Connie Cleveland (Owner of theObedienceRoad.com)
Jared:
Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the Kajabi Edge podcast where we talk to real entrepreneurs to give you an edge on Kajabi. I’m your host Jared Loman, Vice President of Customer Experience. And today I’m joined by my friend Connie Cleveland, owner of ObedienceRoad.com which is a membership site for competitive dog obedience enthusiasts. How are you doing today Connie?
Connie:
I’m great, thank you for having me.
Jared:
Thank you for being here. Well, let’s just dig right on in. Tell us all a little bit about how you got started in the space. Give us a glimpse into your journey into a dog obedience training.
Connie:
Well, a quick glimpse on the dog obedience training. I don’t remember life before dogs and dog training. My mother had dogs and I was the youngest child, and I was willing to go with her to her dog events. So I announced very early in life that I wanted to be a dog trainer. That didn’t go over very well in my family, that was just not an appropriate career choice. So I have actually been in the dog training, professional dog training space my entire career, but just got online really in the last couple of years.
Jared:
Okay, so yeah. Tell us a little bit more about like, you mentioned you’ve always been in the space. What did that journey kind of, how did that begin professionally for you?
Connie:
Well, I went to college dutifully like I was supposed to and my family got an engineering degree but I worked my way through college teaching dog obedience classes. And when I got out of college, I took an engineering job as I liked to say for a long arduous15 months before I took my first full time dog training job, which was actually training service dogs. For the physically handicapped and the hearing impared. And was still teaching dog obedience classes on the side, to supplement my income.
Jared:
So it sounds like this career kind of found you in a way, even though you are seeking it out.
Connie:
Yeah and then, you know then, as I, when you’re working for a non-profit, you’re not making very much money. And I, and so while I was teaching these dog obedience classes, I actually had one of my students come up and say, you really should do this for a living and, and I could help you get into your own space. And, he was a banker for crying out loud. And he helped me develop the brick and mortar building business. And then pretty soon I was not training service dogs for a short period of time while my obedience business was growing.
Jared:
So, brick and mortar business. How long, you started that up. How long did you operate as a brick and mortar?
Connie:
I operated it from my, the business that I ended up selling I started in 1995, full time. We had a boarding kennel and a bill and, and a business. And we actually not only trained beginners and puppy owners how to train dogs, but I got a large group of competitive obedience people that trained with me. By that time, I was doing seminars, I was on the road all over the country doing seminars and I was contracted between service dogs for some non-profit organization. And I sold that business in October of 2019.
Jared:
Okay!
Connie:
So 20, almost 25 years.
Jared:
Well I think the, the sale was probably very interesting because I think that, that kind of starts off your journey into the online space if I’m correct.
Connie:
Kind, kind of. So before, while I was teaching, I was also writing. I had a couple of publications that asked me to submit articles for them. And people would say, why are you doing that? It’s you know, you’re not getting paid. And I, I said I don’t know, I just, I like to write and I like to try to help people. And what that did was it grew my seminar business because now people all over the country, and now the country were reading what I wrote. ‘
And then somebody came to me and said, will you produce DVD’s? And I said well if you’ll help me, sure I’ll do that. So then in the back of my mind I was thinking, I gotta combine the books and the DVD’s because you can’t really write about dog training, pictures just don’t do it. And the DVD’s were okay except that you know, as a dog trainer you’re learning all the time, so once you produce a DVD, it’s done, it’s finished. And you know when we did it, we had to have an entire production crew. So I couldn’t then modify them. So for a long time I was thinking, there’s gotta be a way, for me to write a book with a, with a video embedded. And technology just kinda caught up with me.
Jared:
I love it. So, let’s kinda zoom on that particular point there, is like when did you realize that this technology exists? Or not only that but like when did you realize that that was the logical next step for you? To kind of to I guess, meet your audience where they’re they’re, they're looking for that content.
