Ask The Expert: The "Quiz Queen" - Catharine O'Leary

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Michelle Abraham: 00:00:44

Hello, hello amplify your family. I'm Michelle Abraham your host I'm here today with a special guest for ask the expert interview today. I have got the quiz queen with me, Catherine O'Leary, the Catherine how're you doing today? Oh, I'm

Catharine O'Leary: 00:00:59

great. It's Friday. And it's all good. Awesome.

Michelle Abraham: 00:01:02

I see we're matching today too. So Heather and I both wearing shield to color has shirts today. So it's good. We got the memo of wearing that wearing matching outfits today. Awesome. So Catherine, I know you as the quiz Queen around town and around the the internet, you have developed a name for yourself in helping people set up quizzes and I thought it'd be really fun today to talk about how perhaps quizzes can be something that people could use from their podcast as a great lead magnet, we're gonna we're trying to always get something really cool from your podcast to get people to actually take action. So and I know people are obsessed with quizzes when it comes to on social media. So I think this would be a really cool idea. But first, I'd love to hear like how did you become the quiz queen?

Catharine O'Leary: 00:01:49

Yeah, I didn't grow up wanting to be the quiz queen, believe it or not. I wanted to be the Wolf of Wall Street. So I went to business school. Got my degree, my master's degree in economics and started in, in corporate life in market research and consumer insights. So very much in that, that, you know, asking consumer questions, and translating that into corporate ease. Whether that's new products, you know, marketing campaigns, sales conversations, whatever that looks like. So I worked my way through several corporations working with or working for the likes of Pepsi and apple and HP and Adobe always in that consumer research and, and, or sorry, market research and consumer insights. So, I mean, it was, I remember talking to my father about it, and I was, uh, you know, he asked me at one point in time, you know, what is it that you do, like, what is your title? And I said, you know, what, Senior Director of market research and consumer insights and he shook his head, and he looked down, I thought, oh, what's happened? He's like, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, Catherine, if you're just gonna make stuff up, like, Don't even talk to me. And I was like, Dad, I'm not making it up. I swear to God, that's a real thing. It's just all it is, is translating consumer challenges into, you know, into corporate conversations that the likes of Pepsi can take back to their marketing camps and their product camps to create whatever they need. So that's how I became the quiz queen.

Michelle Abraham: 00:03:22

I love it. And I love the Irish accent that came out there too. You're really good at that one. Yeah, that's great. Yeah, it's interesting. You know, it's it's from small businesses, we don't really think about those those insights in those things. But how great would that be to have a new lead coming to your business where you know so much about them already, that you can really help tailor your conversations if going into a sales conversation with them or, or nurture sequences with them on really how to guide those conversations and be a huge so why are people so obsessed with Christmas?

Catharine O'Leary: 00:04:02

With quiz? Um, well, you know what Christmas are fun, because they're, they're, they're more than just a survey. So corporations do surveys, and they, they learn a lot about their consumer, the consumer doesn't get a lot back. So it's not it's not the same self discovery journey, a quiz like is put together for the consumer to learn something about themselves. And people love to learn about themselves. I mean, their favorite subject matter is what's in it for me, right? So so when you can put into context, your offer your services, how you serve into a what's in it for me, in the terms of your best clients, attract their attention, you've got a captive audience, and you can then proceed to build that, you know, the the authority, the respect and the trust that you need to actually, you know, offer that next step. And so a quiz. People love taking quizzes because, you know, they want I know like, you know how to become, you know, a seven figure, you know, earner or how do I, you know, increase my, you know, lead capture from my podcast or the you know, like they they want to learn things like that they want to learn if their superpower is, you know, talking on stage or maybe their superpowers behind the scenes and and they also in the same time, the business it's a win for because the business builds that know like and trust factor. And the brilliant thing about quizzes is that it it attracts your best clients so you're not dealing with all the tire kickers and freebie seekers. You're building up that knowledge and your expertise in your your field of genius. And then you're inviting them it's a nice warm handshake the next step, so after they learn about their superpower, or after they learned about what you know, where are they best fit in into a, you know, a stage show or something like that, they get that invite they get that invite to your webinar, or to your one on one call, or to the next episode, or, you know, whatever that looks like for them. And, and it's you know, it's not a cold, like it's a nice warm lead now. And and you know, if they don't complete the quiz, that's brilliant, because they weren't your person anyways. So now you're not wasting that time on those one on one calls, or, you know, going through nurture sequence with people that maybe aren't really ready for you yet.

