Julie Mel Cooper on Trading in Corporate Life for Internet Marketing
Julie Mel Cooper was a Finance Manager when she was found redundant after her second child. She then discovered network marketing. Her powerful story and exclusive interview are below.
Thanks so much for this interview, Julie! I have been aware of your blog for some time and excited to learn more about you. So, let’s get started!
Where were you born and raised, what was childhood like, and what did you want to become when you grew up?
I was born in France, in Normandie. A beautiful region in the North West of France. This part of the country is well known overseas from being the place where D-Day happened during the 2nd world war.
When I talk about where I come from, I prefer to refer to the yummy specialty cheeses enjoyed all around the world such as Camembert, Livarot and Pont l’Eveque (all named after the town they originated), the Apple Cider and the Calvados (only for big boys…).
We lived on the coast until I was 11, before moving about 40 km inland to a small town called Saint Pierre Sur Dives where my parents bought their first house.
My parents were working very hard and did the best they could to give us a good life. My young brother and I had a modest upbringing, but my parents sacrificed a lot to send us to private school as they believed it was the best education and wanted us to have the best chances in life.
My childhood was challenging in many aspects, I am a survivor of childhood sexual abuse and bullying, but despite the scars and the challenges, I have always believed that I could get through anything.
I was all over the place, my emotions were like a roller coaster, but somehow I have always raised back up. I am so grateful I had this strength in me.
I believe that every part of my journey was meant to be, it got me where I am now, my life is full of blessings and I am living a better life than the vast majority of the world. And for that, I am grateful.
I had many dreams as a child; I was passionate about horses and music! Weird combo, right? I would spend hours rehearsing my first big concert every night before falling asleep; I was imagining that I was filling up the biggest stages all around the world.
At school, I loved my music lessons; I even was quite good at it. Sadly, my parents did not have the means to offer us extra curriculum activities, and I never had the opportunity to learn music and to sing as I wished.
The closest I got from my dream career was as a waitress in karaoke restaurant in Paris. I did get on a stage singing in front of people… not all bad after all.
My love for the spotlight never left me, though, at the age of 16, I started to do some modelling locally and did a few catwalks. At 18, I began to do pageants and won 3 regional titles.
In December 2000, I participated in the National Pageant Miss France, the pageant was a national phenomenon, watched by the whole country on national TV. It was an amazing experience.
I then moved to Paris, going from model agency to the next, only to be told I was too ordinary, that my eyes were too small or that I was too curvy… I dropped out of university and started doing small jobs to survive.
After 3 years, I began to become sick from malnutrition and depression. I gave up on my dreams and went back to my parents to resume unity and do what I was expected to do… fit the mold.
About 3 years later, I obtained my bachelor degrees. I felt like I had to go away and leave everything behind for a while. I needed to break free from the past and give myself the best chance for a happy life.
I arrived in Sydney in September 2006, initially for only a year, but never left… I met my husband and settled in this beautiful part of the world.
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What did your parents do for a living, and was there any Entrepreneurship in the family?
My dad had his own business, he had a garage near Cabourg. He was working tirelessly, every day until late in the evenings and weekends. My mum was helping him. Luckily enough, our house was adjacent from my dad’s garage, so we were always with them. I have great memories of taking the bolts off car engines or filling up the local mopeds with petrol… hours of fun.
When I was in primary school, my mum took a job. She was working for a company who rented videos to small retailers (remember the old VHS tape?) Her employers, own a stud farm where they were breeding race horses. Mum was allowed to take us there on Wednesdays when we were not at school; this was heaven 🙂
My dad sold his business after years of struggles and went back to the workforce; it was a difficult time for him and our family. I didn’t have much belief in entrepreneurship after all this… Little did I know how much this would change.
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How did you get into Finance, and what was life like then?
I got into finance in high school; I was a very unsettled teenager, I was bullied at school and was leaving in a continuous state of anxiety and stress. My academic results became quite bad.
During my second last year of high school, we had the option to pick a professional major, and I choose accounting as I wasn’t inspired by anything else. It turned out I was excellent at this, I gained a bit more confidence, my results improved a lot, and I passed all my exams without any problems.
I knew this was not and would never be my passion, but I grew up with the belief that I had be successful in a corporate job and make a good salary to be completely independent.
On many occasions, I tried to do something different and failed over and over… I tried modelling, real estate, sales… I always ended back taking a finance job… Why? I was a quitter… I was terrified of being rejected and fail. I would always retreat to safety as soon as I felt I wasn’t doing well enough to impress.
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When and how did you discover network marketing, and what were your first two years like?
Oddly enough, given my background, Network Marketing and entrepreneurship was a rather bold choice of career. Entrepreneurship requires the exact opposite mindset and stamina than the one I had.
I even believe this is probably why my husband has tried to dissuade me from the start. For him it was just something else I was going to start and not finish, and he wanted to protect me from being disappointed in myself again. It was fair enough!