Connie:
Well, I think when people started the blog. I realized that I could not just write articles for magazines but I could write articles and embed video in them. And again I was doing all of this for free, and I was producing all these videos and people were saying to me, you’re crazy. You’re spending all this time doing this and you know, nobody’s paying you, and I kept saying, but you know I love it, I love it. Well the reality was that when I finally sold my business knowing that I'm selling this business, I’m a few years short of wanting to retire. I really want to get online and put this all on a website. I have so much content, it was crazy. I mean, most people are kinda struggling with content. I probably had well over 300 videos at that time that I could pick from to start with my, with my site.
Jared:
That’s crazy, yeah. So, it sounds like for you, like you needed a, a space to, to take, take all of this content and actually make it available to the audience that you have.
Connie:
I did, I, I absolutely did.
Jared:
So I guess when you got started, or when you, when you started that transition to online. Like what were some of the initial, I guess hurdles or challenges that you faced, to kind of moving that content into an entirely new space?
Connie:
Well the technology terrified me. And if it weren’t for my husband, who was really kind of, in the background saying, you can do this, and if you’re stuck I can help you. And he had researched a whole bunch of different platforms for me to, to look at and to potentially use. And I have to say, when he found Kajabi, he said, come here sit down because you really can do this, this is gonna be simple and it was beautiful for me. It was like plug and play, and if I got stuck, he was savvy enough to be able to get me unstuck.
Jared:
I love that. Yeah, so I guess, when you decided to move into that space, what was, what would you say was the motivator? Was it financially motivated? Was it just like, to alleviate stress? Why, why did you want to carry on? Versus let’s just say, sell the business and retire.
Connie:
Well, when I decided I was gonna sell the business, it was really because my husband and I were operating in two different areas and we weren’t even living in the same state. It was craziness. And I said, I, I can’t stand this anymore and I went to a business broker and I said I really want to sell my business and my husband and I are tired of living apart. And he said, it’s gonna take 3 years. I said, okay I got 3 years and 8 months later he called and said, I’ve got a buyer. And I just panicked, because I was kinda counting on the income from that business for another 2 and a half years. So I kinda panicked and I said, you know, am I really ready to sell this? So I talked to my financial planner and he said, yeah you really should work another couple of years. And I thought, if I’m never gonna do this online thing, now is the time to do it. So I sold the business on October of 2019 and from October 31st to January 15, I created that whole entire obedience website on Kajabi and I launched on January 15.
Jared:
Wow
Connie:
And moved to Maryland to live with my husband, so.
Jared:
Wow, well let’s talk about that launch, especially that, that January launch. Did it meet expectations? What, how did that go over?
Connie:
I had done some, again kinda big preparation. I had done some courses. I had never done a membership. The courses were not on Kajabi, the courses were kinda connected to the website in my brick and mortar business had. So I knew that I had some following, but when I opened up the membership, I opened it up for 6 months and I didn’t close it. And at the end of 6 months I had over 300 members and I was blown away.
Jared:
Wow, so did you find like a establishing an audience, was it the same audience that existed for you’re, kind of your brick and mortar business or did that change?
Connie:
No, it was the same audience that existed for the articles I was writing, and the blog I was producing and then some of those digital courses that I had done.
Jared:
Okay so sounds like, you know for all the people that were telling you, you’re do, that why are you doing this, you were actually preparing in doing all the work prior to that you would have to do anyhow once you got started.
Connie:
And that’s where all the content came from. And I, and I realized in that you know 2 and a half months that I put it together, it was just about picking the content that I wanted at that point because I had just so much available to me.
Jared:
Wow so, once you, once you got the ball rolling, outside of let’s say the technology like once you actually kinda got started, moving from the physical space to where perhaps in order to acquire clients you may have been posting at it in this paper, you maybe had a sign, or something along those lines. What were some of, the kinda the unique hurdles transitioning into the online world?
Connie:
I think that for me I needed to learn something about just launching and how do you, you know when you, when you have subscribers, and I did. I had, I had people that subscribed to just my free content. When you have subscribers, how do you get them excited about something else that’s going out? So I got involved in some other online entrepreneurs, let allowing them to teach me the kind of the business. And I, and one that comes to mind for me. And well first of all, with any entrepreneur out there if you haven’t read the book E-Myth you need to read it, and then you need to read it again.
