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Summary

Hellooo and welcome to this Building The Brand episode of Pour It Out with Aidan Muir. Aidan is a dietitian and the owner of Ideal Nutrition – a Brisbane-based dietetic clinic that boasts a team of 11 practitioners. Ideal Nutrition has an industry reputation for retaining its staff….which naturally made me curious to ask – what is Aidan doing to maintain staff engagement that other businesses aren’t? In this episode, Aidan reveals the marketing channels driving the largest number of new client referrals at Ideal Nutrition, we speak about the key marketing areas in which Aidan is choosing to invest his time and money and we also talk business advice for founders who are in the early stages of building their brand. From team to marketing and lessons in business, this conversation has it all.

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Time Stamps

01:48: Aidan’s Journey into Dietetics
04:28: The Birth and Growth of Ideal Nutrition
06:56: Aidan’s Marketing Strategies and Hacks
11:07: Building a Team and Retaining Talent
17:04: Paying Staff to Build a Personal Brand
20:28: How Ideal Nutrition Acquire Their Clients
24:27: Navigating Different Social Media Platforms
29:07: Where Aidan Spends His Marketing Budget
32:04 Quality of Leads from Different Channels
34:35: Reflections on Building a Health Brand Today
38:09: Aidan’s Best Business Advice
42:20: The 5-Step Formula For Marketing Success

Guest Information

Aidan is a dietitian and the owner of Ideal Nutrition. This business has a team of 11 dietitians and focuses on working with clients one-on-one, with a large percentage of work generated through social media marketing.

Website:

www.idealnutrition.com.au

Instagram:

@aidan_the_dietitian

@idealnutrition__

Episode Transcript

Rachel (00:00)
Hello and welcome to Pour It Out, the marketing podcast for health brands who refuse to be bland. I am your host, Rachel Hawkins, and today you are joining me for another installment in my Building the Brand series. Now today I am joined by Aidan Muir. Aidan is a dietitian and the owner of Ideal Nutriton

A Brisbane based dietetic clinic that boasts a team of 11 practitioners who work one on one with clients through both in person and online consultations. Now it’s no secret that the turnover of allied health staff in many healthcare businesses is quite high. However, not in Aidan’s business. In fact, I would go as far as saying that ideal nutrition has an industry reputation for retaining their staff, which naturally makes me curious to ask

what is Aidan doing to maintain staff engagement that other businesses are

This episode is for anyone who wants to establish a strong team, retain talent and build an impactful healthcare business.

Aidan dives into the numbers to reveal the marketing channels that are driving the largest number of new client referrals at Ideal Nutrition. We speak about the key marketing areas in which Aidan is choosing to invest his time and money into. And we also talk business advice for founders who are in the early stages of building their brand.

This interview was one of the most insightful conversations I have ever had with another business founder. And this episode will be the most valuable episode that you listen to all year.

From team to marketing and lessons in business, this conversation has it

So let’s dive in and pour it out.

Rachel (01:40)
So Aidan, tell me why diatetics for you.

Aidan (01:44)
So there’s a few reasons. I was always interested in like sports and nutrition and stuff like that, training when I was younger. I was a pretty skinny kid and I thought the answer to all my problems was getting jacked. Like not joking, like I was like, this will help everything. And I just started like going to the gym and like reading about nutrition and training and stuff like that. And I got really into it partly because I didn’t get good results from the gym. So I’m like, what am I doing wrong? Like what? It just kind of like made me a bit obsessed with it.

And then when I was like, well, what should I study at university? should be one of those two things. My parents vetoed exercise related stuff for a variety of reasons. So was like, I guess I’m doing nutrition. then obviously along the way I started to enjoy it. I’m like, this is what I want to do.

Rachel (02:25)
So when did you study dietetics?

Aidan (02:28)
I started in 2013, so straight out of high school.

Rachel (02:30)
Okay, so straight out of high school into the degree you studied, you graduate, then what happens next?

Aidan (02:37)
the first thing I did was I did start a business straight out of university. I wasn’t necessarily the plan, but there was a gym in Wagga Wagga where I studied that was looking for a dietician. And when I went for like the interview, they’re like, you’ll be a sole trader. Like you’ll be, it’s your own business in there. And it was just a good opportunity. So I’m like, I guess that’s what I’m going to go to.

Rachel (02:57)
And can we talk a little bit about that? How long did that business last?

Aidan (02:59)
Yeah.

Yeah, that’s a pretty cool part of the story. So it started, it lasted for about three months. I was in a time in my life where I read a lot of like self-development books and stuff like that. So it was pretty motivated. I worked pretty hard and I had a bit of belief before I went into that. That was like, Oh, if I just work really hard, things will work out. And some things did go good. Like I actually, one core part of that story is that I, I did like a Facebook boosted posts that was for a competition that went really well. Like I only put like $50 onto it and

It led to the equivalent of about 40 clients booking in at a discounted rate. So like that was one thing that was like, oh, there might be something here, but there was also a lot of stuff that like, I didn’t know how to do certain things. This is so dietitian specific, but it’s like, I had no idea how to like write a GP letter to, I didn’t like at the time in 2016 or 2017 it was, you’d still send faxes to GP clinics. And I was like, I didn’t know how to like, and so it was clear that there was a lot I had to learn. I did.