When I first arrived to Australia, I wasn’t speaking much English at all. Three years after, I managed to get a job as a Finance Manager in a telecommunication company! I had so little belief in myself that I never understood how I got the job… I felt like a fraud for the 5 years I worked there.
That level of insecurity made me very anxious and defensive; I was working around the clock, going above and beyond all the time, always worrying that if I didn’t prove I was worthy of the job I would get caught out… Crazy right? I was a nightmare to work with. Needless to say, I wasn’t feeling fulfilled in my career choice.
Then my world got a lot brighter; I felt pregnant with my first baby! From that moment, I knew things had to change… I started to search for an opportunity to work from home. I knew nothing about the industry at all, and I was very skeptical.
Lilou was born in March 2013; I went back to work after 6 months with her at home. I wasn’t happy; I was missing my baby. Then I felt pregnant again with my second little girl Roxane. She was a beautiful and surprise!
Then 20 weeks into my pregnancy, my position was made redundant! For someone with such a deep fear of rejection like me, this was just hell to get laid off!
It took me awhile to get over this, but I knew I was never going to go through this again!
When Roxane was 10 months old, I started my journey as an online entrepreneur and joined my first network marketing opportunity. This was in July 2015.
I didn’t have much success in the first year, my mindset wasn’t right., my fears were holding me back, and I wasn’t doing the work.
But I had made the decision that I wasn’t going to quit; there were no turning back this time. So I started to look at what the big players outside my primary company were doing and try to figure out how I could make this work for myself.
What was the biggest lesson you learned, and what is the best advice you have for new marketers?
We should never compare ourselves to others! break through “the best way to kill your business in the bud!”
Everyone has a very different background and circumstances.
If a beauty therapist joins a skincare company, of course she will be able to get more exposure for her products than her teammate who is a a taxi driver for example. Does this mean only beauty therapist should join this company? of course not…
What people don’t understand when they first start (and I was the same) is that we are all unique and our story, our beliefs and core value is what will attract the right people to us.
There is a big misconception that everyone who breathes is a prospect. This is a big mistake. Network marketers should be finding a small niche to SERVE well.
I believe It all comes down to having a vision for yourself and knowing who you want to help and serve.
Our vision should not be our network marketing company’s vision… you need your own, and it has to be a lot deeper than your why!
Ask yourself who you want to become and how you are going to make a positive impact on the world. Your vision must be bigger than yourself!
Having a strong vision will keep you on track, eliminate the need to compare yourself to others and give yourself the confidence that you are doing the right thing, you will feel good because what you do is aligned with your core values.
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You were turned off by the “Home Party Plan” of your previous MLM. What system did you find that implemented Attraction Marketing?
The company I joined was one of the first to promote their products using “virtual parties”, and therefore consultants didn’t have to do the traditional “home party”. I wasn’t exactly turned off by it, once again I just didn’t have the right mindset at the time and the confidence.
The good thing is that the first skill I had to master was video… Having to do online parties, meant that I had to do video tutorials and demonstrations… This was an amazing skill to learn and one that is still key in my marketing today.
I failed with this company because I wasn’t ready, I had a lot of personal development to do.
Then I found an online marketing education platform where I learnt all about attraction marketing and this was when a shift started to happen for me.
I learnt that attraction marketing was a bit more than a few exaggerated lifestyle post showing me working in my bikini at a pool that isn’t even mine… an idyllic snapshot taken between screaming kids and me feeling sorry for myself because my current online party as Zero engagement…
Attraction Marketing is all about Value! Attraction Marketing is providing value to the people who already want what you have to offer. If you come from a place of service and are willing to give more than you receive… you will win the game online!
The mindset mentoring from this system has been amazing for me and I came a long way since I was introduced to the platform.
I quickly started to work on my blog, learning how to design and build it, create capture pages and most importantly… starting to publish my own blog posts.
My second marketing strategy was video. I always did video marketing, so it made sense for me to keep going with videos. It is the quickest way to create rapport with your audience.
Even if you feel no one is engaging with your video, if they see you everywhere on social media, providing value… they will remember you! People are watching, and when the time is right for them, they will show up!
I love your blog! When did you start blogging, how many posts are on your blog, and what is your traffic like?
Thank you, Erik! My Blog is still in its infancy stage. I have just under 20 blog posts. Because my blog is still newish, I don’t drive a ton of traffic to it but, it is building up and generates leads for me. I have been working on my brand over the last few weeks and narrow down my target market and how I want to serve them.
My blog will evolve a lot over the next 12 months as I will be focusing on coaching women entrepreneurs and help them to break through and find their own voice online. I am passionate about personal branding and women empowerment.
My own experience taught me that adversities can create fears that will hold us back and prevent success. But, when you breakthrough these fears, these same adversities can become your unique blueprint and your biggest value to the world.