Michelle Abraham: 00:06:28

Right? Very cool. Yeah, it seems like then you're getting warm leads to your inbox instead of colder leads that take a lot more effort. But also, I love the fact that they're getting something out of it, too. They're learning something about them, whether it's their, you know, some of the quizzes I've taken, you know, what kind of salesperson Are you? Or what's your, what's your archetype? Or what's your Yeah, it's so, so many great ones. So is it really complicated to build a quiz or like it? Are there some templates or things that we can use? Or like, how do we go about like, as soon as soon as like, choose your own adventure tweet, like, you know, if they say, Yes, you got to go over here? If they say no, we got it. Like, it seems very, like complex in my head. Is it really that hard to do? One? It's not.

Catharine O'Leary: 00:07:13

I mean, it is it is more effort than, you know, a normal kind of PDF checklist or things of that nature, which are great for what they are. The problem with those things is that right now in the state that we are in, only 20% of those are ever open. So you've got a whole bunch of people on your list that you think that you've developed a relationship with or started to, because they've read your material, and they haven't. So now you're kind of back at square one where they're not really as warm a lead as you thought they were. So you're not really sure who's on your list. But uh, you know, a quiz it, you know, you want to start with your offer. So you always want to start at the end. So where are you trying to, like you're the navigator, right? You're trying to take them on this journey? Where do you want them to end up? So is that your webinars that you're off? What is your offer? So get super, super clear on your offer? And your target audience? Right? Who's your best client? What is keeping them up at night? Right? That's the question that you want to leave with. Because you know, goldfish have a, an attention span of eight seconds, our attention span is seven seconds. So bad, right?

Michelle Abraham: 00:08:23

That's so good. Not so good. Reader, see,

Catharine O'Leary: 00:08:27

we don't have a lot of time to stop the scroll. So you really want to hit them hard hit the bird with, hey, I can help you with that one thing, whatever that is, that one thing that is driving you bonkers or like that you really need to solve in your business. And let's let's figure out how for you that solution works. So just take a little bit more upfront effort. The thing is, is that the back end, you now have a system that can generate leads 365 days a year for you. And now your marketing and your your kind of prospecting is on autopilot, and you get to play in your zone of genius. So once it's created, and you've optimized it, it's it's it's something that doesn't necessarily you know, expire, or go out of style or anything like that, like it's always it's always running for you. So you know a little bit of a more upfront kind of thought and process to it of starting with the offer working backwards to get that problem to solve and then take them, you know, you got to connect the dots, right, you got to get them from point A to point B. And you do that through the questions that you ask. And those questions can build your subject matter expertise. So the way that you frame them the way that you talk about them, they can you can inject your personality in them. If you're quirky, you can, you know, put gifts in if you want or pictures and that kind of thing. But you're also you know, the the answers that you offer might make them think differently, like, oh, I hadn't thought of that as an answer to that question. So you want to take We're through kind of where they are now what they're challenged with, where they want to be. And then hey, you know what, here's a couple of small steps that you can take to get up the mountain. And that's kind of the freebie side of the quiz. So the insights that you give, but then again, the genius is, and if you want to learn more, if you want to get to the top of the mountain, if you want to go all the way, then let's talk about this course, or this coaching, or this, you know, this one on one retreat, or whatever that looks like,

Michelle Abraham: 00:10:33

I was just going to ask that question Is it better if you're trying to lead them to like a product or a certain like a service or like an event or a, doesn't matter what the end result is, or what you're, where you're trying to lead them to it with, we just want to work better than the other.