Rachel (03:31)
Wow.

Well, yeah.

Aidan (03:57)
realize I need to go work for somebody else. Even if the goal was to build my own business, I still needed to work for somebody else to like learn those types of things.

Rachel (04:03)
It’s good to talk about this stuff because I think regardless of, you know, what profession you work in listening to this, that is a common path. Many graduate, they go straight into running their own business. Some succeed, some have a similar experience to yourself and thinking, wow, okay, there’s a lot that I don’t know. That’s obviously your experience of the business last three months. Where does ideal nutrition fit into this picture?

Aidan (04:27)
So that was called Ideal Nutrition and I started the Instagram then as well and I didn’t want to be the face of a brand or anything at that time. So like the Instagram was called Ideal Nutrition. And when I went and worked for other people, I kind of kept that alive in the background. Like I kept like doing blog stuff and I kept doing Instagram stuff, but I wasn’t seeing clients through Ideal Nutrition. I maybe for like around two years into working for other people, was kind of like…

Maybe this is just what I’ll do. Like I’ll just work for other people and I’ll never revive ideal nutrition. And then just towards the back end of working for other people, was like, I’ll keep it alive in case I want to do stuff with this down the line. And obviously that has changed as we’ve gone from there. And now that’s what I do.

Rachel (05:08)
Yeah, well, my gosh. Okay, I’ve learned something new. So you make the decision to revive ideal nutrition. What did the early days look like for you?

Aidan (05:18)
So the early days of the revived ideal nutrition were a really interesting mix because I had put so much work into working for other people that I definitely wasn’t burnt out because I have pretty strong boundaries. I care about training nutrition, sleep, and like I care about them so much. I’m not going to, I’m not going to sacrifice them. So it wasn’t burnt out, but I was like, I do want to rebalance my life a little bit. I want to have some hobbies. Like I play guitar and stuff like that. Like I was like, I just want to like rebalance my life a little bit. So I didn’t work that hard.

the second time around at the start. Like I genuinely worked about 20 hours per week for a period of time. Cause I was kind of like as a business owner, it’s very arbitrary how many hours you work. Like once you’re earning a decent income, like every business owner says they’re busy, but it’s like, once you’re owning a decent income, you don’t need to be busy. don’t know. That’s my, that’s my own two cents. So I was trying to see it was like, what actually makes me the happiest. And I worked about 20 hours per week and it was, it was growing. Okay. It was going okay. But I, thing that got to me a little bit was I wasn’t as satisfied.

working only 20 hours per week. And I think the sweet spot for me is a little bit, a little bit above 40 hours per week. So I started off slow.

I left all my clients behind when I started a second time around and I had about 3000 followers on Instagram. Nobody had booked in with me through Instagram at that time. But when I left that job, I put up a post saying I was leaving and I’d be open to taking on some clients while I plan my next move.

I can’t remember how many people booked in.

But do remember the feeling when the first person booked in and I was like, I’m not an emotional person, but I swear I almost cried. I’m like, this is incredible. This is so good. Yeah.

Rachel (06:45)
Yes, I did it.

That’s awesome. Okay, so you were on Instagram. What else were you doing to market the business?

Aidan (06:53)
Instagram was the big thing. And I’d kind of come to the conclusion that I really benefit from just focusing on a few things. So was like, I’m just going to focus on Instagram and a few other things and seeing clients. Because I think the mistake I made the first time around was I was trying to do everything like I was trying to figure out how to like, run a website, start a website, build a website, do blog stuff, be in person network with people learn how to be a dietitian, see client, I was trying to do like so many things all at once. And the second time around, I just had so much more patience. I was like, I’m just going to do Instagram.

I’m just going to see clients and the combo with marketing. That’s something that I don’t think anyone would know unless they’ve asked this question was yes, Instagram was the thing that was generating clients for me. But early on, one of the biggest underrated things was the combination of Instagram and in person where the little hack that I tell everybody is that, dietitians and health professionals are typically just followed by other dietitians and health professionals on Instagram. And the hack that I found to get outside of that

is identifying a niche. So I’m pretty well known for like not having a very targeted niche. But one of my niches is powerlifters. I just like powerlifting. So like I followed every powerlifting gym in Brisbane, and then eventually in Australia on Instagram. And I was looking at who was like engaging with their posts. And I was like following them because powerlifters like, if they’re not on private with their Instagram, they don’t mind being followed. Like they’re trying to build a little athlete profile. And I would engage with them a little bit. But then

When I would go to a powerlifting gym in Brisbane, people would already know who I was because they’d seen me on Instagram and they’d start a conversation. And then I was picking up clients through that type of stuff.

