How to Create a Six-Figure Online Business FROM HOME ft. Kelli Higgins | Ep #5

Whether you're new to online business or ready to take yours to the next level, Kelli's story is proof that with focus and strategy, financial freedom is within reach!

In Episode 5 of The Authentic Media Podcast, Danielle J. Martin sits down with Kelli Higgins, founder of Elevated Agent and a top 1% Etsy seller, to uncover the secrets of creating a six-figure online business from home. Kelli shares her inspiring journey of building a thriving business selling Canva templates for real estate agents. Discover how she overcame early hurdles, mastered branding, carved out a profitable niche, and developed her powerful 'sticky web' strategy to attract and retain clients. This episode is packed with actionable tips on branding, marketing, and mindset shifts, perfect for entrepreneurs who want to design their dream life through digital products.

Want to launch a Podcast in 2025? Or do you want to focus on rebranding yourself?

Connect with Kelli Higgins:
IG: @elevatedagent
Website: https://elevatedagent.co/

CHAPTERS:
0:00 - Welcome Kelli Higgins
3:07 - What is Elevated Agent?
9:58 - Creating Products Customers Love
18:48 - The Importance of Niching Down
21:32 - Challenges of Selling Digital Products
27:39 - The Podcast Blueprint
28:21 - Creating a Life You Love
34:48 - Marketing Strategies
38:54 - Kelli’s Team Structure
46:28 - Growth from the Beginning
51:54 - Closing Thoughts

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome Kelli Higgins
• 3:07 What is Elevated Agent?
• 9:58 Creating Products Customers Love
• 18:48 The Importance of Niching Down
• 21:32 Challenges of Selling Digital Products
• 27:39 The Podcast Blueprint
• 28:21 Creating a Life You Love
• 34:48 Marketing Strategies
• 38:54 Kelli’s Team Structure
• 46:28 Growth from the Beginning
• 51:54 Closing Thoughts

Transcript

This week on 

The Authentic Media Podcast. I'm gonna dress for the job that I want. I'm not gonna dress for the job I have. 

Would future Kelli do this? Would the CEO in my vision be making this decision? 

The amount of followers you have have nothing to do with how much 

money you're making. Like, please! I do think that there is a point in your life you just have to say, I'm going to start making decisions that improve my life.

And that's how you start raising your standard. By the way, I think sometimes we don't have a standard and you kind of have to find it. 

Say it again for the people in the back. 

You know, this little Etsy business. Now I have these women who I've changed their lives. Like I'm going to cry.

Welcome into authentic media. I'm here with my good friend, Kelli Higgins. She is the owner of elevated agent and the top number one seller of Etsy. We are going to be talking about building a brand that works for you. What does that even look like? Well, Kelli's here. Welcome to the show, Kelli. How are you feeling?

I'm great. How are you? I'm excited. I love 

talking business, so. 

I know, and you're honestly the perfect person to dive into this episode with me, this conversation, because, honey, you're just like a whole, like, big deal out here. Good! I don't know if people know that, so we're going to bring it to light. It's funny when 

people say, well, where are you located?

I'll say Topeka, Kansas, and they'll be like, what? What? Where's Topeka? That's the great thing about what I do is you literally can do it from anywhere, from anywhere. The beach, your bedroom. Topeka. 

So when I dive into your business and you, when you first told me that you're a real estate agent and then you also create Canva templates for real estate agents.

And so you're kind of like helping real estate agents with like their marketing strategy, their creativity. And I think that's so interesting because you're doing it from a space or from a platform that many people used to underestimate Etsy. 

Yeah. I love it when people call it my little Etsy shop. 

Yeah.

Like, oh, your little business? Yeah, my little Etsy business. I'm like, yeah, 

sure. 

Only if you know the 

top number one seller. One percent. I'm in the top one percent. Number. The number one is way above me, but the top one percent. Yeah. That's awesome. Millions and millions of sellers on Etsy. Yeah. I've been doing it since 2018.

Mm-hmm . Is when we opened the Etsy shop. Wow. Uh, and so that's when Elevated agent was born. And there I will say that there wasn't, there's maybe one other seller on Etsy doing what I did. 

Mm-hmm . 

Um, and since then it's been flooded with other people. Uh, and so I will say that I do think that the timing of when I started definitely helped.

With my success, um, I think that if I were to just start today, I would have to climb a hill to get to where I am. And I think before it, I would say I'd have to climb a mountain to get where I am, uh, before I was just climbing a hill. 

I want to dive into really like. The marketing strategy of your business, because I think that's super fascinating.

And I think, as you know, like the number one conversation today on social media is building your brand. Right. And so I think I remember talking to you about how I was even considering doing an Etsy, you know, shop. I was like, Kelli, like, what does this mean? thing about because clearly like it's underestimated.

People are not realizing that this can really work for you, for your business. And so I just want to go back to kind of take me to the beginning. When you first decided, you know what, like, yes, I'm still in real estate and you still help clients in that area, but you kind of have shifted more towards.

Focusing on the marketing and Canva templates and selling that way. So tell us about your whole strategy. 

Sure. Well, just to kind of break down exactly what I do is I build marketing pieces on the Canva platform, and then I take the template link. That you can get from Canva and I put it inside of a PDF and then I sell it on Etsy.

So when you buy something from me, you get a digital downloaded PDF and then in that PDF is the link and then it takes them immediately to Canva. And then once they purchase it from me, they can keep it forever in their Canva and then they can update it as many times as they want. They can download it, they can print it, they can do whatever after they've purchased.

So it's a great. It's a great marketing idea for agents because it's a one time purchase at a low cost. Um, a lot of mine are anywhere. A lot of my templates are anywhere between 5 and it goes up to most of them are 25, but then we go up 47, 97, and then we have our biggest one at 897. Um, so we have a wide range of prices, which works very well with real estate agents when they want just one or two things, or if they want a whole lot.

So just to. I'm not sure I understand exactly what it is I'm selling. Technically, I'm selling a link. Yeah. At the very root of it. Um, I had no idea this existed. I had a friend that was doing it on Etsy, but she was selling in a different industry. She was doing SVG files. Yeah. And I was, Just really, um, intrigued by the idea of that you're just selling a link.

