A simple but powerful roadmap
for building a predictable
and profitable online business.
Hey there, I’m Ruth!
I
’m the founder of Elite Blog Academy® and the
ACTIVATE coaching program for bloggers &
content marketers, and I’m so excited to be able
to share this 6 Figure Blog Plan with you.
Since launching my first blog in 2010, my business
has grown into a multi-million dollar company. I’ve
become the New York Times bestselling author of
7 books, launched a top-rated podcast, and even
given a TED talk. Along the way I’ve also coached
and mentored more than 12,000 students to create
6 and 7-figure online businesses of their own.
But it didn’t start out that way!
You see, I started writing my original blog Living Well Spending Less as a stay-at-home
mom of two toddlers, just struggling to hold it all together. The blog began as a creative
outlet but it didn’t take long for me to realize that I could turn it into a business. I began
paying attention to what was working, and quit spending time on the things that weren’t.
And soon I was sharing those discoveries with others.
Over time, I began to realize that there IS a system, a proven path to building a successful
online business through blogging. Whatever your big goals may be, whether it’s leaving
your current job to work full-time, or earning some additional money for your family on
the side, it’s hard to take action on those big things when it feels like you don’t know
what you are doing.
And that’s exactly what this 6-Figure Blog Plan is all about.
It’s not a magic wand, but it IS probably the next best thing—a clearly laid out, step-by-
step guide that will show you, in crystal clear detail, exactly what to do, in what order, to
get where you want to be. In fact, it’s the same exact plan we use within the ACTIVATE
coaching program to take our students from $0 to earning a full-time income in less than
a year.
Ready to dive in? Let’s get started!
XOXO, Ruth
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LET ’S GET R E AL , S H AL L W E ?
There’s a very good chance that if you’re
thinking about starting a blog, you’re also
thinking about how you should use it to
make money online.
M
aybe you want to supplement your family’s income while you stay at home
with the kids. Maybe you want to leave a job that you hate. Maybe you’re just
ready for a change. And if you are already thinking about these things, then
it is VERY likely you might already be aware of just how much information is already out
there on starting a blog and earning money online.
SO much in fact, that it is possible that what may have stopped you from getting started
was not the lack of information out there, but that there is TOO much of it. From too
many people. Pulling you in too many directions and it is just impossible to know where
to start, so you just don’t.
But if you really want the cold hard truth, it’s this:
MOST BLOGGERS AND INFLUENCERS
ARE DOING IT ALL WRONG.
They spend hours and hours creating more content, optimizing for search and pinning
like crazy, all for the sake of more page views. They exhaust themselves trying to keep
up with social media, posting story after story because that’s the way they think it’s
supposed to be, wondering when all that “engagement” is going to turn into cold, hard
cash. They think blog income is supposed to come from ad networks and affiliate links,
because that’s all anyone ever really talks about. And they set themselves up for long-
term failure by focusing only on short-term gains.
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MAYBE YOU CAN RELATE. OR MAYBE YOU’RE
SCARED OF MAKING THE SAME MISTAKES.
The reality is that having a clear, proven path to follow in your business—along with an
experienced guide to lead you—is a game changer, one that will not only give you the
clarity and confidence to know you’re moving in the right direction, but lead you to
more profit and predictability in less time than you ever thought possible.
The problem? Overwhelm, widespread misinformation, and a lack of support often
make growing a successful and sustainable online business far harder than it needs to
be.
But what if there was
a way to
you got it right?
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Y
our Customer Superhero PathTM is the journey your customer —or potential
customer—will take through your business. Now notice I said CUSTOMER, and not
“reader” or “follower” or “subscriber.” Because if you want your blog to be a
business and actually earn real money, your ultimate goal is for every reader or subscriber
to become a customer.
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So at any point in your business you are either trying to lead a prospective customer into
becoming a customer, or you are delivering massive value to your actual customer so
that they hopefully become a repeat customer.
