EP 438 | What’s working, what’s not, + why it’s time to pay attention featuring Shannon Pruitt
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Get access to the email (and a fill-in-the-blank template) that was directly responsible for selling over $80,000 worth of courses, memberships, and digital products in 2024.
Shannon Pruitt is the Founder and Creative Director of Sunday Muse Design®, where she transforms brands and websites into authentic, strategic assets that convert.
Known for her refreshingly honest approach and strategic simplicity, Shannon helps female entrepreneurs elevate their online presence to attract premium clients.
With a background in wedding planning and a passion for intentional design, she combines creative expertise with business strategy to build brands that aren't just beautiful, but effective. When she's not crafting conversion-focused websites, you'll find her baking sourdough, gardening, or spending time with her husband and daughter.
TAKEAWAYS:
What happens when you stop designing pretty brands...and start solving actual problems? Shannon shares the simple (but powerful) shift that changed everything, and how you can do the same without burning your business to the ground.
You’ll walk away with 10 new ideas and a gentle kick in the pants. From building a business that’s actually sustainable to using AI to buy back your time, this convo is packed with “wait, why am I not doing this already?” moments.
She’s not winging it, and neither should you! Shannon reveals how she makes strategic decisions based on real data (yep, even her Instagram polls are intentional), and why listening is the move that changed everything.
We talked AI, but without the tech headache. Shannon built a custom GPT to analyze client data, and it might be the nudge you need to start using AI for you, not just your clients.
Resources:
Hang out with Shannon over on Instagram.
Visit Shannon on her website.
Listen to the Coach Business podcast with Caryn Gillen! Start with this episode, it's one of Allison's favorites!
Snag the $80,000 Email Template. You'll get access to the exact email that brought in $80K in sales in 2024 (and learn why it was so successful!). If you’re ready to write emails that actually sell, without sounding pushy or fake, this one’s for you.
CONNECT WITH ALLISON:
Follow Allison on Instagram
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Transcript:
Hey Shannon, welcome to the podcast. I'm so excited to have you. I'm so excited to be here. I asked this to everybody, so I'm very interested in hearing your response to this. When you first started your business, what did success mean to you? So it's kind of a loaded question because this is not the first business I've had.
So if we. Rewind to 2015, I think it was 2015 when I had my first business, which was a wedding planning company, I think in my head. It was this like Pinterest version of entrepreneurship. This full calendar, high paying clients, beautiful brand enough. I was also full-time teacher at the time,
yeah, we can talk about how, I didn't realize how stressed I was until later, but, just, having enough income to be able to fully quit that job. But by the time I launched this business in 2021, things looked a lot different. I had a six month old and no sleep, very little childcare. I used to tell people I'm working in tiny pockets of time, I still feel like that, but I think at that point it looked different.
It was just, it was more about making some money to help support the family while also being able to stay home with her. I think there was also a deeper fire of just proving some people wrong and proving that I could do this as both a mom and an entrepreneur. I think whether you're looking at 2015 or 2021, I think there were two different ideas of what it looked like.
As someone who has a very strong eight wing, I totally get the like proving people wrong because like, man, sometimes that motivates me. Okay, so now that you've had two businesses and you've been in it for a bit, what does success look like for you today?
I think this answer it, I think it might sound cliche, but I think it is just, for me, it's being able to have a business that's sustainable. For both me and my clients, so that I'm not running myself into the ground and pulling myself away from the life that I. Built this business to support. So there's also a little bit of role shifting that's happened in the past year, year and a half for me, for this business.
I'm not just designing brands and websites anymore. I'm acting as more of a strategist role. And then I have some team members who are handling a lot of the brand and web design. So it's shifted a lot into also like helping founders and brands figure out what's clicking and what's not and how to actually make sure their business can work like it should.
So there's, I think these days it's making sure it. Everything is sustainable, not just for me, but for the people and the brands that I work with. And not burning out and just a lot of, a lot of grace, especially, you know, in the summertime. Yeah. I love that you said building something that is sustainable, because I think in the beginning we want those like, you know, fast results because let's call it like it is, we probably just need to make money at that point, right?
So like, we're hustling and doing all the things and like showing up in all the places. But then there comes a point where you're like, holy guacamole, like, I need to take a break. These 60 hour weeks, no longer work or, you know, whatever the thing is. And sustainability has been something I have been thinking about for like, the past two years.
So I love hearing you walk through, work through that, because I think it's like, so not a sexy thing on the surface, but it is so sexy when you have it. I had a client a couple years ago who shifted my thinking of sustainability because in my head sustainability, I was thinking, I don't know to what I was thinking back then, but she was like, I want my business to be sustainable on every single front.
Not just for me, but for my family, for my clients. And what does that look like, for the world, for all of these different aspects. And I don't think I had thought about it from that perspective until I was talking to her. I was like, yeah, I mean, who doesn't want that? But being able to verbalize it.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. It's think it's a big thing. Yeah. Okay, so here on the podcast, we pull back the curtain and we talk about the things that are helping us to see and experience results. So I'd love to know, what's that for you? What's being able to bring results? Honestly, listening, watching patterns and paying attention to my people, how they're making decisions, tracking what's working and what's not.
I, one of my most freaking things that I've discovered is by tracking, analytics and everything is, Facebook doesn't do anything for me. So. Guess who doesn't even bat an eye at Facebook? Me. But I think also about a year and a half ago, I started noticing that a lot of the people I were talking to, they weren't entirely resonating with the offers.