And, and I had hired an E-Myth coach to help me, kind of towards the end of my brick and mortar business, and as I was launching this business because what did happen to me in the brick and mortar business I think happens to every entrepreneur that's doing what they love. You know how to, you are the technician, you know, I know how to be a dog trainer and a teacher. I did not have enough skills as to how to run a business and man she really helped me as I started this, this new venture. She said, let’s not let that happen again. You love to teach, you love to coach, you love to train. Let’s make sure that you get to keep doing that, and that you get people around you that can do the technology part that you don’t want to become an expert in. And that was such good advice for me.
And one of, the first hire that I made was a Kajabi product expert, and man, that was, she still owe me works for me part time and I tell her every week when I talk to her, you know that without you I could sell the franchise. But she makes things look beautiful and she knows how to go behind the scenes and do stuff that I don’t necessarily know how to do. And she helps me with my product launches. So that was then what we got interested in was, let’s close down the membership, let’s learn how to manage the members we have and then we only open the membership for about 6 weeks, 3 weeks, twice a year for new members. And that’s proven to be very successful for me.
Jared:
Okay, and then it amazes me that you said, said that, I kinda just jumping back a little bit but you felt as though you didn’t know how to run a business after successfully running a business for, you know, 25 years. What differed from the brick and mortar space vs online that made you feel that way?
Connie:
Oh no, I think I felt that way in the brick and mortar space.
Jared:
Okay
Connie:
And I, and I think you know again, when I started out I just wanted to be a dog trainer. People would say, what do you do? And I would say, I’m just a dog trainer. And it was literally probably 15 to 20 years into it before I stepped back and said, you know you have 17 employees, you need to stop saying you’re just a dog trainer, and say that you’re a business owner, and you're a fairly successful female business owner.
But then I really had to look at it and say, but you know what, I’ve studied, I really studied how to be a dog trainer and then I, then I really studied how to be a teacher and then I had really studied how to be a business owner. And when I looked at those 3 stages of my life, I really didn’t enjoy learning how to run a business. It wasn’t what I was passionate about, I was passionate about training and teaching, and so that, at the end of my career as the brick and mortar business, that was kind of my, my goal was how am I gonna get back to what I love? Because managing employees and being, you know, HR and, it’s just I worked hard to do it well but it wasn’t my gig.
Jared:
Well I guess, tell me a little bit about, like that, that’s such a common, I think challenge amongst entrepreneurs is like, usually you’re very passionate about that thing that you do, you are a great dog trainer, like, like how has that changed for you? Now that your course has moved online or your membership site is online, what’s, what’s kinda changed in that role?
Connie:
You know I’m embarrassed to say this, I’m having more fun than I’ve ever had. And I, because I get to teach and coach all the time. And when I was in the brick and mortar business and I was teaching classes, people would come every week. Well the problem with that is, that they take for granted that you’re gonna be there next week, so they don’t necessarily do their homework, they don’t necessarily practice, and sometimes I’d be rolling my eyes and I’d be thinking, I’m just watching you practice, I want to teach you something, okay?
And when I was on the road doing seminars, I loved it because for 2 days I got to actually teach people stuff. And now with my online group, I give my members and I, I think your audience would be fairly surprised by this because I have over 500 members and they all have access to me. They can send me a question anytime, and I respond using a fabulous program where I can respond with video, so I don’t have to type all my answers, so it’s super quick, I just say, hey click, hey I saw and read your question, here is what I want you to do, and send them the video. And people say, how can you be so hands on? Well because it’s what I want to be, and I mean, that’s just why I’m having so much fun because then I get emails back that say, it works, thanks. You know, that's what I, why I’m having such a great time is that I get to teach and I get to coach. And that’s what really, has always been, what I’ve been passionate about.
Jared:
Very cool. What is it that, I guess, inspired you to really focus in on, say, the competitive obedience landscape?