Like that's so interesting. And then I just had people in my real estate business saying, where are you getting all of these marketing pieces? Who are you buying them from? And I was creating them. And so then I just had a lot of people saying, um, Well, you should do that for me or, you know, you should sell that.

And I do think that people need to, in general, when they have an idea and people start telling you, um, that's a really great idea or where did you get that when they start asking questions about what you're creating, um, always take note of that because that means that it's not already in the market or people aren't aware of it in the market and that it could be a very lucrative idea for you.

Um, and so I took, when people were telling me that, Um, and then I, you know, had this moment with a friend where I was understanding and, and that's really where it came together. I was like, I think I can do this on Etsy. Yeah. Like I said, there really wasn't anyone else doing it was, uh, a newer idea. And I will say about the first year, there was a lot of education I had to do with my customers.

They didn't understand Canva. It was still pretty new. I mean, we're talking almost 10 years ago at this point. Um, I've been on Canva since it started. Canva is an Australian company. When it first started, you actually had to get on a wait list to be approved to use it. And I was on that wait list and I got approved.

Uh, and so I was using it for a long time, so I was very familiar with Canva. Um, and so that's when the store opened and, uh, we just, I tried to put on as many products as I could. The great thing. That I did on accident was I started on Etsy, which is its own search platform, right? And so I didn't have any customers.

Nobody knew I existed, right? And so I was like, why not just start on Etsy and just go from there? So we started, um, it was just me. I was My only, me, myself, and I, and, um, I just started learning all things Etsy, SEO, titles, descriptions, photos. I did lots of research about what other people, how they were displaying, um, their photos and everything.

And, and I just kind of learned and played and And started from there. And Etsy was my very first platform we started selling on. 

Wow. And so also for people to understand too, like these links and these like, um, templates that you're selling to people, like they're for agents to utilize in their business.

So they're very helpful and talk about like how that is helpful on their end. So like what you're doing is like. Not only helpful, but it's also profitable to you. 

Yeah. And just a side note, everything I make, most agents could probably get for free. Um, a lot of times, uh, so when you're a real estate agent, you have to work at a brokerage.

Um, that's how the legality of it is set up. And a lot of brokerages, which would be their office, Offer all of the things that I'm selling, right? So our number one product is our listing presentations and buyer presentations. So real estate agents When we list a home a lot of times we're competing against other real estate agents.

People are interviewing Anywhere between one to four agents to list their house and so What you would do as a real estate agent is you would take the marketing that i've created and you would take it with you and it would show the You Uh, homeowner, all of the things that you're going to do when you list their home.

So how you're going to market it. Um, all of your stats from before, how you can help them stage their home, what they can expect during the listing of their home. I even have things in there. Our, our listing presentation is about 45 pages long. I've completely written it. It's professionally written. It has all of the photos, everything that you would need is included.

If you purchase one of our listing presentations, all you really need to do is go in and change out the photo to your photo, your name and contact information, and it is pretty much set and ready to go. So that costs 25. And like I said, an agent can just buy it for 25 updated. And, and run their business off of it.

So we have listing presentations. We have flyers, we have open house, we have almost a thousand different products. We offer business cards, anything a real estate agent would need to help promote their business. We've already created, we've already written for you. We have anything, postcards. We even have like a, um, a magnet that has their image and contact information.

And then it has like the conversion cart chart. So you could put it on your fridge. Yeah. You know, like we are just constantly trying to think of new ideas for agents to promote themselves. And when I started elevated agent as a real estate agent, my number one goal was to do as much as I can for a real estate agent and then hand it over and be like, you only have to do this last step.

And then you're at the finish line. 

So you created a product that people only have to like plug in one or two things. And then there you go. Talk about how an Etsy workshop can work for anyone really. Cause I, when I was talking to you, like coming from a space from like a business owner, I was like, Hey, I want to help people create podcasts.

And I really liked how you were like, okay. Think beyond just creating like a media kit, what can you create that they can benefit from or what type of like comprehensive toolkit or bundle or something that you could offer them that's going to be actually sustainable to them. And you're not just creating a one time kind of product.

So. Kind of get 

into the strategy of all that. Yeah. So, um, again, when I started, I was just like, I want to help. Right. So my idea when I'm creating products is how is this actually going to help the agent? Right. Um, like, uh, is this going to help them take a listing? Is this going to help them, uh, really take on a buyer and just absolutely captivate them?

And one thing that I love to focus on is the client experience. So helping real estate agents. better their client experience is very important to me. So when I very first started, there really wasn't a whole lot of other sellers in the market. And so I really was just focused on the pieces at first. And then once other people started coming, I was like, I have to differentiate myself from just.

template sellers, um, because I always knew I wanted this business to be more than that. So developing strategy behind templates is definitely, uh, what helped me become a lot more successful than other sellers. I would say on the platform because people now search me out because they know I'm not just selling a postcard.

I'm selling 12 postcards that, that I'm selling. that you send out on the first week of the month and then it also has a QR code that will lead the reader back to your website. I am creating a strategy. It's not just a postcard. And so I do think that the customer really appreciates that because they're They have to think less, right?

It is just a, an easier decision to make because we have all of your follow up typically wrapped up into that one product. 

Right. And so kind of talk about as well, deeper into how bundling a package of products can really help boost your sales, right? Instead of just doing like these one off, like I'm going to post, let's say.

a one time template and then some people might use it to boost their email list, right? And it's like, I guess, how is like a one time template? Is that more effective or less effective than offering like a whole bundle of products for people to boost their sales and business? 

When you're first getting started, I would definitely focus on the single products.

And the reason that is, is because you really want to fill your shop up as quick as you can. If you're just starting I would say the first day upload at least 20 listings. Um, don't just post one or two throughout several months. Like have a chunk that you're going to post initially, and then also have a plan to be posting very consistently.

