Her Empire Builder Show with Tina Tower – Details, episodes & analysis

Tina Tower sits down with her favorite coach, Barrett Brooks, for a deeply personal and transformative conversation about business, personal growth, and the journey of self-discovery. Tina shares how working with Barrett brought unparalleled clarity, contentment, and alignment to her life and business, while Barrett opens up about his transition from the COO of ConvertKit to becoming a world-class coach.

Key Topics Covered: 

• The Power of Coaching:
  Tina describes the enormous value she's received from working with coaches throughout her 20+ year career, and how having Barrett as her coach was particularly life-changing.
• Why Barrett Left Tech Leadership:
  Barrett shares the story behind his decision to leave ConvertKit, citing burnout, misaligned values, and the importance of honoring what truly works for him.
• Reinventing Yourself:
  Barrett discusses the “progressive surrender” to his authentic self and letting go of other people’s expectations. He emphasizes the courage required to walk away from prestigious roles to pursue work that is deeply aligned with one’s true nature.
• Internal Work and Self-Awareness:
  Both Tina and Barrett talk about how internal family systems, therapy, and somatic practices helped them process old beliefs, trauma, and self-imposed pressure, unlocking new levels of happiness and productivity.
• Burnout and Boundaries:
  Barrett shares how he intentionally structures his coaching business to avoid burnout, setting clear boundaries and focusing on a select number of clients to maintain excellence and energy.
• Entrepreneurial Mindset:
  Insights into why entrepreneurs often feel compelled to do more, the importance of embracing ease, and how to find fulfillment beyond relentless hustling.
• Masculine & Feminine Energies in Business:
  Discussion around societal expectations of men and women, provider roles in relationships, and the importance of balancing masculine and feminine energies for healthy organizations and partnerships.
• Coach vs. Mentor vs. Therapist:
  Barrett explains the distinct roles of a coach, mentor, and therapist, and how they can complement each other in an entrepreneur’s personal and professional growth.
• Navigating a Changing World:
  Barrett talks about setting boundaries with news and technology, his approach to AI, and the importance of focusing on what one can control and contribute, even in times of uncertainty.
• Defining Success:
  Both discuss redefining success as loving and being loved, showing up authentically, and embracing the impact of deep personal connection over superficial metrics.

This episode is a masterclass in personal and professional transformation. Whether you’re an entrepreneur craving clarity, or a leader seeking deeper purpose and healthier boundaries, you’ll find actionable wisdom and heartfelt encouragement in Tina and Barrett’s conversation.

Where to find Tina:

Her Empire Builder: https://www.herempirebuilder.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tina_tower/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@herempirebuilder

Where to find Barrett Brooks: 

Website: https://barrettbrooks.com/

The Good Work Show Podcast: https://www.goodworkshow.com/

Subscribe to Little Leadership Lessons Newsletter:https://barrettbrooks.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/barrettabrooks/

Resources mentioned:

• To Bless the Space Between Us by John O’Donohue (book)
• Presence-Based Coaching (Barrett's advanced coach training)
• Opal app (for digital boundaries)
• Peter Levine's work on Somatic Experiencing

In this episode, Tina Tower dives deep into the world of masterminds—what makes them magical, how they differ from memberships, and how to create an unforgettable mastermind experience within your course creator business.

• Membership vs. Mastermind:

  • Memberships are scalable, group-focused, and often larger in size with less personal touch.

  • Masterminds are smaller, more curated, higher touch—and while less scalable, they foster deep connections and high transformation.

• Tina’s Offer Suite and Ascension Model:

  • Starts with a low-cost, high-volume evergreen offer → signature offer → back-end membership → high-level mastermind

  • This tiered system has helped many hit the million-dollar mark in their businesses.

• Real-life Evolution:

  • Her Empire Builder started as a mastermind, evolved into a scalable membership model as numbers grew.

  • Original small group became the Empress Circle Mastermind for higher touch and intimacy.

• Curriculum and Facilitation:

  • The Empress Circle is more information-heavy, with teaching and small group accountability.

  • The Impact Mastermind is peer-to-peer focused and supports 7-figure+ business owners with connection and facilitation rather than explicit teaching.

