Lauren Tilden 5/26/22 Lauren Tilden 5/26/22

63: How to Stick With It

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 63.

I’m really excited about this episode, because Making Good is celebrating its first birthday! As of May 19th, Making Good podcast is one year old. That is one year of releasing podcast episodes EVERY. SINGLE. WEEK. And some fun extra bonus episodes on top of the weekly episodes, just for fun.

So, Kate and I were on a walk through our neighborhood yesterday, and I was telling her about how I wanted to have this week’s podcast episode be a celebration of 1 year of Making Good… but also something super valuable to listeners, and she said, “Oh, like “how to stick with it” or something like that?”

And I thought… YES! Exactly that.

Before I jump in, I just have one request for you. If this podcast has been valuable to you, I would LOVE to hear from you. Send me a DM to say hello and that you’re listening to @laurentilden on Instagram.

So here we are. In today’s episode of Making Good, we’re going to be talking about what I’ve learned about sticking with something and being consistent every single week for a full year of podcasting.

Let me start by saying that Consistency and Sticking With It aren’t words and terms that I would normally use to describe myself.

I can’t tell you how many things I’ve started and then just let things fizzle out.

Books (writing and reading).

Hobbies (I tend to buy alllll the supplies and try it once and then be done).

Organizational systems (I like to set up elaborate organizational systems and then never use them).

Exercise regimens (don’t even get me started here).

I could go on, but the point is… I’m not QUOTE “one of those people” who is super organized and disciplined and always finishes what they start.

So, I have to be honest and say that I find myself somewhat surprised to be sitting here celebrating 1 year of Making Good.

1 year of designing content, writing episodes, recording episodes and interviews, editing episodes, writing show notes, publishing episodes and telling you all about them.

Consistently. Every. Single. Week. No matter what has been going on in my life (and this year has been a big one -- becoming parents just over a month ago).

So yes, this is my opportunity to pat myself on the back and say WOW. I’m so proud of this podcast and the content I’ve created and the community I’ve found and the fact that I’ve showed up for it to release an episode 52 weeks in a row (and many weeks more than one episode).

But, my conversation with Kate yesterday helped me realized that along the way, I have figured out how to really commit and stay with something for a year.

So, I also want to use this episode as an opportunity to really dig in and explore what I can learn and share about HOW TO STICK WITH IT… whatever “IT” is for you.

So, let’s dig in.

What do I mean by sticking with it?

Let’s start by getting on the same page about what I mean by “sticking with it”. With “sticking with it”, I mean committing to doing something over an extended period of time, and showing up for it on a regular basis, even when you may not feel like it, even when you’ve got a lot of other things on your plate, even when you may not be seeing exciting, motivating results.

I think “sticking with it” is an important topic to cover on this podcast because it’s a critical part of the journey for just about all small business owners. Running a small business is full of ups and downs. It’s not always exciting and uplifting… a lot of the time it feels like we’re putting in a lot of work and not seeing the results we want.

“Sticking with it” is about the willingness to keep moving forward, no matter how things are going in the short term.

So, what kinds of things should we stick with?

I am not suggesting that we have to keep doing everything we start doing forever. Sometimes there are activities, projects, or even businesses that we have to let go of.

I talk a lot about the role of intention and clarity in your business, because it helps us know where to spend our time and energy, and this is so relevant to this topic.

Two of the most important things to get clear on are your WHY and your VISION.

Your WHY is -- why are you doing what you’re doing? What kind of change or impact do you want to make in the world?

And your VISION is -- what do want to create? What do you want your business and life to look like in a year, or 5 years, or 10?

When you have answers to these questions, it’s a pretty simple process to look at what activities, projects, businesses are worth sticking with -- and which we can let go of.

In this episode, we’re talking about how to stick with things that are WORTH sticking with… that when we run them past our WHY and our VISION, they are activities that will move us toward those goals.

So how do we stick with it?

Okay, so we’ve defined what I mean by “sticking with it” and we’ve talked about how to know if a particular part of your business or life is worth “sticking with”.

Now, how do we stick with it? I’ve been thinking about how I’ve been able to stick with it… and what I’ve learned from my years as a self-improvement junkie, and I’ve come up with 8 ways to stick with it.

