like this, you know, speaks on stages. And I actually said something similar. I was like, but it’s like it’s like he on purpose doesn’t choose to know or doesn’t know the other like inner workings of his business, and he doesn’t have to, it just runs and she’s running it, OBM. I’m like, this is this is great. I want an OVM.
SPEAKER_01
You know, I realized that, and you know, between us, this is something we kind of laugh about internally in our community, is that we lovingly joke about our clients being successful despite themselves. And I think that what you just mentioned about how your client just kind of shows up. It doesn’t really, he’s not really so interested in the systems or perhaps even interested in using the project management tool. And it was really crazy for me, especially at the beginning of my career as an OBM, to really understand that not everybody like thinks like I think, and not everybody is, you know, I mean, organized is such a I don’t know, it’s a silly word, like because it’s not about being organized, it’s about thinking with a systems mindset and being able to reverse engineer and problem solve and being very strategic and actually really loving the big picture of business. And so I realized in my kind of discovering it in myself, but then real and then in all of my years training others to do this, I was like, we’re just I was like, tell my students, like, you’re just really different from your client, you know, and they’re like, I don’t understand, you know, so-and-so scaled this miraculously successful business, they’re making$60,000 a month and they don’t even use a project management tool. I was like, I know it’s bananas. And so when an OBM can step in and really partner with a client who is, you know, very visionary, and we come in as that container, and they essentially pour themselves into ourselves as their container, and we hold together their vision and their goals and you know, and kind of keep that boat forging ahead in a profitable, you know, right, semi-stable, you know, calm way, you know, calm to the chaos.
SPEAKER_00
Right. I just see working with an OBM, and we’ll get to ads in a moment, because you are spending an incredible amount of, well, not incredible, but a solid amount of ad spend each month. I just want to tease that to the listener right now who thinks like we’re about to talk with a business owner who’s spending like$4,000 a month. No, like you have a well-oiled machine that’s working profitably for you. What I want to say about OBMs before we transition to your ads is that I feel like working with an OBM really does allow small business owners to one play like on a level, play on a level, run their business on a level that previously, whenever before OBMs were really a thing, that only larger businesses could. And if you think about it, all of the big businesses and the names that we could name that have like a CEO, it’s like there are a few exceptional CEOs who also are specializing in operations of their business, right? But usually you have like the CEO.
SPEAKER_01
You’re very keen, I have to say. I think you read people well because I have worked, some of my favorite clients have been have said to me, you know, Sarah, if for whatever reason my business doesn’t work out, you know I’m gonna be an OBM, right? I’m not even not once, not twice more than that. Okay. I have, yeah, so there are, you know, and I think I’m kind of would bucket myself in that as well. I’m not very visionary. I’m certainly a good OBM, but a lot of them are visionary and and like, you know, can and but then they do all the things in their business. And so those are the ones that get to like 60, 80,000 months. And you’re like, how are you still a solo pruner with some random contractor you use here and there? Like, how are you keeping it all together and sleeping? And so those are my favorite, favorite clients because they actually know and respect the effort that goes into being an OBM because they themselves like have a knack for that tenacity of being like organized and like liking new tools and setting up systems and setting up tech systems, like the kind of stuff that we like geek out on.
unknown
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01
You know, and yeah, because you’re like that too. I was like, you would also probably be a good OBM.
Offers That Keep It Simple
SPEAKER_00
I think lots of goods. I I’ve seen true OBMs in their gifting and skills and passions working, and I’m like, I could, I could not, I could not do that. I remember lovingly but firmly being whipped into shape as an employee in a business that had an OBM and the OBM was definitely doing the whipping, and I realized I couldn’t, I couldn’t do this. I’m not I’m not skilled in that area. Let’s move to let’s move to your offers because I think I think the listener and me too would need context and like why it is that your ads work so well. And to do that, I think we need to understand the ecosystem of your business. So tell me about your offers, and then somewhere we have to talk about and where like share with the listener where you live in the world and why it’s so crucial that you have ads. Yeah, definitely.