We tried to publish, um, we go through spurts, but we do try to publish one. Template every day. And then sometimes we get low on templates. Um, you know, we're just maybe working on other things. Um, and so then we try to go at least once every other day of every three days. So that's how often we're dropping templates.

Now that could be a bundle or a single product. So when you're first starting out, I would say. Try to have a schedule because Etsy really does like schedules. Most platforms do. I don't think that's talked about very much, but they really like to see a consistent schedule of activity on their platform.

So when they know they can expect us to drop that many templates, I do think that organically, they probably do push our products more because. They know that we're a consistent user. Right. Um, so once you have that built up, uh, I would say probably once you're around 75 to a hundred listings, um, that's when you can really start focusing in on your bundled products.

And where we started with that was what are people buying together naturally? Like, let's look at the past orders and see what they're bundling on their own. 

Right. 

Um, and so we started doing that. And then we also. Um, just used a little bit of logic, like a listing presentation and a buyer presentation, those tend to go together pretty well.

Right. Um, and so what we did was, so if you purchase those all a cart, that's a 50 product. So when we bundle them, we say you save 10 and you can get them for 40. So it does give them a reason to purchase the bundle because they're saving, but it also boosts our average purchase price. So that's. super nice as a seller.

Yeah. Um, and then once we really started getting the data, which Etsy's really pretty good about giving pretty clear data, um, once we started figuring out what our average sell was, we knew then, like, that's, we want our bundles to be up to date. Right above that. Yeah. So like, uh, for example, if our average sell was, let's say 40, I would probably start really pushing something that was maybe 57 to 67.

Um, probably right in there because that is not a huge, significant jump, but it is definitely We're just jump, jump in just a little bit to try to get that number up. And, uh, this last year we've really focused in on that and we've increased about 10 an order this year alone from doing that. So it was very, a very successful data campaign that we used to take that psychology and use it on our customers.

And it's really worked. 

And for people to understand to the full understanding of your little Etsy business, honey, let me tell, let me tell you, like, when he told me your revenue was over six figures, it's like, come on. Oh yeah. We do six figure. 

We do multiple six figures every year. 

And so. Talk to the, talk to the people on the other side to just encourage them to understand that, like, you can do anything with Etsy as long as you have a strategy.

Cause when you told me that I said, wow, like I need to look into this a little bit more, but there's a lot of business owners who are overlooking Etsy. They're going to Pinterest, they're going to, you know, other platforms. Like Kajabi, right? Like to just sell their products. But what is it about Etsy that could really benefit you in the end?

Um, Etsy is a great platform, especially to start out on because they do a lot for their sellers. So, um, the last couple of years, they've even rolled out some more opportunities. For example, like, uh, if you have all three of their seller stars, they will. Organically push your shop to more viewers. Right.

They also have Etsy ads, which you do pay for. However, you don't pay for it until they convert. 

Yeah. 

Um, and so that's super beneficial. They also will organically, they pay on their end to push you out on Pinterest and Google. You don't pay for that. They organically do that for you. So they're opening your products up to a whole new audience.

Right. Also, let's just say people go to Etsy and they just. search stuff all the time, all the time. And so, um, it's just, yeah, I do the same thing. Um, it is, it is a, it's a great platform for people to find you on. Um, and so I, that's one reason why I really like Etsy is because you can, they help you with that.

The one thing that I will say that. If you look at all of us in the top 1%, we have a niche. Um, and I do think that's very important to talk about. If I were to just sell business templates, I don't think I would be near as successful. I have a lot of other industries that come to me. We have, I have. So many interior designers, insurance agents, um, mortgage brokers, they want us to get into their industries.

And I just have to smile and say, I'm sorry, but I can't. Um, we are a real estate company. One, I just love real estate. I've had my license now for 18 years myself. And so. I got to marry my two passions together, but we don't have time to go into other industries. We are still so busy making and creating for real estate agents and it is such a good industry back to us, um, that we don't want to go to other industries.

But I do think that's something that has really benefited us from the beginning is, is having a very specific niche and a very specific target audience. And so now, honestly, uh, elevated agent is a trending search. On Etsy, which is so fun. Even my competitors use my name in their tags, which is funny when I get to search on backends, you know, we have secrets by where or whatever, and I can search and see what their tags are.

And they're using my name as their tag. I'm like, well, sometimes it might be annoying. It's still a little bit like, okay, 

cool. But that's important too. I loved how you talk about the, the specific, um, importance of behind niching, because I think that the. Just time that we're living in we're trying to like dip our toes in like all of these little things, right?

Talk about how that could hurt you instead of help you. 

Yeah. Um, well one you don't know who you're talking to You know when we write our descriptions I say hey real estate agents, right? Hey agent, you know, hey broker. Yeah We are talking straight to our customers. We're not just saying Hey, business owner, because I could be anyone.

Right. You know, um, and so I think that they feel seen when they see that. And they also, I think our customers think, um, well, this is designed specifically for me. Yeah. Um, if we were just business, uh, templates, I think that they would probably think this is good, but there's probably someone out there that knows exactly what I need.

Right. Um, and I don't blame them. You know, when I'm, when I'm searching on there, I have. Bought plenty of templates on there. Um, I, one thing that I tend to buy a lot of are budget templates. Oh, I never ended up keeping a budget. I just keep buying the spreadsheets. I'm going to 

use this one day. 

I'll have a plethora to choose from.

Um, but I don't buy from a general shop that just says we have spreadsheets. I go to a. Shop that specializes in budgets, you know, and so I I think that that time has come and gone where you can be really generic Um, I don't think you can anymore And I and I honestly just think it's because you know who you're talking to exactly and the searches too I mean our search is real estate marketing.

That's like our number one Keyword and so if I was just a business template, it is so over saturated that we would never show up never and so We just stick to our niche keywords and And that's fine. Yeah. I 

think many of 

us need that reminder. And you can do lots of things inside of a niche. We have spreadsheets for real estate agents, um, we have postcards, we have letterheads, we have everything that are technically business templates, but they are marketed for real estate agents.