Catharine O'Leary: 00:10:51

It doesn't, and you know, what, it's really about making sure your offers dialed in, and you understand that and then the problem to solve, right? So if you want to be driving in traffic into your coffee shop, then maybe you start with Hey, are you You know, what's, what color is your latte? You know, like, you know, and then you can like take them through and have a coupon at the end. Where you know, like, Hey, your, you know, for your chocolate latte, or maybe your the caramel latte, or you or the raspberry, Here's a coupon for you come on in and to the bricks and mortar. I mean, you know, if it's a book launch, then you can, you know, you know, take them through some of the things, the challenges that the book talks about, and then lead them into the the, you know, buying the book, or retreat, you know, maybe it's, it's, you know, What's are you what's the first thing you pack? You know, is it a hiking boots is a bathing suit, or is it you know, a sun hat, and take them through a quiz that, you know, maybe it's an adventure quiz that I'd adventure retreat or a beach retreat or something like that. So, in 25 years, I have yet to meet a business I can't create a quiz for. So I think I do think it works for a lot of people. I think it works really well, for speakers and podcasters. And broadcasters, because I think that they leave a lot of leads behind. So they don't have a really robust way to capture the people that are in the room or listening. So if you can draw up a quiz at the end of your podcast, you know, like my quiz is, hey, you know what, go ahead and and take the quiz for my business.com. Right. That's a live quiz. I drop it everywhere, every network meeting, every podcast, every Summit, like I just did, that's my business card that takes them to the quiz where I get to capture their their information and give them something for that. So I think that, that that speaker podcaster broadcasters is potentially leaving some of those people without a way to get connected back with

Michelle Abraham: 00:13:02

hula, can you share a little bit more about your request? So you said you're using that now as a business card. So now when you go, which I think is great, you know, rather than sharing, you know, go to my LinkedIn profile or something like that, you're saying go to my quiz. And so what is your quiz trying to establish as establishing you as the authority? Or is it asking them like, on a choose your own adventure kind of thing to lead to somewhere? I'm sure I've seen both.

Catharine O'Leary: 00:13:27

Yeah, yeah. So I mean, my question is what what quiz is best for your business. And there are there are three kind of stages, I guess I'm a business. So you know, you either you're building your foundation, or you've got a signature course, and you're building your brand. Or you've got kind of your systems in place, and you're ready to amp up and you're ready to really kind of scale. So depending on kind of your goal, I guess, you know, where you want to start thinking about your offer. And my quiz takes you through kind of where you're at right now in your business journey. What quiz is going to help you achieve that result of whether it's building your list, or building your brand or building you know, your that that system, a quiz can do all those things. So it's just really kind of what the quiz does is focuses you and personalizes it to what you need that quiz to do. The functionality of the quizzes is the same across all of those, but like I'm talking to Michelle who wants to really build his brand and become that subject matter expert be the real estate agent in the area. You know, or I'm talking to Kimberly and she's all about, you know, ramping it up, you know, making sure the systems are running 365 What does that need to look for her? It tells me when I'm talking to them, where they are in their business and how to frame the quiz.

Michelle Abraham: 00:14:47

Hmm, that's great. I love it because you're you seem to be then arriving at like a consultation stage with them, or the next stage but far more educated and prepared to have those conversations issues that lead to sales and in a more efficient and more efficient way since,

Catharine O'Leary: 00:15:05

yeah, I mean, quizzes are really good for shortening the sales cycle, because you're building all that kind of, you know, respect and trust in 60 seconds versus 60 emails, you know, nurture sequences, so you're build that you're building that goodwill, you're inviting them right away, they're reading it, because they get the results immediately. So you're not like counting on them to read the download. So you're shortening your sales cycle, it's also because it's fun, and people like taking quizzes, you're gonna get probably three times as many leads for the same amount of effort. So, you know, if you're used to getting like, you know, 100 leads off of, you know, Summit, you know, like, you might get 300. Now, with the same effort. So like, I always like leveraging the same amount of time and getting better results. And now, the other thing, too, is that now you're just dealing with quality, right? So I used to, I used to work in network marketing, and I used to get like 1000s of leads, they were not very good leads. In fact, most of them were not at all good leads. And so like I often said, I'd rather get 10 Really good solid leads and 1000s of people that I have to weed through and try to figure out who's, you know, who's really interested versus not? And that's the quiz does that for you, too. So it's kind of that lead magnet on steroids?

