There have been a lot of events taking place here in the States recently. Sadly, several black American’s have been killed by police in rapid succession these last few months and these events have essentially become “the straw that broke the camel’s back”. This has been a long time coming and I believe that in combination with Covid-19 and many other issues happening recently we, as a country, created a perfect storm for change to some of our policies. Now I will try not to get too political because that is not what you are here for. 

The reason I bring up these events is because as a business owner you have to find ways to work around what is happening and not appear tone deaf. This was something I dealt with both in my own business and in my client’s businesses. So what do you do when things are happening in the world around you that are controversial, but you are a professional and a business? 

I read a quote from Janelle...

“I’m too busy…” 

I hear this phrase a lot! From people who are looking to grow companies, start companies, or even friends of mine just trying to lose weight. This is probably the most common excuse we give as reasons why we can’t start things, follow our dreams, or accomplish goals. Let me tell you right now that I don’t believe in being “too busy”. I understand that you may have a lot on your plate, as a mother and business owner I can tell you right now I have a bunch going on. The thing about the term busy is that it’s not a permanent state of being. At any point in time you can make the choice to not be busy by simply moving commitments around or passing things off to others (even procrastinating a bit).

Think about the last time you were extremely “busy” and something came up that you had to do or that you WANTED to do. Let me give you an example: I have been telling my husband for years that...

This might seem like a grim topic given the times but this is a necessary conversation because many people are not talking about it.

In life we talk about preparing for death, crisis, and mishaps constantly. We are constantly inundated with insurance commercials, medication commercials, many of us put money in a savings account or 401K but when was the last time you really thought about what would happen to your business if you died?

Now maybe you have thought about this and have thought about setting up a trust and talked to your partner about taking over in your absence. But what you might not have thought about is the fact that your partner (in business or life) probably has no idea how to do your job. Think about this for a moment, if you died tomorrow and your partner had to pick up where you left off and keep the business running, would they know your passwords? Would they know how to run your social media? Would they know who to invoice and how to do that? I...

For a long time I thought about being an entrepreneur. 

I remember when I was about 16 and Shark Tank the TV show came out. We would watch this show as a family and I even remember watching it in DECA (a high school business club). After watching this show, I kid you not, I would think about what I could invent to become a business owner.

Working for someone else was never in the cards for me. I bounced around from job to job, always looking for something better. Often in the pursuit of money or something that would make me feel whole. I always knew I wanted to help others and even went to college for nursing for a brief stint. Nothing ever seemed to fit, until I got into the world of business finance!

I worked for a company that did business lending and was pretty sure I would work there until I got a degree in Accounting. My plan was to open up my own CPA firm once I had my degree, but for the time being I was right where I wanted to be!

The problem was, after about a...

Authenticity in business is a big deal! It builds the know, like, trust factor and helps our target audience see more of who we are.

But there is a fine line between authenticity and oversharing. 

Authenticity is sharing things in your life that are relevant to your business or help people get to know you better. Oversharing is giving me information that doesn't benefit me, help me get to know or connect with you, or tell me about your business. I see this line crossed pretty often, all for the sake of authenticity and it can seriously damage your business.

If you find that you are having trouble determining what is authentic and what is oversharing, ask yourself "does what I'm sharing provide value in some way?", "is what I'm sharing relevant to my business?", and "is sharing this on brand for my business?". These are sure fire ways to stay away from oversharing and possibly driving customers away.

As a business owner, it is your job to make sure you are nurturing your ideal...

Alright, I wasn’t going to do this but as life gets crazier and crazier I have decided to talk about being prepared. Because of the Covid-19 hysteria, people are going out and stockpiling supplies. Not really sure what the logic is behind that because it’s not like the Zombie apocalypse is coming but essentially what this has taught me is that most people are not prepared. This is applies to business as well. Most people don’t prepare for growth, decline, or changes in their business because we are so sure that we will have time to do it later.

Procrastination is something pretty much everyone struggles with and I see it a lot when it comes to implementing systems and SOPs into a business. Many business owners don’t realize that adding SOP’s and systems into your business is part of building a strong foundation and is necessary if you want your business to be around long term. When you create SOPs for your business you make it easy for other team...

Do you have webinars included in your course launch plan?

I have been launching courses for quite some time now and have tried so many different strategies it would make your head spin! My favorite strategy for any course launch is to use Webinars or Masterclasses to act as a tripwire offer for your course. So what do I mean by this? Basically everything about human buying patterns comes down to a value analysis. Without perceived value, the consumer moves on. This is why I talked about doing regular newsletters in my post last week, you need to make your audience value you so they keep you in their inbox.

A Masterclass or Webinar essentially is a tripwire (meaning they opt-in to a smaller item and get targeted for a larger one later) you typically offer this value at little to no cost and filter your client pool significantly so that when you retarget later you know they are super qualified leads. Having a place where people can ask you questions and get really...

Time is the ultimate commodity isn’t it? There is never enough of it and no one can ever get more than 24 hours into a single day. The biggest challenge remains, how do you maximize the 24 hours you have in order to make the most money and accomplish everything you want. 

This is such a big issue for everyone I speak to that I have chosen to write my book on this topic because, after all, helping people get the most out of their day is my specialty! So what do I mean when I say maximizing your time? Well I’m sure you already have some idea of how to do this but either you don’t think it can work or you are simply too lazy to implement. Maximizing your time means finding all the ways you are wasting time currently. In this world of constant distraction and everyone trying to capture our attention, it becomes pretty easy to get off track and fall down a rabbit hole. 

I am a big fan of systems and SOP’s being a way for people to help...

So I get asked a lot about email marketing because I am often responsible for most of my clients email strategy and content. The most common question I get asked is, “is email marketing dead?” First let me start by saying, if someone told you email marketing is dead please consider the source and whether or not this person is trying to sell you something.

Email marketing is absolutely 100% NOT DEAD! In fact, email marketing is still considered to be one of the most successful forms of marketing out there. Email is currently being used by 3.9 billion people and is rising everyday. In case you didn’t know (I know I didn’t) that amounts to half of the world’s population! Here is a tip, if your customer is using email in their daily life then you should be using it to speak to them.

I can understand why people might think email marketing is dead though. I mean billions of emails are sent out everyday and depending on how interested your...

Recently I had a conversation with one of my clients who does not have a freebie. As we are talking about plans for the business and her goals over the next few months I bring up to her that we need to create a freebie and start offering this is people to help build her email list. She was a bit confused and started saying things to me like, “Why should I have a freebie?”, “We don’t do email marketing so what’s the point?”, and “We don’t need to worry about that right now”. I had to stop her and give her some insight that I am going to share with you. 

YOU ABSOLUTELY NEED A FREEBIE! 

I don’t mean to yell but seriously! A freebie is essentially a free piece of content that provides value to your audience and ideal client. This freebie typically lives on your website and requires people give you their email in exchange for this piece of content. This is one of the easiest ways to build an email list...