#1: Schedule it

If it’s not on your calendar, it’s not a priority. Possibly the most critical step to “sticking with it” is to make sure that you are carving the time out in your schedule to ensure it gets done.

Let’s say the business activity you want to Stick With is consistently marketing your business on Instagram.

Just like any meeting or appointment, if you want to make sure that this gets done, it needs to be in your calendar.

It always helps me to break things down into the smallest possible elements in order to get my head around a project.

So if I’m talking about consistently using Instagram for my business, I’d need to know:

On a weekly basis, how much am I posting? What combination of posts, reels, stories, IGTVs, etc. am I posting?
When I know the breakdown of what I’m posting, I need to get honest with myself about how much time it will take to create that content.
When I have an amount of time that I need to reserve in my calendar, the important step is that you actually put it into your calendar. Add it like any other appointment that you can’t miss.

#2: Make it easy

Make it easy on yourself. It’s tempting to overcomplicate things and pile too much on our plate, but the simple reality is this:

THE EASIER it is to do something, the more likely it is that we’ll do it.

This is a very important concept in marketing -- we need to make it EASY for our customers and audience to take the action we want them to take.

But it’s also a very important concept in human behavior. The EASIER IT IS to do a task, the more likely it will be that you’ll do it.

Sticking with this Instagram marketing example, let’s talk about how we could make it EASY to make sure we get our Instagram content created each week.

For example, if we’ve followed Step 1 in this process and reserved time in our calendar to create this content, we’ll have an appointment in the calendar telling us to “CREATE INSTAGRAM CONTENT”. How could we make it EASY for us to actually take action when that appointment time comes?

Well, we could include a link to the Google Doc where we’re writing the posts.

We could have a clear plan laid out of WHAT each post is about so we’re not starting from scratch.

We could have already selected images for the posts and have them handy.

The key here is to not force yourself to THINK too much.

The Nobel prize-winning behavioral economist Daniel Kahneman said: “Thinking is to humans as swimming is to cats; they can do it but they'd prefer not to.”

Thinking is hard. It just is. If there’s something that we know we struggle to get done each week -- for example, creating your Instagram content -- figure out ways to make it as EASY as possible, and you’ll be so much more likely to get it done.

#3: Find accountability

Gretchen Rubin has a concept called The Four Tendencies, which is a model that answers the question: “how do I get people -- including myself -- to do what I want?” If you want to take the quiz (it’s free!) head to quiz.gretchenrubin.com -- I will link it in the show notes at makinggoodpodcast.com/63.

For one of these types, Obligers (which I am!), accountability is critical, but I think even if you don’t identify as an Obliger, accountability can be a super powerful way of making sure you stick with things.

This means that if I want to make SURE that I’m going to get something done, other people need to know about this -- and ideally -- CARE whether or not it happens.

For this podcast, it means that podcast episodes are released every Tuesday. I know that listeners expect new episodes to drop each Tuesday, so I feel accountable to making sure that I release an episode each Tuesday. If I only told myself that I was going to release the podcast on Tuesdays, I think there’s a much lower chance I would have the same track record with consistency that I have.

A few suggestions of what accountability might look like to you:

Having an accountability buddy that you check in with on your projects each week
Having a coach who expects you to complete certain actions each week
Working in a group program or coworking session to get stuff done
Telling your audience when to expect things from you and having them hold you accountable.

When you have something you need to get done, try building some accountability in. I *know* that this is one of the most powerful factors for me, and I’m figuring out how to build it into other aspects of my business, too :).

#4: Get feedback

On a similar note to accountability, my 4th suggestion is to get outside feedback.

Getting feedback is a step further than building in accountability -- it’s inviting someone you trust to look at what you’re doing and give you their thoughts, ideas and suggestions.

A couple of ways that I love to incorporate feedback into my businesses:

I love to talk to other small business owners about challenges I’m facing and get their ideas. Sometimes we just get too close to things. (If you’re looking for small business community and somewhere to get these answers, check out my FB group for this podcast: makinggoodpodcast.com/community).
My FAVORITE way is to talk to my target audience. As businesses, we have customers or an audience, and pretty much everything we do should be in service to them in some way. For this podcast, I love to hear from listeners and ask them questions about the podcast, what kind of content they’d like to see, etc. I often do polls on my IG stories for ideas on topics people want to learn about, etc.