Michelle Abraham: 00:16:29

Yeah, seems like such a good idea. Just having so many like ideas in my head, like how you can use quizzes for this or for that, or for other things. Do you suggest like businesses have one quiz? That's like their main gateway into like working with them? Or would it be like more specific for, like, each program they run would have its own quiz,

Catharine O'Leary: 00:16:50

it really depends, again, you start at the end. So what are you trying to achieve? You know, I like a lot of quizzes that I that I like to do are kind of higher level, they're the umbrella quiz, if you will, that they like they're kind of for your business. The thing with quizzes is that it's really super easy at the back end, like if you're going for, you know, like this month, you might have a webinar, so you're sending everyone to the webinar, but you know, in a month, that's not going to be relevant anymore. So you just change the back end link to go to now your sales call or your sales page or your waitlist, you know, whatever that is, so that back end is really easy to to switch up when you need it. So I suggest I like to do that umbrella conversation, like, you know, like, have the quiz be higher level, so it lives longer. And then in the back end, you can customize things so that they go to like the immediate tactics of the day.

Michelle Abraham: 00:17:44

Yeah, super cool. Seems like it's just like so much more of a valuable lead magnet than like a PDF or like, you know, download or some sort that we see these days that just are not comforting, and they don't excite people, it doesn't doesn't really do much for list building at all, really. And I know so many times I've gone and downloaded something that looks good. And it's like by the time I go to my inbox, I forgot what it was. And I never went back and open it right. Even though I was interested in that moment. It's like it's so amazing, even three minutes later forgotten, and we will.

Catharine O'Leary: 00:18:18

Yeah, yeah, that's why I mean, that's why I love quizzes, because as soon as they give their email information, they get the results now whether they watch your video or whatever, if you have that at the end of the quiz, that's different, but you've at least got two different ways to connect with them. You do send them a PDF, you do send them a PDF report, you know, like, that's something that you did promise, so that's fine. But they've gotten the results in there. And more importantly, they gotten that invitation to the next step. Right then right there like there. You don't have to wait for the PDF. And you don't have to wait for them to open it. They have it right there to connect and register, or connect your calendar, whatever that looks like.

Michelle Abraham: 00:18:57

Yes, that's a good idea. Love it. Well, I'm sold. I need to get I need to get I need to get a quiz on my podcast. I think that would be a great, a great way of lead generating from the podcast, having worked with podcasters that to to add quizzes on. And it's been something that they've really seen success with.

Catharine O'Leary: 00:19:15

Yeah, is so a lot of a lot of speakers are podcasters Yeah, so there. So now you've got a lead generation system that works for in either situation. Yeah, that's great. You're not creating like a whole bunch of stuff that only works for one thing or another. You've got that's why I like quizzes because like, even if you're in a networking meeting, or you're at a retreat, and somebody wants to know what you do, and it's like, hey, just take my quiz. And so it can it can live, you know, across platforms like that. It's also agnostic, so it lives anywhere a link can live so you can email it, you can have a QR code for it. You can put it in ads for Facebook or Google or you know, you know, whatever you're you're doing Get. And you can also put it in your profile for Instagram, that kind of things. So it's easily transferred to wherever you really need it to try and capture those leads, and you're capturing everyone in the same kind of frame of mind. Yeah, and the same with the same information. So it just makes it just streamlines everything for you.

Michelle Abraham: 00:20:22

That's awesome. If you were starting out today, Katherine in a business, what? What would you what would you know now that you would have liked to have known when you first started looking at quizzes or implementing quizzes today? Oh, that's

Catharine O'Leary: 00:20:36

a good question. I would have liked to know that it. So while it seems overwhelming to start with, once you get into it, you get clarity on your offer and your target audience, then you didn't think that you were going to get so I think one of the benefits of quizzes outside of the actual, you know, three times your leads and three Theano double your conversion rates is you actually get a lot of clarity in like you get super focused, because you got to sit down and think okay, what's that one question that people are getting to? So I think I think I would have liked to know that. So I would have been a better service.

