Episode #7: “Rejecting What Made Me Rich”
Tarzan Kay trusted a highly respected sales guru to teach her how to sell online. And she readily admits that led to a seven-figure business. But she later realised that what he really taught her was how to use persuasion to her own advantage and sell people courses they didn’t need.
In this episode of Mistakes That Made, I talk with email marketing and storytelling expert Tarzan Kay about the dangers of online courses and coaching that use persuasive marketing tactics to take advantage of people. We talk about how these tactics can work on even the savviest of business people and how this can be detrimental to those who are new to the online business world.
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Links from this episode:
Tarzan Kay on Instagram: @tarzan_kay
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Eman Ismail: I recently bought an online course created by someone I really admire. The thing is, I don't even think I needed the course. Not really, but I'd spent three or four years watching this course creator launch this digital product, and this was the year I got tired of the fomo-- the fear of missing out. The fear that this course had one valuable piece of information that could change my entire business.
I didn't spend my hard earned money on this course because I thought I needed it. I spent my hard earned money on this course because I was afraid of not having it. The course. It's interesting. Have I learned anything I don't already know? Not yet. For me, the most interesting part of all of this was the realization that persuasive marketing tactics actually work on me, an email copywriter.
Urgency, scarcity, fomo, the countdown timer, social proof, early bird bonuses, mid-launch bonuses, the intense and overwhelming email schedule. I know these persuasive techniques and tools because I've studied them as an email copywriter. I use some of them for my own launches and for my client's launches too.
And yet, they still worked on me.
They convinced me to buy a course I didn't really need, even though I was able to recognize and identify every single one of those techniques in action. Now, I can only imagine how influential and powerful these persuasive principles and techniques must be on people who don't know them and who can't recognize them.
We all know there are serious conversations happening inside the online business world about the coaching industry, how we launch, about the boss babes and the bro marketers. We have podcasts like Duped: The Dark Side of Online Business by Michelle Mazur and Maggie Patterson. A great podcast that explores topics like predatory pricing practices, celebrity entrepreneurship, the use of triggering and traumatic stories to sell, and the scam of sales psychology.
Then there's Tarzan Kay.
Tarzan Kay: All of these business owners that have just been, bled dry of all of their money and don't have a lot to show for it.
And I like it, I just could not look away from that. I could not.
Eman Ismail: Tarzan Kay teaches email marketing skills to online businesses, digital course creators, and freelance service providers.
I know her because she came up in her career writing copy for people like Amy Porterfield. She's known for her brilliant story filled newsletters And the fact that she spent the past three years slowly dismantling her seven figure boss babe empire and unlearning the systems of influence and indoctrination that were taught to her as a new business owner.
She's now dedicated her work to undoing that harm and teaching sales strategies that leave space for conversation and critical thinking.
Tarzan Kay: The biggest mistake that I made was trusting Jeff Walker to teach me how to build an online business.
I trusted him to teach me how to use persuasion to sell things.
And what he actually taught me was how to persuasion to make people buy things that were not in their best interest.
Eman Ismail: Tarzan Kay is an expert email marketer and storyteller, and she's here to talk about how trusting Jeff Walker's method of launching meant she created a seven figure empire she felt was contributing to the dark side of online business until she decided to slowly dismantle it, start over, and do better.
Tarzan Kay: If there's one thing that people take away from my work, like I just want them to be brave.
And sometimes what that looks like is engaging in conversations like this that are complicated and highly nuanced.
Eman Ismail: Welcome to Mistakes That Made Me, a podcast that asks extraordinary business owners to share their biggest business mistakes so you know what not to do on your road to success. My name's Eman Ismail, and I'm an email strategist and copywriter for online business owners and e-commerce brands. I'm a podcast lover, a pizza binger, a proud mama of two, and I have this radical idea that if maybe us business owners were a little less guarded and a lot more open about the mistakes we've made, we could help each other grow a business that brings us more joy and less regret.
Eman Ismail: Hi Tarzan. Thank you so much for joining me.
Tarzan Kay: Eman I'm so happy to be here. I'm really excited to chat to you because you are one of the most open and honest people I know. And actually, this was a question I was gonna ask later on in the interview, but I'm just gonna go ahead and ask it now.
Eman Ismail: I think one of the things that makes you so unique is how honest and open you are and the fact that you are not afraid to share exactly what's going on with you as you are living it. And I guess I wonder when you made the decision, how you made the decision, if it was at all like a conscious decision to be so open about you, your life, your business, your family.
Tarzan Kay: Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's been an evolution and I also. I have so many thoughts on this, but I'm gonna start with where I am now and then I'll walk it back. Like I actually just realized recently, like I've built this reputation for bringing people on the journey and sharing everything that's going on.
And I had a call with a, it was like a pre-interview for a podcast and I was getting ready to reveal something that is potentially pretty explosive. And I was like, you know, I'm worried about my nervous system. Like there's gonna be some pushback. Like this is a big deal. I don't know if I wanna talk about this.
And this guy, bless him, said to me, you know, like, you're not under any obligation to like to share everything. You don't have to air all of your dirty laundry and not everything in your life has to be like another turning of the wheel. And that was really valuable to me because even though the thing that I was wanting to talk about was really relevant to business. It still was just something personal and I was like, maybe I could just keep this for myself and work this out.
So, it's taken me, you know, seven years to get to that place where I'm negotiating. What do I share? What do I not share? What's useful to share? What's, what is salacious? And what's just fun. Like, so I'm negotiating that.
But I did have some experiences really early on that were really valuable. When I was writing Amy Porterfield's newsletters and or rather, they weren't really newsletters, they were her weekly email about her podcast, and I remember one of our earliest conversations her saying to me how she kind of had recognized this thing within herself that she was like only being vulnerable from the other side of it. Like oh, I went through all of these hard things and now I'm here and isn't this great? And so that was something that we worked on a lot in her emails, which was like to share things, like to just let people in a little bit more. And, you know, share some things that were hard even when she hadn't figured it out yet.