And we're also very, um, we, we know that the real estate industry, when, especially when we first started seven years ago. The marketing and real estate look like it was straight out of the 1980s. It was bad. It was bad. It's come a long ways. Thank you to Canva. Um, it's come a long ways, but I remember when we first started, people were like, this is so much prettier than anything I've ever seen.

And so I think that also caught a lot of eyes that, um, our designs were just really good. 

Kelli, everything that you're saying is really spot on. And I just hope people understanding, I hope people are understanding that the power behind having a strategy and niching down, I had to learn myself too, that like doing all of these things is great, but like just focusing on one thing is very key.

And so I also want to go into the challenges of the things that you've experienced, um, firsthand, because I think that you can tell us, you know, from firsthand experience, like, this is what you're going to come up, up, up against, because I think I told you, I said. I would love to do this, but one of the things I'm worried about is people taking my stuff or like just going on Etsy, buying templates, right.

And then selling them as your own product. And so I was like, well, does that really happen? And then you kind of share with me, it does, you can't control it, but this is what you can do instead. So can you kind of share that answer with us here? Absolutely. It happened just this week. 

Unfortunately, it happened this week.

It does. Yeah, it happens. I would say it probably doesn't happen as much as you would think. Maybe I should take that back. It probably does happen as much as you think, but I just don't know. Sometimes ignorance is bliss. Yeah. Um, but it does happen. And I do think that I got into this business knowing, Okay, this is going to be Part of the business, as a digital product, this is a new landscape.

You know, we're really coming into a world where digital products is becoming more and more prevalent. 

Right. 

Um, when I first started there, it wasn't even taxed in any state, um, digital products. I never had to pay sales tax because that, it wasn't even something that lawmakers had even considered to do.

Charge tax on because it didn't exist. Yeah. Um, so I, I knew going into this business that was going to be a risk. Now I am so happy that I move forward, even though it was a risk, because it has made me, So happy and such a fulfilling career that if that would have stopped me, I would have been so sad, you know, and so I would really encourage people to not let that stop you because there are so many people that reach out to me and just say, thank you so much for making these.

This makes my life so much better. Um, and then there are just those few people that steal from you. Um, so what they can do is they can download your products and then basically just, you know, Maybe redesign them a little bit, um, but a lot of times the people that are stealing from you, they just repost exactly how you have it verbatim, even like they don't even change the words.

That's so weird. It is. And we've even, we have found professional people in our industry, um, illegally using them. Yeah. And so what we can do. So there is a law that does protect places like Etsy that are marketplaces against copyright infringement claims. And so while you can make a claim on Etsy through their reporting system, a lot of times they will say, Well, we're going to take it down for now.

If the seller wants to counter, they can. If they don't, then we'll leave them down. But if the seller counters, then that means that they can put them back up. And then the only way to get them taken down again is through a lawyer. Um, so a lot of times, a lot of times Etsy taking them down originally scares the seller enough that maybe they'll stop.

Right. Um, the situation I had this week, the seller is absolutely in the wrong and we have all kinds of proof, but she decided to go the opposite direction and almost double down. Like she kind of, she emailed me and was like, why are you doing this? Tell me what's wrong. And of course I didn't respond at all because those types of people are usually trying to find a crack.

Right. 

You know, and, and when you double down like that to me, I'm like, yeah, we're not going to respond. Yeah. Um, and that's usually the best way I have gone on social media a couple of times and called out some of the people because, you know, in this day and age, I, I think that people should know if you're doing business with these people, just know that they're stealing.

Right. So you're doing business with people. Be aware. Yeah. And I don't think that that's wrong. I actually think more people should call 

people out 

because I think that as business owners, we are so. Scared of what our customers might do to our business. Right. Um, that it stops us sometimes from speaking our truth.

Right. And this day and age, if people are going to talk bad about your business Yeah. Then we should be able to stand up for ourselves too. A hundred percent. And so I've only done that a handful. No, not even a handful. I think maybe twice. Yeah. And, um. I will say one, the one time I kind of wish I wouldn't have, but the other time of the other professionals in the industry that I went on and I said, these people are stealing.

And if you're doing business, I I'm, I still stand behind that one. Right. I will say that we lost followers on Instagram because of that. Really? Yeah. Cause you can go on and you can see how many people followed you or unfollowed you. You got unfollows off of that one. Wow. 

But I mean, sometimes it comes with standing up for what you believe in.

And I think that like, that is what I'm learning about this whole journey of just like, not only business, but just myself that it's like, I'm going to stay on the values that I believe in. And if I have to lose people along the way, because interestingly, when I started speaking about my faith, I did lose some people and I did gain some people.

So I think that's also interesting finding your crowd. Yeah. You find your crowd, you find your audience and anything that I would want more than anything that I would want more than anything is that. I would prefer to have people that truly support me and want to stand with me versus like people that are just like here to just see what's going on and see like, Oh, what do you have going on?

Just snoopers, you know, things like that. But I don't think there's anything wrong with like standing up and letting people know, like, Hey, these people aren't as truthful and they're not, and they don't have any integrity in their business. And I just want you to know, like. Just be aware about that, you know?

Yeah, and I think one of the big lessons that I have learned going through this business is while I have high integrity for my business, not everyone else does. And so, uh, you know, when you were saying you were holding yourself to a high Yeah, well, you know, the people that steal from you, they don't have that.

That high integrity. Yeah. And so while it really hurts my feelings and it makes me feel like I'm let down almost when people do that to me, I have to remind myself, like not everyone has that mindset. Um, so there's a lot of people in business that are just out for themselves. So you really do have to be cognitive of that because that's out there.

And I think that if you're not, if you're not aware of that, um, you will get taken advantage of. And I have been in the past. And so now, now I'm very. I ask questions. Have you ever thought to 

yourself, I'm just waiting for the perfect time to get started? Honey, there's no such thing as the perfect time.

This is why I created the podcast blueprint, seven days to go live. That's right. In just seven days, you'll learn everything that you need to know to launch a podcast. I'm giving you my exact system that I've used to get to a thousand downloads in just under 30 days. Have you ever thought about elevating your brand, elevating your podcast?