Rachel (08:27)
Super clever. love this. I said to you before we started recording, I’m so excited to talk to you because I know you have such a great marketing brain and I just feel like this episode is going to offer so much value to people already with that great little hack there making yourself known within a specific niche of the industry. have to ask you, it seems like you had a far more relaxed approach to

revived ideal nutrition. Why do you think you felt so much more relaxed and I kind of get a sense that’s a little bit like nonchalant about the business.

Aidan (09:04)
I think it was because I was so much more ambitious the first time around and not really that ambitious the second time around. Like it’s kind of crazy how it has worked out now in 2025 versus when I did start things in the second time around in 2019. I’m not proud of this, but something that I thought that like the first time around was I thought I was going to try and build the biggest artisan business in Australia. I think that stems from the self-development books I read, to be honest. And then I worked for a company that

did that, like they did build the biggest diet. And there was many things about that, that I was like, it’s just not what I want to do. Like I, this is going to be the smallest example, but the boss would travel all across Australia to see all the different dietitians and do some in person stuff with them, which is kind of what you probably, I don’t know. It’s, it’s, we’ve got online stuff, but like, it’s probably something that you should do. And me, I’m like, I just like my routine. Like I like playing basketball every week. I don’t want to travel like for work related reasons all the time.

So the second time around, I was like, what do I actually want? was like, I want to make a decent income doing things that I enjoy. And because that was all my goal was at the start, it was very easy to be nonchalant because it’s like I could be like 25 % of as effective as I could be, and I’ll still get what I want out of this. So that’s why I was so laid back the second time around.

Rachel (10:14)
I think there’s a huge lesson in that, because what I’m hearing from you is that you were a lot more sure in yourself, what you wanted for your future, what you wanted the business to be like, as opposed to maybe building something based on comparison or what you think you should have or what you think the business should be. And when you are so, I suppose, firm in your beliefs and what you’re building, that really does

Aidan (10:21)
Yeah.

Rachel (10:42)
guide everything that you do. What does ideal nutrition look like today?

Aidan (10:47)
So we have a team, if you count me, we have a team of 11 dieticians who are all full time. One’s part time, but they work for the Dexer business that I have on the side as well. And then we have an intern as well.

Rachel (10:59)
Wow, okay. And when did you hire your first team member?

Aidan (11:03)
So 2020, so I hired Tyler June, 2020. The funny part of that story is it was like, I think I hired too soon. Tyler is a very good dietician, but it wasn’t like I had an overflow of work. Like I basically waited until I had just enough money coming in to tick the box for what I needed to be happy and comfortable. And then instantly I was like, okay, I’m just going to hire somebody. I hired him 10 hours a week as an intern and then very quickly transitioned him to full time seeing clients. like,

We didn’t really have the client load for him yet at that time.

Rachel (11:35)
can I ask what prompted you to hire was that a I should hire this is the next step if you felt like you didn’t have the load there or.

Aidan (11:44)
I saw things were growing, one, one little thing that I don’t think I identified as clearly then, but it’s so clear to me now. There’s definitely things that I’m personally lacking in my abilities. One of the ones that it won’t be super clear on social media, but like, I can’t design stuff. I can’t do infographics carousels.

This is not me downplaying it like every now and then like I actually have a crack at it and I don’t know if people can see like how much worse money is than other people. So like I need I need a team around me to kind of help. So like I’ll write every word of my infographics and carousels, but somebody else puts together with like videos when I do videos, I’m not the one editing it somebody else’s editing it. like originally the 10 hours per week for Tyler was like help with that type of stuff for me.

Rachel (12:08)
Hahaha

I see. Okay. And what role has team played in building your brand?

Aidan (12:32)
Yeah, this is going to be the key part about how the business works. every single dietitian who works for ideal nutrition has their own personal brand on Instagram. I checked the stats yesterday in preparation for this. So I’ve got 81,000 followers as a team. have over 200,000 followers when you combine everybody on Instagram, when you combine everybody’s profiles and every year my percentage gets smaller out of that total. And there are a lot of

people who book in with Ideal Nutrition who don’t even know who I am because they followed an individual dietitian from the team.

Rachel (13:03)
Amazing. So anyone who isn’t familiar with Aidan’s business, I having studied dietetics have sort of been aware of your brand, seen you online for many, many years. And something that has always stood out to me is that staff turnover in the industry within businesses is really high. However, with your business,

Your guys seem to hang around for a long time. What are you doing in your business to keep your stuff engaged? Cause there’s something going on here that I think so many other business owners could learn here.