Running a small business can be a solitary operation -- getting feedback from others can help breathe some fresh energy and air into things and keep you excited and on track.

#5: Track it

My fifth suggestion is to TRACK IT. We spend a lot of time, energy and money in our businesses, on various tactics and projects that we hope will help us make more sales and a bigger impact.

But the only way to know for sure if what we’re doing is generating the impact we are hoping for is to find a way to TRACK IT. Yes, my friend, I’m talking about numbers are your friend.

Looking at the numbers in our business can be a double-edged sword. Sometimes we will look at our sales numbers or our # of Instagram followers or podcast downloads and be disappointed. WHY aren’t things changing?

When we’re thinking about tracking and numbers, the important thing is that we are paying attention to the RIGHT numbers.

What numbers can you look like that will actually represent the impact of whatever activity we are trying to “stick with”? And then, try to set aside any immediate emotional reaction, and ask yourself, “what can I learn from this?”

Taking me and this podcast as an example, I’ve learned so so much from paying attention to the podcast download numbers. Between different episodes, I can make some judgments about what topics my audience is most interested in. I can see what length of episode people like the best. I can see the time of year that I get more downloads and less. I can see the types of campaigns that lead to listener growth, and the types of activity that leads to more of a plateau.

Numbers are powerful if you’re paying attention to relevant ones.

#6: Get efficient

The next step is to Get efficient. And for me, efficiency is about -- how can I spend LESS TIME and get the same or better results.

For me this might be: How can I create podcast episodes that are just as good (or even better) in LESS TIME?

This is a place where I’m constantly evolving, but I’ll tell you some of the things I’ve done:

I have a guest questionnaire that I collect guest information from
I have a system in place for taking a recording from edited episode to get it uploaded to my host and then build out the show notes
My podcast episodes get scheduled in advance to be automatically published early Tuesday morning each week
I have a consistent process for promoting my podcast episodes through IG and email

What I’m working on doing:

I’m working to do a better job of BATCHING my content. Batching is an amazing skill to have -- for me this would mean. Recording a bunch of episodes one day. Editing them on another day. Setting up all the marketing on another day. Sticking to one kind of task at a time saves is much more time-efficient than switching between tasks for one episode all on the same day… which is what I often do at this point.
At some point I will be outsourcing the podcast editing -- it is not my zone of genius and takes me a bit too long!

The goal is for me to spend as little time as possible … creating content that is AS GOOD as I’ve been creating, if not better. And every free minute I find in my schedule is time I can use to work on new, fun things that light me up in my business, or spend time with little family.

#7: Create community

When I first started out in my small business, back in 2017, I was so excited to work for myself… by myself. I’m an introvert and I felt like this lone wolf working style was going to be my sweet spot.

It only took a couple of months for me to realize that running your own business… for yourself, by yourself… can be super lonely.

My experience as a small business owner got a LOOOOT better when I started to prioritize finding community and letting other people in. Sharing what I was struggling with, sharing my wins, asking for advice and input where I needed it.

For this step, I’m going to simply say: FIND SMALL BIZ COMMUNITY. You won’t regret it.

If you’re wondering HOW, here are a couple places to start:

Join my community! If you like this podcast, you’ll love the Good Business Community, free FB group where we take the conversations further and do other fun things :). You can join at makinggoodpodcast.com/community
I did a whole podcast episode about finding your small business community -- that’s how important I think community is! Listen to episode 25: How to Find Your Small Business Community.

#8: Let it be fun

Okay, my last and final tip for STICKING WITH IT is my favorite, and that is to LET IT BE FUN.

If I’ve learned anything over the last few years in business, it’s that enthusiasm is a VERY VERY powerful energy.

When I’m excited about something, when I’m having fun with it, that’s when ALLL the best things happen in my business. And nothing keeps me motivated and more likely to stick with it, than keeping things fun, fresh and exciting.

I’m glad that I’ve approached this podcast from the perspective of, WHAT SOUNDS FUN? What do I want to talk about on the podcast? What lights me up?