• Designing Your Mastermind:

  • Get crystal clear on your ideal (“hell yes!”) mastermind client.

  • Curate members through an application process for group harmony and energy.

  • Decide on the purpose: connection, strategy, or support.

• Transformational Experiences:

  • Psychological safety is a must—what’s shared in the mastermind stays in the mastermind.

  • Live retreats and in-person events are crucial for creating lasting bonds, especially in the age of AI.

  • Personal touches like favorite snacks, drinks, and personalized gifts (hello, monogrammed pajamas!) make members feel truly seen.

• Structure & Flow:

  • Strike a balance between structured learning and downtime at live events.

  • Prioritize generous break times and early finish for dinners to accommodate different lifestyles.

• Keeping Connection Alive:

  • Use platforms like Slack, WhatsApp, or Voxer (Tina’s favorite!) for ongoing relationship building.

  • Encourage collaborations, celebrate wins, and recognize growth privately.

• Onboarding and Engagement:

  • Thoughtful onboarding with surveys, welcome gifts, and public shout-outs help new members feel valued from day one.

Tina’s insights serve as a practical guide for course creators considering adding masterminds to their offer suite and emphasize that, with the right structure and intention, masterminds can provide transformational experiences that go beyond business strategy, nurturing long-term relationships and personal growth.

If you have a successful course or membership, adding a mastermind might just be the next logical step in your business ascension model—and as Tina says, when you pay attention to all the details, that’s where the real magic happens.

Where to find Tina:

Her Empire Builder: https://www.herempirebuilder.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tina_tower/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@herempirebuilder

Resources mentioned:

• Kajabi: https://kajabi.com/30-days-trial-lp?utm_campaign=&utm_content=27629&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_source=...
• Kajabi Communities: https://kajabi.com/features/communities
• WhatsApp: https://www.whatsapp.com/
• Voxer: https://www.voxer.com/

In this exciting first episode of our three-part series, Tina delves deep into the world of online courses, offering strategies that take you from the brink of an idea to making your very first dollar. Tina shares her wealth of experience as a business strategist, course creator, and best-selling author to guide ambitious women on their journey toward creating wealth, freedom, and impact. Whether you're just starting out or looking for motivation, this episode is packed with real insights to help you turn your dreams into reality.

Introduction to the Series: Tina introduces a three-part series focusing on scaling online course businesses from zero to your first sale, then moving to six figures, and finally to creating your first million.

Personal Reflections: Tina shares personal anecdotes about getting started and the significance of making that first sale.

Dreams and Regrets: Discussion about the importance of going after your dreams and the common fears that hold people back from starting.

Fear Setting Exercise: Tina mentions a TED Talk by Tim Ferriss about fear setting to manage and overcome the fear of failure.

Four Steps to Your First Dollar:
1. Choose a Profitable Course Topic:
Align your passion with expertise and market demand.

2. Validate Your Idea:
Share your idea and gather feedback to ensure it's market-ready.

3. Sell Before You Create:
Learn the importance of pre-selling your course to validate demand.

4. Deliver and Refine:
Launch, gather feedback, and refine for future launches.

Biggest Mistakes to Avoid: Tina outlines common pitfalls such as overcomplicating tech, waiting for a big audience, underpricing, and striving for perfection.

Encouragement to Start: Tina emphasizes the importance of making that first sale and the fulfillment it brings.

This episode is your call to action to take the leap and start your journey in the online course industry. Tune in and turn your dreams into reality!🎉

Resources:

Get the FREE Online Course Checklist: https://www.herempirebuilder.com/ready  

Get Kajabi 30 days for FREE HERE

Where to find Tina Tower:

Her Empire Builder: https://www.herempirebuilder.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tina_tower/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@herempirebuilder

My guest today is the fabulous Liz Nable! Liz joined Her Empire Builder two years ago and the reason why I wanted to share her story with you is of course, because she's fabulous - but also, because having so much background and expertise in different areas, it was difficult for Liz to choose her online course path and she tried a few iterations before she got her winner.

Liz shows you that you can reinvent yourself and that the winner idea is the one that uses both your knowledge and expertise, and also aligns to what you love talking about.