Aidan (13:42)
for the full context on for anyone listening, we we’ve had one person leave since I first started hiring in 2020. And the reason for that is like, she’s just a very different personality. She’s somebody who needs to run her own business and she’s very driven and she’s succeeding. But everyone else has stayed. So what’s different? So the first thing I was a little bit concerned that I swung the pendulum too far after working for somebody else. The people I worked for, like they did some things that I don’t know. I was like, Oh, if I just do the opposite of those things.

people will stay longer. like, I did I did learn a little bit from that. But what am I actually doing? So I’ve got three core things that work really well short term. One is I try to pay people well, that is flawed longer term, because I genuinely believe a lot of people who work for me could walk out and start their own business and eventually earn more money. So it’s like that works really great short term, but it doesn’t solve everything long term. I provide mentorship, I’m an open book, I’ll tell people everything I know, whether they’re working for me or whether they’re not, I’ll give everything away.

but that therefore means if somebody has been around me for 12 to 24 months, they’ve got everything from me. So the first 12 to 24 months, they’ll be really good for attention. But after that, it’s not really that great. I’ll try and generate clients for them where I can, or I’ll try to set the business up in a way. So even if it’s not me generating it, the business is generating clients for them. But once people are succeeding, they could fill out their own workload themselves. Like there’s the people who’ve been with us for like three plus years.

If they left, they’d have, they’d have a full workload by themselves. So like this stuff keeps people for like maybe two or three years. The biggest problem I was trying to solve for longer term is one of these is a bit out of my control. The other one is in my control. The first one was community. So early on I was like, this was actually something that made me rush a little bit more to grow a bigger team was dietitians like being around other dietitians and they enjoy that. And I’m very fortunate that dietitians like other dietitians, which therefore means like now that we’ve got like a team of

like say 11 dietitians, if somebody left, they might feel a bit isolated working for themselves. So like even if they made more money or whatever, they’d be isolated. I’m a little bit less in control of that because I can’t control with people. But that’s worked out really well for ideal nutrition. And the other one is and I came to this conclusion about two, maybe three years ago, trying to set things up so that I really help people succeed on social media in ways like we have

Sophie on our team who’s head of social media marketing. She’s always giving people feedback and stuff like that, but she’s also like doubling as a videographer. So if they want a videographer to film videos, she’s there. We have Monica on our team who does graphic design type stuff. She’s the person who designs most of my Instagram posts. Originally, I just had people designing stuff for me, but now it’s like, no, anyone on our team can use Monica to design it. So if people were to leave, they no longer have access to it. I’m not trying to set it up so that like people can’t leave or anything like that.

But it is like, how good can we make it here? Like that’s what I’ve been trying to work towards.

Rachel (16:29)
Wow, that is incredible. And that is really clever because inherently people are going to be motivated by different things. Some people are motivated by money, some motivated by purpose. And, you know, they want to really enjoy going to their workplace every day. In implementing all these different strategies within your business model, you really are safeguarding the business. Something else that you haven’t mentioned yet that you did

let me know before we started recording is that you pay your staff to spend time on building their personal brands on social media.

Aidan (17:07)
Yeah, 100%. And I don’t think anyone else is doing this in the industry as far as I know.

Rachel (17:12)
have never heard of another business doing this. I think this is genius. I think that a lot of business owners will be listening to this episode and I feel would view their staff as having their own personal brand as being a threat to their business. Why do you view it differently?

Aidan (17:31)
So that partly started with the pendulum swing. So it started with the fact that at the job that I used to work at, any dietician who had a personal brand, it was kind of shut down by the boss indirectly. He never said you can’t do it. He would just do things to try and force you to stop. Example, every time I would make a post, would be in my DMs, criticizing me, like not joking. And I’m just lucky that I’ve got the audacity to just like, I don’t know, I’m gonna keep going.

I saw everyone else around me stop doing it. I remember how that felt. And I remember when I first hired people who had their own personal brands, I was like, well, I don’t want to do that. Let’s just start with that. Like that’s the first thing. But then the next thing that’s very obvious is it obviously helps grow the business. Like we’re generating clients. Like I literally said earlier, there’s people who book in with us who have no idea who I am because of those personal brands. So it definitely helps grows, grow the business. One of the obvious threats and why,

the boss I worked for and other people try to shut it down is because if you succeed with your personal brand, you could just leave, which was the thing that I kind of just talked about. And I agree, but I, if somebody were to leave ideal nutrition, I’m going to support them.

I’ve made it very clear. I’m not going to sue anyone if they steal clients or anything like that, which once again, other people, other business owners could think I’m silly for that. And maybe they’re right. don’t care. I think me having this view low key has been one of the biggest factors for retention.

The fact that everybody knows that I’m trying to help build their social media, give them a platform. And if they ever choose to live down the line, I’ll help support them with their own business and everything like that. It makes them think that’s like, okay, I could leave now or I could leave in five years time. And if I left in five years time, I’m almost in a better position to start my own business than I am right now. Versus if I did the opposite of those things.

It’s almost like them like looking at being like, time slipping away. If I don’t start now, it’s harder in the future. I’ve wasted time like after start that rebuilding process. And when we think about like phases of life, it’s like, it’s a lot easier when you’re younger to just like take a risk on a business than it is when you’ve got a mortgage and stuff like that. So it’s like, okay, let’s do this now. It kind of pressures people to leaving if they feel trapped.