Why Ads Are Nonnegotiable Here
SPEAKER_01
We’ll like we’ll trickle that out, we’ll let them sweat about it a little bit, right? So, yeah, I mean, I I got into ads, I would say probably like 12 or maybe 15 years ago. Like it was it was many years ago. So this isn’t something that I have like been running for two years or three years. Like this is like a fine oiled ads machine. And so inside of OBM School, we have two main offers. One is the accelerator program, that’s for you know junior OBMs just starting, and one is our certification program, the OBM accreditation, and that is our higher ticket program. So I am a systems girl through and through. I don’t just talk the talk, I walk the walk. So my launches are systematized down to the SOP. So it’s not like a rinse and repeat, right? Because there’s like different seasons, but you know, we know we’re having a pre-launch meeting, we’re getting our ducks in a row, you know, we have so the other thing that we do is we have a lot of these opt-ins, these freebies, right? You guys you know your community is familiar with those. So we have an SOP opt-in standard operating procedure. We have an OBM starter kit. And then every quarter we try to run OBM week because I love socializing, which is funny because I don’t really meet people in person. And I, the the if I’m leaving my house, it’s probably just for a yoga class, to be honest, or you know, seeing friends. But our our offers are not complicated. And I think one of the things that might resonate with your community is I’m kind of like plain Jane when it comes to my OBM stuff. Like I don’t, I’m not some visionary entrepreneur that’s like, I need this lead magnet and I need to launch this project and I’m gonna change OBM to like operations archetype, you know, or some silly, you know, things that people are always distracted by the bright, shiny object, especially when it comes to ads. But I have always been of the opinion, like, give it 90 days, let’s see it through, let’s make sure that like this is working. So I run my opt-in ads, like those are my freebies, that’s to cold traffic. I have my product ads that we run, you know, quarterly through the cycles. And then I have this whole other side of my business, which is the agency. And that’s, you know, kind of like not definitely not the bread and butter, but where I started and and the the kind of loop that, and not to be cheesy, but for me, a lot of what I do is about empowering other OBMs. Like I’ve I’ve had my success. Like my kid’s 12 years old now. I feel like I’ve given her the stay at home. I’ve got another two. My youngest is seven, but like I feel like I’ve I’ve really lived up to giving my kids the stay-at-home mom, whether they like it or not, feeling. So I’m like, I’m good with that. So now for me, it’s really about helping to show others that this is actually a thing and you can make it work for yourself. I live in Israel, which, you know, may or may not shock, shock people, but I always say that if I can do this from here, having, you know, I can’t network in person. Yes, I can virtually network and all of that stuff, but and that’s what I that’s what I’ve been doing. But ads for me is also okay. So the other piece that I’m maybe intentionally not sharing with you guys is like most OBMs, I’m not sorry, sorry, Beth.
SPEAKER_00
Like most OBMs out there, help them out there, kid.
SPEAKER_01
On all the devices, like most OBMs. So the the thing that I really want to share here that might be not be obvious is that I’m very introverted. Like, yes, I’ve learned to be an extroverted person and put myself out there, but like I just want to be left alone. So I think that that most entrepreneurs or visionary entrepreneurs, when you’re passionate about something, like you can go and you can put yourself out there on social media or you can be this like social extroverted person. That is not me. So I think Joe, the other thing that I want to mention here is that I need ads to make up for the fact that I don’t want to actually show up in that kind of way if I’m being very honest. Like I don’t, I mean, I have put my kids on Facebook and social media way back when, but like I would never do that again just because I don’t want them to have these like, you know, digital blueprints when they’re in the, you know, like like like when we were young, how none of that stuff existed. Like, I just don’t want, you know, I don’t want to put my kids out there in that way. I don’t want to show myself and my life and and honestly, like even in these days, like sometimes where I live, because it’s ruffles feathers. But then I go back to my reason of why I’m I’m doing this, and it’s about empowering other people to understand that you can have the flexibility, the meaning, and the freedom working as a freelancer. And if you have some rich corporate experience where you don’t want to be someone’s assistant, I get that. Like I’m I’m a manager too. Like, I don’t, and I’m sorry if that’s offensive for some people that might be offending some of our listeners, but it is what it is, you know.
SPEAKER_00
I I would hope that my listeners wouldn’t have such thin skin to be offended. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I hope it’s like we have one life, and not to be morbid, but it’s going to end. So let’s live it in the best way, though.
SPEAKER_01
And I think that you and I, you and I have been living our best lives. Like I would not change anything about my life. I really live in the most beautiful place. The sun is always shining, and I’ve got beautiful family and beautiful kids, and I’m so grateful for the life that I’ve built. And it’s only because I took a risk on myself. And a lot of people don’t do that. They’ll, you know, I could have also stayed in the corporate job. I would have, I had an M, I have an MBA. I can have a really, you know, the hundreds of thousands of dollars if I, you know, like I just I think there’s something so fantastic about building a business and being able to also have that exemplified for your family, you know, like my daughter, my sons, like they will, I got three kids, they are seeing their mommy, you know. Although my daughter will say, Oh, my mommy sits upstairs and she talks to her girlfriends all day. No, badass, first of all.
SPEAKER_00
So so I live in Mexico, but before this, most of my audience knows I spent 12 years in China, and I would have spent what I believe even longer there, maybe my whole life there. At least we had we had no plans to leave. We were all in living in China. You pulled that off, living to Israel. You’ve been there now for you said was it 20 years?
SPEAKER_01
Almost 20 years. Yeah, almost 20 years.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, almost 20 years. Much in the same way that I’m an immigrant to Mexico. Like I tell people, I’m a Mexican immigrant. Are you?
SPEAKER_01
It is I know, I’m an immigrant too. But like my family was we were all immigrants in Canada anyway, so it makes sense.
SPEAKER_00
It really does. It’s funny, my dad did not approve of me living in China.