Connie:
Yeah, it’s a pretty small niche isn’t it? My, my avatar too is like 50 to 70 year old women okay, that’s who dominates the sport and I, I tease cause I’m one of those. I tease us because we’re empty nesters and you know, the kids are gone and so who do you pay attention to? The dog, and you find out you have this amazing community of other women who love being around dogs in this sport. You know I, I thought the audience is big enough and it’s not too big and I know how to do what they want to do. 99% of the people who compete that sport is their hobby, and I just want to help them have a good time doing their hobby. And it’s something they can do forever you know, I had a, we had a private Facebook group, and the 70 to 80 year olds in my membership we’re on there, kinda pushing each other along, and they’re totally intimidated by the technology but they’re doing a great job and they’re still super active because they got this dog that they wanna exercise and they wanna train. What a great hobby, you get to do it your whole life.
Jared:
Yeah, you touched on something really cool there, cause I was going to ask you like, you mentioned for you setting up technology is a barrier, now with your audience, how, have you observed significant technical barriers for them as well? Kinda adopting online courses as a, as a mechanism vs. just going to a building?
Connie:
They’re doing fabulously, I am so impressed. A lot more issues at the start than now, you know I’m a year and a half into this now, this membership site, and they, we’ve changed themes and made it even I think easier for my audience that was, you know, my product expert kinda helped me do that. They’ve learned their way around and so I’m, I’m hesitant to change too much now that they’ve kinda got the fuel for it, but they’re doing great. They really are doing great.
Jared:
That’s cool, I kinda wanna reverse back in time a little bit because entrepreneurship, there’s usually some element of persistence involved to this and I imagined that you’ve worked through this through your, throughout your time in the brick and mortar space. It sounds like for you, like that, that layer of persistence was probably being done when you were working away at all of this content producing this. Like what was that time period like? How long did it take you to build that audience of, you know by doing blog posts, guest posts, creating that that content online? What, how long did that take first of all?
Connie:
You know, it’s a super hard question for me because I was really enjoying that time, and I, I stepped back and I try to look at it from somebody else’s point of view, and I think yeah I really did put in my 10,000 hours, I mean I really did. And you just chip away at it and I think that when you grow up playing an instrument, or you grow up training a dog or creating art, you learn that you’re not always gonna get paid for today’s effort.
And, you know if you wanna become good in an instrument or sport, you just practice. And I was really blessed to have learned all of those things growing up. And so it never felt like work to me, it was just how I was going to perfect my trade and when I became really interested in teaching, creating content was how I was gonna perfect my trade. And so you know, I yeah, it was, it’s just kinda what I did, I mean that’s a lame answer isn’t it? I mean I know you want me to say I started on this date and ended on this date, but I’ve now hired a second gal to help me, who was a member of my membership and has a huge marketing background and is great. And she says to me, most people I say, we need more content, you? You need to stop producing content, we need to just deal with what we have.
Jared:
That is remarkable. Is there, has there ever been a point in your journey, no matter where that happened that you felt like giving up, or you hit a struggle that felt instramountable at that time?
Connie:
The, the time that I wanted to give up actually, was toward the end of my brick and mortar career because I couldn’t figure out and this was, this is on me, but I couldn’t figure out how to give up being the business owner and get back to doing what I love to do without selling the business. Which in retrospect I guess is kind of sad that I couldn’t just hire the people to do the parts of the business that weren’t that interesting to me. But I, I couldn’t wrap my head around that, I don’t know if it was a control issue or what it was. But boy, this move was fabulous for me, just fabulous and really revived me.
Jared:
Yeah, how did, what was that process like for you to, I guess overcome that? Did you just make the decision or was it because the buyer came in so quick that you're forced into it?
Connie:
Yes, that's exactly right. And and there was that moment of panic, that moment that lasted about 2 months while the sale was actually going through, where I thought, this wasn’t supposed to happen, what am I gonna do? That freaking mortar business, when you run a business like that for 25 years, that’s kind of your identity. You know I’ve been in a community for decades and I, I love the community and I was known around the community. And so it was hard to give that up but I’m not looking back now.
Jared:
Very cool. Well what would you say has like been the biggest change for you now that you’ve, you've moved away from that space, your business is entirely online, like what, what’s most surprising to you now?