Rachel (19:31)
Mm, I just am so obsessed with this business model. I think it’s a genius and it’s very clear just from this conversation that you’re an open book and clearly very transparent when it comes to your staff and their career progression. it speaks volumes of your confidence in the brand that you’ve built in the environment that you have created within your business to, I suppose have that.

mentality and that approach towards it all. think, you know, touching on having your team and having their personal brands bringing business in, there’s a good sort of segue now to talking about marketing and what your business’s marketing strategy looks like. Can you speak a little bit more to that?

Aidan (20:17)
Yeah. So the biggest thing is Instagram. obviously do a lot of other things, but Instagram is the biggest, would say around 80 % of our clients come from Instagram, either directly through Instagram or somebody found us through Instagram. And then there was word of mouth or something like.

there’s a few things that I personally push. I do subscribe to the kind of give out as much free value as you can. know other people disagree with that, but it’s worked for me. So I’m just going to keep doing it. give out as much free value as we can. I have a bit of a rule that’s like, if I give out three things that people are implementing in their own life because of me, they’re probably more likely to book in with me. Like for example, if I recommend a supplement and then they start tanking it, they like,

linking that with me forever. And it probably like at some stages, just like, I’m already doing like these three things, like, what would I get out of a consult if I book in I do a bit of that, but then the other kind of missing link in a, a way is the positioning yourself as an expert thing. And this is something that has come a bit more naturally to me, just with the confidence and stuff like that. But like, I think if dietitians can do all of those other good things, like relatable content, stuff that gets engagement, stuff that does build a bit of growth over time.

trust from the audience and positions themselves as an expert. That is like the secret for getting people from Instagram. And if we, if we’re going like specific without, with our team from the outside looking in, you may or may not actually be able to pick who on our team gets the most clients based on their Instagram engagement. But the ones who get the most clients are the ones who do these two things. They position themselves as experts and they show a bit of personality as well.

Rachel (21:52)
Fascinating. on the topic of social media and specifically Instagram is something I’ve always wanted to ask you. I remember back in the day, and I can’t remember whether this was your personal brand or whether this was ideal nutrition, but you used to repost content from other people. Like that was your strategy. Was it completely reposting?

Aidan (22:09)
Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Completely reposting and giving credit to the authors. It’s definitely not something you can do now. Like there were people who did it at the time. And I think I might’ve done it a little bit longer after it was maybe acceptable to do. That really does stem from that thing I touched on before about my own limitations, about the fact that I can’t like, like if I was like reposting, like an infographic or carousel, it’s like, I just couldn’t create it myself. And then one day we got to the point where it’s like, we’ve got a team. Why don’t I do all this?

Rachel (22:20)
No.

Aidan (22:40)
in-house.

Rachel (22:40)
Okay. So can I ask you when you were reposting content, did that lead to inquiries? You felt that had the same effect in terms of building your authority and all those things that you just spoke to?

Aidan (22:54)
It’s really hard to say. don’t think so. like

I was definitely still reposting stuff at that time that I left and started my own business and the second time around. And I did get people booking in. like I did. I don’t think it’s as effective though.

Rachel (23:05)
Yeah, but anyone listening as well, reposting content on Instagram specifically,

I suppose it’s not allowed anymore when you do that Instagram sort of down play or deregulate the how many people they show you content to that is absolutely poor explanation. could not find my words, but essentially in their quest to support creators and make their platform a creator platform.

They want everyone to be sharing original content, which is why there’s now been this massive shift and less of those pages that are just, you know, re resharing content.

Aidan (23:38)
Yeah. I

also think when it was like ideal nutrition rather than a than the dietitian, it was easier for me to do that as well. I do have a funny, there was one person with over a million followers who I reposted his stuff heaps and gave him credit every single time. And he got in my DMs and just ripped into me like really hard. And he’s like, he’s a pretty well known person in the nutrition space. And I was like, damn, okay. And now I just like am off that guy forever.

Rachel (23:58)
you

Sure why do I feel like I know who that is anyway.

Aidan (24:09)
Yeah.

Rachel (24:11)
Speaking about social media you want any other social media platforms or is Instagram your main one.

Aidan (24:16)
Instagram

is the main one. we are on other stuff. So we do blog content. We do TikTok. We do podcast stuff. We technically do YouTube. don’t really, we just put podcast stuff up there. I technically have Twitter. I use threads occasionally. Like we’re trying to be on everything. as you can imagine, the biggest threats to the business. And this is so present for me because like we’re at this size now, like, and this is the thing I care about the most is what if Instagram declines? I know a lot of other people.

push email marketing. personally haven’t had much success with email marketing specifically. So that’s why I’m not personally pushing it. My thoughts is just, I need to stay up to date with things as they progress. For example, when I saw TikTok doing well, and I thought maybe TikTok is the next thing. It did not come naturally to me. I don’t think I’m good at TikTok. But I was like, I need to be doing that. I need to be on there. So I’ve got 10,000 followers on TikTok now. Even though it doesn’t come naturally to me, I don’t enjoy it and everything like that. Because I’m like, well, what if

I don’t keep up with trends. Like I think that’s the biggest safeguard. like, even though Instagram is clearly what’s working for us now, it makes sense for me to be on other platforms for that reason.