Because the times that I really dig into what I’m excited about and lit up by, that’s when things really take off. Those are the episodes that are downloaded the most and that you message me about and say they made an impact for you.

Ask yourself, what would make me excited to work on this project? And then entertain that idea!

An example for me is that in November, I decided it would be really fun to give a holiday gift to my listeners of a BONUS episode every single week in the month of December. This was… a lot of work. But it was SO fun, that despite it being a very busy time in retail, I was able to pull it off.

In December 2020, I released 11 episodes, and they were some of my favorite episodes to date.

Not only that, but this campaign of doubling up on my episodes led to some pretty massive growth in my listenership, which has continued to this day.

So, if you have a tendency to be “ALL BUSINESS”, I would encourage you to give yourself the opportunity to do something fun -- it will keep you excited and motivated to keep going, and you never know what kind of results you might see!

So, as a quick review, here are the 8 ways to stay on track and stick with it:

Schedule it
Make it easy
Find accountability
Get feedback
Track it
Get efficient
Create community
Let it be fun

Sticking with things is hard. But it’s possible, and I hope this episode offers some ideas you can put into practice the next time you have a project or idea that you really want to stick with.

If you enjoyed this podcast, here are a couple of ways to keep the ball rolling:

First, I have an awesome guide to creating great marketing content and coming up with new ideas. Download it (FREE) at: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, there’s a Facebook community of amazing other small business owners and great content just for the group that I would love for you to join. makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

If you found this podcast episode helpful or valuable, I would love to hear from you! Take a screenshot of this episode in your podcast player and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden.

You can find the full details from this episode over at the show notes page at makinggoodpodcast.com/63.

If this is your first time tuning in and you’re interested in hearing more about my businesses, check out:

How I can help with your small biz marketing, laurentilden.co

My plant-inspired greeting cards, vinyl stickers and art prints, goodsheila.com
Seattle retail shop Station 7, station7seattle.com.

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/24/22 Lauren Tilden 5/24/22

65: The Exact Tools I Use to Keep My Business Running Smoothly

65: The Exact Tools I Use to Keep My Business Running Smoothly

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 65.

When you start a small business, no one hands you a manual with how to set everything up. In my experience, the process of getting set up and figuring out how to run your business is a process of Googling, asking around, and experimentation.

And because there’s no ONE way to do it, I LOVE seeing the behind the scenes of how other people run their businesses. And specifically -- what tools are they using to help them get stuff done?

I often get questions about the different tools I use to run my various businesses -- and between my stationery brand, Good Sheila, retail shop Station 7, and podcast and marketing offerings at Making Good, I use QUITE a few things.

So, today I thought I’d share the specific online tools I use to keep my business running and organized, and to market it as effectively as possible. It’s going to be good.

BUT. Before we jump into the episode, I have a few of things I wanted to chat about:

First, let’s talk about content. One thing that I hear over and over again is: I can’t figure out what to SAY in my marketing. If that sounds like you, I have an awesome workbook that will walk you through a process for generating A LOT of content ideas that your audience is guaranteed to love. To download that, head to: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, I invite you to join other values-driven small business owners for inspiration, accountability and lots of business and marketing inspiration. That all takes place in the free Facebook community for this podcast, the Good Business Community. The link will be in the show notes, or you can go to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to be redirected.

FINALLY, if you love this podcast, there are a few ways you can help spread the love! First, I’d love for you to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher to help others find the podcast. And second, take a screenshot while you’re listening and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden -- I would so love to connect with you and cheer you on!

Alrighty! Let’s get into today’s episode about the tools I use in my business.

I use A LOT of different online tools to help me keep my business on track. I want to say up front that this is probably WAY MORE than most people need, because I do have such different arms to my business - a paper goods business, a physical retail store that also has ecommerce, a podcast, and marketing offerings. And the only reason that I am able to keep such different legs of the business going is that I do have support helping me -- primarily an operations Manager, Mary -- and then an awesome crew of sales associates who work in the shop. There’s no way I’d be able to do this all myself.

That said, I want to emphasize that you definitely will not need anywhere near ALL of these tools, or probably even half. I’ll talk a little bit about each one to help you know if it might be a good one for you to check out.

