What transformation are you in the business of delivering with your blog and online business? You better figure it out if you want to make money.

In this episode, we talk about the “transformation map”; a tool to help you define the transformation. This tool will help you map out blog content and products you will sell.

So with that… once again, , welcome back to another episode of Coffee Break Blogging! And actually, yes… I am having a cup of coffee. 😉 I do that a lot. It was actually something to do with the name of this podcast.

Now in this episode, like I said earlier, we are going to talk about something called “The Transformation Map”. This is what I call it. And we are going to create this because it is really going to help you not only map out your content moving forward but it is also going to help you brainstorm product ideas. It is also really going to help you REALLY understand the person you are addressing with your content and ultimately what you want to sell them.

What Is A Transformation Map?

Let’s first look at what the transformation is…

I use the word “transformation” in order to refer to the process of getting a person from point A to point B. And that point B is their ideal scene. That is where they want to be in whatever your market is. So in my particular case, because I am talking primarily to blog owners and people who want to run an online business, the transformation is usually going to begin in the area of “they have got maybe a loose idea or maybe they do not have a niche idea yet”.

They just want to make some extra money. So that would be at the far extreme of where people would begin and then on the other end of it, that transformation is that they have got a profitable online business based around their blog and they are actually making money possibly even enough to quit their job.

Now, what I am in the business of doing is delivering that transformation. And everything that I do at the Blog Marketing Academy is based around delivering that transformation and enabling people to travel that journey from point A to point B. So that is the transformation. And your market has the exact same thing, whatever that might be. Yours might look different. You know, if you are in the weight loss market then obviously the transformation is going to be; on one end you are overweight, on the other end you’re not, you look hot. But even in the hobbyist space; if you just got a hobby, what is the transformation in a hobby? Well, on one end maybe you are not very good at it and you do not know what you are doing and on the other end you are impressing your friends because of how awesome this thing is that you are doing as a hobby. Whatever it is.

Also, you want to dive in into the emotional side of what that transformation is going to mean for them so that you can really dive into that. And the more that you understand that, the more that you can make that transformation very real for them.

So the transformation map is basically an overview. A map of how to get from point A to point B… how to travel this road to get this transformation that they want in this particular space. So it is typically a series of steps. But it could also be a typical series of barriers or challenges that one may actually experience while they are traveling this journey.

An Example Of A Transformation

I’ll give you an example and I will just base this out of my own market of talking to bloggers… and again, primarily because A: I am really familiar with it and B: You guys probably are, too, because you guys are probably in my target market, otherwise you probably won’t be listening to me right now.

So it starts of, (again) at the far end of this transformation map would be the blogger who has little to no traffic and no income. That would be where it usually begins at the starts. So we go to typical steps of this transformation and typical things that they are experiencing along the way. It starts off with maybe they have got no clear niche; they have no idea where they want to head, what market they want to serve. Well, you may have, also, if you are following along with our series here with Coffee Break Blogging; you will realize that I am actually talking about “that” right now. In fact this entire podcast, as we move forward into the new year, is all going to be about traveling this transformation in a logical sequence. So remain subscribed to Coffee Break Blogging if you were to follow along.

But as we move along from “no clear niche”, a lot of times people are experiencing “overwhelm” and “information overload (That is a very typical thing that comes up. It actually happens in all stages of this transformation but very common at the beginning, when people are trying to figure out what to do and how to do it.) we go into being disorganized to having no clear business model into not really knowing what your Unique Selling Proposition is going to be.

Now, as we move forward a little bit on our transformation; and you are going to be dealing with technical website issues like, how to set up your blog, how to customize your theme… all the technical hurdles that go along with this business. Now, once you have worked out some of that, you are typically going to be thinking, “I don’t have really that much traffic” so you are going to start figuring out how to get more traffic. That is another hurdle that one will need to deal with on this transformation.

Then you are going to be going into “I don’t have an email list yet”, so you will have to tackle how to handle that email list. Now, the next thing would be getting better on content; really upping your game in terms of your content. Then another part of the transformation would be having no offer. Well, you could have a blog and have great content, maybe even having some people coming; but if you are not offering anything to them it is really going to be hard to make money. So we got to build the offer. We are going to build product. We need to increase our social engagement as we are moving forward to this transformation.

Now, again, later on in the transformation; if you got a lot of those things in place, then you are going to start talking about things that are challenges when you are a little bit down the road like, conversion testing, conversion optimization, split testing, expanding your team, hiring your virtual assistant, systematizing your business and dealing with entrepreneurial overwhelm simply because you do not have a lot of systems in place yet.

Now, these are things that when you are at the very beginning, you are probably not experiencing them yet because you have not gotten to that point, but they happen a little bit later in our journey. That is the transformation map.

If you just back up for the last 2 or 3 minutes of me, talking; we are going in a logical progression of the typical things that happen along this transformation. And then the end result at the end of this transformation would be a person with a functioning online business generating enough revenue to power the lifestyle that they want driven by content marketing.

That is what I am in the business of doing here at the Blog Marketing Academy and that is my transformation map.

What To Use A Transformation Map For?

So what would you use this transformation map for, once you have created it for yourself? Well, you could definitely use it to create your long term content planning. So when you are actually planning your content for months or maybe even a year in advance; you could do that when you have that basic framework in place. Otherwise, it is going to be like just throwing darts up against the wall and just seeing if you can hit anything. But when you have a real framework, a real plan of action to go by then it makes it a lot easier for you to start coming up with content ideas and really plan that into the future.

Another thing that really helps is to use this transformation map to come up with product offers. It helps you realize where people are in that transformation and you can create custom-tailored product offers that are going to help move them along. Because the purpose of all your blog content, all of your podcast, and anything that you offer is ultimately going to be to move them a little further along in this transformation that you are in the business of delivering.

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So that is the transformation map. I definitely encourage you to work on creating that for your own business. Now if you want some more assistance with this, this would be a really good reason to jump in to the VIP program over at the Blog Marketing Academy because inside one of the courses there that is called the “Content Marketing Clinic”, there is a full walkthrough of the transformation map and it has some guidance on how to actually set it up. There is actually a little field of fill in the blanks and you will actually put together your own transformation map.

If you want that assistance beyond what we are talking about here in the podcast, jump on in the VIP Program. I believe you are going to get a lot of value out of that subscription… but at the Content Marketing Clinic, you will find some information on how to create this transformation map for yourself. Okay?

With that, I will leave you until Episode 43 which will be the last episode of this particular year! So, I am going to talk to you a little bit about how we can make your 2015 the most productive year you have ever had.

Have fun! Stay productive and I will see you in Episode 43 coming up in a few days. I will see you soon! 😉