[Author: Paige Donaghy]

I hate endings. Even a happy ending. But sadly, as the summer draws to an end, so does my time with Sara and BTL. 

Am I so excited to move back to Amherst with all of my best friends and start my second year of college?

Of course I am. 

But will I dearly miss BTL and Sara and Woo and everything about this summer???

Yes. For sure. 

Since this is the last you’ll be hearing from me for a while, I’ll leave you with some words of wisdom. 

Here’s everything I learned being Sara’s summer intern. 👇🏼

What SEO is

(Promise you won’t judge me too harshly for not knowing what this was before?)

Technically I knew what SEO was, I just didn’t know that that’s what it was called. 

But now I know that Search Engine Optimization is the process of improving your website traffic to bring more potential clients to your website, and how important it is for your business. Check out Sara’s blog posts on SEO to get all the tea. 

What an ideal client avatar is

Honestly, I think this concept is really cool. As Sara and I have talked about before, I think developing your ideal client avatar ties a lot into the law of attraction. 

The importance of developing your ideal client avatar is—obviously… 😉—so you know exactly who you’re marketing to. 

But, it also helps you envision yourself working for your dream client, which in turn can attract that situation into your reality… if you believe in that sort of thing.  

(Confession: Sara & I both do.)

Basically, don’t rush through creating your ideal client. For more on how to do this, check out this recent post from the archive of Sara’s weekly newsletters, Tuesday Table of Contents.

& if you’re seeking some help in developing your own Ideal Client Avatar, Sara’s Target Audience Development Workbook is exactly what you need.

Don’t skip CTAs 

Always include a call to action! Don’t leave people hanging without a next step. 

Giving a potential client that last steer in the right direction could be the difference between them working with you or not. 

Even something as seemingly simple as linking your socials or including a “subscribe now” option is more important than you’d think. 

Definitely don’t skip the dentist

If you’re a loyal TOC reader, I know you’ve heard about Sara’s dental bills. Enough said. 

I actually didn’t take this advice in time, and now the wisdom teeth that I chose to ignore for two years are causing me trouble…

But if I didn’t have some sort of dental dilemma rub off on me, did I really work for Sara all summer??

(Just kidding, my wisdom teeth are entirely my own problem. *chugs pineapple juice*)

So now as Sara deals with her root canals, I prepare to end my summer with my own tooth surgery. 

Long story long (as Sara would say), go to the dentist!

The importance of a weekly newsletter

I never knew the importance of popping up in someone’s inbox every week until after working for Sara—aka the queen of the weekly newsletter… she’s never missed a single one in over a year and a half!

If you don’t have your own newsletter, you should totally consider writing one.

(Sara always talks about how worth it they are—since starting my internship at the end of May, she’s gained almost 900 new subscribers!—so they must be important, right?)

For some extra assistance creating your weekly newsletter, check out this post! She tells you everything you need to know about how to do it (including all the reasons why you should).

She also has a free guide for business owners who want to master their email marketing; it’s literally a sample lead magnet and 4-email welcome sequence that she’s giving you full permission to 100% steal.

(Part of me still can’t believe she’s giving it away for $0… but, then again, of course she is – that’s so her.)

All things Chatham Bars Inn

Now, I have been vacationing on the Cape since I was little, just like Sara (and just like basically everyone who has grown up in Massachusetts), but I’ve never stayed at the famous Chatham Bars Inn.

And until I saw it for the first time with Sara this summer (who used to work there as their lead concierge), I didn’t know what I was missing.

I like to think I know a lot about the Cape, but Sara is for sure the expert. You can see all of her top picks here. 

Every Paw Patrol character 

Don’t feel uncultured if you don’t know who the Paw Patrol squad is, I definitely didn’t either until I started watching Woo.

(Sara’s 3-year-old toddler.)

I also definitely didn’t expect a babysitting gig to come from my summer internship, but I’m so glad that it did. 

My favorite character is definitely Marshall, but Woo likes Chase. Watch an episode and decide for yourself who the best pup is. 

(Sara’s favorites are Zuma and Liberty.)

How to write a blog

Who knew that so much goes into writing a single blog post? Meta descriptions, SEO, keywords and headlines.. on top of writing the actual blog content? 

And who knew how important incorporating Pinterest is in blogging? If you’re like me and had no idea how to use Pinterest to your blogging advantage, read up on it here. 

(You can also learn more about how to optimize your Pinterest and increase your blog’s & website’s views by pinning if you enroll in Sara’s website copywriting course—her Pinterest manager, Sarah Burk, teaches an entire lesson all about all things Pinterest!)

Give back, because money is a boomerang

The first time I ever heard the phrase “money is a boomerang” was from Sara, and it’s so true. 

While I now often use that logic to justify spending money on a ridiculously expensive concert ticket or treating myself to an unnecessary coffee, I’ve learned from Sara to apply it in a giving sense too. 

One morning when I walked into BTL headquarters, Sara tasked me with something out of the ordinary. 

I spent the morning putting together backpacks and pencil boxes full of school supplies to donate (she may or may not have spent a casual five hundred dollars at Target before I came in that day), and later we dropped them off in the center of town, fully preparing 10+ students with everything they needed to start their school year off strong.

(This girl loves education, almost as much as she loves giving back. And—I’m pretty sure she’d be cool with me saying this, much to her Financial Planner, Matt’s, dismay—using giving back as an excuse to go shopping.)

Besides taking care of her own toddler and running a successful business, I still don’t understand how Sara does it all. 

I know she’s not a fan of the term girl boss, but that’s exactly what she is. 

I’m so grateful for everything I learned from Sara during the time I spent at BTL, and I’ll take it with me everywhere I go in the future. 

*wipes tears from eyes* 

Hey, don’t be too sad! You didn’t hear this from me, but I might be back again someday… 

(Cough, cough, later this winter during my school break, cough, cough.)

Thanks for reading all my blog posts and newsletters! I hope you enjoyed hearing from me; I loved writing for you. 

xoxo, Paige