Why More Followers Won’t Fix Your Business—But This Will [Happy Trap Series #3]

If you’ve ever thought, if only I had more followers or more subscribers or more people on my email list, then I would make more sales. This is for you because you’re not alone. And unfortunately that is just not true. It’s not the way it works. If you have more followers, have more subscribers, whatever.

It does not automatically lead to growth. So what does? Today, we’re going to talk about why having more subscribers doesn’t necessarily mean anything about what your sales numbers are. There are people online who have 10, 000 followers who don’t make that much money at all. And there are people with 1000 Instagram followers who make multiple six figures per year.

In this episode, you’ll learn why more followers won’t automatically lead to more sales. The real factors that drive revenue instead and even how to maximize the people that you already have in your audience, no matter what size audience you have and make them paying customers now. In case you missed it, this episode is actually part three of my happy trap series.

In part one, we talked all about the, when I start my business, then I’ll be happy, happy trap, the thing I wrote my entire book about called When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy. And in part two, we discussed how there’s more than one right way to build a business online. If you could just stop looking at what everybody else is doing online around you, then, maybe you could focus more on what strategies actually work to grow your business, which is the key to success. I’ll link to both of those two parts of the series down in the description below. All right, now it’s time to dive into series number three of the Happy Trap series. Let’s talk all about why more followers won’t lead to more success, but what will instead.

So why do we believe that more followers equals more money myth? Well, for one, we see people online making success claims, making even earnings claims, which by the way, there’s like a whole legal thing around that and the FTC is cracking down on it right now, but that’s neither here nor there, but you do see all of these people making these claims and I think it’s only natural to then assume like, you see somebody online who says that they’re successful. A lot of times those people will then have large audiences, usually because they’re also talking a lot about money, which then attracts a large number of people who want to be more like them, right or what they purport to be. And it’s only natural that you think, okay, they’re doing this.

Yes. Therefore they’re successful. And you start making these little associations along the way. Like sometimes it’s about followers and money, right? So it’s like, Oh, they have a big audience, that’s why they’re able to make a lot of money. Other times we make more personal assumptions like that person is able to do that because they’re really pretty or because they’re skinny or because they live in a certain house or a place or whatever, right? So there are all kinds of assumptions we start making about people. And I think we start to connect things in our mind. That say, that’s why that person’s able to be successful and you might perceive yourself to not have that thing, whether it’s the size of audience, the body, the house, the car, the whatever, and you then start making these conclusions that like, that’s why you can’t be successful until you have that thing.

I think the common thread here is that we’re always looking to something outside of ourselves or something that we think we don’t have already and using that as like the reason or maybe we would even say excuse, I don’t know, as to why we can’t be successful now or successful with what we have, right?

So we’re always looking at these outside things and it’s almost like the equivalent of continuing to dangle the carrot and move it down the road because you’re like, Oh, once I do this, then I will be successful. Once I get more followers, more money, better house, better car, better whatever. If you keep doing that, it’s like keeping yourself on this cycle. I think it’s like the businesses version of the diet cycle where it feels a little insatiable and it’s never going to quite be enough because nothing, it doesn’t, that’s not true. And it doesn’t work like, just like if you try a diet, not only might it not work for you, but that’s not going to be the thing that makes you happy. So it’s going to keep you on the cycle of constantly trying different diets to find what works when really none of them will or make you happy.

I think we also just have this like growth obsessed culture and especially in being an online business. We’re in this environment of constantly thinking that everything has to be growing bigger, better, faster, stronger, right? And so this idea that you have to have more followers, um, that you should never be kind of satisfied that, you know, no matter how much money you make, it’s never enough, no matter how big your email list is, it’s never enough, like you’re just constantly supposed to be in this era of growth and I don’t think that’s true or healthy. So I think as a business, it’s not always the case that your business is growing. Um, everything is not always just getting better and better and better. Even your revenue year over year, it doesn’t always get better. better. Some things change or you have a year where you invest a lot and you’re kind of like head down and then the following year maybe is the year you grow.

But I think it’s also a little bit of this myth or this mythical mindset comes from buying into this idea that we always have to be growing too.