Connie:
Well, what’s most surprising is how, several things. First of all, nobody knows where I am and that’s great because I’ve gotten to spend the last 2 winters down in Florida and nobody knows I’m there and it doesn’t matter. And you know, I can be at our house at Maryland or we, we like to go out to our travel trailer, I can be in the travel trailer working and we can be traveling around the country, I mean that fabulous. If my husband’s on the road, I can go on the road with him, nobody knows where I am and they don’t need to so the freedom of that is spectacular. And the fact that my hours, I can answer questions early in the morning or late at night or whatever time a day that I wanna schedule to be available to my client, like I should say, my members.
Jared:
Yeah, tell me a little bit more about, kind of like the structure of what you’re offering is? Like how do your members interact? What do, what do, how do they get involved?
Connie:
Well, the obedience role, so, so in the competitive obedience you could be starting with a brand new dog or you could be preparing one to show at the highest levels. And so when I designed the membership, there are modules for each level of training. And so what I tried to show people is, you get out onto the road and you figure out where you and your dog are in that obedience journey. So they can actually have a step by step, it’s all available to them, I don’t drip content, it’s all available to them because everybody who comes on, they may have more than 1 dog, and they may say, well my, my 4 year old dog is way over here at the end of the journey but my 6 month old dog needs to start with this content over here. So they can find where they can fit in the success path if you will.
And then every month I try to have, I try to have a theme where we're gonna discuss some subject. For instance, one month we picked an exercise that people struggle with teaching, and it didn’t matter whether you have a beginner dog or an advanced dog. I could, I could produce content that month for anybody that was on their journey no matter where they were on that path. This month coming up, I actually asked somebody to do a webinar with me about performance anxiety and how you deal with your nerves if you’re gonna go on perform, because these are people who are competing with their dog. And I know that that’s gonna generate a lot of questions and a lot of conversations. So every month kinda has a theme.
My members are always welcome to send me questions or short videos that I can evaluate for them. And the other thing we do is we have a private Facebook group, so the community can respond to each other. Like I saw a great post on there just this morning about somebody saying they needed advice, at about how to keep their dogs cool in the car at an outdoor event. And bang! They got hundreds of members responding to them with ideas. So I think, they, they feel really safe in that community and they can get advice about stuff that beyond the scope of the content that I’ve created for them.
Jared:
Tell me about pricing and how you figured it out, did you just transition things from the way you priced it before? Or how did that work out for you?
Connie:
I don’t think that my avatar is very worth, is very willing to spend a ton of money. So I told them that they could join the membership for the cost of one dog show entry. Now that’s $30 a month, so some of them go to 6 or 8 dog shows a month. So you know, they’re thinking, this is nothing, but that’s how I wanted them to feel, was you know what this is so affordable and I do give them a discount if they sign up per year, and a huge percentage of my members sign up for a year at a time.
But you know, until I’m just overwhelmed by the questions and the, you know my, my time is overwhelming, I’m gonna keep it that affordable because I have a lot of what I call lurkers. The membership site that they, they really are either shy or maybe just uncomfortable actually contacting me, but they do love having me, library of information available, they love having the, the Facebook group, they love coming to the webinars. So, I think sometimes we get ourselves intimidated by how much work it’s gonna be, I’m gonna let it tell me when it’s too much work.
Jared:
How long did it take you to kind of reach critical mass if you will, did the sales trickle in? Did they show up on day 1?
Connie:
Well in the first 6 months I was up to 300 and I thought that that might be critical mass. So I shut the membership down for 6 months and just to deal with 300 members. And then I opened it up again saying, well I wonder if I can handle some more, and I went to a close to 500 members in the next open cart. And so I shut it down again thinking that might be too many, and I’m about to open it up again, and I, I know I have a 150 people on, just on the waiting list. So you know, we’ll see what happens, and then I have to decide, I am gonna shut it down and say, this is critical mass? Or am I gonna hire other people to help? I don’t know, I, we’re gonna let that evolve.
Jared:
That’s cool, I guess that, that segway is really well and to kind of what’s, what’s next on the list for you? What are your goals and dreams? Like where are you taking this next?