Michelle Abraham: 00:21:12

Yeah, that's a huge, that's actually a huge benefit. Because I think a lot of times, US entrepreneurs are unclear on not totally clear on our offer or the pathway to our offer. And when we're not clear, our audience is not clear and they don't buy it. So confuse buyer never buys. And so I think that's a huge benefit of actually doing a quiz and mapping it out. So you get to make that map right there. Right and have that clearly. So that's awesome. I love that. So Kevin, where can we go and test out your quiz like so I'd like to send our audience to your quiz so they can see and experience your quiz. I think that would help them put some ideas in their head of how they can create a quiz for their pot. Yeah.

Catharine O'Leary: 00:21:53

So it's literally quiz for my biz.com

Michelle Abraham: 00:21:57

Perfect. So is it easy to buy quiz, quiz related URLs? Are they kind of like hard to hard to come by?

Catharine O'Leary: 00:22:04

You know what, and it doesn't have to say quiz it can be like whatever you would name a lead magnet right? You can have some fun with it. So I mean, that's that's the thing. You want to have fun with it. It's not the census. You're not You're not trying to get every single answer to every single question known to mankind. It's meant to be fun is meant to show off your your sense of humor and so on. So quiz for my biz works for me, because I'm kind of quirky. And, but yeah, when I mean, it's just like when you have a thought for a book, title or something, go and get the domain right away, you know? So same same with a quiz, I would say,

Michelle Abraham: 00:22:43

Yeah, I didn't do that with my business right away. So I'm sitting three more days till they're there. Their domain expired. I'm gonna grab it. Sit is expired. Oh, gosh, yeah, domains are one of those things. I have a whole bunch I don't use and then there's one of them waiting for. So yeah, that's great. And so it doesn't have to actually say quiz and it could just be like, you know, what's the flavor of your coffee or something like that? Like you mentioned earlier? Yeah. Okay, cool. Yeah, I was always one. Yeah, no quiz for your biz quiz for

Catharine O'Leary: 00:23:13

you. I mean, I? Yeah, quiz for my biz. Yeah, so all written out. So not the number four, just quiz for might is. And the other thing is just to make sure that even if you have to buy a domain that only goes like kind of a redirect for the quiz. Make sure it's easy. It's easy to spell out, it's easy to remember. So like, just get it especially if it's going to be something that you're going to brand and you're going to use everywhere. Just make sure that it's super easy.

Michelle Abraham: 00:23:45

Okay, yeah, that sounds great. I love it. I mean, I'm thinking like with our text to number we can even do like we have the word podcast that you text to a number even that could then can be broken, like connected to the quiz too. So that's great. Yep. Love it. Well, Catherine, thank you so much. You've kind of like opened my mind about quizzes. And I've got a whole bunch of them and like molding in my head now that believes that we can use quizzes to double our air our leads in our flow in email even said three times the amount of leads. So that's really exciting. Because, you know, the PDF down the blog just doesn't work anymore.

Catharine O'Leary: 00:24:24

It's challenged, it has its challenges. Let's say that, let's say that.

Michelle Abraham: 00:24:28

Exactly. We want people to feel like they're getting something of value to when they are downloading something. So if they can get that right away and learn what their flavor of their coffee is, what color their coffee is. That's awesome. Well think about themselves. Yeah. Fantastic. Yeah.

Catharine O'Leary: 00:24:44

So and you can you can have a lot of fun with like, whatever your your podcast title is, or your pod, like you know, the the, you know the focus of your podcast, you can have a lot of fun.

Michelle Abraham: 00:24:56

Yeah, I can see that again, make kidzee super creative with it too, so very cool. Well, Catherine, thanks so much for joining us today. It's been fantastic having you. Make sure you guys go out and vote for you listeners head on over to quiz for my biz.com. So you can check out Katherine's quiz. See if you get inspired to start a quiz for your business too. And make sure you reach out to Katherine to do that. Alright, have a great, fantastic week, everyone. We'll see you again here next time next week. Same place same time, Catherine. Any last words for our listeners?

Catharine O'Leary: 00:25:27

I just had the you know to track best clients, you got to ask the best questions. Ooh.

Michelle Abraham: 00:25:33

All right. Have a great week. Everyone. Take care.