Rachel (25:21)
And I just think that’s so smart. You know, last year I went through a trademarking dispute with Instagram that I’ve spoken about publicly now. And that was a situation where I was in real danger of losing access to my accounts. And I talk about diversify your marketing channels, diversify your marketing channels. And even though I have email marketing and I do have other marketing channels, Instagram really still is the best performing.

Aidan (25:36)
Yeah.

Rachel (25:50)
platform for me and I attribute that to, you know, having been on the platform for such a long time and really, building my brand there, but it really is so important, particularly as you save 80 % of, you know, client referrals are coming through that platform, jumping on other channels. I know you’ve got your podcasts, but also you’ve got the safeguard of your team really as well. If we think about the business, each of your team also have their own platforms.

on other social media channels as well. And that brings relevancy too, which is quite clever.

Aidan (26:21)
Let’s talk about challenge of that as well. So I heard this story a long time ago about Facebook when Mark Zuckerberg identified that phones were like the next thing is like, need, he was like, we need to be putting our focus on the app, not the browser version. And he found it so hard to get his developers to switch to app first that he set a rule being like everything we program has to be app first. can’t be for the browser first, just cause everyone was kind of like set in their ways.

I do find that challenge to a degree with, with ideal nutrition where let’s say TikTok actually was the next thing and Instagram was declining. TikTok was on the up swing as an example. It is actually pretty hard for me to get everyone to shift their own individual brands over to their partly because things are working well and stuff like that. It would require a lot of trust on their behalf for them to be like, no, Aidan’s right. Let’s go and do this.

So like that is a challenge I foresee if something else does take off even more in Instagram.

Rachel (27:17)
a good point and even just considering the logistics

everyone has only a set number of hours in their day and you know you do really favor the channels where you’re seeing results it’s certainly less desirable to be spending a couple hours a week on a platform that doesn’t necessarily generate any momentum for you right now but it’s more of a long-term game isn’t it

Aidan (27:39)
Yeah.

It’s also humbling as well. the more you’ve succeeded on one when you start on a new one, like it is humbling.

Rachel (27:47)
I’ve just started on TikTok and literally I shared a video that had I think nearly like 10,000 views on Instagram, which is pretty good for me and my page literally two views, two views on TikTok.

Aidan (28:02)
That’s crazy.

That’s crazy. That actually is crazy. I find for me, it’s an interesting kind of testing ground in that my good videos or what I would consider to be a good video for me go better on tick tock and my bad videos and what I’d consider to be bad for me go worse on tick tock. For example, I’ve got a video on tick tock recently that has a hundred thousand views and another one with 1000 views on Instagram, the hundred thousand view has 50,000.

And then the 1000 view would have like 30,000. So it’s like, I think it’s just cause it’s like that more like people trust me more on Instagram and they’ll watch whatever I put out to a greater degree. Whereas TikTok, the algorithm picks up very quickly. No one cares about this. Like let’s not shut this tape’s faithful.

Rachel (28:43)
fascinating. I would love to dive into the data sort of looking at content performance on either or I’m certainly learning that myself. Can I ask, I’m going to get a little bit pervy now, but where do you choose to spend most of your money in the context of marketing?

Aidan (29:02)
Yeah, for sure. And obviously I’m super open to sharing this. like the first one is because I do pay staff to do social media stuff. It’s harder for me to track this because it’s like, I don’t know how many hours they spend exactly on this, but instantly that’s hundreds of thousands of dollars going straight to like those people building their personal brands. Like you can do the maths on that and be like, that’s good. It’s got to be in the hundreds of thousands. I do a tiny, tiny bit of boosted posts on Instagram, but like that’s nothing crazy. Like it.

I would say I’ve spent about $10,000 over the years on boosted posts. We don’t do Instagram ads yet, but we probably should. And we do have plans to implement that probably this year. the pro tip for anyone listening is what we will probably do is get a lead magnet, do the ad against the lead magnet that leads into an auto generated email sequence leading to consults. Like that would be the plan, but the

Other stuff we do is I pay for Sophie to be head of social media and marketing. So technically she, she sees clients one day a week and then four days of her role is focused on social media and marketing. So that’s another expense. The design stuff I spoke about, I, a little part of me trying to make the environment as good as possible. If any staff member wants equipment, I’ll pay for it. Like if they want a mic, I’ll pay for it. If they want lighting, I’ll pay for it.

And that’s such a tiny expense in the grand scheme of things, but I think it matters. It also improves our quality. then Google ads is something I’m a little undecided on and we’ve played with it on and off over the years. And this year we’ve, we’ve started spending a lot of money on it and we’re tracking the conversions and it’s, it’s at a point where it’s like, maybe this is profitable. Maybe it’s not, but we’re spending so much money on it. That it’s like, even this is the best decision I’ve ever made.

or it’s a terrible decision and we’ll find out in like six months time.