This is a list of the online tools I use, but there are also physical tools like computers, scanners, art supplies, podcasting microphone… etc. I’d be more than happy to share about those things -- feel free to DM me on IG if you have specific questions @laurentilden.

So, that said! Here are the different categories that I’ll be going through today:

Productivity
Administrative
Graphics + Content
Social Media
Website
Email Marketing
Podcasting

This is one of those episodes that you’re definitely going to want to check out the show notes page for direct links -- you can find it at makinggoodpodcast.com/65.

OKay! Let’s start with productivity tools.

Productivity

Focus at Will: Focus at Will is quite possibly the MOST important tool that I use in my business… because it helps me get stuff done. I’m very easily distracted and have a hard time focusing. Focus at Will is MAGIC to me… so much so that a few years ago I bought a lifetime subscription. Focus at Will is essentially music and sounds that is optimized for productivity. I use it in 25 minute sprints -- so it will play music for 25 minutes, I work hard during that time, and then I take a short break. Over and over again. In fact, as I’m outlining this podcast episode, I’m listening to Focus at Will.
You can do a free trial at my link here (and if you do decide to sign up, it will kick a little bit back to me.. Which helps support this podcast!): makinggoodpodcast.com/focus https://focusatwill.go2cloud.org/aff_c?offer_id=16&aff_id=2396
Notion: I think every business owner needs somewhere to keep things organized. A project management tool is a great place to do this. I have tried A LOT of them, and in my experience this is really just something you need to play around with until you find the right fit for you and the way your brain works. I currently use and LOVE Notion, because it’s super customizable and you can really design the user interface to look however you want. I’ve used Youtube to get inspired by the way that people have set theirs up. If Notion isn’t for you, you could also check out Trello, Monday, Asana, or ClickUp. I believe that all of these have free plans.
Google Workspace
A lot of the work I do in my business is done through Google Workspace. Basically this is gmail/ Google Calendar for business. You generally pay a small monthly fee per user, and then you get access to all of the tools. I primarily use Google Email, Docs, Drive, Forms, and Calendar. This is all pretty self-explanatory, but I’ll just say quickly what I use each for:
- Email: I have email accounts for each business, but they’re set up as aliases so I only pay once and they all go to the same inbox. Super easy!
- Calendar: My life is in Google Calendar - work and my personal life both, beecause really they’re pretty tightly intertwined. When I’m really on track, I’ll even use Google Calendar to schedule in worktimes for various projects because I know that if it’s not on my calendar… it may not happen.
- Google Drive: All my files are stored here now. I have the Google Drive app installed to my computer so I can actually see the Google Drive file structure in my Finder on my Mac.
- Google Docs and Sheets: I use these to organize pretty much everything in my business -- including the outline I’m writing now for this episode. Much preferred to Microsoft Word.
- Google Forms: I mostly use Google Forms for two things: Surveys of my audience, and questionnaires (this is mostly for my podcast).
Calendly: If part of your business operations involves scheduling calls with people… you NEED a scheduling tool. Instead of the 5 emails back and forth to find a time that fits everyone, a tool like Calendly syncs with your calendar/availability, so that all you have to do is send a link and then people can sign up for a time that works for you. When they book, it gets automatically added to your calendar. SO EASY and SO USEFUL. I like Calendly, which does have a free version.

Admin

Gusto: When you’re ready to take the step of hiring support for your business, I could not recommend Gusto more. All I have to do when I hire people is fill in some basic information in Gusto, and then Gusto collects the rest of the information needed. To do payroll, I simply put the hours worked for each person and then submit, and they take care of the rest. They have great customer service and I can’t believe how easy they make it. It’s also very affordable.

When you’re ready to hire, I really hope you consider Gusto. AND, they have an awesome promo where if you sign up using my link, we both will get $100 Visa gift cards.

