Ruth Poundwhite [00:00:00]:
Fear is not proof that you are doing the wrong thing. It is proof that you are stretching and doing something new. Today I am sharing all of the fears that came up for me when launching a brand new membership. The things that I overthought right up until going live and even when I was live, and the reframes that shifted it. Welcome to the Soulful Sales show where we talk about believing in the value of your offers, getting them in front of your right people, and selling more of what you do in your unique way.

Hi and welcome back to another episode of the Soulful Sales Show. So this is kind of a behind the scenes episode today because I just launched a brand new membership, the Aligned AI Lab. It’s not behind the scenes in the sense that I’m going to give you all the details, the practical stuff, but I thought it would be really helpful for me to be really honest about some of the mindset and the feelings that came up for me.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:00:55]:
Because this is a real thing when we launch a new offer. So let me be honest and open with you in the hope that it will be really, really helpful for you when you are launching something new as well. Okay, so let me paint the picture of where I have just been and where I am right now. So I just launched the Aligned AI Lab. I have just wrapped up the launch at the time this episode is going out. Like I said, I’m not going to share all the practical details and the numbers and all of that. Actually, I’m going to share that stuff inside the Soulful Sales Society membership for my members. So if you’re interested in that, go to ruthpoundwhite.com SSS but for now, this is about what came up in terms of mindset and feelings and I wanted to record it while it’s all still fresh because the thing about these tricky launch feelings is that once the launch is over and if the launch has done well and spoiler alert, I am happy with how the launch has done.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:01:53]:
It is so easy to then forget how loud those fears really were. So let me share this with you while it is all still still fresh. So before I launched the Aligned AI Lab and you can go back to last week’s episode to hear more about this one. I actually did a sale of some Claude skills and custom GPTs in a spring skill sale. I think I probably alluded to that in that episode, but it did feel a bit new for me to be doing something really, really like a wholesale like this tied to AI. But it was definitely the precursor for the Aligned AI Lab. And even though I had just run a sale that was related to AI, it still felt very, very new for me. And that is really important context because you’re not just stretching your comfort zone in terms of a new offer, but if you’re doing something you haven’t quite done before, like in a topic you haven’t done before, in a format you haven’t done before, then it’s new for you in that way as well.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:02:51]:
And it makes it an even bigger comfort zone. Stretch. I was definitely feeling that when it comes to AI. And actually I have, I have fears around going deeper into AI. I know that it’s a really, you know, people have very mixed feelings about AI, very understandably. And I’m not saying AI is all good, because it isn’t. And there are genuine concerns. And at the same time, I’m doing my best with what I have learned about AI.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:03:19]:
And I definitely live the belief that it’s not going anywhere and that it is helpful for me in many ways, especially as a neurodivergent human. And I’m doing my best with the way that I want to use it. Anyway, I went off on a tangent there. When I did my Aligned AI Summit last year, I definitely had all these fears come up around how people would perceive that and the pushback I would get. And it actually was a lot less than I expected. But yeah, this stuff definitely was coming to the surface with these more recent offers as well. I also did things a bit differently with this launch in that I’ve launched it direct to school. So I’m still using my old Spring System Thrive cart for a few lifetime payment slots and for an alternative payment if people want to pay on PayPal.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:04:00]:
But generally I am linking to the school checkout page directly, which again, is another thing that’s new for me. Something else going on at the same time was that I already have a membership. I have my Soulful Sale Society. I would say that that is my core offer and that is where I direct everyone to. And it wasn’t that long ago that I closed a second membership because I wanted to keep things simpler. So it was definitely bringing up all these feelings as to like, okay, and now I’m really gonna open a new membership. But it definitely feels like quite a different approach. So I feel like I might be getting ahead of myself.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:04:36]:
I’ll say it now, this, this is going to be a bit of a. An all over the place kind of episode because it really is me verbalizing all the stuff that’s Been in my head. So if it’s a little bit messy, then so be it. So, yeah, I definitely had concerns about running it alongside my other membership. But I came to the conclusion that the Aligned AI Lab is me demonstrating specific workflows on how I am using AI to take marketing tasks off my plate. Whereas the Soulful Sales Society is where I give the sales and business and offer strategy. It’s where you get coaching with me, it’s where you get, get it done weeks. It’s a very different vibe.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:05:08]:
The Aligned AI Lab is me giving one workshop a month. And the Soulful Sales Society is so much more richer and more complex than that and strategic than that and actually helping you do the thing, giving you accountability and coaching as well. So that’s how I kind of separated them in my mind. And yeah, one is focused on sales and one is focused on AI for capacity of marketing. Generally there’s no overlap. So that kind of solved that problem for me about having two memberships running side by side. Anyway, all of that to say that that is a lot of stuff for one new launch, when there’s a lot of new stuff all at one time, your nervous system is obviously gonna think, hang on a minute. So danger, danger.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:05:49]:
This is not familiar, this is new territory. So fears will show up, thoughts will show up to try and keep you safe by emphasizing those fears, try and keep you safe and stop you doing the thing. Because everything is new. Hence some of the thoughts and mindset struggles that I am about to share with you next. So one of the loudest ones, and I think that you will all relate to this is this fear. Kept coming up saying, basically saying underneath it all, I’m not good enough, I am not good enough to launch this. But it wasn’t coming out in those kind of literal words in my head. It was more like, but I’m not an AI expert.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:06:25]:
There are so many people out there teaching AI, why would anyone want to sign up to this and learn from me? Who am I to launch this? But actually, in some ways this was one of the easiest ones to shift. Firstly, I know that this kind of imposter syndrome or not feeling good enough is a very, very common thought pattern for the brain to try and keep you safe. And this is literally the work that I am trained in and do with my clients as a self belief coach. It’s very, very normal as a way to stop you doing the thing to hold you back, to keep you in thinking mode more or learning mode more. Because it feels safer to think if I just learn one more thing. If I just get better at that or if I just wait a bit longer till I feel more confident and then I can do it later. But that just pushes the launch back and we all know that that can end up in the worst case to it never happening. So yeah, I’m very familiar with this feeling and what the conclusion I actually came to was that the fact that I’m not an expert is actually the benefit of this membership.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:07:26]:
So I was thinking about some of the AI programs I’ve been in and people that I learned from and they are brilliant at what they do, but their lane is, is not my lane. So my lane is I am the person who has been running my business since 2008. I’ve been running an online business fighting all kinds of hurdles that relate to me personally. My introversion, my energy, my confidence, my self belief, my neurodivergence, my capacity, my chronic illness. Oh my God, what a lovely list that I’m really off there. But you know what I’m getting at, that’s my lane. And I help people to navigate all of that stuff as well as to figure out the strategy that works for them in their business. The AI experts are on top of all the features, they’re playing with all the AI tools, they’re telling us what they mean, they’re telling us what you know, how to use them.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:08:16]:
That is very, very helpful. But that’s not what I’m building this for. I am not teaching from a place of being an AI expert, I’m teaching from a place of being a business expert and then applying my discernment to how and why I use AI in my business. So the Aligned AI Lab, the reason this became a benefit actually, when I worked through this fear, was that the Aligned AI lab becomes actually a really, really great place to join, to learn from someone who actually has a business like yours. You’re not learning from someone who’s an AI expert, but speaking to all kinds of business owners. You’re not getting distracted by features of AI that are changing all the time, that don’t apply to your business. You’re learning from someone who has been doing the online business thing for many years, an online offer thing for many years, and is applying that to the way they use AI. So actually quite quickly I realized that was the selling point and it was a real aha moment for me and I really leaned on that in the messaging once I work through that.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:09:14]:
So just a side note here, but sometimes working through this mindset stuff can actually be marketing gold, which I hadn’t expected. One of the other fears coming up in doing this in membership format, and I will say I was very intentional about choosing to do a membership for this. For months I had known I wanted to do more with AI and the things I was learning with AI. The problem with AI is that it’s changing all the time time. So for me, it made a lot more sense to do a membership where it’s a living offer and I get to do a new workshop every month. I am having so much fun setting up these workflows for myself behind the scenes. I’m genuinely loving it. But my fear is that when you do a membership, especially when you do a founding launch for an annual membership, is that I’m now committed to doing this for a year.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:09:59]:
And is the joy gonna fade when I turn this into a paid offer that I’m not just playing with behind the scenes for myself? This is a real fear. And I think that this actually is a logist concern that is important to think about. And the way that I reframe this is firstly, this is something I say to my clients all the time, but you do not have to stick to something forever if you figure out it’s not right for you. In the end, there are always ways out. And my future self will figure that out. So when I closed my other membership, you know, not that long ago, I had some people who were signed up on annual plans and I gave them the option of a proportional refund and or credit to spend on my other membership. And I think I had a mixture of different choices that people made and that was absolutely fine. So there’s always a way out.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:10:43]:
Another thing that I built into the sales page of this is that I won’t necessarily always deliver the workshops live if my energy is low. My plan is to deliver them live, but I think that it’s important to have the option not to if I need to. I also made sure to brainstorm enough topics that I felt like I was comfortable to talk about across a whole year, they will absolutely change. I’m not going to stick to that list, but it’s good to know that I have enough topics. And also by running it as a membership and knowing it’s a living offer. The real thing about this is using AI to reclaim my time, energy and capacity. I don’t need to be teaching something new each month. I need to share how I am doing that because that’s how other people will benefit as well.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:11:35]:
So remembering what the goal is, what that kind of North Star of the membership is. Was very helpful as well. But it’s true. I might not love this for a whole year. I might want to close it. It might be a big mistake. I don’t genuinely believe it’ll be a big mistake because I would learn from it either way. But there are ways to deal with that if that comes up in the future.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:11:55]:
But for now, all I know is I’m loving this, and I’ve wanted to do something with this for ages, and the aligned AI lab absolutely feels right. Another fear that came up was that I had some numbers in my head about how many people I would like to get in. And on the very first day of the launch, I started fixating on the number. Like, I’m not getting enough. I’m gonna have a tiny amount of people. I’m gonna be doing a workshop to, like, one person. And the truth was that the numbers were tracking fine. Yes, the numbers are small, but I never did.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:12:28]:
I. That’s. That wasn’t the point of doing this launch. I deliberately started with a founding annual membership, which I know is not going to be for everyone. So when I was planning out and debating whether to do a monthly launch or an annual launch, I had decided really early on to do the annual launch. And that was because I did have evidence that this was a good way to launch a membership for myself, because I had done it when I first launched the Soulful Sales Society membership. Now, obviously, that was three years ago and things change quite fast, but I still felt good about that strategy. The reason I chose that strategy at that time was because I wanted to lock in a number of founding members who I didn’t need to worry about canceling because they would form the kind of foundation of the community in the membership and I would know that I would always have someone to show up for, even if when I eventually opened monthly, people were canceling month to month.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:13:21]:
And I wanted that same energy going into this one. However, I really did question it, and I think it was purely based on fear and not knowing what would work. I was really almost going to start with a monthly membership, but I decided it just would not be worth it to me to launch monthly and have like a couple of hundred dollars come in from new monthly members versus launching annually and getting a chunk of cash up front, chunk of energy from the community up front, and commitment from those people and also from my side commitment, both sides, knowing what they were signed up for annual and then later on opening up the monthly membership. So all that to Say is I had a very good reason why I chose to do an annual founding member launch.