This is your opportunity. So what are you waiting for? Go ahead and grab that podcast blueprint down below. In the meantime, let's get back to today's episode. Can I tell you, and I think I told you this before we started recording. I said, I love everything about you. I love your mindset. I love your lifestyle.

just everything that you've created. And I think that you are such a strong powerhouse when it comes to standing on what you believe in when it comes to creating the life that you've always dreamed of. And so I'll never forget one time you're like, no, Danielle, I literally like love my life. I left my like house and everything.

And I just never met someone that was so. So confident and like saying it and believing it. Cause you know, like sometimes people will say things and you're like, yeah, you know, it's like saying, how are you? And people were like, you know, the nonchalant good, whatever. But like you responded in a way that was so accurate and so like truthful that I said, I want to get to know more about this person.

And like, how do I create on the level in create the lifestyle that you have? And Coming in here at first of all, like your home is so beautiful. And, um, I think that you can speak to the women and really anyone out there who may feel like they don't know how to create the life that they've always wanted.

And so kind of take me through your thought process. 

Um, okay. I will say that I went through a big mind shift change about, well, it was 2017. I have it on my ring. Um, because I like to be reminded of it. But I just decided that I didn't want to live another day If it wasn't the life that I loved, and if it wasn't the life that I wanted to live.

Yeah. 

And so I, I, I do think that there is a point in your life you just have to make a decision. Yeah. You just have to say, I'm going to start making decisions. Yes. That improve my life. Mm hmm. Um, and that's how you start raising your standard, by the way, is I think sometimes, We don't have a standard and you kind of have to find it.

And sometimes that standard might be on the floor. And so that's okay because that makes it really easy to rise up. 

Say it again for the people in 

the back. My standard was on the floor, okay? I, I almost tripped over the bar. So I just consciously started making decisions that I knew was going to make my life better.

better. So I knew I am not the type of person that wants to be in a nine to five job. I'm a free spirit girl. I, if I have an idea, I love floating towards it. You know, I just, and as my family, they're always, their favorite line to say about me is, which way's the wind blowing today? That's where Kelli's going.

Um, and at first it would drive me crazy. It was almost a trigger for me. And now I'm like, Yes, because that's exactly how I want to be. You know, I want that freedom, right? I didn't realize, I thought that was like a life sentence when they would say it to me, but now I see it as freedom. Right. And they probably said it because they were projecting that they wish they were that free.

Um, can you be as free as the wind? I can. Wow. Um, so anyways, I made a decision to just start making better decisions. And then I also started Deciding to be around people that had better mindsets. I didn't want the negative talk anymore. That also meant that I had to cut a lot of people out of my life. In the last 10 years, I have probably gone through, well, one actual divorce, but I would say three friendship divorces.

And those were harder than my actual divorce. Losing a really, really good friend, at least someone that you thought was a really, really good friend, is hard. It's very hard. But then I also developed a mindset of, you know, friends come and go. I always say friends can be there for a reason, a season, or a lifetime.

Right. Um, and so you just kind of have to look at each friend differently and understand what that relationship is. Yeah. I also decided to just throw away the rule book that society gives you when you're, when you're, when you're, Like going into your adulthood. 

Wow. 

You know, here's the rule book. This is what you need to follow.

You need to get married. You need to have kids. You need to have a secure job. You need to do all of these things, you know, you can't 

stay stuck in this whole like lifestyle 

of 

suffocation. 

Yeah. It's a cycle. And. And we can get even deeper into the fact that I truly believe that it is a society cycle that they want you to get stuck in because you buy, you buy their medicines, you buy their things, you buy their makeup, you buy the clothes that are trending, and so they want you to stay in this cycle.

They really do. And so once, once you become aware, like, that's just the first step. You start becoming aware and you're like, wow. That's weird. Yeah. Wow. That's weird. And then you start questioning. Like, awareness is truly the first step, and I know that's what they always say, but it was so eye opening. And then, um, then I started doing affirmations, and I started writing on post, post it notes of wonderful affirmations for myself.

And then, so then I started getting into this different mindset. And then when I started Elevated Agent, I just decided I, any business that I start or I move. Into or whatever has to be flexible. Um, and so now anytime I have an idea for a business, if it is something that ties me down, no. And I have people around me that tell me no.

I this year have hired a CFO in my business and we had talked about potentially doing a physical location. Um, and she said, no, no, you can't. And I was like, it's my, it's my money. And she said, no. 

Wow. Period. And I was like, okay, cool. You're right. You're right. 

That's how you know, they're like your people.

Yes, absolutely. Wow. And so, but back to, you know, having the, the friend divorces and stuff, those people, you know, like a rosebush, you have to cut away the dead roses or they'll never have new ones grow. Right. You know, your rosebush can die if you don't prune it. Yeah. And so you kind of have to think about life like that too.

If you're not constantly pruning your life, where are the new. Um, and so then I just slowly developed this life where I was like, I really truly can make my life like I started seeing success signs. I started seeing little signs that my life was changing. Right. Um, and then I just started getting more and more positive because I had less negative people around me.

Yeah. Um, I started seeing success in my business because I was focusing on the right areas instead of what I thought society would tell me. Such as? I have built a lot of my business, not necessarily in front of the camera. We aren't super popular on social media. That's because we develop our email strategies and our Google SEO strategies.

And we're doing other things other than just being in front of the camera. And can you talk 

about that too? It's like how, like the amount of followers you have. have nothing to do with how much money you're making. I know. Like, please, like, clear the air, Kelli. Yes. Clear the air. 

Yes. So when we do, uh, so everything that I do, I call it my sticky web.

And so if I'm doing anything for Elevated Agent, I typically try to have anywhere between two and three different contact points of either different products or different ways people can connect. Yeah. So I'm not going in just saying look at this really cool product. Isn't this neat? Okay, goodbye. Yeah.

I'm saying this is why you need to use it. This is what you can get from it. Right. Um, this is where you can find it. You can leave a comment. We're going to send it to you. Um, and then. And so we're, we're using different things. Also, like, um, let's say if it's a postcard campaign. Right. Um, I'm also saying this works great with our email campaign.