SPEAKER_01
Really?
SPEAKER_00
I’m like, but dad, you immigrated to the US. Like, shouldn’t you support moving around the world and like experiencing a new culture and all this? And he had more choice words, which I won’t share on this podcast.
SPEAKER_01
And look at you being six your successful self. What does he say now?
SPEAKER_00
He well, I mean, he immigrated to the states in the late in the late 70s, and he came, he’s from Ghana, so I’ll say it like this about a month, no, about a month ago, I got my permanent residency here in Mexico, which all that means is now like me and my family, we can enter and leave. Like, we don’t need a visa to stay in Mexico, which is great, right? And I had two weeks ago gone to Dallas to speak at the Creative Educators Conference on stage. On the return flight, it was fun. I blacked out, I don’t remember what I said on stage at all, but thank God I practiced and everyone liked what I had to say, even though I didn’t say everything I was meant to say. I was on the return flight home, sitting next to this guy, and he had the look of, I don’t know, a tech entrepreneur or maybe somebody like high up in tech, right? And so I struck up a conversation with him because I was in the middle seat and he was on the aisle seat, and his name is Kieran, and it turns out that he is a professional Pokemon player.
SPEAKER_01
That is the cutest thing ever.
SPEAKER_00
I was like, whoa, really? Like you play, and he’s like, Yeah, he has summer camps, you know, where he teaches people how to play. He travels the world every two to three weeks to participate in tournaments, and he makes great money doing it, like any other professional, like you know, athlete would. And I’m just like, this is blowing my mind. But to get to the point of immigrant parents and how I’m my dad’s utter disappointment in me, his parents are from Lebanon, and I was like, So, what did your parents as immigrant parents and me understanding everything that that can mean? I was like, So, what did your parents think about you becoming a professional? Professional Pokemon player, you know, because to get to the point, my dad did not talk to me for six months when I let him know that I was going into linguistics of all things. Wow. Back in college. And like, yeah, it sucked. It hurt. And I can kind of understand as an immigrant from Africa, coming, you know, Ghana, coming to the US when back in those times, like doctors were like the epitome, like the best profession ever. It was a doctor or a lawyer.
SPEAKER_01
I don’t know anybody else’s who had parents that immigrated to I mean every every Jewish parent who’s like, you’re either a doctor or a lawyer, or you’re not, or you’re not in the family anymore. My brother’s a doctor, so I’m the black sheep that I can do whatever I want because we’ve got the doctor in the family.
SPEAKER_00
I wonder if that’s how my younger sister feels. But yeah, my dad, I’m like, I guess it took him six months to process that a lifetime, or my full lifetime, 18 years-ish at the time of we’ll just say brainwashing because there was no other option. Yeah. All the friends, all my family, all my aunts and uncles, anybody who he let me be friends with knew that I was going to be a doctor. Yeah. So Jesus. Cheers to immigrant parents. We love you and your sacrifice. We love you. We love you.
Lead Magnets That Convert Cold
SPEAKER_01
We’re gonna be our own selves. Yeah, free spirits.
SPEAKER_00
Yep. So you, if I understood this correctly, you have multiple opt-ins into your business ecosphere that people can take. Yes. Are you running Facebook and Instagram ads to all those opt-ins, or is there one that has really been performing super well?
SPEAKER_01
And you’ve also no, we run they they all perform super well, to be honest. We have a really good, I think our I think our conversion rate is like, I want to say something like 35%. Like nice. It’s really nice. Like I think I have been really lucky in working with really great ads managers. I think that’s part of it is finding somebody who really jives with what you do. And like naturally, you know, I think the OBM space and for a lot of ads managers, like it’s sort of there’s a lot of overlap there in that freelance world. So I’ve always really found great ads managers who care about the product and who are really invested in getting our audiences where they need to be. And I also think that, well, I know that because so ads, so again, newsflash, ads are also my SEO strategy, right? Because like, I don’t know, you know, I’m like SEO these days with AI now and everything. Like I know that the times in my business life that I have had to cut my ads off or, you know, like because life happens. There’s been times where a couple times where I shut my ads off because I was making some changes in my business, my SEO tanked. And I was like, that’s another reason to run my ads. The SEO piece. But yeah, our our opt-ins perform very well on cold traffic. And then I think once if you know, it’s a it’s like how it was with me, and for any OBMs who might be listening to this podcast, like the online business manager is like it either really feels like, oh yeah. Like when I remember the first time I heard OBM, I was like, that’s me. That’s me. So most of the women and some men that come into my funnel are they’re either like a yay or a nay. Like it’s a hard no or a yes. There’s no like, oh, I don’t know, am I, am I? Like, no, you’re either you’re like, yes, this resonates with me, or no. So I think that I’ll also say that I have, you know, what I’m offering people is an is like a career. It’s an opportunity to like make money and it’s real. And I mean, I think that I’m in Israel and I’ve been doing this for many years, and I I have a lot of case studies and proof to show that I’m like, you don’t have to be in the same time zone. You don’t even have to meet your client in person. You just have to be accountable and strategic and have a good plan. And that’s what I’m gonna help you knack working with these clients. So I think for me, once I get people into my honeypot, they’re they’re very keen to take the next steps because they know it’s the real deal and they know that wow, if Sarah can do this, so can I, right?