When people go from being victims to survivors and set themselves up to use their experience to help and empower others, beautiful things happen and the world becomes a better place, one person at the time.
This is an aspect that I want to bring to Personal Branding for women entrepreneurs as I believe it can really help women create success, not only for themselves but for all the people they will be mentoring as well.
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What are the 3 obstacles for starting an MLM blog, and how do you overcome them?
Technology: Most people do not have the technical skills to build a blog, so they give up before they even started. My advice is to outsource this to someone who knows how to do it.
Some people love technologies and get a real kick out of designing and building blogs. You can always learn how to do it yourself, but unless you are planning to build blogs for others and create an additional source of income from it, your time will be better spent doing activities that will build your business.
Self-Worth: This was a big one for me and I know this is common. People will often think, who am I to teach people about this when I am so new myself… but I came to realise that even the people I admire and follow have to overcome the same thing. It is a normal feeling.
What we need to acknowledge and dismiss is our self doubt. You don’t have to be an expert to deliver value to your audience, be the messenger and share what you learn. As you grow, you will develop your own expertise… in time.
Content creation: Another big obstacle is content creation, network marketers aren’t sure what to talk about. I learnt a very effective way to overcome this from Ray Higdon. He calls this ILT, Invest Learn & Teach. The idea is to invest either time or money into learning something new and then teach others what you learnt.
The truth is that in today’s day and age, there isn’t any original content… every topic under the sun has been covered in one way or another. But you can share your take of a topic you learnt and teach other about it.
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How has Facebook Live changed your marketing strategy, and what is the best techniques for Live video? Do they perform better on your fan page or personal profile?
l have always used videos so Facebook Live Broadcast were a normal evolution to my marketing strategy.
Facebook Live is very effective, people are watching, they get to know you a lot quicker, this makes conversations a lot easier.
Also, Facebook algorithm is pushing Facebook Live in the news feeds. Facebook wants this feature to be widely used, most likely because these broadcasts will soon be hosting advertising too, in a similar way than YouTube.
If you are creating content using Facebook live, more people will see it and for longer. Facebook will keep pushing Facebook Live and 460 videos in 2023, so it is not too late to take advantage of this. Facebook Live is the quickest way to build a loyal following on Facebook.
I found that I get more people engaging with my live broadcast if I go live on my personal page, but if I look at the number of views after a few days, the difference in views is not that large.
There are many advantages in using your Facebook page over your personal profile; you get precious insight about your audience so you can better target the right people with the right content and you can boost your post and reach individuals who are not in your network. Fan Pages offer many features designed to help you promote your business.
Some tips, when doing Facebook Live, ensure that your audience knows what you are going to talk about right away and stay on topic, people’s attention spans are very short and if you spend 5 minutes “doing your hair while you wait for people to jump in” you will lose everyone who comes along in a flash.
Also, keep your content engaging and interactive, ask questions and encourage your audience to interact with you by using some CTC (call to comments).
Another important tip is to ensure you have a call to action, tell your audience what you want them to do, this can be as simple as sending them over to your blog where they can find more valuable content and be exposed to your story, your opt-ins and your products if you have any.
You can also use some third party tools such as OBS (open source software) and do some pretty cool stuff with your live videos as having your logo on the screen, change views, add titles and even use Chroma Key to change your background.
But most importantly, have fun, be yourself and relatable.
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What is the best way for you these days to generate Leads and can you give us a particular technique you use?
Facebook Live and my blog. It allows me to create a very tight relationship with my audience; I have people reaching out to me daily and even referrals. I also like to participate in some groups, not so much posting ads but more by offering value and assist people when they have questions.
Some of my posts recently had over 150 comments in less than 24h and converted to 55 qualified leads who subscribed to my list.
I am not saying this to brag, but attraction marketing and providing more value than you receive does works!
What is your favorite book right now and why?
I am a huge fan of Tony Robbins and I have just started one of his best sellers, Awaken The Giant Within.
Tony is the best breakthrough coach I can think of and his wisdom is a great source of inspiration for me.
This book is a few years old but still very relevant today.
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What are your goals for 2023?
My goal for 2023 is to offer a more comprehensive personal branding and attraction marketing coaching program specifically designed to help women in my team and other women entrepreneurs break through and create success online.
I will build my business to a level that will allow me to quit my part time job, so I can spend more quality time with my baby girls.
And I will start taking singing lessons as well!
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What is your favorite quote and why?
I love quotes and I have many favorite, but one of my top quotes is a quote for the late A P J Abdul Kalam, former president of India.
I am always grateful for the good and the bad that happened in my life, Every experience made me the woman I am today and I am proud of who I have become.
“Difficulties in your life do not come to destroy you,
but to help you realize your hidden potential and power.
Let difficulties know that, you too are difficult” – A P J Abdul Kalam
Wow! This was a great interview, Julie! Thank you for your time.