That I was putting out there. They're a lot like you and I. They're busy, they're smart, they're running their own show. They value design and strategy, but they don't want to be drug through this like six month, eight month branding website vortex. They want momentum and they want decisions and they want somebody to partner with them and really not just hand them another PDF of things that they need to do.
So I back in February of 2024, I started shifting. Offers and making things simpler that are easier to say yes to for people, not because they're easy services. They are not. But they're just more focused. So some people will come in and they start with my, one-on-one strategy intensive, and it, I basically map out, Hey, here's what is working.
Here's what's not working. Here's my suggestions, three phases, whatever that looks like for each brand of how I would get this done. And ever since I implemented that and really refined it, there has been a massive shift in my business, more engaged audience. Sales. I mean, usually summer is slow for me.
Mm-hmm. And it's not anymore. And I'm not saying this is the be all, end all answer, but being able to actually listen and see what my clients are wanting, it's also a great foot in the door. So you don't have a lot of people who are like, I don't wanna invest this amount of money and Brianna website and working with somebody I've never worked with before.
So this is kind of a great, get your feet wet. And all of that just came from looking at. What was working, what was not working? The same thing I do for my clients. I had to do for myself and listening and paying attention and asking the right questions. Did you find that really hard to do? Yes. Yeah. I still find it hard to do.
Because I think your brand is, and your business, it's ever evolving. It's ever shifting, like what's working for me now in 2025 may not be working in a year from now. And I think we constantly have to be asking questions and paying attention to the answers. So how do you go about asking questions like, do you have a certain method about this?
I have, well, formally I do two formal surveys a year. Okay. And I send it out through my email. So I always do one in July and always do one at, either at the end of the year or at the beginning of the year. I'll compare what answers were given to me in July versus what's given to me in December as well, because a lot can happen in six months.
But, I'll also do random polls and surveys on Instagram stories usually. People love those, especially if you make 'em super quick and easy to like hit that little poll fee feature. And then in my weekly email newsletters, every now and then I'll throw in a poll or a question and get responses that way.
So that's how I do it. But also paying attention to discovery calls. What are people telling me? What are their biggest challenges? Where are they struggling? Because that's gonna tell you what people need and that that changes year from year too. Interest. So how do you go about, do you have like a tool that you use to, I'm like, so interested in like the nitty gritty here.
Do you have like a tool that you use to help you, like discern all that information? Or are you like manually going through and reading it all? So I used to manually. Like I, I could pull up the color coded spreadsheet. I used to manually do this. And then when chat GPT entered I created my own custom GBT, and I have trained that thing to analyze.
Analyze testimonials and analyze what people are saying on discovery calls and what they're putting in the answers on these surveys. And so I will use that. I don't rely on it a hundred percent because it's not entirely accurate, but I will use that and it cuts down on that time, and I'm not having to go through and color code this massive spreadsheet like I used to do.
That's phenomenal. The thing that boggles my mind about Cha GPT is how we can use it in our own businesses. 'cause when I first learned about Cha GT and what in the world it even was, I was like, oh, I can create these things for my clients. And that's the only focus I had for a while.
And then I had this one day and I was like, oh my God. Like I do things over and over and over again. I just turn it into a GPT and use these internally. So I love hearing different ways that entrepreneurs use. Custom bots you've got my wheels turning right now.
Like how can I do this? I highly recommend it. I mean, you work smarter, not harder, right? Absolutely. Yes. But like I think with. AI and chat gt and all the, all these new tools we have, it's totally like a, you don't know what you don't know kind of thing. Right? But like, I, I never even thought about this right now until right this minute, and now I have this like, new idea because of just the conversation that you and I had.
So it gives other people the idea as well. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Moving forward. You have all this data, you have all this information, you have this way of discerning it, you have a very specific process that you execute and that has really helped you to grow and scale your business and create offers that meet your people where you are or where they are.
How do you think that this is going to continue to evolve in your business? If you could like look into a magic ball, look into the magic ball. I think. I think this is gonna be like the North Star, to be honest with you. I think I, I don't, I don't foresee, and obviously things can change, but I don't foresee myself ever not asking myself, I.
When I'm making any decision, is this one gonna make my life easier? Is it gonna make my client's life easier? Is it gonna make my business run smoother? Does it actually solve a problem that they have without adding noise? I don't foresee myself ever not asking myself those questions before I introduce any new offer or launch anything.
Um, write a new email. I, I don't know. I think that just going in with this. Simplicity mindset of how am I gonna make things easier for myself and for my clients? I think that is going to continue to shape this business. And I think also as this business grows, and I've stepped into more of the strategist role with team members who are handling a lot of the implementation, I'm realizing that I'm not just here to hand people a.
Brand. I'm here to help them see their business and their brand in a different way and how they can make that work and click, and something that feels good for them to run. Because I think for me, that's the point of it, besides being there for my family, is helping other people feel good about their business and seeing it and a way they probably wouldn't be able to see it otherwise.
I mean, so powerful. So powerful. Okay, so shannon, I know that our listeners are gonna wanna find you online, so where can they go? Sunday news design.com.
That's the website. There's a resources tab on there if they wanna scroll through some freebies. Otherwise I am most active on Instagram and my handle is at Sunday News design. Amazing. Listeners will put all of that in the show notes. Freebie, check out, send Shannon a DM on Instagram. She's delightful.
You will love her. Shannon, thank you so much for being here. Thank you. I so appreciate you. Thank you. I appreciate you.