And so that was my first introduction to that conversation, and it was really valuable. And through writing her newsletters, which I only did for maybe eight months or something, people, I, I just, you know, got a chance to experiment with that. And that was really valuable and impacted my work a lot in terms of what I share and don't share.
Eman Ismail: And it's interesting that you mention Amy Porterfield, because I don't listen to her podcast a lot, but one of the episodes I listened to was the one where she was talking about the fact that, well, I guess her strategy around deciding what to share and how, I mean, I guess this would've been a long time ago now, a couple years ago. And how she does only share kind of what was going on once she's out on the other side. So it's more of a, like, look, this is what happened. This is what I learned. Now I'm on the other side and this is what I'm gonna share with you.
So, I am actually familiar with that philosophy coming from Amy Potterfield, I, I mean you share so much.
And I remember in one email specifically, no, I think it might have been on your ck So if you don't listen, if you don't subscribe to tarzan's emails, go subscribe now because um, I mean Tarzan is just an amazing storyteller and your emails, emails are full of stories, but you also have a CK newsletter as well.
So I think it was that where you started sharing one story and then you stopped yourself and you said this kind of infringes upon someone else. Story and life. So I'm gonna stop here and I'm not gonna continue to share. Share, right? So what kind of, that's a boundary you've created yourself for yourself. What other kinds of boundaries have you created around what you, what you do, and don't share.
Tarzan Kay: Yeah. Well, so that's a problem that everyone who writes, memoir has to contend with. Like, which part of this story is mine? How do I share this without hurting people or exposing them? So I'm navigating that and I specifically started the CK newsletter because it felt like there was so much that was not related to business that I really wanted to share. Like things like relationships, sex, cult recovery, like there is some cult recovery stuff that's relevant to business, but a lot of it, I just wanted there to be a more clear boundary about where I could just really dig deep into a story. And where, versus my newsletter where I always feel obliged to like bring it around to business, have a bit of a lesson, you know, so separating those two out, like now I have two email newsletters, which, you know, when people, when my students in my program email stars come and say like, they have two newsletters, I'm like, that's such a bad idea. Please don't do two newsletters.
And even for me, actually, I was publishing one email newsletter a week, like on my business list and also Substack. And I found that to be just way too much. Like it was beautiful. I produced a lot of really good writing. However, my Substack writing is not only longer, like long form, you know, it's usually like, you know, 2000 words, 1000 to 2000 words. Whereas my emails average like maybe 500 words, 750 at most. So, um, just having that LA like the length of that piece, It just meant that it took up all my time. So I decided to move to once a month.
Um, negotiating like how I'm writing and when I'm writing and what my commitments are, like, that's really important to me.
And even having boundaries around, like when I work on my email, like I basically always work, write my emails on Tuesday and they go out the following Tuesday. When I'm writing for a promotion, like when. And now in the current iteration of my business, I'm not doing Very highly produced live launches, but in the past, like all of that content always got written about a month beforehand, so it could be uploaded.
I would leave, like if I'm writing a launch sequence, I would leave a bit of space. Now, like on Wednesday there's just an open space here to address whatever objections are coming up. Um, but for the most part, I prepare all of the emails. And my team would load them, schedule them, you know, edit them, whatever, ahead of time so that we could really focus on being present for the promotion.
Um, so those are some of my boundaries around email and writing.
Eman Ismail: Tarzan, one of the most amazing things about you and just watching you do business is how quickly your business grew. So you started copywriting full-time in 2016, and I mean, you very quickly grew to six figures, then seven figures, and we've watched you hit, you know, a million and more.
And a couple of months ago you shared that you had actually let your entire team go. And that having grown your business to seven figures, you are now scaling back. So we're gonna go into that part in a second, but tell me about letting go of your team. How did you reach that decision and what did that look like?
Tarzan Kay: Well, that was not an easy decision and I definitely much like choosing to get a divorce. Like I tried a million different things to make my marriage work before I got to the point where I was like, this is not working. And in my business, like actually it was working, you know, we were doing okay. We didn't like selling online courses.
Like definitely the market's tough right now, so it wasn't as gravy as like 2020. But it was working. We were okay. But however, it was not working for me personally as the leader. And I think in the last couple years, like I've really, you know, in my first years in business, like I think it was year three and I was charging $10,000 to be in my mastermind, which in retrospect, you know, I really didn't have the capacity to lead and it was, or, you know, the ability, the experience, like there were a lot of things.
And actually it was running that program that made me realize that I had a lot to learn about leadership. Like I didn't know anything about leadership. And nobody was really talking about leadership in any of the programs that I was taking. So, you know, that was like 2019. And I have since then learned a lot about leadership and taken a lot of responsibility as a leader in terms of what I need to bring to conversations, how to support people, how to have hard conversations, and how to lead a team, like all of those things. And actually Being a leader requires a lot of presence. It requires a lot of energy capacity. And in the last year, I just haven't had that capacity. Like I'm going through a divorce, like doing a lot of recovery.
recovery work around me, like childhood trauma. I was raised in a cult. And the impact of that is like it affects all areas of my life. So I've been doing some really difficult work this last year and also trying to show up for my team and be in leadership for my team and my students and all those things. And I got to a point like toward the end of the summer where I just like, we were looking at what we were gonna offer next, and I just realized like, I don't have capacity to lead this next group of students. Like I just don't have it. The volume of students, even just like who I need to be in a program like the one we were considering, I knew I just didn't have it, but I also knew that in order to make revenue, that we needed to keep everything running, like I had to do something.
And, what I realized was that I actually just needed to step back and take care of myself before, like, putting some big thing on the market. And, it was a really hard decision up until the moment when I made the decision. I really didn't consider it as a possibility. I just was like, I'm here to, you know, provide for the team and to keep this thing going no matter what.