So here are some things that are just not true that I can tell you after eight years in online business, many, many millions in sales of my digital products, my digital legal templates. I can tell you these things are not true.

Big audiences do not always convert, right? So just because you have a lot of people, just because you have people on your email list, following on social media, it doesn’t mean those people buy things. Just having more people isn’t what leads to sales.

So what leads to sales? I’ve made a lot of sales. I’ve watched a lot of other people. My friends make a lot of sales. What makes sales then if it’s not just having a lot of people? Well, for one, being good at sales leads to making a lot of sales, right? I feel like I’m pretty comfortable selling things. I know how to do all the things I’m about to talk about, but being good at sales leads to sales. It’s kind of not anything more magical than that. I think one of the simplest things that leads to actually making more sales is just having a really good product that people actually want and that actually works and knowing how to position that product properly and like it to the right people in order for it to make sales.

But I think oftentimes people don’t think enough about it. Does this product that I’m creating actually work? AKA, does it bring some sort of results, some measurable result that people are going to be happy with that they’re then going to tell other people about or tell you about, so you can use it as social proof like that should be a big part of your focus.

Another thing that gets in the way of you making those sales is not positioning yourself as an authority, not creating enough content or creating content that positions you enough as an authority or building an audience that knows, likes, and trusts you, which in order for you to do that, you have to be authentic and vulnerable, create content that’s a little bit different and unique, but that’s also true to you, right? And so you actually connect with other people. I think it’s also important to remember to create a product that’s actually based on what your customers or your potential customers actually want. And not just something that you’re focused on. You’re like, this is a really good idea. So I’m going to create it cause then other people will want it. We actually want to do the research on the front end to make sure that this thing is already in demand. I talked about this a little bit in part two. But knowing that this thing is in demand, that there is some supply to show proof of concept, but also that there’s some room for some differentiation, um, and really making yourself uniquely stand out.

So if you don’t do all of those things, if you don’t have a good product and you don’t position yourself as an authority, and you know, you don’t work on the like, know, and trust and build a community and all of that, people won’t buy from you, right? They won’t buy your product. And so it won’t matter if you have 40, 000 people, 4, 000 people, 400 people, it doesn’t matter. If you’re not doing those things, because who are these people and what are they there to do? Right? So instead of focusing so much on like, I have to have so many more people or a certain number of people in order to do what I want to do. We actually want to focus on getting these right people. And it could be that you know, you sell a product, for example, that you don’t need 40, 000 people to be on your email list or following you on Instagram. Some of the times, the example I used earlier of people I know who maybe have 1200 followers on Instagram, but make multiple six figures per year. That’s because they sell a high ticket thing. They don’t need to have 150, 000 followers on Instagram in order to do well. So you want to keep your eye on the prize of what you actually need based on what you do.

When I started my legal templates business in 2017, I didn’t have an audience either, you know, it took me years and years to build up quite a bit of, you know, people on my email list and all that kind of stuff. When I only had a few hundred people on my email list, I started making 5, 000 a month and 10, 000 a month. I remember even 30, 000 a month in gross revenue. I still only had maybe a thousand, 2000 people on my email list. It really wasn’t until later, especially when I decided to invest into things like Facebook and Instagram ads that my email has started to grow at an exponential rate. But I was doing very, very well in my business with very few people in my audience or on my email list. That was because I created products that people really needed. I created a, a different product that had a different spin on it like my legal templates were instantly downloadable and they had, they have still have how to video tutorials where they, I walk people through how to fill out their contract templates and my marketing and my branding, my messaging all filled a gap in the market, which was this like chill lawyer who doesn’t do the scary legal tactics thing, but also really loves building her own online business and keeps it all pretty evergreen and has a life and is like laid back and blah, blah, blah. That was something people were looking for and didn’t really exist at the time. So I focused more on creating that and really listening to the people who were on my email list at the time, or who were maybe responding to me on Instagram or something like that at the time listening to their questions and then directly creating content in response to their questions or concerns. Not what I, as a lawyer, thought that they should be worried about.