Connie:
You know, I’m having a great time right now and, and I am really committed to having a lifestyle that I enjoy. So this is so much easier than running a business that was 24/7 taking care of animals, I just can’t even tell you how much easier this is. So I, I think that either you get to a point where you say I have to limit the membership because I don’t want to change anything, I don’t want to increase the price, I don’t wanna do any additional work or it may be that I come up with a two chair membership where I say, you know if you really want that much excess to me, it’s gonna be more expensive and there’s only gonna be x number of people in that part of the membership but if you want to lurk, it’s a different type of membership. I don’t know, those things are all kind of railing around of my head and we’ll see how the next launch goes.
So the other what’s next is that I had developed some courses on my older website, and the gal that I’ve hired to help me who understands everything Kajabi, we’re now moving those courses so I don’t just have the membership site on Kajabi now, I have some other individual courses and the one, the two that we’re bringing over that I’m excited about are, I guess the best description is an online puppy class for pet owners and an online beginners class for people that have a new dog because you know, that’s always been one of my passions when I had the brick and mortar business was teaching pet owners how to have a well behaved pets. So those are coming over to Kajabi, and that would be more of a course than a membership but I’m really excited about those moving them. We’re gonna, we’re gonna be doing that in the next 4 to 6 weeks. So she’s helping me get everything on Kajabi.
Jared:
Yeah I know that we’re gonna have a lot of people excited about potentially taking some of those courses. I don’t know if we have many, people who, who participate in dog training championships but we definitely have a lot of people around here with dogs and I’m sure we have a lot of listeners with dogs. So if anyone where to want to kind of check out what you have to offer, I know it’s gonna be a few weeks before some of that is available, but tell us how does a listener kind of connect with you and get a hold of you?
Connie:
Well ObedienceRoad.com and then you go to the store and all of our offers are in the store and the list is just getting longer and I, I also see us bringing in some other types of dog training. There’d been other people in, in other sports so I do competitive obedience but maybe somebody who trains dogs to hunt, you know some of those people have contacted me and said how’d you do this? How does this work? So we’re, we’re looking at bringing in some other types of dog training under our umbrella.
Jared:
That’s really cool. You could be like the dog training empire.
Connie:
We’ll see what happens. We’ll see what happens.
Jared:
I love it, well tell me a little bit about like what would, what would’ve this journey look like for you, where Kajabi not there for you?
Connie:
Don’t go away.
Jared:
We’re not planning to.
Connie:
Don’t make me panic, don’t make me panic. You know, like I said, I had looked at so many different ways and my courses were actually built on another platform. They were so complicated for me to use and for the user to use that this, the themes that we’re using now are so simple and it’s, I mean, me putting in content is so simple I can’t imagine. So just promise me you’re not going anywhere, cause I’m not going away, I’m loving here..
Jared:
We’re not going anywhere.
Connie:
And and, if as long as you keep letting me add courses and content to my website, I’m very happy here.
Jared:
I love it. Well thank you so much Connie for joining us today on the Kajabi Edge podcast, it has been a true pleasure chatting with you.
Connie:
Well thanks for having me and I, and I hope you know, everybody that has dog questions sends me questions. So I hope that if there’s somebody out there that’s one, what is, you know what, is there’s something that they think I know that could help I, I’m always willing to fire off an answer.
Jared:
I love that, that is such a, a really cool commonality and thread amongst entrepreneurs is just this genuine willingness to to help out like, I don’t think I’ve met someone who isn’t so, it’s so remarkable to hear from you as well.
Speaking of helping out, for anyone who’s listening please we’d appreciate you’re, you’re review, you’re subscription, we’d love to see you share this content with your friends as well so that they can take advantage of some of these incredible knowledge shared by Connie today as well as any of our other episodes. So thank you again Connie for being a part of this.
Connie:
Thanks for having me.
Jared:
And we will look forward to seeing everyone next week on our next episode of the Kajabi Edge podcast.
Did this episode help inspire you to start your own online business with Kajabi? If so, head on over to kajabi.com/edge or mention the Kajabi Edge podcast in the where did you hear about us field when signing up on our homepage. Listeners who sign up from our show will receive an additional success call with one of our customer success managers on top of the call, all new customers receive. That’s 2 calls to help guide you along the way to success. So head on over to Kajabi.com/Edge, that’s K-A-J-A-B-I.COM/E-D-G-E and start writing your story.