And then it just got to a point where like, personally the cost was too much. And I realized that if I continue to do it in this way, there's actually not gonna be anything left for me. Like in terms of like, whether it's money or, or um, like energy, like all of those things. I just like continuously putting myself last in order to like, hold up the sky of my business.
Like also, you know, my husband was a stay-at-home dad, so I'm paying for all of my expenses, all of his expenses, and trying to figure out how to be a single parent, like all of these things. It was just like so many things at once. , I just, I, it just sort of came down on me in a moment when I realized like I have to put some things down and so I let go of my whole team in a day and it was really shocking for them and shocking for me, but, you know, harder for them because they, you know, lost their jobs and totally didn't see it coming at all.
So, you know, even that is something that I've had to like, Just have to hold. Like me, I held my team really close and they'd put a lot of trust in me. And I know for some of them, like it felt like that trust was broken. And that was hard. But I, I, I don't regret it. Like I know that was the right thing to do.
Tarzan Kay: It just is complicated and messy for everyone involved.
Eman Ismail: What I'm hearing there is, I mean, you had, you have so much going on and I feel like people, other business owners can relate to that in terms of how do you keep your business running? How do you keep things going when you just feel like you, you can't anymore. You don't have the space, you don't have the capacity, emotionally, mentally, all those things.
And I think the difference is, I think the courage that it takes to pull the plug on something that just isn't working as opposed to continuing to just keep going, keep going because you think that's what you have to do and
Tarzan Kay: Yeah. I can't imagine how long. Yeah, I did that too. Yeah, I did that too. Like, I kept going, kept going, kept going, kept going.
And then one day I just couldn't go anymore and that was the end. So, you know, that's hard, it's a hard call to make. Like when is the end? When do I put this thing down? When do I keep going? And I think making that decision really is different for everyone.
Eman Ismail: I listened to you talking on a podcast, recently where you said someone had sent you an email criticizing your decision to write an email about letting your team go and sharing that you had let your team go and the criticism was that you were exploiting that situation for content, basically to create content. I personally thought that criticism was a little harsh, but everyone's very harsh. Everyone's entitled to their opinion, I guess. And one thing I do wanna say is I think you take, uh, criticism and feedback so amazingly well, that's something I'm working on because I am still in that mode where I jump to being defensive.
How have you found a way to be able to, just to take on that feedback and criticism, because from what I've seen and what I've heard, it feels like you do take on a lot, you share the criticism that comes your way, you share that. As a matter of fact, it was criticism that initially led you to kind of change your entire business.
Eman Ismail: initially, or I guess your outlook on life initially. . Right. So I think someone had, someone had come to one of your events and told you that it just was not diverse enough. And that kind of led you on another journey. But my point is, you're so good at taking criticism. How do you do it?
Tarzan Kay: Okay, well this is a superpower and it's also. Um, . It's also a childhood trauma. So I was, like I was raised in the Christian fundamentalist religion and basically like it was impossible to be, to not be like a bad sinner who was like doing things wrong all the time. So I have like, I am constantly, like my head is on a swivel to make sure like, am I okay? Am I doing something wrong? Is anybody mad at me? And that I actually have to learn how to manage. So, you know, for some people, for a lot of people, like when they get criticism, their default mode is defensive, like not my problem. However, I have the opposite issue, which is whenever I'm criticized for anything in any area of life, I assume not only that I am the problem, but also that I may die if I don't resolve this problem.
Like it feels life threatening. Um, cuz like as a child it was, it was like, I was gonna burn in hell forever if I didn't figure this out. . so I'm able to take criticism and hear it. And I also, so I've had to learn sort of the other side of it, like, okay, how do I decide if I'm really the problem or not?
Rather than like, how do I decide if this person is the problem? ? And in my email, like early on before I had like a really good grid around this. Uh, in my earlier days I had a rule that was like, if more than one person replies to an email and says, hey, this thing is a problem, or I disagree with this, then I know that I have to take a closer look.
So that was an early rule that helped me, when I didn't. And now another really important rule that I have is when I get critical feedback to just sit with it. Because another thing about my childhood trauma is like when I'm told I'm bad, I also immediately go into action. Like I am in like, you know, the like, fight, flight, freeze or fawn.
There's actually a lot of people who don't know that there's a fourth, the fourth F: fawn. And that's what I do, which is like we all know, fight, flight, or freeze in terms of the bear. And fawning is like, you love the bear, you make the bear feel so wonderful about themselves that the bear will not hurt you.
Tarzan Kay: So I know that that's what I do when I get some feedback that's hard, I wanna immediately tell this person like, thank you so much, I appreciate this. You are so wonderful. I'm so bad. Here's what I will do going forward. So, in order to protect myself and those people offering me often helpful feedback, I just give it three days.
Like, okay, there's that. And even in the span of three days, there's usually I might have a conversation with my best friend about it, who we talk about a lot of business stuff, all, all things. So I might have a conversation with my bestie or someone in the industry. I might like, even just sleeping on it often will help a lot and getting, like, regulating myself like now, you know, I'm not as easily dysregulated by a single email, but I used to be.
And so in any situation when I'm deciding, like, what am I gonna do with this criticism, the first step is to give myself space to regulate my nervous system and then make a decision from a calm place. Because when I'm reactive, like, this bear is going to eat me, like I can't make a decision about how to address this criticism.
So, just to summarize, does more than one person share this opinion? And then second, giving it a couple of days before replying or deciding to do something about it.
Eman Ismail: I really like that. The second one as well, is a, is a rule that my mom has always taught me. My mom has always said, give yourself 24 hours before responding to anything that kind of, you know, upsets you, or like you said, regulates you.
Anything potentially upsetting. Just give it 24 hours, let it sink in. You know, give yourself time to reflect. That's always really helped me. And I feel like the times that I haven't gone that, the times that I haven't done that and that I've gone against that, I've always regretted. So that's really good advice.