SPEAKER_00
There we go. I’m going to invite you to share the next steps before we hop into your ads, like the rest of your ad funnel. Yeah. If somebody is listening and their ears are perking up right now and they’re like, ooh, this OBM thing, either working with one or becoming one, sounds intriguing. What would be the next step that they could take to further explore that path?
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, well, if they are somebody looking for an OBM and they’re interested in visiting our directory or learning more about if they’re a good fit to hire an OBM, meaning, you know, are you making, you know, at least six figures in your business? Do you have something that you are needing help managing? Those kinds of things. So they can definitely head over to Sarano Ked.com forward slash services. That’s the matchmaking like of like that whole Sereno Ked piece. That was always my agency for all these years. And then OBM School and any kind of person listening who’s like, maybe I want to become an OBM, they can head over to obmschool.com forward slash resources. And we’ve got tons of different, you know, lead magnets, like different opt-ins, you know, like a starter kit, an SOP kit, but we also have a podcast, and we also have a free community on Facebook, and they can get all of that good stuff there.
Omnipresence Ads Explained Clearly
SPEAKER_00
Right on, right on. Okay. So you’re running ads to your various free opt-ins. Somebody comes onto your list. What is the next ad-powered part of your funnel?
SPEAKER_01
You’re asking good questions. It’s the omnipresence, the almighty omnipresence adds. And break that down for us. What yeah? So I think that it’s yeah, I think that, you know, again, like we’re saying here, you know, I’m I’m not showing up at events. You don’t know me as your local entrepreneur. So when people come into our honeypot and they’re like, ooh, what’s this OBM thing? I want to make sure that they’re buttered up and that they’re really clear on what it could look like for them. So we have a YouTube channel where I feature a lot of day in the life. Like I primarily do my, you know, my talking head, blah, blah, blah, and interviewing our students who have completed certification. And I, and I, and I, from the perspective of like a day in the life, because I want people, like I, you know, it’s crazy to me, and this might be shocking for your listeners, but there are so many talented individuals who make amazing OBMs, who really second guess themselves, or they have some trauma from corporate that kind of keeps them stuck, or, you know, they’ve been kind of conditioned, like many of us in high school and university, to kind of like work for the man, you know. So the part of my omnipresence is showing YouTube videos, showing these like interviews, showing like clips of testimonials that we’ve had and and like sort of sound bites, because we’ve got, you know, oodles. There’s no shortage of good stories that we have. It’s just about making sure that, you know, once you’re kind of in our honeypot, that you are, you know, made certain that this is a feasible, viable career if you have the skill set. So we want to make sure that like obviously a big part of OBM school is like having successful OBMs that then go and have successful businesses. That’s what kind of makes the wheels turn. So it’s an amazing product, if I do say so myself. But a lot of the amazingness comes from inside the people themselves because it’s already there. You know, I’m like, I’m just gonna, I’m just gonna teach you how to position the skills that you already have, you know, and make them marketable to people who have online and offline businesses. So that’s what that whole omnipresence is. It’s like, and and to be honest with you, a a large bulk of our ad spend is spent on these, you know, omni, omnificent, like, you know, all over the place in your face. And so people will come to me and they’ll be like, oh my God, I saw you on YouTube. And then I was like, got all these ads and I binge watched all of your videos, and now I’m ready to be an OBM. And I’m like, great, you know, you’ve you’ve you’ve sort of self-selected yourself. And that’s what I’m looking for. I don’t like, I’m not, I’m not here to convince people. I’m here to just say this is a viable option. If you want to be nomadic, if you want to live from anywhere, if you want to be home with your kids, if you don’t want to change out of your pajamas, this can work for you.