Rachel (30:49)
going to ask what your page marketing strategies look like. I know a lot of businesses do invest into Google ads with mixed results. How long did you say you’ve been spending on that for?

Aidan (31:00)
So I feel like probably like four or five years I’ve been doing it on and off just with smaller budgets and stuff like that, like often like $30 a day type thing. But yeah, we’re going a lot more than that right now. And it’s generating over a client per day right now for context. that’s why you can see what and we’re not perfectly tracking conversions. I suppose that’s too deep for this podcast, but we’re tracking it enough to be like, I think, and we also don’t know for sure what our cost of acquisition is because we

or what we can acquire a client for profitably, because it really depends on the retention of a client. And we have got stats on what our retention of clients is. But those stats are skewed by Instagram. Instagram clients are really good clients. They’re bought in, they’ve seen our content, they’ve decided whether they want to see us first. A Google Ads client, they know nothing about us. They could have completely different views on nutrition. So we don’t really know what our retention rates are like with those people yet.

Rachel (31:53)
that is a really interesting conversation to have right there around the quality of leads you get from different channels because that is something that has been proven to me over and over again, that the quality of lead you acquire from social media is of higher value than others

Aidan (32:13)
so much higher.

Yeah, let’s even talk about that from the staff retention standpoint. like, in previous jobs, I myself found many clients coming to see me who like weren’t even really sold on seeing a dietitian let alone seeing me I would almost have to convince them why I’m worth listening to somebody who finds me through social media I never have to do that they’ve already made the decision they already trust me and

I personally find that so much more enjoyable and it gives you so much more job satisfaction as well like it’s so much more enjoyable working with somebody who wants to work with you than somebody who doesn’t even really know who you are And I make a few decisions with staff related stuff about like, sometimes we get opportunities, like as everyone knows, like in the health space NDIS is huge right now. And every now and then like some NDIS related opportunity will come across my desk. I’m like, do I want to pursue that? Cause it’s like, either it doesn’t really lead to something or it does.

But if it does, do I now have a staff member who was getting really good quality clients from Instagram now working in a space that is great for some people, but maybe it’s not for that person. So it’s like, maybe we make some money, but maybe that increases staff turnover as well. Like I do really care about the quality of client, both in terms of retention, but also is this enjoyable for me and staff as well.

Rachel (33:22)
Mm.

That’s fascinating. You know, I’m recording another podcast episode this afternoon. And one of the things that we’re going to be talking about is whether or not brands can survive without social media. The thought wave there is without social media, do you have brand relevance? And it’s very obvious that your business has really been built and relies on that brand relevance, relies on that

presence online, you could easily pivot, but it works so well for your business model. And it’s just so unique. It’s fascinating.

Aidan (34:05)
Yeah. I don’t think I’ve innovated on that many things, those things clearly are important. Like they clearly matter to me.

Rachel (34:12)
Absolutely.

I would love to sort of dive into some reflections and perhaps advice for any listeners. I often think that sometimes when I listen to podcasts and I hear the story of other business owners building their brands, sometimes the strategies maybe aren’t as relevant to what would work today. I know we spoke about the thing with Instagram, you

wouldn’t create and build a brand around resharing other people’s content. Now, if you were starting today, how would you approach building a new brand?

Aidan (34:36)
No.

I have thought about this a lot. So the first thing that I personally would do, and I don’t think this is as relevant for other people is I would try to get enough income doing whatever it kind of takes getting clients, whether it’s through Instagram, whether it’s through in person, like whatever it is, I would try to get enough income to tick that box of like, okay, this is enough to make me happy. Then part two would be I would hire somebody 10 hours per week to help me with the stuff that I’m not good at. And I’m so sold on that, that like that is 100 % what I would do.

because 10 hours per week, it’s not that much money, but it would allow me to narrow my focus so much more on the things that grow the business. that is what I do. I would focus on Instagram. If I had to do this again, I would focus on Instagram. If I moved into any other space, like if I wasn’t a dietitian, like any other space, I would be doing Instagram. Like if I was a physio, I would be doing Instagram. And then I would still do that thing of trying to combine it with in-person stuff.

There’s another thing that I haven’t touched on that is a little secret that had for getting clients to myself. And this is what I would do if I was starting again. I personally see other health professionals myself whenever it is relevant for myself. For example, if I had a knee injury, I’m going to go see a physio or I might see an exercise physiologist. that is partly personal, but it’s also a business like networking kind of thing. And I will see those professionals for like six months and then move on to the next one.

Because if they’re referring to me after that six month period, sick, I’ve got that connection. I’ll keep that forever. If they’re not referring to me, they’re never going to. And my logic as well is I’m probably with them for 30 to 60 minutes once a week, once a fortnight or whatever for that six month period. it gives them a lot of time. Like I’m not even trying to sell myself, but at some stage they’re going to be like, what are you doing today? And I’ll mention how I’m posting on Instagram or whatever. And then they’ll follow my Instagram and then they’ll see all the nutrition content. And it often leads to stuff from.