I am excited to move on to the meat of this episode and to talk about what I invited you here for. Are you ready?
Tarzan Kay: I'm nervous and I'm ready. Yes.
Eman Ismail: Yeah. That's the most common answer I got. I am nervous. Okay.
Tarzan, what is the mistake that made you?
Tarzan Kay: So, the biggest mistake that I made was trusting Jeff Walker to teach me how to build an online business.
Eman Ismail: Okay. Take me back to the beginning. What did your business look like before you decided to trust Jeff Walker to teach you about how to do launches and why? What was the mistake in that?
Tarzan Kay: Okay, so I started my business in 2016, and the first thing that I did was I bought a B School. And after I bought B School, I was like, wow, this is a great way to get clients. And then right away I bought Amy Porterfield's courses that convert, and then I was just right away, like on the train, like I'm learning about online courses, how to launch, how to get, I knew right away that I wanted to focus on emails and sales pages.
So I just started taking whatever programs came my way where I could learn about how to do that better. I wasn't even thinking about doing it for myself. I also saw it as an opportunity to get clients. So, I just kept going down that road. Now, what I didn't know at the time is that in online business, like if you've taken a program from Marie Folio, Amy Porterfield, Stu McLaren, James Wedmore, like basically the lineage of that like can all be traced back to Jeff Walker.
I never have purchased a Jeff Walker program. However, I've been to two of his live events because as I was coming up in the online course world, my best friend was trying to build her thing too. And she had chosen to learn from Jeff Walker and she liked his story and also he was like, I think because he was like older and closer to her age and she had like this whole story about how he was like, well he has this whole story and you know, she felt like if Jeff could do it, I could do it. So she chose to go down the Jeff Walker path and I chose to go down the path like all the other people who also learned from Jeff Walker.
And let me just pause for a second because I also wanna say, any names that I have just named, like, I'm not naming them as bad people, good people, even Jeff Walker. Like, we're all in this mess. This is a mess. We are all in this. I participated in it. Like, so we're all, we're all in it. We're all using some strategies and not others, like trying to figure it out.
However, Jeff Walker's kind of like the granddaddy of launching, like he taught like even if you buy from Tony Robbins, like Tony Robbins learned it from Jeff Walker. Like a lot of people that are, anybody that's using the three part video series, like that all goes back to Jeff Walker. So, okay, so it's my first year in business and my bestie buys this program and she says, I'm going to this Jeff Walker event in Phoenix. Do you wanna come? Like, I get to bring a friend?
Tarzan Kay: So I'm like, yes, of course. I definitely wanna come. So I go to this event in Phoenix and so on, in my little bit of an aside here in my cult recovery work, something that I've learned about, there's sort of an offshoot of cult recovery, about large group awareness training.
And I now can identify that that's what that was. But I didn't know at the time I was just going to a business event where other business owners were gonna learn about business.
And Jeff Walker is an absolute, like, he is masterful. He is so good at running these trains. It's a three day event. And you know, we've all, like probably a lot of your listeners have been to these types of events. It's like what you usually get, it's free or low cost because they're selling something that's high cost, that's like a high ticket, like 10,000 or more. And it's basically like an indoctrination event. And, Jeff Walker is really, really good at it.
And I, so I go and I'm really excited. I'm meeting all these people and Jeff Walker tells this like a beautiful metaphor from the stage. And he has this metaphor, like he's from Colorado or lives in Colorado and he's like a real outdoorsy guy. And he talks about this canyon trip, like down the Colorado River. And a lot of people do this. It's like, it's a really special experience. Like you have to apply and the permits are given by lottery. And when you get a permit you have to drop everything and go do this canyon trip and it's like three weeks or something. You're totally immersed. And then at the end, the reason he told the story is because he made this metaphor about what he called rim world.
And when you're in the canyon, like there's the canyon and then there's rim world and rim world. Like at the end of your trip you have to go back to the rim world. And it's really, like it can be a culture shock because all of a sudden people are like looking at their phones, going to their jobs, like caring about different things that you were totally disconnected from for three weeks.
So he tells this metaphor and the purpose, like he starts telling this on day one and he tells the, comes back to this metaphor every day for three days. And what he's preparing you for is that when you go home, like you know, this L gat, this large group awareness training, like that is the canyon experience.
And when you go back home to rim world, you are going to be amongst all of these people that do not understand what your life in the canyon was like. And they're gonna think you're weird, they're not gonna agree with what you're doing and all of these things. . And at the time I thought like, that's a really beautiful metaphor.
Like yes, like there are a lot of people in my life who don't understand what my business is. They don't understand why I would spend $10,000 on a coach or like, what is, what even is this business you're in? Like, so that really resonated with me. But what I actually know because of my work in cult recovery is like that, is strategically separating people from their communities and sowing mistrust among the most important people in their lives.
And the whole purpose of that is because at that event, they're selling a $10,000 program. And a lot of people like, you know, the, it's that culture of like the first five people to the back of the room get $500 off and then like everybody runs to the back. Like it's designed to shut down critical thinking and just like go buy the thing. Most people that join those programs are not like that, that's not what their business needs. You know, people in industry language, we would say they're not ready. However, I would, I would argue that, you know, that readiness is just basically a sales tactic. It's really not what they need. A lot of them don't even have businesses yet.
So then of course, like when they go home to their spouses, their spouse is like, what the shit, like, you just spent $10,000, like, we don't have $10,000. However, like, you know, they're held in this whole, I like this canyon community. And then your spouse is like, you know, some rim world person that doesn't even understand you or know what you're doing.
I wanna be clear, like I don't think that Jeff Walker is a cult leader. I don't think he's studying like David Koresh and figuring out how to, you know, incorporate these culty things into his business. However, the model is highly, highly coercive. And at the time, I did not understand coercive control.
In copywriting, well, you know, this Eman. As a copywriter, like, you know, the first thing you learn is Cialdini's principles of persuasion.