SPEAKER_00
Awesome. Awesome. I’ll add some quick insight. I see omnipresent ads work well for clients. There are two kinds where one, especially for service providers, omnipresent ads can be running to the either to your warm audiences or the audiences that you want to be your warm audiences. And so, like for you as a listener, if you’re early on in your ad journey, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend omnipresent ad strategy yet, because I always say like for Facebook ads, you want to be running them to first an offer that works, or sorry, running them to a funnel that works. And so, ideally, running them to a lead magnet that you know that you can nurture those leads into your offer further down the funnel. And for many people, at least in the online course space, that offer is a repeatable launch that’s profitable. So, speaking in that context, then first start there and then start running omnipresent ads to warm up your audience because people that you know identify with the education that you’re providing or the problems that you solve that you’re communicating through ads will watch a percentage of those ads, and then you end up retargeting those folks into or with ads that bring them in further into your business ecosphere. That’s one thing. And then the second is for a service provider to provide context to what you’re saying, Sarah, a service provider who is running omnipresent ads, those can work really well because let’s say, for example, like I’m a service provider. Yeah, somebody who is an OBM is a service provider. Let’s say they’re providing a service that’s upwards of$2,000 a month. Just for example, that is a pretty high initial ask, right? Like someone does not casually spend$2,000 a month. They need to understand all the benefits, right? And so there’s a cool kind of omnipresent ad strategy where you know you could have four buckets of ads that are running all the time at low ad spin per day, but reaching at least all the folks you need them to reach, educating them on like what you do, you know, sharing client testimonials, talking about your very unique process and how that has helped clients. That’s more like a client case study, if you will. And then the tried and true sales ad with urgency, but not in a sleazy way, like for example, for an OBM. That could be something as simple as saying, look, you’ve reached this amount of revenue. How will you scale further? It’s clearly not going to be you doing more of what you have been doing. Right. Let’s look at, you know, making your business more efficient, efficient, having somebody who’s skilled in systems take that off your plate so you can do more of the things that you’re uniquely skilled and like gifted at doing. Things like this, these kind of omnipresent ads work very well. After I broke that down, that’s basically what you’ve been doing lots of, right, Sarah?
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, thank thankfully, because I got a good ads manager, but I mean, there, you know, and it’s so funny because I hear you say that, I’m like, yeah, you know, I know you really know what you’re doing. And I had a, you know, I I just sometimes there’s been many times where you mean you probably get annoyed like this with your clients, but I remember saying to my ads manager, like, do we really need to be spending this much money on these omnipresence ads? And she’s like, Yeah, because look at these conversion rates. I was like, Okay, and then I shut my mouth, but it seems it’s very counterintuitive, but it really does work very well. So yeah, I just wanted to for all of you lay folk out there who might not, you know, be too deep in ads, like, yeah, what Quayo’s saying is is the real deal. It really is.
SPEAKER_00
I love how you said, but effectively, data. And then you’re like, okay, I will listen to the data.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I listen to the data. I’m good about listening to the data because I can like most entrepreneurs be like, you know, I wake up in the morning and I’m not having a bad day. I want to burn it down. You know, I I’m like that too. Yeah. I was like, I want to burn it down, but let me listen. And also I tell all of my OBMs, like, when you talk to your clients, you talk to them through metrics, not through the emotional narrative that it’s like, you know, Mercury in whatever retrograde and like yada yada. No, the here’s the conversion rate, here’s the proven blah, blah, blah. We said we were gonna do it for 90 days. Like, let’s stick to the plan. So I’m I’m good with sticking to plans.
OBM Week Launch Engine
SPEAKER_00
So tell me then about since we went to the free lead magnet or the opt-in, if you will, and we talked about the importance of running ads to a funnel that works. Tell us about the next step in your funnel where I believe you mentioned it’s OBM week, correct?
SPEAKER_01
Right, right. So every quarter-ish, usually three or four times a year, we try because it’s a big production and we run this event called OBM Week. And I, you know what? Again, like I kid you not, I’ve probably run this event 40 times, and I’m not exaggerating quarterly. Like I lit, like truly. And that is because I’m a plain Jane and like if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, kind of thing. And I know that the energy of this event and the people that, you know, come to this event and they are literally coming to learn and see if this is a good career move for them, you know, they’re gonna get their answer. So it’s something that we put a lot of effort into. And so would we run ads to this? We treat, we actually, I’m not even sure we run ads to cold. I now I do think we have a small cold audience for OBM week, but mostly it’s warm audiences. And we’re just, you know, again, re-re-engaging them to come back. You know, you came on the list, you’ve been here for a while, come to OBM Week, see what I’m all about, see what our community is all about, and decide for yourself if this is like a thing for you. And that’s hands down something that we spend a lot of money on ads running. We put a left, a lot of effort. We have knacked it to the core because we’ve we’ve rinsed and repeated it so many times that, you know, now we have like an OBM VIP lounge that we also run retargeting ads to. That’s like sort of like, I guess it’s a tripwire in many ways. So we’ve been doing that too, and like we’ve been finessing and and and doing that, but that’s sort of another lead magnet, if I if I may call it that, this beautiful event that we do every quarter. And that also works along with our with our lead magnets as another kind of opportunity to get people in. And that’s a rinse and repeat cycle. Like I was saying, we do it every quarter, and it’s great because even when we run our ads, we’re like, okay, let’s just like put in another couple of, we know what works, right? It’s like the ugly, ugliest ads that work also. And I was like, okay, let’s keep the ads ugly and let’s put in another couple ugly ads to see if we can have more ugly ads running.
SPEAKER_00
But again, ugly.