It’s like if you and I were building out a restaurant and all we did was focus on getting tons and tons of. Foot traffic to walk by our restaurant. Like it doesn’t really help us to have thousands of people walking by our restaurant on the sidewalk, just so that the sidewalk looks really busy. We need people to stop, notice the restaurant and come into the restaurant and then place an order. And then we need them to come back to the restaurant and keep eating at the restaurant and we also need them to tell other people about the restaurant and post about it on social media. So we can get other people in there. You know what I mean? So that’s what we need for your online business. It’s no different. You don’t need, you know, I feel like Instagram can be the equivalent of just having a hundred thousand people walk by the sidewalk of your restaurant. We need them to come in and eat. So you need to focus more on making the content that invites people in that actually gets them to sit down and order than just building up a bunch of people peering through the windows.

If this is all hitting home for you, then I encourage you to pre order my book that comes out on April 15th, 2025. When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy: a Practical, No BS Guide to Successful Online Entrepreneurship. I break all of this down that we’re talking about step by step in the book. The link to order my book now is in the description.

Alright, so instead of chasing more followers and more subscribers, let’s try this instead.

Number one, we’re going to focus on an engaged audience of the right people. That doesn’t have to be a lot of people. As I mentioned, if you’re pricing your products correctly, or if you’re selling premium things.

Number two, we’re going to focus on creating high quality content. Notice I didn’t say quantity, but high quality content in a searchable, hopefully a long form place like YouTube, a podcast, or an SEO optimized blog posts that positions you as the expert and puts your product and area of expertise front and center.

The third thing we’re going to focus on is having clear messaging and a clear offer. I want to know how do I pay you money? Nothing drives me crazier than when I go to somebody’s Instagram account. Well, actually two things drive me super crazy. When I go to people’s Instagram accounts, I can’t stand one. I don’t know what your name is. Please, please have your first name somewhere on there that’s easy to find. Um, I always use people’s first names when I respond and I can’t tell you how many people. Who’s profiles I go to don’t even have a name on there. It drives me nuts. So have a first name, but also I want some clear snapshot of like, how do I pay you money? What are you known for? What’s the thing that you sell?

I want to make sure you’re talking about your products often, not just when you’re going through some sort of sale or promotion. I easily work in talking about my main product, the Ultimate Bundle® into so many different conversations, whether it’s that somebody asked me a question and I maybe use that to create an educational piece of content and then work in that. The I actually talk about this or teach about this in the Ultimate Bundle®, or I mentioned something about it in my email every week to my Sam Sidebar newsletter, but I always am working in just casually talking about my products so that it stays top of mind. People are familiar with the name and they’re familiar with what it is, which really, I think like breaks down a lot of the friction around selling it when it does come time to run a sale or just open up a sales conversation.

All right. So now we want to maximize using the audience that you already have, no matter how big or small that is, and we want to turn them in to paying customers. So how do we do that? The first thing is to focus on your content, in your everyday, just like responding to messages and everything, talking with people and not at them. You want to listen to what they need, ask questions and engage with them. I think nothing like no little thing goes unturned. Like I respond to every email, every comment, every DM. I’m constantly looking at stuff. And so it’s really helpful to understand what they’re connecting with, not connecting with what they’re looking for.. And if you’re listening to this part and you’re like, I don’t know what they want, then that’s usually a good sign that you haven’t asked or haven’t engaged. And if you’re like, well, I have a really tiny audience again, come back to this mindset shift that we don’t need a big audience. Even if you have four people. Those are four human beings you can go talk with. And I wouldn’t even put aside the idea of like meeting people on zoom or if they live near you asking for a little coffee chat or something like that. Like you could get to know people. You could even with their consent, of course, you could even record your conversation because that kind of stuff makes great voice of customer research down the line.

The second thing to do is make some part of your content strategy, being relatable or vulnerable, or showing some sort of personal side to yourself or your life. That doesn’t mean you have to share everything, but I do like to pick one or two things that you are comfortable sharing and you can talk with your audience or share something with your audience about something going on in your life.