So I learned the principles of persuasion and what I didn't know because I never actually read the book, until many years later, is that Cialdini-- I didn't learn this until I took a, um, wonderful program from Kelly Deals. The program used to be called Feminist Copywriting. Now it's called Copywriting for Culture Makers.
And she had this program, it was like a program inside the program about persuasion. And she's, she says like, you know, Cialdini didn't write that book for like salespeople. He wrote it for consumers so that consumers would know when they were being manipulated. And then, all these salespeople came in and made Cialdini's book influence like the bible of copywriting.
And Cialdini himself actually called those tools of influence. And so like to summarize, like why I define this as a mistake that made me like, I thought, like the reason why I felt compelled to name Jeff Walker specifically, is because I trusted him to teach me how to use persuasion to sell things.
And what he actually taught me was how to persuasion to make people buy things. That was not in their best interest. And like, it's taken me seven years to be able to actually articulate that. And a lot of self-examination, a lot of looking at the industry, a lot of walking back the things that I used to do and don't do anymore.
And again, like I don't, you know, it's working for Jeff, like he's not gonna do it differently because his model works for him. It makes him money. Like there's no reason for him to question what he's doing. But for me, like I, I can't look away from all of the people who have been harmed in this industry.
Tarzan Kay: Like all of the people who bought program after program that they will say in their own language, I wasn't ready for it. But really like, that just was not something they needed, but someone really crafty with, with their persuasive bonuses and countdown timers and all those things, like convincing them that they needed it.
And now there's like this whole just like a graveyard of broken businesses and people feeling like, like so many people who've been through the grinder of online business have so much like intense guilt because we are taught to be like the person responsible. Like the whole message is like, if I can do it, you can do it too. Like it's intensely individualist. So if people, if it didn't work, people assume like, it's my fault. I didn't do it properly, I didn't buy the right program. I did webinars. I should have done a three part video series or whatever. Like all of these business owners that have just been, bled dry of all of their money and don't have a lot to show for it.
And I like it, I just could not look away from that. I could not. And that once I started looking at that, like it really changed the way that I promote, like it changed everything. It, it, it changed my whole life, like way beyond business.
How did these methodologies show up in your business when you were using them? And when you, you know, when you had initially been taught them
Tarzan Kay: Well, for starters, like I did my own large group awareness training. Like I did everything, well, not everything that Jeff Walker did, but like, you know, I followed the basic formula because like, you know, if you've been to one of those events, you've been to them all. They all look the same, like It's the same format. You know, there's usually like, you know, the, the, the leader will speak for several days and then they'll be like a panel of past students and they'll be like, some incentive to join the next level and whatever. Like, I've seen it done a million times. I did that, I did that. And that actually was, that was probably like the climax of me showing up in the online business world in that way.
But you know, I also did like live launches with expiring bonuses and big red countdown timers and like big promises about what you're gonna achieve and all those things. Like I did all those things and all of those things actually worked for me. They worked for me financially, but they didn't, like, they didn't work for my students and they did, they didn't work for a lot of people.
Tarzan Kay: And so I started, you know, I like, I've walked, I walked it back really slowly. Like at first I just made the decision like, okay, I'm not gonna do any more affiliate marketing for a year. I'm just gonna put that away so I can focus on delivery of my own programs. Because that was one thing, like one thing about the launch model and for people who are people who are doing courses like you know, you spend like 10% of your time creating a program and then 90% of your time marketing it. Like, that's basically what I did. And I mean, there's always gonna be a bit of an imbalance because, you know, a program needs to be recorded and updated, but you know, it is, it kind of can live on its own.
Marketing needs to be fresh and new all the time. . So, you know, there I'm not, not suggesting the balance has to be like a certain percentage or whatever, but I did walk back all the marketing I was doing so that I could actually focus more on delivery. And then in the end. And then in the, you know, subsequent three years, I also started experimenting with using persuasion differently, like each individual tactic.
And, I understand that a lot of people just want a manual for how to use persuasion ethically. I'm never gonna create that manual. I don't even like the word ethics, because all, like, who gets to decide what's ethical and what's not.
So for me it's been about like, looking at every one of my offers. Like what's the price? Okay, how much time do people have to make a decision? How much persuasion am I going to use here? What am I not gonna do? Like, you know, I, that's something that I'm negotiating with every single promotion.
Eman Ismail: It's been fascinating to kind of watch you experiment with how you're doing launches now. And I think one thing is that the people who buy these courses are becoming much more aware of these tactics and what's actually going on and are not buying into it like they used to. And I think one thing that a lot of people are experimenting with, you are, and I am right now as well, is giving people a longer period of time to decide.
So instead of a week, I right now have my, Like a Boss mastermind doors open and they're open for a couple of months to give people a real chance to figure out whether they wanna join or not. And I know you're doing that with your program as well. You've left the doors open for an extended period of time. So, that pressure of making a decision right now and spending a lot of money this second is lifted from people.
But I also know that you've sacrificed a lot of revenue So we'll go into that in a second. I do want to know what was the moment that you kind of realized this is something that I don't want to be a part of anymore and this is not working?
There have been a lot of moments. Definitely like seeing, so I mentioned that my best friend Kathleen, she brought me into the whole Jeff Walker world. And you know, she went to the events, she bought the $10,000 thing and you know, I saw her, like, I witnessed firsthand everything that was not right about her whole experience. So, you know, I had to reconcile myself to that and figure out why it was different for me and her? What really was the difference?
So that experience was really important. I don't think there was a single moment. I've been reexamining persuasion for a while. However, I do remember like, I think it was January 2020, and I was on a psychedelic journey with two friends of mine.
As a side note, like I do use psychedelics and other drugs recreationally and therapeutically, and in this case therapeutically.
Tarzan Kay: And I saw, I thought about this promotion, this program I was gonna promote. And I just saw in the moment, like what was beautiful about it, what was terrible about it, and what, what was just like gritty and the harm that could be caused by doing this promotion. I just saw it all at once and something, there was like such a big knowing in me that was like, I cannot do that.