I also knew that this would mean I was likely to sell more to people who were warmer in my audience. Now, don’t get me wrong, it is a low cost offer and there are absolutely people who could sign up for that who haven’t known me for very long. But mostly, selling an annual thing to something that hasn’t been created yet is going to more appeal to people who do know me and have the evidence to trust me with that. So it makes sense that it was designed to be a small founding cohort of members.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:14:28]:
So I had to keep reminding myself of that. And also that nobody would be judging my numbers as much as I would be. I think one thing that really made this harder for me was the fact that the number is visible on school. So you could go on my school group and see how many people in the group at any time. There’s something about that visibility of it that that makes me think people are going to judge me. Especially because I’m the person with the Soulful Sales Soc membership. What if I can’t do my own launch? Well, now, as it turns out, I got. I exceeded the number that I.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:14:58]:
That I felt good about getting in, but it was a real fear for me coming up throughout. And even if I had not exceeded that number, I would have re. And this is the conversations I was having with myself and with AI and with my journal throughout the launch. I would have rethought the strategy and done another promo straight away. Now, I would absolutely stick to the fact that the founding member launch is the lowest price you’re going to get. But I would definitely do another promo for when I open the monthly membership straight away to get more members in after that. And that is the thing with a membership as well. It’s not a launch and then done, it’s a launch.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:15:34]:
Interact with your members. Create this living product together. And it’s a relaunch and a relaunch and a relaunch. You have to mention your membership all the time. And that is one of the hardest things about having a membership. But once you get in a rhythm with it, and I am in a rhythm with my other membership, Soulful Sales Society. I launch it every single month. And it’s easy for me.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:15:51]:
Now that’s the point of a membership. So it makes sense to start small. But it also makes sense whether I hit the number or didn’t hit the number, to have a plan in place for how I’d be selling this after the initial founding launch, which I have had a plan in place all along. This founding launch is just the start of that plan. So really, really helpful for me to remember that and maybe I’ll talk about the bigger plan in future. But certainly if you’re in the soulful sales society, I am happy to share that with you there. And actually, something that happened while I was in the middle of the launch is I went into AI and I said, help. I’ve only got this many people.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:16:24]:
And actually the reflection I got back from Claude, it was so funny, was like, that’s right on track for your goal. And Claude gave me this reframe, which was really great, which was just like, this is this many people who have chosen to sign up for a whole year of something they have no evidence of yet. Like, how amazing is that? And that reframe helped me so much. So focusing on how incredible it is that I have built this relationship with my audience where people will buy something that I’m pre selling and have not delivered yet for an entire year. Like, isn’t that amazing? Isn’t that amazing? But also, it’s very, very normal to have these kind of questions and wobbles throughout our launch. So I just want to put that out there as well. Like, it’s okay to have them, even if technically you should know better. So, yeah, they were the big mindset questions that came up either just before or during the launch.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:17:15]:
But also what I did was because I’ve been using Claude to strategize this launch, make the plan for the launch, and act on that plan. I asked Claude to go through all the conversations I’ve had about this launch and to pick to make a list for me of the tiny things I overthought. Now, I’m not going to go into loads of detail about these. This is more like a fun section to give you an example of the kind of things that we all do right, to normalize this kind of overthinking. Even from someone who supports other business owners like I do, I still have these. I want to say silly. They’re not silly because they’re coming from a protective place where we think that the more we tweak and that one little decision we change is going to make us safe and control the outcome. We can’t control the outcome, of course, but we all have these.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:18:05]:
So let me share some of that list with you now. So, literally the night before the doors opened, I was fiddling around with certain visuals for the sales page, certain mock Ups that Claude was designing for me. And Claude kept telling me, you need to set up the checkout. You need to make sure the payment button works. Don’t focus on these. But I was definitely going deep in a rabbit hole of these mock ups, which were not important. I don’t think I even used them in the end. It was probably a nice distraction for my brain.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:18:33]:
I also had two options for a single part of the page and kept flipping between them constantly. This is from my list of Claude. I don’t even remember that. But it’s funny seeing it. I was questioning whether my photo should be on the page, which photo I should use, where it should go. And this one is so funny. I. And I actually do remember this.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:18:51]:
I was really debating on whether to call this Aligned AI Lab or the Aligned AI Lab, as if the the in the title was gonna make all of the difference. Oh, my goodness. I also remember at one point I was questioning whether to end the launch on a Tuesday or a Wednesday or a Sunday. And, you know, this is the kind of tiny decision making that really robs us of our energy when we are launching. And honestly, it makes no difference. Like, yes. Could it make a difference what day you end? Yes. But if you want to extend it by one day or not, that is not going to make a difference.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:19:23]:
The biggest thing that is going to make a difference is just deciding and then getting on with the stuff you actually need to do for your launch. So, yeah, I just thought that was such a funny list of some of the stuff that Claude gleaned from our conversations that I was overthinking right up. Not just until the launch, but during the launch as well. And the final thing I want to say in this episode is that it’s so, so powerful to make decisions ahead of a launch, to make decisions before you’re at the point where it’s all feeling very real and you’re about to go live, because then you can make them with a clearer head. And then when you are launching, you remind yourself that you made those decisions for a reason. So, which is ultimately what I did. Because even when I questioned, should I add a monthly tier? Should I do this? Should I do that? Ultimately, I stuck to the decisions I made ahead of time, which was the boundaries between my two memberships, the fact that I am not doing any, like, coaching in the Aligned AI Lab, like, I’ll answer questions on the specific monthly theme, but it’s no coaching. It’s not the overall sales strategy.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:20:24]:
I baked in my exit strategy into one of the FAQs about like, what if the lab closes or whatever. And yeah, the dates when it went live, when the early bird ended, when it finished. I really locked those in. I definitely questioned them at some point, but then I caught myself and I was like, this is not a good use of my time. So locking in those decisions ahead of time, really, really helpful. And if you’re in the middle of something, selling something, and you feel yourself questioning those decisions, this is just part and parcel of launching. That is your brain safety mechanism going, hey, how can I control this more? Is there a way I can control the outcome? There really isn’t. You got to keep going.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:21:01]:
You got to trust the version of you that made that plan with a clear ahead and see it through till the very end. And this was something else that I really noticed and I learned again and again. I had an early bird bonus. Once that ended, I had to really, really be careful not to tell myself the launch was over. And it really was not over. A lot of people signed up after that early bird ended. So you got to trust the entire process of the launch. What I would really love for you to take away from everything I am sharing is that fear does not mean that it’s proof that you are doing a wrong thing.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:21:33]:
If you are moving into new territory in your business, if you are launching a new offer in your business, even if you are launching the same offer in your business, the fear is because you care about what the results will be and the fear is trying to protect you, but it’s not a sign that something is wrong. You will make better decisions when you decide before that fear kicks in. Because once the doors to your launch are open, you are not in the same headspace. And your biggest job really is to keep showing up for the launch, not to change things about the launch. And honestly, the small things that I was overthinking, that you will be overthinking are often like the big thing in disguise. So for example, when I was, you know, when I’m worrying about what’s, what’s it going to look like to see how many people I have in or don’t have in, when people can see in my school group how many members it has or should I change the day by one day, all of this stuff is the bigger picture is, is this going to work or am I good enough to launch this thing? It’s really not about those mock ups that I was spending all that time on on the page. So yeah, don’t listen to the fear, listen to it. To the extent that you can actually get clear on exactly what it is, work through it, reframe it in your mind in the way that I did with my big fears, but keep going with the plans.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:22:48]:
And I get it as well. Sometimes we are not as organized as we think. We don’t have time to make all those decisions in advance. Something that’s really helpful for me when I am in the middle of a launch. Actually, no, generally it’s just to think about what’s worth spending my energy on is a decision about a tiny piece of a sales page or a graphic or you know, shall I end it this day or the next day? Is that worth your time and energy or would your time and energy be better spent elsewhere? And elsewhere can also include resting and clearing your mind from this launch if you need a bit of a break from it as well. I hope that you have found it helpful, me sharing the truth behind the launch and knowing that it still affects me in this way. But ultimately I know how to work through it and I massively benefit from putting the effort to work through it. I know I haven’t shared the actual numbers.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:23:32]:
I’m going to share that inside my membership, the Soulful Sales Society. So go to RuthPoundWhite.com SSS to read more about that. You can also go to RuthPoundWhite.com lab if you want to join the Aligned AI lab. Although the founding annual launch is now over, the initial monthly membership fee is the lowest it is ever going to be. So now is still the best time to join. We just went live with the signature AI brand kit training so you’ll get access to that, the community and the bonuses that I’m adding. And it’s gonna be really, really fun delivering the next few workshops on sales pages, interactive products and freebies and all of this stuff. So yeah, I hope that was useful.

Ruth Poundwhite [00:24:17]:
Please bear this in mind next time you are launching and yeah, I will catch you again for another episode next week. Thank you so much for listening to another episode of Soulful Sales. If you have a moment to rate and review, know that it really does does make a difference and if you would like to carry on the conversation then you can connect with me in the free community@ruthpoundwhite.com community or my personal favorite, join me inside the Soulful Sale society membership@ruthpoundwhite.com membership and keep doing what you’re doing because your work really does matter.