255: Creating a Niche Online Course with Laura Fowler Massie

A lot of yoga teachers experience doubt and hesitancy around picking a niche, but it can work wonders for your yoga business. In this episode, Laura Fowler Massie shares how she created a niche online course and successfully marketed it during the pandemic. 

Laura has been a yoga practitioner for over thirty years, the owner of Yoga Chelsea, and creator of Calm Kids Yoga. She became a yoga teacher in 2008 and took specialty training so she could offer Slow Mindful Yoga, Yoga for Pelvic Health, Yoga Nidra, and Children’s Yoga. ​Laura is also an Early Childhood Educator with a BA in Psychology and a Masters degree in Education. Just before the pandemic, Laura created and launched a specialized in-person course designed specifically for Early Childhood Educators, but she had to shift gears when the lockdowns began.

Laura explains how she dealt with having to shift her offering from in-person to online because of the pandemic. Despite the change, her course has been very successful and allowed her business to grow. Laura shares how she reached her target audience to market her niche offering, and how she leveraged a free Facebook group to grow her audience. She also talk about what helped her on the tougher days, why showing up consistently is important, as well as a lot of the fears and objections people have around niching down.

This is a great episode for anyone who has been hesitating about picking a niche.

Key Takeaways:

[3:22] Shannon introduces her guest for this episode – Laura Fowler Massie.

[6:24] Shannon gives a shout out of thanks to sponsor, OfferingTree.

[10:14] What does Laura do and who does she do it for?

[10:58] How did Laura decide to combine yoga and early childhood education?

“I always had it in my mind that I was going to turn this into an online offering because it would just make it so much more available for people.” ~ Laura Fowler Massie

[14:09] How did Laura market her offering and who did she market in order to get such a great turnout?

“I use my professional expertise to really market myself as a subject matter expert.” ~ Laura Fowler Massie

[16:29] How did Laura deal with the fear that most people have around niching down, that they will have fewer people to market to?

“Start before you’re ready. Done is better than perfect. And everything is figure-outable.” ~ Laura Fowler Massie

[19:30] Laura shares some of her marketing strategies to really promote her niche offering.

“I feel like also word of mouth, even in the internet world during a pandemic, it still is wonderful advertising.” ~ Laura Fowler Massie

[22:28] Marketing can be tough, and some channels can be successful while others fail. What are some things that helped Laura on those tougher days?

[23:47] Laura has stayed consistent in putting out free content to her Facebook group as a way to market her offering and grow her audience.

“I feel like I was being sincere and honest by really responding to what the people were saying they needed from me and they were interested in learning about.” ~ Laura Fowler Massie

[25:06] Laura shares more about the business coaches she has worked with and learned from.

[27:35] Does Laura also share her Facebook Live videos to YouTube?

[30:27] When does Laura’s next training start? She shares a little more about how her course is structured.

[34:54] How did Laura come up with the wording and messaging that allowed her to connect with early childhood educators?

“You have to speak in the language of your target audience.” ~ Laura Fowler Massie

[37:46] Connect with Laura via her website and her Facebook group.

Links:

• Laura Fowler Massie, Yoga Chelsea 
• Laura Fowler Massie, Calm Kids Yoga 
• Calm Kids Yoga for Early Childhood Educators Facebook Group
• Learn to Teach Yoga to Young Children Course (10% Discount Code: CYT10)
• Children’s Yoga Teacher Mini-Training: Calm Down Strategies for Reducing Anxiety (10% Discount Code: CYT10)
• Learn to Teach Simple Meditations to Young Children Course (10% Discount Code: CYT10)
• Niching Down Resources
• Emily Sussell –  Make a Profit Teaching Private Yoga
• Amanda McKinney – Discount codes for Amanda’s offerings
• Live interview with Victoria Levitan (YouTube)
• StreamYard
• Pelvic Health Professionals
• The Connected Yoga Teacher Podcast Episode 007: Breath and Pelvic Health with Trista Zinn
• Yoga Teacher Conf 2022
• Shannon Crow on Instagram
• The Connected Yoga Teacher Facebook Group

Gratitude to our Sponsor, Offering Tree.