I cannot, and that was January or February and then like, I spent the next like six months, like trying to talk myself into it and being like, no, you know, it's fine. Like it, we, we'll do it this way and then it'll be okay. And in the end I looked at it and said, I really just, I really just can't do this.
So I, I wanted to mention that because like, I, I think. You know, we have this three day rule, you have your 24 hour thing. Like we all have these moments where we see something or understand something, but our programming, like our ways, ways of thinking are like so deeply entrenched. Like, you know, we often have a breakthrough and then just go back to doing things exactly the same way.
We've always done that. Like, I have done that 1,000,001 times. However, like that moment it just really stuck with me. And in the end I couldn't, I couldn't do the thing.
Eman Ismail: I wonder if there are some people listening to this who do not like understanding what is harmful, why it can be harmful. And I know from my perspective, it took me a while to realize and, and understand this. But having seen people make humongous investments in programs where coaches are all but guaranteeing that they're gonna, you know, be super successful and make all this money, et cetera, et cetera. I've seen these people join these programs and then become I guess fall into, kind of ought to despair when they realize that what happened for this coach, the amount of money this coach is making is not the amount of money that this person is gonna make, these promises were made where actually they can't really be fulfilled. It works for a few kinds of select people, but it doesn't work for the many.
And then actually one particular case, this one coach that I know of that has, I guess, a policy of then following up, kind of missed payments because these are huge investments people cannot possibly keep up. And by the way, when they're, when they think to themselves, I shouldn't make this investment because I don't have the money, they're told that that is a limited belief and they should overcome it. and believe in themselves and believe in their futures and invest, you know, everything they possibly can, and all this jazz, so they do, and then they can't keep up with the payments.
And then, you know, some of these coaches involve, you know, bailiffs and people. I know of people who have, who have had bailiffs coming on their door, knocking on their door trying to take their stuff because this person now owes a coach. This money from being, you know, from joining this program.
And now what you are saying, correct me if I'm wrong, is while some people believe that the person who made the decision holds that responsibility for making that decision, what you are saying is that the coach, the person who is selling the thing, the seller of the thing, bears this responsibility of putting so much pressure on people and using these persuasive tactics, to influence people, to make the decision that they want them to make. That is harmful. They bear that responsibility and that we need to be accountable as people who have, people following them, buying from them. We need to be accountable to those people and for our actions.
Tarzan Kay: Yes, thank you, Eman. I sometimes assume that people have a certain background. So that was actually really helpful and we haven't talked about mindset work and limiting beliefs, but, that's a really important way that people like their own inner knowing is used against them.
So thank you for pointing that out. And yeah, exactly like you said, what people I think don't realize about persuasion is that it is intentionally designed to shut down critical thinking. Like even if you just look at the concept of a timer, like the idea of a timer is like, if you don't make this decision right now, you're gonna lose out on this thing. So you better just make a decision right now. And also you're protected by a guarantee. A maybe. So maybe just make the decision right now just in case you miss it because you don't wanna miss it. Because actually, like, you know, a lot of people are really successful with this thing. And you like it, it just goes on and on and on.
And actually, like, the way my best friend Kathleen described it was like the intensity of the promotion created so much tension in her that it was like, I am just going to buy this thing to break the tension and to like, make this problem go away. Wow. Um, which I think, like, I had never thought about it that way.
And, you know, especially for, you know, people who are trauma survivors, which is like almost all of us. you know, it's like when you're being intentionally triggered in that way and there's like, possibly it might give me some relief to like hit this buy button and I don't know if it's a good idea, but let me just try because maybe I will be in less pain if I buy this thing. You just buy the thing.
So when I am evaluating, what articles, what elements of persuasion I'm going to use, like how much social proof am I going to share and what kind of social proof, how much am I going to use my contacts and my history to show authority? Like how, I mean the biggest one is definitely scarcity and urgency. Like what elements am I going to put in here? and then the combination of all of that together. like is my customer going to be able to think critically about this decision and make a good decision? And, you know, if it's a $27 product, like I don't, I'll use a countdown timer. Like sure if there's a reason and it's real, like, or a digitally real, sure, I'll use a countdown timer because it's $27 and that's not gonna break anyone.
But if we're talking about, you know, even a decision that is a few thousand dollars, like arguably most people could recover. However, there are also people who are desperate and looking for a solution and willing to try anything. And so, like, and you know, a lot of these programs that talk about like, you know, rescuing you from your sad day job, like a day job where it really like something that I.
This is a total aside, but I really don't like how online business really undermines the dignity of work, like, of having a job, like whatever that job is like providing for your family. Like whatever, like, I, I want people to feel positive about having a job. However, a lot of these programs talk about like your terrible day job and like freeing yourself from, from hours for dollars and you know, really preying on people that have you know, that are in like a hard place in their life. like, basically they're selling to the most vulnerable people. And you know, right now, like it's December, 2022, we are in the early days of a recession, we don't know how long this is going to last. We're also like, still like in a global pandemic.
Like the whole world is like, is still like, there's just a lot of shock and grief and I feel like people are so vulnerable right now. I have to be extra, extra careful about how I use persuasion. Like persuasion on vulnerable people is always tricky, but, you know, evaluating it in the context of today where we are in the world, like it's just.
It just needs to be treated with even more care. Like I want to hold these people, like children, like I'm not forcing them into anything.
Eman Ismail: Yeah, I love that and I think I definitely haven't got this perfect yet cause I do launch my own stuff, but it's definitely something I've been working on, something that I am still trying to figure out and figure out what I'm comfortable with, what I'm not comfortable with.
I think you had a conversation once about the use of testimonials and you know, are you sharing testimonials that are reflective of, you know, a reasonable expectation of success. Like, well, what are most people achieving? What is kind of like the average amount of success people get as opposed to, you know, the one superstar who managed to achieve X, Y, Z in your course.