Rachel (36:27)
so clever. feel like networking, strategic networking has been something I feel that’s played well

that’s yeah such a great tip for anyone listening. Is there anything that you would do differently?

Aidan (36:39)
I would have hired slower and this is just like a profitability thing. Just being like, there were probably two times where I made mistakes One was I hired Tyler too early. I’m sure if I spoke to him, he’d be fine. That like, knows, he knows the back of business. I hired too early. I probably would just waited longer because it’s like

why did I wait until exactly the moment I had just enough money to be happy? why didn’t I wait until I had like, let’s say 30,000 a year on top of that or 40,000 or 50,000 I could just wait longer and just made more money the second one was there was a year that I project we were growing at over 100 % per year we’re doubling every year and there was a year that I projected doubling again, and we didn’t double again like, we had like 60 % growth instead of a hundred percent, but I hired as if we were going to get 100 % growth. So.

Once again, I would have hired a bit slower with that.

Rachel (37:29)
I feel like that is a very easy mistake to make based on past performance. You definitely had the data there to forecast that you could potentially grow, but yeah, I’m sure there’ll be a lot of people listening, kind of nodding their heads in the relatability of that piece of advice there.

Aidan (37:40)
Yeah.

Rachel (37:47)
what is the best piece of business advice that you have ever been given?

Aidan (37:52)
If we’ve got time, I might share a few. like the first time around in business, the gym that I worked out of the business owner, such a funny guy, like could not string a sentence together over a text message. Like just could like, I don’t know, it was not smart in that way, but was just a genius when it came to understanding people. He built a gym that had 3000 members in Wagga Wagga, which is a town of 60,000 people. And you’re like, how’d you get 3000 people to sign up to a gym in a town that only has 60,000? But he gave me a few pieces of advice.

One of them was related to that free content thing. He was just like, and I would never use these words. He was a much more blunt person than myself, but he said, you can give out all the free information in the world and people will still want their hand to be held. How I would reframe that is I can give out everything I know about nutrition on Instagram, but I can’t do an individualized plan on Instagram. I physically can’t. So if somebody wants to see me for accountability in an individualized plan, that’s what I’m selling. And it’s different to the free content that I put out.

And that’s obviously worked well for me. The second thing was he was really big on just like getting out on the gym floor and speaking to people in person. that isn’t something that necessarily comes naturally to me, but like every time I’ve done it, it’s worked. So like, it’s a really good business piece of advice. And that could be relatable to different industries in different ways. And the third one that he, the first time I saw a client, so he’s not a dietitian, he knew nothing about this.

First time I saw a client, saw that client and I booked them in for one month later and I was not going to speak to them between consults. And he was just in my ear being like, you should send him a text, just check in to see how it’s going. And I didn’t take that advice too seriously at the time, but that is what I do now. Like as busy as I am right now, if I see a client on Thursday, Monday, the next week, I’m sending him a message as being like, Hey, just checking in to see if you started the plan, seeing questions, how things are going, just because it kind of shows that I care. And I think that massively helps retention.

So those are three things I got from him. And then obviously I can see my business content.

I’ll share one more thing. And actually two things. One, one was I’ve seen a business person talking about how like everyone talks about how deep work is really hard when you’ve got all these distractions and stuff like that. Kind of made a point that like, if you can set your schedule up so that you can have X amount of time, let’s say two hours, four hours or whatever each day or each week to just be alone.

Rachel (39:52)
Go for it.

Aidan (40:12)
We have a laptop or whatever emails closed phone away all these things and work on deep related content that moves the business forward. The more of that time you can have probably the better. And because I’m somebody who’s pretty easily distracted, it’s really hard for me to create that time. But every time I do that, things go better. So it’s like, that’s a really good piece of advice. And I’ve also heard people say if you have a business that’s making less than like $3 million a year, you should probably try to spend like four hours a day promoting that business.

Like obviously make a good product, make a good whatever, but like, it’s not like churn and retention stuff like that is the issue. People just don’t know about your service or they’re not getting in. I think you should do all of those things, but I like that like four hours of the day. Cause it’s like, I’m not personally going to do that, but I’m like, my business would be bigger if I did. tell you what.

Rachel (40:59)
That’s such good advice, you know, spanning from, I suppose, tips and advice around client retention, because I think that’s a huge mystery of opportunity for a lot of business owners. And as you say, the impact of a simple hello and conversation or check-in can be monumental in terms of, you know, keeping people in your business. But yeah, I think a really good reminder to always be

speaking about what you do and how you can help people. I, that even resonates with, with myself. don’t nearly do enough promotion of my services. So yeah, such wonderful advice.

Aidan (41:38)
Yeah, awesome. Thanks so much.

Rachel (41:40)
Amazing. Thank you so much, Aidan. This has been such an incredible conversation and I can’t wait to share it.

Aidan (41:46)
Cheers, thanks for having me on.