That matches. You know, so I'm also cross selling other things in the video while still giving really good education on it. So for example, we just did one on foreclosures. Yeah. And we have a whole foreclosure magazine that we've created. And so I did a whole video about that. How to actually use the marketing piece.

I'm not telling you to go doorknock and just start handing out foreclosure guides. That would be offensive You know, and so i'm saying now If someone happens to overshare and says they're behind on their mortgage payment This would be a great piece of information to give them right at that moment, you know Or that time after they share that with you.

Yeah Um, so we we go into all of our content You giving reasons for them to either reach back out or buy something. A lot of people will get on there and they'll just say, um, something like, real estate agents should do more open houses and I think they should do them Saturdays at noon. That's not selling anything.

That would make, that would generate zero sales for me. Um, and unfortunately, those types of content, if you're cute, like, I don't mean like cute girl, but like, if you're doing something cutesy or if there's like a weird hook at the beginning, that'll get a lot of views. Tons of views. Yeah. Uh, but no sales.

You know, I see this a lot in the um, in the, like, homemaking and parenting industries. So, for example, like, someone might show you how to fluff their Christmas tree. How they're putting it up. Great. But what about the products you're putting up? Like, give me a link to the products. Give me a link to your Christmas tree.

Right. Um, tell me about. Like. Yeah. Sell something. Don't just show me. You know, you're wasting your time. Yeah. Parents that say, um, oh, this one coloring book. Well, but not even that, like, uh, Oh, I used San for a sensory activity today. Cool. You've got 60, 000 views on that, but what money did you make? Exactly.

It's like, you have to 

get people off of the platform into your funnel system, email system, and send them somewhere. Cause if not, then you're just getting viewership, but you're not getting any sales, which if that's what you want, if that's what you want, then okay. But why exactly? You know, like, what are you putting in all this work 

for?

People are going to say, well, we get monetized. Tick tock is monetizing me. Great. But that's a very narrow minded business. Yes. That is a one, that's all your eggs in one basket business. And that's not what we're building over here. We're building a company. Uh, and so like, if we were to take that sensory video that had 60, 000 views and compare it to my 2, 000 view foreclosure video.

I'm making money. 

Yeah. 

Okay. That, that foreclosure is that, that guy, it's 25. Maybe that real made me several hundred dollars just selling that one product. Wow. Um, 

instead of just getting like 5, 000 views, that's like you were going nowhere. Right. Or they're liking, they're commenting, you're getting the viewership, you're getting maybe a few dollars from the platform.

But like you said, it's like, first of all, at TikTok, who knows if it's going to be here next year, but you know, that's fine. Um, and no hate to that, but we're building something bigger than that. Now I want to address the elephant in the room. Are you the only person like on your team doing all of the templates or do you have other people helping you create them?

Okay. 

Uh, that's a great question. And thank you. I'd love to clarify that. So I was alone for the first four years, the last three years, um, so year five, I hired, uh, Maria, who is my assistant designer. So I do have an assistant designer. Um, I design everything first and then she designs it in different forms.

Okay. So, uh, one thing to be very clear, just for clarification, uh, when I started Elevated Agent, it was very, very important to me that agents had a place that they could go get all of their marketing material that looked good. The same for branding purposes, right? Because we, when, when you are branded very well, what it does is branding is actually a psychology.

And if you have a very strong brand, what you're doing is you are creating trust within that customer. So for example, if you have posted something on. on Facebook, let's say, and then people click on that post and they go to your website and they see a completely different person or different product than what was on Facebook, you are, they're immediately going to click off because now they don't trust you.

Right. 

So what I wanted to create was something to where agents could have everything that was designed similar. 

Right. 

and it created that brand for them. Right. And so we have five different brand styles that we do. We have a minimal, a natural, a classic, a playful, and a peaceful. Wow. And they're all very different looking.

Right. Um, like our minimal is a lot more masculine. It's blacks and whites. Our peaceful is very, um, calm blues. You know, anyway, so you can get the idea. Different 

styles, different, um, like you said, um, personalities that go along with 

them. I love that. Yeah, and we've actually developed an entire quiz that a real estate agent can take to find which one matches their personality the most.

And it's really fun because I made it like, Like, as if you're a real estate agent getting ready for the day to go to an open house. Yeah. So, say like, what shoes would you pick to go to your open house? And I have all these different shoes and I've personally picked out every shoe that I felt like matched every design style.

What car would you get in to go into this open house? 

Yeah. 

Um, you know, what would be your ideal office space after your open house? And so, like, it takes them through and then at the end. It spits out what their design style would be to match their personality. 

That's amazing. 

Yeah, it's a lot of fun.

People like doing it. It's free, you know, whatever. Um, and so, Maria, now, uh, I design one, let's say I'll design like a flyer or something, and I'll say, okay, here it is in, peaceful style and then she would remake it in all of the other styles. Wow. Um, that was super helpful when I, um, she was my first hire, hire again.

I did hire her off of Upwork. I think I like to talk about that because I think people get a little bit scared. She is in Brazil. Okay. She's maybe 23, 24. Fun. Yeah. I, uh, love that she was kind of, uh, South in Brazil and she was able to move up North to like a beach town. Um, I pay. All of my employees, 25 or more.

So for someone in Brazil, 25 is lots of money. Right. And I love that. I love being able to do that. I love the fact that she was like, thanks to you. I have been able to quit all of my other subcontractor work. She works just for me now. And she gets to live in this beach town in Brazil, you know, like just helping you.

And getting to do like, and like what she loves and she gets to do it anytime. Like I really don't, I don't make any of my employees work certain times. They can work whenever they want. Yeah. As long as it gets done, cool. Right. So that was my first hire. And then I hired on an assistant and her name was Elise and she was in Florida.

And I loved me some Elise. Still do. But she left, uh, she wanted something a little bit more full time. All of my girls work between 10 and 20 hours a week. I honestly, I don't, I don't even cap their hours. They work how much they want. Sometimes I'll get like Maria. Sometimes it'll be like five hours this week.