And I think someone else who does this really well is [unclear], who is a fellow email copywriter. And when she's launching one of her products, she says two things in her emails. She says, number one, you can and will be successful without my course. This is not the only way to achieve success as an email copywriter. But my course will help speed up your journey, your educational journey, basically. So you'll get there in the end with or without me. But if you want help speeding it up, come join me, the type of thing, which I love.
And then the second thing she says is, do not join this course if you are in debt. I do not want you to join. I will not allow you to join. If you make me aware of that, that's that you are in that situation. Please don't join.
And so it's interesting to see how this kind of new awareness of this entire situation is cropping up and how people are responding to it.
Okay.
Eman Ismail: We've talked about your mistake and we've talked about the mistake that made you. Tell me how this mistake made you. How was this the mistake that has helped you to get to where you are today?
Tarzan Kay: Yeah. Well, you know, like I totally fell for it and it was easy to fall for, because actually it worked for me. Like I was really successful, really fast. And so, you know, in some ways like learning from Jeff Walker and all of his descendants, that actually worked for me. Like my business grew very quickly. I grew an audience. I have lots of students who, you know, made millions of dollars. So, um, you know, gotta acknowledge that.
And also at the pinnacle of it, you know, when I did this large group awareness training, that actually was when I was approached by a student and she had signed up to our $10,000 thing that we had offered. And then she wrote an email after and she said, I would like to tell you my experience of your event as a brown Muslim woman. And I had like, never thought about my whiteness. I hadn't thought about how I have other advantages, like, you know, charisma, beauty, thinness, all these things. Like I never thought of any of that. I never had to. And this person was really articulate. Like she was, you know, working on her PhD in social justice, like a really smart person. And she articulated all of these things in her email and I read them and was like, oh my God, I have a huge problem and this is really important. Like, I have to figure this out.
And so, you know, the training that I got, like it got me to the place where someone actually could speak up about what was not right about it. And, you know, that led to this whole exploration, which took time. Like, it's not like I dismantled the whole thing in a day. I had to, you know, like a white person who didn't know anything, who was like, you know, blissfully ignorant, that doesn't change overnight. Like I, honestly, I still feel like such a beginner in all anti-oppression work. Like, I feel so green. Because I, I, I never thought about it until I was like, I don't know, 34 years old or something.
But like, I'm so grateful to that person. I've spoken about her on many podcast interviews. I've written about her, like she changed my life. And like, I wouldn't have existed in the world publicly in that way and been called into that conversation, like, if not for Jeff Walker. And not only that, but like that has been so impactful and continues to impact my life in so many ways. Like even understanding persuasion in my business led me to exploring the coaching industry and everything that is harmful about the coaching industry. And that led me down a path of cult recovery. Like, I, like I didn't know, I didn't know. What I, this, like, my experience as a child was what it was like, I've spent my whole life minimizing it.
Tarzan Kay: And now, just this year, like I opened this Pandora's box of, like really hard stuff and that's, opened up this whole other world for me and this whole other, this whole other like exploration of myself and my responsibility in the world and all of that. Like
Thanks Jeff. Like . Thanks bro.
Eman Ismail: So how does your business look different today and your life as well? Cause I know this has impacted more than your business, it's impacted your entire life. How, yeah. Does your business and life look different today?
Tarzan Kay: So right now,I'm fortunate right now that I have. Like, I will preach about email marketing all day long, but I have to say like my email list and my relationship with my email subscribers, like, has carried me through this whole thing, not only as a place to like read my stories, to read my work, to be on the journey with me, to be saying like, hey, look over here. This is important to you. Or like, yes, we're with you. Thank you. All those things. So my email list is like the one thing that I have never not done, and I've done it in different ways, of course, but now like, because I don't have this more scaled business, which costs a lot more, I can make offers to my email list that are not scalable, but that are also still really profitable.
And what it means for me in this iteration of my business is, I'm not spending nearly as much time writing emails, working on marketing, webinar invitations, getting the webinar ready. Like all of that stuff that was required of me in the previous version is not. Like right now I'm selling, like I'm, I'm only selling 20 spots in my program. I haven't sent any promo emails. I've talked to people on Zoom calls, which I never had time to do before. And people, people email me a lot, they're like, thank you so much for your time. I know you're so busy. And I'm like, yo, actually, like I'm not that busy. Not that busy right now . And that feels really good.
Like there'll be other seasons of hustle. But right now, is not a season of hustle, especially cuz you know, in my personal life I'm just going through so much. Like I'm still learning how to be a parent. Like my husband was a stay-at-home dad, so you know, he took care of the house and food and children and, and you know, that's, that's like my number one thing right now is just really connecting with my sons and being a really awesome mom for the time that I have them.
So that's different because that wasn't really a priority before, like that was taken care of. My husband had that. I didn't have to think about that. So I have to think about a lot of things I didn't think about before. And I'm fortunate again, like, because they have this list of people who have been, who've been with me, some of them for a number of years.
They do read my work, they show up and they will purchase things from me when I make offers.
Eman Ismail: Earlier on you were talking about the feeling of, I guess, energetically just not being capable of, or not having the capacity, no, sorry, not, not.
Capability, capacity to take on leadership and I guess like holding space for people like you need to when you are, when you're a coach. And I was thinking then as you were talking, it's, I feel like it's, it's also motherhood as well because we both have two boys and with the kids you have two humans needing you, touching you, wanting you all the time. And that takes, that takes a lot from you. Like to the point where sometimes I open my inbox and I'm just like, I, I don't have the energy to respond to people that need me right now. I can't do it. Cannot do it. Close my inbox.
So I feel like that will have a lot to do with it as well. And, I love that you were able to respond to your needs in the way that you needed to.
Tarzan Kay: Yeah. I just wanna say, what specifically women are sold. The story that we are sold is a lie. Like that you could have your side hustle business while you're taking care of your children and like you could do it all.