Your customer superhero path is the order in which your customers take those essential
steps from having a problem and not knowing the solution to experiencing the solution
and the transformation of becoming a loyal customer that purchases from you again
and again, and in the process experiencing even more transformation.
Now you might not be thinking about the people you interact with as customers, at least
not yet, and you definitely might not be thinking of those customers as the superheroes
of your business, but making this mindset shift is pretty important because it will change
the way you look at your business and at everything you do in your business.
...because it will change
the way you look at your
business and at everything
you do in your business.
That’s why your goal needs to be continually improving the performance of your cus-
tomer path so that you are doing a better and better job of turning prospects into
customers, and turning customers into brand evangelists that purchase from you again
and again.
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VISUALLY, BUILDING OUT THE CUSTOMER SUPERHERO PATH
IN YOUR BUSINESS LOOKS LIKE THIS:
Of course, if creating all that sounds a little overwhelming, then let’s take a step back
and talk about the exact steps—or levels—that are involved in building out this path in
your business, as well as how long each step will take.
These are the exact levels that our students move through in the ACTIVATE coaching
program, and we’ve found that doing things in this order allows our students to make
real progress faster than they ever thought possible, as well as to start seeing their first
sales come in within about 18-20 weeks of starting their blog.
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LEVEL ONE | Foundation (13 weeks)
W hen building your blog from scratch, you’ll start at Level 1, which I like to refer to
as the FOUNDATION of your business. This is where you get all those setup and
essential elements in place, and more importantly, where you get comfortable with
the online world and how it all works—choosing your name and logo, building your
website, setting up your email, learning how to actually publish content and how to
start sending traffic to your website.
The reality is that learning how to blog is a little bit like learning a new language—it’s
going to feel hard and confusing and maybe a little bit uncomfortable at first until
you start to adjust and understand what’s going on, how everything works, and you
get your bearings.
And while a lot of people let themselves get stuck here for a very long time, my
belief is that you should push yourself to get through Level 1 as QUICKLY as possible. I
recommend 13 weeks, which is the equivalent of one full quarter, or 3 months.
That’s it.
The danger in this phase is overthinking EVERYTHING, which is why it is better to just
move fast and imperfectly. You can always go back later, once you make it Level 3,
and improve on the foundation you started.
LEVEL ONE HAS THREE PHASES
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PHASE 1
This is literally just getting your online business off the ground and set up so that you
can move forward. It’s nailing down some of the basic questions you may already be
thinking about—WHO will your business serve and WHAT will you sell?
It’s then choosing your business name & URL for your business and setting up your website.
During this phase, you’ll also want to get a few other basic pieces in place—choosing a
logo, setting up your business email, and claiming your name on social media.
PHASE 2
It’s during this phase that you’ll establish a structure for your website, and also where you’ll
get comfortable with creating content for your blog that serves your target audience
and helps answer those essential questions they might be trying to answer.
My recommendation is to write 7-10 blog posts answering those basic questions. This is
enough to give you practice at writing to your audience, and to give your site a little bit
more “meat”.
During the REFINE phase you’ll also create a branding guide to use yourself or share
with your graphic designer—essentially creating the visual & graphic standards for your
business in order to keep things consistent and professional looking as you move forward.
PHASE 3
It’s during this phase that you gain a solid understanding of what it actually takes to
grow your business, and the different methods you can use to increase traffic to your
website and attract more customers.
This includes gaining a basic understanding of how to use search engine tools like Pinterest
and SEO to make your content more findable, as well as how to use your website as a
marketing tool to grow your email list.
And once again, it’s important to move FAST through Level 1! Don’t overthink it, or get
caught up in perfection. Don’t languish here and let it take you months and months
or even years, or you’ll get frustrated because you aren’t really seeing any progress.
Instead, seek to understand the basics, but keep moving forward, because the next
level is where it all starts to really come together.
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LEVEL TWO | Launch (6 months)
L evel 2 is what’s known as the LAUNCH phase of your business. This step, which should
take you approximately 6 months to complete, is all about developing and validating
your core offer, as well as creating the assets and materials needed to lead people to
your core offer—also known as a lead magnet and tripwire, or an “entry point offer.”