Yeah. And then the next week it'll be like 20, you know? And so I'm like, she worked hard that week. Yeah. Okay. And so then, um, and then lovely came into my, I love all my girls names too. Lovely came into my life and took Elisa's spot as like the assistant. She kind of does a lot of things. She's kind of a floater.

I don't even like Call her assistant. Cause I feel like she's, she's even higher than an assistant, you know? Um, but she does a lot of, uh, management of the templates. So she's the one creating the downloads now, um, and doing all of that. And then we recently brought on, um, divine favor and excuse me, lovely.

I hired myself, so I didn't hire her off of Upwork or anything. And then I hired divine as our customer service representative. Divine favor promise is her name. Isn't that amazing? That is crazy. She's from Nigeria. Wow. Uh, and also just stunningly gorgeous. Like all my girls are so beautiful. Um, and again, she gets paid 25 an hour.

And so Nigeria, their average income per month is about 350. And she makes that at least per week. Wow. Uh, and so, The fact, I just am so happy, like I'm gonna cry. I'm just so thankful that I can change their lives. You know, this little Etsy business, now I have these women who I've changed their lives. Um, and they are amazing.

Like, I think too that I love on them so much that they love the business so much also. And 

they 

work for you. Harder 

on the business, which makes them happier, which makes them stay and come back. The beautiful thing though, is that like, so all of these ladies you've gone through, I think one of them, you said, didn't go through up work.

Um, correct. Uh, Elise and lovely. We're both, uh, to that lovely, actually I found on social media. She had followed me for a while. We had kind of chatted a little bit. She was kind of trying to do her own thing on the side. I think she still does a little bit, totally fine with that too. 

Yeah. 

Um, and. I was like, I think you would be a really good, um, asset to us.

Yeah. She's grown a lot. Mm-hmm . You know, especially in her design skills, um, we hold a very high standard of design in our company and, um, I'm very strict about it and they know it in a, in a kind way. Yeah. Um, but if, if it's not up to my standard, I pun it right back to him. Yeah. 

You're like, let's try 

again.

try again. 

Let's try again. Try again. Uh, and I don't like doing, I used to be really bad about just saying, okay, give it back to me and I'll do it. Yeah. You can't do that. When you get to a certain level in your business, you no longer have margin of time to do that. Um, so that has been a pretty hard lesson this year that I've kind of learned that I have to give it back to them because I can't always correct their mistakes.

Because they have to learn. They do. And they have to grow. And the best way to do that is doing. You know, so I think it's beautiful that you've, okay, so you, you cleared the air saying that like you're not the only person doing the design anymore, which is a great, cause I'm like listening to you. a lot of templates.

Like how are you getting through all of these so fast? But I think in the beginning though, it was just you for a while. And then you brought on a team, which I'm sure like has. You know, helped you grow your business, like amazingly exponentially, like to a whole nother level. Um, but I think the most beautiful thing is that in case people don't realize, but you work from home.

Yeah. Okay. Um, you have the freedom, financial freedom. Um, I do know that there are some people including myself that could see you and be like, wow, that's so beautiful. How do I get there? Bring me back to the beginning a little bit. And if like the first couple of years, how long were you kind of like grinding, getting all of your system?

Cause I know you've created this whole like web thing, which I love your system, by the way, where it's like, you know, people get into your funnel and they are sent somewhere. They're not just like, they literally cannot get out. I love. And it's like how many of us are creating, just like you said, a one time thing.

Thing in the beginning, it's like, okay, create what you need to create to get started, but like make sure, cause I'm learning that, that like, you have to like send them somewhere. Cause people will come in and then it's kind of just like, you know, a relationship. If you're not entertaining me long, long enough, I'm out.

They forget about you. I'm done. Yeah. 

This day and age, I mean, things are like boom, boom, boom, right? So take me to the beginning. Okay, so I, so we were on Etsy. Then we, about year two, I knew from the beginning, I was just allowing us time to ramp up and get the momentum. So about year two, I knew that I needed another, Uh, platform that wasn't Etsy because we were growing very quickly organically.

I mean, very quickly. And I knew Etsy had lots of rules around what is yours and what is not yours. The clients that buy things from you on Etsy, that is not your information. They do not give it to you either. And if you take it, that's illegal. Um, so like, and what I mean by that is their emails. You, you don't get your customer's emails when you.

Have an Etsy shop. 

Mm-hmm . 

Um, they, there used to be kind of ways around it. Yeah. And they have since cracked down on all of that. There's, you are not getting the emails unless you go in and scrape it yourself. Which is illegal. Yeah. Yeah. We don't do that. Um, so I knew if I'm gonna continue to build this more than just an Etsy shop, like I knew I needed to take it off platform.

Right. So that's when we opened our Shopify. I recommend if anyone is going to do anything like what I am doing. Shopify is the answer. Yeah. Do not go anywhere else. Um, they are built exactly for that and they have any type of plugin that you would ever need, they have. So that's when we decided to go to Shopify and basically just start our shop over on Shopify.

So our Etsy and Shopify mirror each other. They have the exact same products. We run the same sales. They have the same marketing. Elevated agent marketing is very clean and simple. I always. our number one brand term is editorial. Um, and so it's very easy to know. Like when I said, when you click off of Facebook and it's not the same, not us, we are identical on all fronts.

Yeah. Um, but we knew that we needed to start collecting that data. If we were going to really become a company, we needed to own the data. And so then that's when we moved off of Etsy onto Shopify, not, you know, I shouldn't say off of Etsy. We just added Shopify. Um, and then slowly over the years, Shopify became our number one, a revenue generator, and now Etsy is about, I would say about a fourth of our revenue now is Etsy and it used to be a hundred percent, you know, so I actually find that as a success because you can't sit on a stool that only has one leg, um, so now we have four legs and that makes it a lot more stable.

Wow. Yeah. So, uh, okay. So. One thing that I always encourage people to do and I think this is really important for creating a good sticky web is you need to look at all of the nooks and crannies of your business and think, where is there a billboard that I'm not using? Okay, so where I found billboards on Etsy was, um, our mock up images.