SPEAKER_01
I’m just like, oh, it’s like it’s like the the bro marketer in me, you know, like the ugly landing pages. So that’s another sort of freebie lead magnet that we run. And then I told you already about our our omnipresence ads. And then to be honest, like we don’t spend a lot of money on sales ads, which I don’t you know, may or may not be surprising to you because I don’t have anything to really measure it against. But I don’t know if it’s the Facebook meta ad gods that are like, they don’t like these short snippets. Cause like, you know, we’ll we’ll have application open ads running to our warm audiences, you know, from time to time. Actually, no, not from time to time. Just after OBM week, we’ll also run ads to our accelerator program because that’s what we launch. We have like an OBM week bonanza, if I may. Um, kind of thing.
SPEAKER_00
And then there the offer that you’re selling off of the back end of OBM week is the accelerator.
SPEAKER_01
Right, which is our kind of junior OBM. I call I like to, I I sometimes like, sometimes don’t like calling it a business in a box because I was like, I don’t know, it’s not sexy, but it is essentially all the things you need to get your OBM business going. And then once they have proof of concept, they join us inside a certification, and there’s a nice little opt grade to certification.
SPEAKER_00
So that is the profitable funnel behind the ads, or the profitable funnel that I would say needs to always be there first in the business before you run ads. Free lead magnet, opt-in to the email list, nurture done well, and then every quarter there is OBM week, and OBM week is a free training, right? Effectively. Okay. And then at the end of OBM week or somewhere near that, people have the opportunity to join the accelerator.
AI Energy And Ads Over Organic
SPEAKER_01
Accelerator, yeah, with juicy bonuses and maybe an OBM week discount and any, you know, any kind of flair that you know, late lately. I’ve been, I mean, like many of us, I’m like obsessed with AI in many ways, and and and teaching our OBMs how to leverage AI and set up AI as a system for their clients. And it’s just it’s honest to God, made me so excited about this business again. Whereas I I if I’m being honest, like last year I was like kind of like like I was like after chatbots, like I don’t know, five years ago, it was like chatbots, chatbots, chatbots, and then there was like nothing fun to do for like ages. And now now we’ve got this AI, which is like a can, right? Like it keeps opening up more worms, keep coming out of the can. So I love, I love the tactics. I love just being able to experiment with things and and teach it back and show them how I’m using it. And because I do the matchmaking and I and I actively run my agency, I get I get the best of both worlds. I get like the OBMs who are like making money and building their businesses, and that’s really satisfying for me because that was always my why was to you know pay it forward because I was like so gracious for like for for bestowing success on me. And then from the other side, I’m like, I have all of these great clients that like even like how we’re having this conversation today. Like, I’m so I’m learning new things about ads. I’m like, oh, there’s like different kinds of re-engage, different kinds of omnipresence, and like it’s so it’s so refreshing to speak to people who like aren’t OBM sometimes. So that’s why I love my agency. That’s what really kind of gets me off in the agency world.
SPEAKER_00
I I I get it. I also enjoy, for example, when I went and traveled this recent first ever speaking opportunity and event. There is something refreshing about engaging with people who have like a specialty or a niche that’s just different from yours.
SPEAKER_01
It’s it’s nice to learn new things.
SPEAKER_00
Especially when it’s especially when it’s Pokemon, like wow, you wouldn’t believe how many questions I believe.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, like asking this guy about wow, like I mean, I tell my mom, like I’m an OBM, she’s like, What’s that? Like, let alone a Pokeman, like this has made my I just feel like how do you explain that to a parent?
SPEAKER_00
I don’t honestly, and I even asked as a parent, I’m like, could my kids do this? And the first question I asked was, so what’s the difference between like what you’re doing and then like Pat Flynn, who Yeah, like what Pat Flynn is doing, yeah. He he does op like he opens Pokemon decks and looks for like rare cards, and so you know what he told me? He said, actually, that’s like Pokemon collecting, which has a little bit of an overlap with like professional Pokemon playing, but you don’t need to have rare special Pokemon to win. Actually, when you play, you open basically like the equivalent of a$30 deck, like, and that’s what you’re playing with. So it does come down to skill and strategy. And some person in the online business niche, I watched one of their videos and they were talking about how we think like we underestimate how much pros or pro video game players actually practice, and we think like if we put in a little extra time, like we could be like them. And so I quoted this back to the guy next to me, and he’s like, Oh, yeah, I’ve been playing like six hours a day plus ever since I was 10. And I’m like, dang.
SPEAKER_01
Wow, yeah, it takes work. Wow. I mean, that’s it’s really interesting. I think that we should all be open-minded, like, you know, with our kids, with ourselves, with our potential. You know, I think that’s the beautiful thing about being an entrepreneur that I can say, because even before I had my OBM business, I had a landscaping business. So I’ve always been an entrepreneur. Yes, I am. You can’t tell it, but and maybe you’re not watching this, but my thumb is green and I love to be in my garden. That’s all I want to actually do is just be left alone outside.
SPEAKER_00
Wow. Yeah. We okay, so we kind of share that in common too. Not one of my main businesses, but a business that was main for me at the time was I had a window cleaning business. Way back in the day.