Now remember, when you look at the Customer Superhero Path, your core offer is really
the center of your entire business. Everything you do in the attraction and initiation phases
should lead people to your core offer, and everything you do in the transformation and
ascension phase happen as a direct result of your core offer.
And so, for your business to be successful, it is really essential that you not only nail the
right core offer, but the right messaging FOR your core offer in order to speak to your
customer’s felt need and highlight the transformation your core offer will provide.
PHASE 1 CONCEPT
This is the phase where you’ll solidify your idea for your core offer—first by getting clear
about what your target customer truly wants (not just what they need), then by actually
mapping out what I like to call your “proven process,” or the unique way that your
product will provide the desired results.
From here, you’ll also start thinking about how to move your customers from the
attraction phase into the initiation phase with your Entry Point Offer—also known as your
lead magnet and tripwire.
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It’s important to understand that both your lead magnet and tripwire need to speak to
the exact same felt need as your core offer, which is why we figure out the core offer
FIRST. That way you always know you are attracting and initiating the RIGHT people, and
not wasting time or energy trying to talk to everyone.
Once you’ve got your concept nailed down, you’ve got to actually create your lead
magnet & tripwire, as well as create a logo for your core offer, then get everything
hooked up and ready to deliver. And once you’ve done that, you’ll be able to move
into the next phase of Level 2, which is.
PHASE 2 PROOF
And to be honest, this is where things really start to get exciting, because this is the point
where you finally start validating your idea by getting in front of REAL customers.
The best way to do this quickly is to start utilizing paid traffic through Facebook advertising,
running ads straight to your lead magnet to grow your list, and straight to your tripwire
product in order to start generating revenue that will help offset the cost of your ads.
Your goal is to grow an audience of at least 1000 subscribers so that you can then
test out your core offer by running what we call a Baby Seed Launch—essentially a
beta launch of your core offer to a small group of “testers” in which your goal is to get
feedback and make sure your product is actually creating the transformation you are
promising.
PHASE 3 SCALE
In the scale phase, once you have a core offer that will actually sell, and you also feel
confident in your messaging of that offer, you get to work actually scaling that offer and
bringing it to more people.
This is the phase where you start to fully build out your sales funnel and all the different
elements of your customer superhero path, where you begin to track and measure your
progress, and get a little more advanced and sophisticated in both your list growth and
launch strategies.
This is also the phase where you begin to start earning REAL money in your business, and
where your revenue starts to become a little more predictable.
And once you’ve hit that point, it’s time to move on to Level 3!
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LEVEL THREE | Improve (forever)
L evel 3, then, is where you’ll be for the rest of your life, or at least the life of your business.
And while at first glance that might sound a little boring, I can promise you—it’s NOT!
In fact, I’d say that Level 3 is the most fun and most exciting level of all!
This is the place where you are focused on continual improvement, growth, conversions,
and increased revenue. It’s where you get to take what you’ve built and make it better,
little by little, bit by bit, so that your business can steadily become even more profitable
and more predictable.
Unlike level 1 and level 2, level 3 doesn’t have distinct phases that you’ll need to pass
through. Instead, in level 3 you focus on improving your skills in 3 distinct areas—Business
Skills, Sales & Marketing, and Strategic Planning, while consistently utilizing a combination
of strategy, tactics, and implementation.
It’s in level 3 that you really start owning your role as the CEO of your company, where
as you scale, you also begin to grow your team and build a true business that works.
It’s in this level that the sales and marketing piece—which was so essential to getting
your business off the ground and to get you earning real revenue in the first place—
becomes less of a focus, while understanding how to set bigger long term goals and
knowing how to grow and train your team becomes more important.
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And like I said, this is a process that’s never really finished. There will always be room for
more improvement, more growth, better leadership skills, new marketing tactics, and
better goals.