You can put anything in those images. So why not promote other products in those images? Right. So like. When, so what I mean by a mock up image is when you're searching on Etsy and you're looking to purchase a product, there's 10 images that you can slide on Etsy to look at that product. Right. And like I said, you can put anything in these images.

They don't really regulate them. Um, and I don't mean that in a weird way. Uh, but like, so I started doing things like, um, if you like this listing presentation, we have a matching one. That you can look up here. 

Okay. So I love that you are talking about the idea of billboarding yourself everywhere that is an empty space, or maybe it's an opportunity for you to connect with your ideal client, but you're not like thinking about it cause you're like, Oh, there's like this empty space here, but I love how you have like this whole sticky web thing that you're like, okay, no matter where you are in the web.

I'm going to make sure that I get you, which is like really, really key. Um, it sounds like this is why your business is so successful and it also sounds like, um, there's a lot of opportunity that I don't think that many people realize, especially in the digital realm, I'm learning myself that there is a lot of opportunity that I'm willing to learn.

Um, but I don't have all of the. Understanding and strategy. So I told Kelli, I said, okay, after this, we're going to like, sit down. You're going to walk me through, how do I do this Etsy store? Because at the end of the day, I want to create a life that gives me the freedom and the ability to, um, really just like be the free spirited person that I know that I can be, you know?

And so, first of all, thank you for sharing your wisdom, your ideas, your strategy here on the show. But if we could wrap up everything in a bow of how you were branding yourself an individual as a person, um, would you say that your business aligns with the person that you are? 

100%. I don't think, I'm, I don't, I think I'm the type of person that it would be very obvious if it didn't.

Yeah. And so I, I absolutely think, it lines up with who I am, I think that it also aligns with who I want to be. 

You 

know, I sit down, something I love to do is future visioning. Um, and so I'll sit down in my journal and I'll write out a dream day of mine, like from beginning to end. And it's so fun. The better you get at it, the more detailed it gets.

So sometimes I'll have just a morning and it'll be three pages long, 

you 

know, and I'll say this is exactly what I want my business to look like. And what do I need to get there? Um, and then I also think that one thing that I did that really helped me is. I don't love the phrase fake it until you make it, but I would always say that, like, I'm going to dress for the job that I want.

I'm not going to dress for the job I have. And so I make decisions based off of my future self. Would future Kelli do this? Would the CEO in my vision, in my journal, be making this decision? And that's how I try to make decisions and how I decide to make decisions. move forward with a business idea or something, it has to align with that person.

And everything goes back to that. And I, so I think it's just really, really important to be very clear and focused on what you want. Um, and not, don't let your brain or society put you in a box and make you think, Oh, you can't have that. You know, like if I really wanted a, my own plane just because I live in Topeka, Kansas, and I'm just this little, you know, thing that 

you're not a little, you're a big thing, you know, like 

I could have my own plane if I wanted to.

I don't, you know, I don't really want, that's a lot of maintenance. I'm good. Um, but I just think that people truly can do whatever they want and where you are right now is a reflection of. The size of your mind. That's good. Say that one more time. Where you are is the reflection of your mind. Of the size of your mind.

Of the size of your mind. Yeah. Because if you are not in a place that you want to be, I'm guessing your mind's not in a place it should be. That's powerful. 

Okay. But did it take you obviously like 

years to get there? It did. This was not overnight. Yeah. Like I said earlier that I've been. I'm at a place now from 10 years ago.

Um, I will say the last few years I've been probably at a place where I've loved to be, but the first few years are tough. Yeah. You know, like, you're, you're like a, be like a snake shedding its skin, I guess. I don't, I don't, snake's probably not the right word. I 

mean, you know, that's how I feel. I'm shedding.

Yes, you 

have to. You have to because you can't take that old skin into your new life. Like, it just doesn't fit, right? There's no place for it anymore. You can't fit into that skin anymore. Um, and so there's definitely a period of adjusting and learning. Um, you said I work from home. That is true, but I will say that there was a solid Nine month transition process where I was just like calling everybody like, what are you doing?

Yeah, 

they're like, well, we're at work What are you doing? And I'm like, I'm just not used to being alone. Yeah, and now I'm like, I want to be alone Right, like I need my alone Yeah, yeah, I'm not coming out I am such I have so much more peace and I am so much more calm than I've ever been in my life And I think it's just because I've just been able to You 

Yeah.

I feel like you could help so many, so many young business owners get off the ground by just having like a one on one session or like a webinar. Would you be open to that? Sure. I think that'd be so cool. 

Especially when you're getting things started. And I think that the really important, if someone, if someone wants something, but they don't know what it is, please take this away from this podcast is be open minded and be aware of what people are saying to you about the things.

If you're taking photos just for fun and people keep saying like, wow, you have a really good eye or man, that is a beautiful, like over and over and over, please Right? Like take note of that because that is a passion, but also a skill. And when you can marry passion and skill together, you can almost be unstoppable.

So if it weren't for people saying to me, where did you get that marketing? How can I get that? Like, where's, it's beautiful. I wouldn't have probably ever started and I'm so happy I did. But I just think that that is something that people disregard way too much is when people are giving you compliments about that kind of and you should take note.

Yeah. Because that's what you're good at. You're shining usually. Like if someone's going to compliment you, it's because you're shining at something. 

Yeah. That's so good. Kelli, I appreciate your time here. Absolutely. It was a beautiful time. We're going to put all of your websites and your social media handles in the description below.

But in the meantime, thanks for being here. Absolutely. I loved it. Thanks for having me. Thanks for watching the Authentic Media Podcast YouTube. At Authentic Media Company, our mission is to help you develop an authentic brand so you can make the impact that you are called to make. If you got anything from today's episode, make sure you drop a comment down below.

I'm interested to see what your takeaways are. And if you haven't already, make sure you're subscribed to our YouTube channel so you can be the first to know when we drop our newest episode. In the meantime, have a great day.