Join Her Empire Builder:

https://www.tinatower.com/herempirebuilder 

Links:

Show notes: https://www.tinatower.com/184 
Find Liz @liz_nable on instagram 

Having a million dollar online course business is the dream - so you don’t really hear much about the downside. This is for two reasons.

1. There’s no complaining on the yacht! Meaning that you’re privileged AF so complaining about anything can feel plain mean, insensitive and ridiculous.

2. Usually, to get an online business to that level, you need to maintain the facade that everything is perfect all of the time or you feel like you’ll lose credibility.

Neither of those are helpful to you on your growth though so I want to tell you about the growing pains of the next level. I fully and upfront acknowledge that these are fabulous and privileged problems to have and I work hard every day to do good with the massive advantages in life that I’ve been give. And second - I am constantly learning in this experiment we call life and reserve the right to change my mind as I learn and grow and have my mind totally blown, my naivety shattered and strive to do better.

Now that we have that out of the way, on today’s podcast episode I am sharing with you what happens after you start to kick over around consistent $20k months so that you can be prepared and so you can consciously decide a little more easily, how far you actually want to go.

Join Her Empire Builder:

https://www.tinatower.com/herempirebuilder 

Links:

Show notes: https://www.tinatower.com/183 

The Life by Kenny Chesney: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRD5t8uBEEQ

Julie Stoian Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/3YzG9nqvFyJXMv6Cvasqvp?si=0785c7d2fd5348c7 

Dr Laura Williams has such a great story to share with you. Laura is also our first Her Empire Builder member from the UK which shows huge dedication because our live sessions are ran in the morning so she stays up late to watch them. I share this because it's the dedication and purpose that drives Laura. With the sudden passing of her husband in 2018, she's a single mum to 5 children and instead of feeling like an (understandable) victim to that, she's chosen to be victorious.

Laura is one of those fabulous humans who is so good at her job and cares so much about her impact, and I just can't wait for the world to get access to that and her new course 'Know your own Psychology'.

Find all of the notes and links for todays episode at tinatower.com/182 and find Laura on insta at @drlawilliams

Dr Laura Williams is a clinical psychologist, trauma specialist, best-selling author, media contributor and mum to five. She holds specialist interests in anxiety, eating disorders and obsessional compulsive disorder. Beginning her first degree in psychology at the age of 19, Laura would continue to learn and train in the field of psychology for the next 20 years. She has a BA in Psychology, a Masters in Forensic Psychology and a Doctorate in Clinical Psychology. After clinical training, Laura worked within specialist services in prisons and hospitals with people who had experienced high levels of trauma in their lives.

After the sudden loss of her husband in 2018, Laura started working for herself for the freedom and flexibility she needed for her young family. She has since built a thriving online psychology practice and works with people to help them understand how their early and past relationships have impacted them. Laura now offers an online course KNOW YOUR OWN PSYCHOLOGY to scale her work and help more people.

Laura has written for and been featured in publications including The Telegraph, The Sunday Post and The Skinny. She has contributed to television documentaries for ITV and Channel 4 in the UK on the topic of morbid obesity. In addition to her television experience, Laura has broadcast experience often contributing to Radio Scotland programmes. Her first book, Grief Writer: A Journal, published in 2021, hit the amazon bestseller list and aims to help people grieving to process their emotions after loss.

Laura lives near Edinburgh, Scotland with her partner, their five children and a Labrador named Beau. From there, she is helping change the conversation around trauma and mental health. When she is not working, you’ll find her out running, swimming outdoors or trying to 'pop-up' on a surf board.

Creating a winning lead magnet is important for ALL online businesses. If I was just starting out, it's the very first thing I'd do and what I think is most important in quality list growth. And for a business making millions, it's still the thing to focus on to find more customers and show them what you're all about and the massive value you can share so that they can decide whether or not to work with you.

In today's podcast episode I am telling you the 'what'... what you you need to be thinking of in order to create the perfect lead magnet. If you'd like the 'how' then I am running a 4 day LIVE training starting September 5th that takes you through actually HOW to do all of this and provides you with tangible tools to get RESULTS.