SPEAKER_01
Oh, look at us. Look at us.
SPEAKER_00
Definitely landscapers.
SPEAKER_01
Yes. Yeah. I love that. Yeah. I mean, I think we start from humble beginnings and then we realize that we have all of this potential. And that also we hire the experts. Like I, you know, we’ve talked about man ads management. And I just think that you’re a great ads manager. You’re very knowledgeable. And you I because I’ve been interviewing, I have interviewed a lot of people in my day, both on my behalf and on my clients’ behalf. And I think that it’s so important to really understand like what you’re saying, like the funnels, how these ads work, how you can, because it has been like I will never not run ads in my business. Like it is wholeheartedly 99% of my strategy. I will, I will, you know, I’m not, I’m not hiding that from anyone. And also when I speak to online creators and they’re like, oh, I don’t run ads. I just rely on organic stuff. I’m like, but why? But why? Like, why would you, you know, it’s there’s days where I don’t feel like I want to show up or days where I’m not feeling good, days when I’m taking care of my kids. I want to be on vacation. I don’t want to be, yeah. Like, I mean, even today I put like the funniest Instagram story of myself literally in my pajamas. Like now I have my face on-ish. But this morning, the the Instagram thing I put was like real literally me in my pajamas doing the dishes. Like, because I don’t I don’t care anymore. Also, but you know, I don’t I don’t want to do that every day. I can do it when I feel like it, but like I’m not, I don’t want it to really be reliant on me. I want to rely on Mark Zuckerberg’s pocket and putting money into it.
SPEAKER_00
Right, right. And knowing that when you put money into ads, you’re getting more money out of them.
SPEAKER_01
You should be. If not, you’re not working with the right ads manager and you need to speak with Quayjo here.
Moving Abroad And Learning Languages
SPEAKER_00
Right. Or, or you hired an ads manager too early because ads managers do come with an ads management fee. And or or maybe you’re running the ads yourself and you started running ads too early. Like I said on stage two weeks ago that we do need to look at the profit. And if the profit is there, but not quite enough there, then it’s a wiser deal to go and explore improving the other like profit opportunities, conversion opportunities in the fall before we run ads. That is so cool to to finish soon. But for the person that is really interested in traveling the world in living in another culture, might we spend just five minutes talking about what it’s like to encounter a new language and go through that learning process?
SPEAKER_01
Oh, I want to hear what you have to say about that. I feel like you’re gonna have something way smarter to say. Mine’s just like, I’m more with the flow. I fell in love. Okay, I’m a crazy person. So, I mean, what brought me to Israel? I mean, like, yes, you know, I am Jewish, but I live grew up in Canada, so it wasn’t like a religious thing for me. I fell in love with my Israeli husband, and I was like, I’m gonna do anything anything to make this relationship work. And so I think you have to be a little bit out of whack, wouldn’t you say? Like, you have to be like almost, almost, you know, like optimistic about everything in life. Like, I feel like I’m a very optimistic person, and I think that’s really helped me to, and also I will say that I had an amazing, I had amazing parents growing up, an amazing life growing up, and my parents always made me feel confident in my own skills. So I knew and also like coming from a family, I’m like my all my whole family were immigrants that came to Canada from from Germany and also Israel and also Poland and also Amsterdam and all like my all of my grandparents are from different places and not Canada. And so I think that there’s something like some tenacity, some sort of zest for life that I have. And I think that allows me to be, and I love new cultures, I love different kinds of foods, I love traveling with my family. You know, we’ve made me and my husband, we’ve been to India and South America and like all over the place. So again, as someone who like is a real homebody and quite introverted, I love, I love everything that I’ve built. And I was saying to my husband not too long ago, I was like, you know, I really don’t have any regrets in life. I’m like, we’ve been married for 20 years, babe. I don’t have any regrets in life, you know.
SPEAKER_00
Well, that ain’t bad. That ain’t bad.
SPEAKER_01
But I think it’s because I’ve always followed my heart, and I think that you can say the same about you. Like that, you know, we’re not normal. We’re definitely not, we’re the exception, right? You and I.
SPEAKER_00
They say that most people don’t move like more than I don’t know, 40 miles or something right around. So for me, I will say along that line for what it was like to learn a language, fascinating is the one word and the first word that comes to mind. But to like unpack that briefly, my first experience ever going abroad was working in Paris, France. And actually, one of the guys that I met there and hung out with was a Jewish rabbi. And I remember like that was the first trip where I ever left the states, so I was a very typical, only knew like the Northwest Seattle corner of the states, like never encountered like anyone who believed anything different from what I believed. I didn’t even know there was anything different from what I believe, and I think that alone is something that makes it you have to go learn another language because language and culture are like this. You said I was saying something deep and profound. Here, here, here it goes. Language and culture are like this. I’m holding my hands together in that very cliche synergistic fashion, but they go together, right? And so if you learn a language or struggle to learn a language, because it was a struggle for me, I love it, but it was a struggle, then you’re literally learning how to see the world through somebody else’s lens because like different languages, like I remember learning in linguistics class, the one that my dad hated me for taking, but different languages describe things in different ways, and thus you learn to see that. And so I remember being in Paris and meeting people who I never even understood or knew existed. Like this guy told me so much about what he was so passionate about, and I remember just like the conversations we would have, and I was just so fascinated because I knew not a thing about like becoming a rabbi, and like he was telling me all this cool stuff, and like wow, you know, but then like I met this other lady from the UK who shared this same language with me.