Because this thing is just your little project on the side that will make all of this money while you take care of your children. Like that, anybody who is listening who doesn't know that yet, like please hear me, that is not true.
Like I get emails from people all the time and they're like, I'm really struggling to make this work. Like, why can't I do, you know, they're like explaining to me all the things that are going on in their business and then there's like maybe a little sentence at the end that's like, you know, also I'm like a full-time caregiver to my two or three children or whatever. Like as if it doesn't matter because they've basically been taught that it doesn't matter, that it's not important, you could do this thing anyway.
And I'm like, let's just back up a freaking second here. That is an unrealistic expectation that a stay-at-home parent should also run a side business and make all this money. Like most people who do that, who say that you can do that, have childcare or had childcare. Like it's really rare that someone is able to actually build something while they're also caring for children.
Like, you know, maybe they have some support, like a few hours here and there. Like if you don't have any support, like it's gonna be really hard and do not like to beat yourself up or like tell yourself that you failed because you can't make it work. Like you're already sleep deprived, you're already handling everything. To add a business on top of that, I just had to jump in because I just feel like it needs to be said. Like that is not realistic. People who tell you that it is are trying to sell you something and the dream that they are trying to sell you is a lie.
Eman Ismail: It's so important that people hear this. And also if you haven't listened to the episode with Belinda Weaver, go listen to that because me and Belinda spoke for a full hour about this lie. This idea that you can have it all. You can do it all, and it's all just so easy.
You know, I've spent this year, so I had my baby last year. He's just turned one, my second son and I spent the majority of this year at home with him and working as well, like growing the business and I don't know why, but I had this thing in my head that I wanna stay at home with the baby until he's one. Like me, I don't know where it came from, but I was like, I think, I don't know. I told myself this is. I'll be okay. I can go back to work if I stay at home with him for a year. Okay. And then he'll be, he'll be great, he'll be happy. I'll be a good mom. And, Hmm, I had a lot of mental health moments this last year because it was not easy. And you were talking about sleep deprivation. That's where I'm at right now, as in I have literally, I think I, I'm, I texted my cousin yesterday, if I'm being totally honest. I texted my cousin yesterday and I was on the edge of a breakdown. I'm so tired. I'm just, I'm so tired. And it's got to the point where you think you can't be any more tired, like it's not physically possible. And then you become more tired and you've still got an entire business to run.
And I do wanna add that I now have childcare for both kids. So both kids have, you know, daycare. And it's still hard because I realize it's hard. Well, the hours I'm working, I'm working and the hours that I have my kids, I have the kids.
So when do I get a break, exactly? This is what I'm trying to figure out. So I mean, there's just so much and it's so hard. And you're right. I think there's a lot of dishonesty around how easy or hard it is. And thank you, thank you for sharing that and go listen to the episode with Belinda.
Okay, we've gotta wrap up in a second.
Eman Ismail: So I wanna ask you one last question. What do you want others to learn from your experience?
Tarzan Kay: Well, I hope this doesn't come off as like. A personal development lecture. But if there's one thing that people take away from my work, like I just want them to be brave. I want people to have brave conversations with their families, with their email subscribers, like with their customers to be braver.
And sometimes what that looks like is engaging in conversations like this that are complicated and highly nuanced. And there's no, like, this is the right way, this is the wrong way. You know, it's a lot like in online business, we all want to believe that we could just follow someone's step-by-step system.
And I think the brave thing to do isto figure it out for yourself and do it in a way that actually makes sense for you and your life and your business and your potential customers.
Eman Ismail: Thank you. Thank you so much for coming on the show. I'm so excited that you said yes and that we, I knew this conversation would be amazing and I think so many people are gonna, they're gonna benefit from it, so thank you.
Where can people find you if they want to stay connected?
Tarzan Kay: Okay. So if you go to tarzankay.com/join, that is the best place to get on my email list. And that's where, you know, I share stories and talk about business and what I'm doing. And then I also do some storytelling, which is more purely my writer's side, and that's where I write about recovery from cults on Substack. And that's tarzankay.substack.com.
Eman Ismail: And you're writing a book as well. So people should look out for that, right?
Tarzan Kay: Yeah. Oh gosh, yes. Like look for it on the bookshelf in, uh, 2027 . You know.
Eman Ismail: Remember that. It will be there. I'm looking forward to it. Looking forward to reading it. Thank you so much, Tarzan.
Tarzan Kay: Thank you, Eman.
Eman Ismail: Despite everything Tarzan and I spoke about, there's one thing I want to make very clear.
I don't love this idea of ethical marketing. That's not what we're trying to push here. Because at the end of the day, what is ethical marketing and who gets to decide what is ethical and what isn't?
What Tarzan is encouraging is critical thinking. We should be critical about the persuasive tactics that we use to sell our brand, our products, and our services, and we should think critically before we allow ourselves to fall for certain persuasive tactics as consumers.
Does any of this mean I won't use a countdown timer again? No way. I'll use the countdown timer, but I'll also give you enough time to make a decision that comes from a place of confidence rather than a place of unfounded fear and pressure. And the amount of time you have to decide will be proportional to the investment you're about to make.
Being critical of online business practices doesn't mean I'm perfect or Tarzan's perfect. We're just trying to do better. Surely that's better than doing nothing, right?
You are listening to Mistakes That Made me. I'm Eman Ismail, and if you like this episode, take a screenshot, post it on Instagram and tell everyone you know that this is the podcast to listen to. And tag me @emancopyco so we can say hi. And so I can share your post. You can find the links to everything I've mentioned today in the show notes.
Next time on Mistakes That Made Me.
Layinka Sanni: You're looking at the bank balance and you're like, I want this thing. I can't go rob a bank. You know? And then you have someone who'll tell you, go and get a loan.
And that was the position I was put in, but I didn't get the loan.