You can register for that at tinatower.com/challenge

Show notes for this episode are at tinatower.com/181

Try Kajabi 30 days free: https://app.kajabi.com/r/XqN7VFxG/t/hzety79c

I love Kelly's story. Starting a career in teaching, obviously has its perks in course creation where we're educators, but I love the story of reinvention. So many members that we have in Her Empire Builder started with so much skill and expertise and thinking "I wonder if course creation is for me?" "How big can I actually go?"

And it makes me so happy to see people grow and adapt and then inspire everyone around them. That's Kelly's story as she's taken her niche as a teacher and turned that into a 6 figure online business and in today's episode, we're sharing with you how she got started and everything she's learnt along the way.

Find Kelly on instagram at @kellybell.coach

Listen and get the show notes at tinatower.com/180

Kelly is a passionate educator with 18 years experience as a PDHPE & Community & Family Studies (CAFS) teacher. Kelly has presented workshops across NSW in PDHPE & CAFS and in Australia on teaching pedagogy.

She has taught CAFS since 2004 growing the course from about 15 students to over 60 students in a small all-girls school and then spent 2.5 years teaching CAFS at a senior high school.

She has dedicated her career to working with government and community organisations to support the development of teachers and their students through
professional learning, webinars, resource development, marking and mentoring.

Kelly started supporting the professional learning of teachers in 2010 where she held voluntary roles in a professional learning organisation and served on the
Board from 2014-2016 and President in 2016-2018. Her contributions to the organisation was recognised by the Professional Teachers’ Council NSW in 2014 for her work where she received an Outstanding Professional Service Award as an acknowledgment of excellence in the profession.

Her commitment to supporting teachers to be the best educators they can be was further developed when Kelly completed a Master in Educational Leadership from the Australian Catholic University in 2015 and when she became a Google Level 1 Educator in 2020.

Since starting The Learning Network in 2020 Kelly has supported over 1000 CAFS teachers across NSW in online courses, resources, coaching & mentoring and 1000s of CAFS students in her Year 12 CAFS MasterClasses.

Kelly is surrounded by the beach, bay and bush on the sunny Central Coast of NSW, Australia where she delivers massive support to enable teachers to connect, learn and grow together.

Links:

Find Kelly at thelearnnet.com/tinatower

Join Her Empire Builder at herempirebuilder.com

Today I am interviewing one of our fabulous Her Empire Builder Members - Claudia Neal - Shaw.

Claudia joined Her Empire Builder in February as a brand new course creator ad then did all of the pre-launch activities to start from scratch and launched her first digital course for online marketing in June.

She had a great first launch making $12,000 on her first launch with her second already half sold out and incredible client transformations from her first lucky group of clients.

Show notes: tinatower.com/179

Join Her Empire Builder at herempirebuilder.com

Starting her first business at 21, Claudia Neal-Shaw was a few years into her combined Law and Communications degree convinced she would be an actress or a lawyer.

A natural communicator and connector, Claudia offered marketing advice to small-medium businesses on the side while she completed her formal legal training and travelled globally for work experience.

She learned very quickly that in order to create the career of your dreams, you had to rewrite the rules for your own success.

She left her corporate career behind and relaunched her consulting business focused on empowering female-led businesses to market themselves with confidence.

Through 1-1 coaching, online programs and education platforms, Claudia candidly shares the most authentic ways to grow your business; powerful storytelling and a compelling personal brand.

Her mission is to elevate the voices of women globally so that there are more women in positions of power and influence.

She actively supports the UN Global Sustainability Goals of Gender Equality + Quality Education in her offerings to create maximum impact through her business.

Claudia is currently writing a book called 'How to Market with Confidence', a marketing playbook for women in business.

Find Claudia at candourconsulting.com and on insta at @claudia.nealshaw

So you want to have a winning live launch? The PRE-LAUNCH is where it's at! In this podcast episode I'm sharing with you all of the things that I do 6 - 8 weeks before I open doors and launch. This allows me to be fully present in launch and show up with ALL of the energy. Launching isn't the time to be writing emails and figuring out what to put on social media. 

It's the time to let the strategy unfold and connect with clients and serve with all of your beautiful energy. 

Listen at tinatower.com/178 and get the checklist for this episode at tinatower.com/checklist