I think the key here, my little secret tip here is tying it back to what you do. So not treating your business as a journal entry and just talking about like, Oh, all this stuff’s going on. My life is so stressful and blah, blah, blah. Actually talking about something that’s already happened and that’s probably resolved. Right. Um, so like, what’s the saying sharing from uh, scars, not wounds or something like that. So sharing from something that you’ve kind of already, worked through so that there’s some sort of lesson there to share with your audience and tying it back to what you do. So for example, I’ve shared a lot with my audience over the last few years about my parents dying and how my parents died within the same year and obviously that was insanely difficult, still is insanely difficult. And, when I have talked about it, I have shared, uh, you know, bits and pieces there here and there personally, but when I talk about it, I’m also tying it back to kind of how that’s impacting maybe the way that I’m thinking about showing up online and, you know, thinking about my marketing strategy or I’m always coming, coming back to like kind of my evergreen roots and creating evergreen content or focusing more on long form content, especially because of what’s happened with my parents. And I know that my audience is generally thinking about that too. Not because they hopefully have not experienced the double loss of, of both their parents in such a short period of time, but because they, you know, maybe are feeling called to be on social media less, or they realize that their social media content’s not working like it used to. And they want to drive more leads more consistently with evergreen strategies, for example. So that’s like a way where I would use a story, um, something that feels authentic to me and that, you know, is honest about what I’m going through as a grieving person who also owns an online business that’s pretty like, you know, face forward and talk about how that’s actually impacted the way I’m thinking about and approaching my business.

And I’ve been amazed at how many thousands of people have said that that’s something that really resonated with them too, even if they weren’t going through the same exact situation as me.

Last but not least, the third way to maximize your current audience and turn them into paying customers is to make it really clear what you do and how people can pay you.

So I know I mentioned this a little bit earlier, but if you haven’t yet, if you’re not able to clearly go to your profile and like have a, kind of a 30, 000 foot view of like, Oh, I realized this is not clear. I want you to go and ask a friend, ask somebody else who owns a business, ask somebody who you follow online. If you came and looked at my profile, do you understand what I do, who I work with and what I sell? That would be a great thing to ask an outsider and just get a quick snapshot of like. Hey, is this clear? Because if I don’t know who you are and what you do by, by quickly looking at your profile, it’s probably true that a lot of other people are feeling that way too.

Okay. So let’s recap more followers won’t magically fix your business. Engagement, trust, and clear messaging matter way more. And you don’t need to go viral in order to make sales. You need to connect more with the people who already follow you or focus on just creating content that really speaks to the person you’re looking for if you don’t have an audience yet.

If you’re ready to stop chasing vanity metrics and start building a business that actually makes money, pre order my book, When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy: A Practical No BS Guide to Successful Online Entrepreneurship, out April 15th. It’s packed with strategies to help you create a business that works for you without relying on social media, growth hacks, and all that good stuff.

I even have an entire chapter dedicated in the book to teaching you how to build out your first 1 million digital product online. And then the next chapter is dedicated to helping you build out a marketing strategy. Just around that product. If you purchase my book before it comes out on April 15th, you’ll get instant access to my email list builder course, The Ultimate Email List Growth Toolkit , as well as a seat in my live book club come this May, where I’m going to have four live sessions with all of you who have purchased my book to actually implement every single aspect of the marketing strategies I teach you in the book.

All you have to do to get those bonuses right now is pre order my book, wherever books are sold. It’s called When I Start My Business, I’ll Be Happy and then head to samvanderwielen.com/book to redeem your bonuses. You can even head to samvanderwielen.com/book to see all the places listed. I linked to a bunch of places where you can buy books, but feel free to support your local independent bookseller.

All right, next week, we’re onto part four of our happy trap series. I’m kind of sad that it’s going to be over next week, but we’re busting another huge myth: why working harder doesn’t always lead to success.

I’ll show you what you actually need to do to move the needle in your online business, so you don’t want to miss it. Thanks so much for listening. I’ll chat with you next week in part four of the series if you want. In the meantime, go back and binge the first couple. In the meantime, DM me on Instagram and let me know what you think of the series so far.

I want to hear from you, so DM me on Instagram at samvanderwielen. See you next week!

Thanks so much for listening to the On Your Terms® podcast. Make sure to follow on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you like to listen to podcasts. You can also check out all of our podcast episodes, show notes, links, and more at samvanderwielen.com/podcast. You can learn more about legally protecting your business and take my free legal workshop “Five Steps To Legally Protect and Grow Your Online Business” at samvanderwielen.com

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