Soulful Sales With Ruth Poundwhite – Details, episodes & analysis

In this episode I share something vulnerable: that my email list has not been growing. In fact, it has been shrinking. I'll walk you through exactly what has gone wrong and the strategy I'm using to turn it around.

I’m sharing the real numbers and feelings behind noticing that my list had shrunk, why it actually made sense after running a summit, and why unsubscribes are not always a problem to fix. 

But I’m also getting honest about where I hadn’t been paying enough attention, and the systems and strategies I’m putting in place now to grow my list in a way that leads to real sales, not just vanity metrics.

🎧 Tune in to hear:

• Why my email list shrank, and the unsubscribe reality I accept
• Why list growth can become a vanity metric if you’re not also looking at sales
• Why I built an AI-powered dashboard to help me track list growth and unsubscribes
• What to do after spikes to make list growth actually sticks

💭 [02:12] - "Whenever you do anything that brings in a nice chunk of people, you are always going to have a little bit of a increased exodus of some of those people afterwards. And it really is nothing to worry about."

💭 [07:09] -  "If I can't see it, I can't fix it. If I'm not seeing that things are shrinking, I can't do anything about it and be more intentional."

💭 [14:47] - "Don't spiral about people unsubscribing after an influx because it's normal, but build those systems systems in place. Put those welcome emails in place, put the right fit offers in place to help improve the chances of those people becoming clients over time."

🔗 Links Mentioned:

• Upcoming AI/Claude resources (including the Claude Brand Workshop)
• Free Claude workflow training (replay inside the Skool group, limited time) 
• New AI Bot Shop (including the Welcome Sequence Builder) 
• Quietly Ambitious Skool Community
• Start your own Skool community (affiliate link) 
• The Extra 10K Experiment 
• Soulful Sales Summit 
• Soulful Sales Society (activate your free trial)

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

It is very easy to feel alone when something goes wrong in your business - a refund request that feels personal, a client who turns on you, a payment that fails and goes quiet, or something bigger that knocks the wind out of you. But these things happen to all of us, and talking honestly about them is one of the most helpful things we can do.

This one is a Weird Hermits mastermind roundtable on the less glamorous side of running an online business. We get into the hardest client situations we have navigated, our different refund policies and the philosophies behind them, how we handle failed payments and payment plan ghosters, the contracts and terms that have saved us, and the mindset shifts that help us stay regulated when things go sideways.

With Kate Kordsmeier, Destini Copp, Jordan Gill, Faith Mariah, Liz Stapleton and Ruth Poundwhite.

🎁 Click here for a free bundle of goodies from the Weird Hermits 🎁 

🎧 Tune in to hear:

• The hardest client situations each of us has navigated (including one that shocked us all to hear)
• How each of us approaches refund policies, and why there is no one right answer
• Payment plans, failed payments, and the conversation most people avoid
• Why contracts, terms, and clear checkout language matter more than you think
• Mindset shifts for the moments that feel huge but look smaller in hindsight

💭 [09:00] "Sometimes in the moment, these things are so huge and so difficult and we don't know how to deal with it, or how to take this what feels like an attack on us. And then it's no big deal when you look back. We can laugh about it. It's all part of the journey." - Ruth

💭 [41:06] "Sometimes giving refunds has been a way of closing things out that actually feels good. It doesn't always have to feel like your boundaries are being pushed over. It can feel like this is a relationship that needs to end." - Faith

💭 [43:23] "At a certain point, the energetic leak and how negative and scarce it made my mindset was just like - this is not worth it. I gotta just walk away." - Kate

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

This episode wasn’t planned. At all. I’m recording it messy, tired, mid-marathon-training, and deep in summit prep… because the message needed to be said. If you’re struggling with ‘shoulds,’ this one’s for you.

🔗 Links:

• Donate to my London Marathon fundraiser
• Get your FREE ticket to the Soulful Sales Summit (starts Mar 9)
• Limited time: Get your free trial of the Soulful Sales Society Membership and complete the 7 day "sell every day challenge" FREE!

🎧 I talk about:

• Honouring real capacity after returning from Thailand (and why this episode is intentionally imperfect).
• Navigating summit season + marathon training and letting go of “shoulds”
• A quick update on your London Marathon fundraiser for ActionAid.
• Why selling feels different in 2026 and the small tweaks that actually move the needle.
• What to expect inside the free Soulful Sales Summit (including TWO brand new trainings from me about what's working with offers in 2026)

💭 [02:24] “I need to be really honest with myself about what my actual capacity is right now.”

💭 [06:18] “I’m not gonna lie, I have thought about quitting quite a lot over the last few weeks.

💭 [08:05] “I had a really great year in 2025 despite all of this noise… and I was kind of believing things were getting harder until I looked at the numbers.”

💭 [10:28] “Even one idea could totally change the trajectory of your business in 2026.”

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.

🤖 The Aligned AI Lab is open for founding members until Tuesday 26th May 🤖

A monthly membership for heart-led offer creators who want AI workflows that actually take work off their plate. Real marketing tasks like sales pages, emails, and offers, all in your voice and style. The founding pricing is the lowest the Lab will ever be → ruthpoundwhite.com/lab

QUICK LINKS:

👋 Join the free Quietly Ambitious community on Skool - for heart-led business owners who want to sell without the hustle-bro energy, with soulful AI support.

✨ Start your free trial of The Soulful Sales Society - where heart-led offer creators build a sales ecosystem that keeps selling, even when they can't show up. Monthly challenges, live coaching, AI tools, and a community building sustainable sales together.

🤖 Browse the Bot Shop - AI tools for course creators and coaches. From writing welcome sequences to planning flash sales to building your own AI tools. Works with Claude and ChatGPT.