SPEAKER_01
He didn’t we had nothing to talk about.
SPEAKER_00
We had we did have nothing to talk about, actually.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, well it’s it’s funny that you say that because I always tell people that you know, when I met my husband, you know, he speaks Hebrew, I speak English. His, you know, my my I didn’t speak any Hebrew at the time, and he his English wasn’t great. And it also forced me to slow down and actually listen. And I and I and I told him also years later, I was like, you know, I think the secret of our relationship success was that you didn’t hear my my smart ass replies, and I had to listen to what you were saying and actually take the time. And I and I, because you know, in this fast-paced world where you’re like and everything is like blah blah blah blah, and you just want to like consume information and you know, we’re just like scrolling, like it learning a different language really makes you kind of slow down. And because Hebrew is like literally the opposite of English in every way, shape, and form, it like it also is like this mind jumble where you’re almost thinking backwards about what you’re doing. And I I love my OBM life because I get to learn languages, I get to eat great food, I’m like 15-minute drive from the Mediterranean Sea. My husband and I are like advid surfers, and like, you know, I just feel like I owe all of this to just, you know, taking a chance on myself and on him also, and being like, you know what, life is short, like you were saying, I’m gonna make the best of it and I’m gonna have experiences. And I think what both you and I do in our own respective businesses allows us in many, many ways and shapes and forms to like, even though we’re getting older, like to kind of continue having the experiences with our kids and with our spouses and with the bills, you know. I’m in my 40s now. I don’t know about you. I’m in my 40s. Me too.
SPEAKER_00
I’m about to be 45.
SPEAKER_01
Oh, okay. So you’re older than me. So now I’m we just laughed.
SPEAKER_00
We what you’re saying is profound, and not to make light of it, we just laughed yesterday, my wife and I, because we saw this Instagram reel, and it said, you know, unpopular opinion, that kind of thing. Let your kids come back and live with you for three years after they finish college. And I I sent it to her, and I’m like, This is kind of interesting. She’s like, it makes sense. And then I ran the math and I was like, No, we can’t do that. Our kids are three years apart, our youngest is seven. If we let them come back each and live with us for three years after college, I’m gonna be 67 before I get to just be with the woman that I married and only her. I’m like, nope, we gotta get these kids out of the house.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, we gotta get them out. We gotta make sure that they’re strong enough to be on their own.
unknown
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00
But to come back to what you were saying, that was very profound. You are right. I could not stay here in Mexico and have my kids going to a Mexican school, growing up effectively as like Latinos, you know, and experiencing all of the rich Mexican culture, if it wasn’t for Facebook and Instagram ads, the business that I run as a service provider, because I’m a service provider too. That’s allowed me to stay here in Mexico for six six years, going on seven years.
SPEAKER_01
So and and running everything. I mean, I’m I don’t I would imagine that you have clients all over the world, but probably not locally, like no, not locally, you know, where you can kind of get in a car and and drive over to somebody’s house or meet for coffee, like we were saying at the beginning of this conversation. I think before we hopped on, but you know, it’s not like I don’t meet my clients in person, like it’s it’s and and and I think because of that, that that is what birthed this need for Facebook ads, because I was like, I need to have this, and I’m so grateful for it, you know. I mean, yes, does it feel good spending like 10k a month on ads? No, but like I’m grateful for it because it the ROI is there, you know. So, you know, why not scale it?
Final Takeaways And Next Steps
SPEAKER_00
Why not add more ad spend there we’ll finish the episode right here? You said the roi is there, so why not scale it? Why not add more ad spend? That that’s a good way to finish.
SPEAKER_01
Amen. That’s how I feel. All right, I’m happy to talk to anybody who wants to ask me questions about ads or about you know, about all of this whole world, all of it. I’m happy to, you know, anyone in any any any business scaling thinking about ads, or maybe even working with an OBM, like I’m your gal.
SPEAKER_00
Right on. So, dear listener, take away two things from this episode, please go back and listen. But the benefit of having an OBM in your business, allowing you to go further and faster than you could on your own. And then also the benefit of running Facebook and Instagram ads once you have that profitable funnel with which to amplify with Facebook and Instagram ads. And with that, I would say it’s been a great episode recording with you, Sarah.
SPEAKER_01
Thank you for having me on.
SPEAKER_00
Till the next time I see you, listener, or you hear from me. Take care, be blessed, and we’ll see you in the next one. Bye.