But in this phase there is also stability and security, because you know you’ve built a
business that is both predictable and profitable, and you know how to duplicate your
results again and again.
So that’s it…..your full plan for moving forward.
LEVEL THREE
CONTINUALLY
IMPROVE ON THE
LEVEL TWO FUNNEL AND BUSINESS
CORE OFFER, YOU BUILT
LEVEL ONE ENTRY POINT OFFER,
EMAIL LIST
LAY THE
FOUNDATION
Start with Level 1. Lay the foundation. Get the essentials in place. Choose your name, set
up your website, get clear about your target audience, and begin thinking about those
essential questions you’ll need to answer for your audience.
From there, move to Level 2. Nail down your idea for your core offer, create a compelling
entry point offer, begin growing your email list with paid traffic, and then validate your
core offer by launching it to a small beta group. Then, once you’ve fully proofed your
offer, build out your sales funnel so that you can begin to sell it to more people.
Once you’ve got your funnel in place, your only job left, in Level 3, is to continually
improve on the funnel and business you’ve built. And this is where your business gets
really fun…..not to mention a whole lot more profitable AND predictable!
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OF COURSE THAT BRINGS US TO THE OBVIOUS QUESTION, RIGHT?....HOW
DO YOU IMPLEMENT THIS PLAN AND MAKE IT A REALITY?
That’s where ACTIVATE comes in.
Because the path that I just laid out for you is the EXACT plan that we follow at ACTIVATE.
It doesn’t matter where you are starting, ACTIVATE will show you exactly what to do,
every single step of the way.
The only coaching program for bloggers and content marketers designed to help you
build and scale a predictable, profitable business, (not just a popular blog.)
LEVEL 1
You’ll start in Level One with EBA® Foundation,
our groundbreaking curriculum designed
to help you get your blog up and running
and lay the foundation for your successful,
profitable, and predictable online business
at record speed.
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LEVEL 2
After 13 weeks, you’ll be ready to move
on to Level Two, where you’ll dive into our
Product Launch Playbook Academy™
and work to develop and launch your
core offer, as well as your lead magnet
and tripwire. Level 2 is where things really
start to get exciting, because it’s when
you get to experience the thrill of your first
sale—usually within 5-7 weeks of starting
Level 2.
LEVEL 3
Once you’ve launched your core offer, you’ll move into Level Three, where you’ll work
on continually improving your results. This is where our advanced training and high-level
coaching sessions will help you thrive and grow in a steady and intentional way.
Along the way, you’ll have continuous support, motivation, and community—along with
the very best implementation tools—to help keep you focused, motivated, and moving
forward.
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HERE’S WHAT MEMBERS ARE SAYING:
I realized I’ve done more work and made more progress in one week through
Activate Coaching than I have in an entire year. From the bottom of my heart –
THANK YOU.
- Flo
I’ve made HUGE strides in my business in the last month since joining and think this
just might be my year to finally make some money! Why this has been so hard in
the past, I have no idea, but I’m a slow learner and know what helps me learn
the best is to be with others in a community. Activate is just what I was missing.
Just beyond grateful. Love you guys! Here’s to “my year” and everyone else’s
too! Woot!
-Katrina
It is so obvious to me what I need to do. The pieces are just falling into place.
Activate is everything I didn’t know I needed right now!
-Aisha
I am absolutely loving Activate and things are already becoming more clear. I
have never been more ready to create my business and Ruth is a beacon of light!
-Michelle
I can’t tell you what a relief it is not to feel terrified by the uncertainty of not
knowing what I’m supposed to be doing or whether what I am doing is actually
working. And I can’t tell you how excited I was when I realized that this is just the
tip of the Activate iceberg!
-Leslie
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READY TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THIS INCREDIBLE PROGRAM AND
HOW IT CAN HELP YOU REACH ALL YOUR BLOGGING GOALS?
Simply visit our website at
eliteblogacademy.com/activate,
or reach out to our team at
support@ruthsoukup.com with any questions.
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