Learn more at makinggoodpodcast.com/gusto

Loom: If you have a team and need to show them how to do things on the computer, I so recommend Loom! You can use Loom to record your screen and your voice. This is helpful when you’re training a new hire, you can record yourself doing a task you’ll be asking them to do, and then they can refer to that when they’re getting up and running. After you record, it’ll provide you a super simple link you can then share. They have a free plan and it’s so useful.
My TimeStation: If you have a physical business and need an easy way for people to clock in and out, check out My Timestation. It’s super basic and you can use their free plan up to about 10 employees, I believe. I installed the app on our iPad at Station 7, and then each person has a unique code. To clock in, all they need to do is walk in the front door, walk to the iPad, type in their code, and then they are logged in. Then, the next time they enter the code (when they’re leaving), it will clock them out. All I need to do before running payroll is log in to my account, and then run an employee report of the dates of the payroll, and it tells me the hours worked.
The only caveat here is that sometimes people forget to clock in or out, and then it will show that they clocked in one day, and 3 days later they’re clocking out… which will show a VERY VERY VERY long shift. So it’s good to do a once over the shifts before you actually run payroll just to make sure there’s nothing wonky.
Xero: For bookkeeping, we use Xero (with an X). I don’t have any particular attachment to it, over something like QuickBooks, I would just say that the important thing is that you use SOMETHING. Most of these tools will sync to your bank account, which makes tracking your expenses and income pretty simple. I was able to do this by myself when I was just doing Good Sheila, but now that I also run Station 7 I’ve hired a bookkeeper, but this is totally something you can do yourself.

Graphics & Content

Canva: I strongly believe that every small business owner should have a Canva account. It’s SO easy to use and has SO MUCH capability. Their free version is super super awesome and you can do pretty much anything you need to do with it. I use Canva for social media images, Pinterest pins, lead magnets, images to put in my emails, podcast graphics… pretty much everything outside of creating branding and digitizing my artwork.
- Pro tip: Canva has a ton of built-in templates you can use, but you can also purchase templates made by designers. A great place to start would be to go to Creative Market and search Canva Templates -- and you’ll find all kinds of beautifully designed templates you can purchase at a low cost.
Adobe Lightroom: I love Adobe LIghtroom for editing images. You can get what are called Presets -- which are essentially just really detailed Filters you can apply to your images. You can get them free online, you can purchase them, or you can create your own. If you apply the same Preset to all of your images, they’ll get a very uniform look. I use the Presets from Light & Airy.
Adobe Lightroom has a FREE mobile version you can download and use on your phone, without a paid subscription to Adobe Creative Cloud.
Social Squares: Social Squares is a stock image membership. I can’t describe how beautiful these photos are, and you can filter by color scheme, contents of the photo, style, etc.… I just love them. It is not free, but in my opinion it’s worth it because the quality of every single photo is so high. I use these images on my podcast graphics, Pinterst pins, social media images, and much more.
Unsplash or Pexels: A couple of free alternatives to Social Squares are Unsplash or Pexels. There is SO MUCH you can find on these websites, and they are free to use (they recommend you credit the photographer). However, not all of them are high quality and in my experience you have to do a bit of searching to find the right image for you. However -- there are a lot of great images on Unsplash and Pexels.
Answer the Public: Answer the Public is an incredible tool for coming up with content ideas. You simply type in a keyword like “podcast marketing” and it will generate A TON of different things that people are searching related to that phrase. For example, I just searched podcast marketing, and here are some of the phrases it generated:
- How to market a podcast
- How to use a podcast for marketing
- Why use a podcast for marketing
- What are the best podcasts about marketing
- And on and on.

You can do 3 free searches per day on Answer the Public before you have to upgrade.

Pinterest Trends: A similar tool to Answer the Public that is free and unlimited is Pinterest Trends. On Pinterest Trends, you can see WHAT people are searching for. If you’re looking for your content to be FOUND when people search, this is an awesome way to find out what words you should be using to be found.

Social Media

I thought here I’d share what social media platforms I’m currently using and any relevant tools for each.

Instagram: Instagram is probably my main social media platform.
- Planoly: I use Planoly to plan out content for my posts. I like it because you can drag and drop images, which helps you see what your feed will look like when things are posted. I will say that Planoly is mostly useful for posts in the Instagram feed. They do have a free version, but I have a paid version so that I can switch between my different IG accounts easily.
- InShot: InShot is an app that I’m really just digging into, but many people love using it to create their reels so I thought I’d share it here.
- Mindful Social Club: This isn’t so much a tool as a program, but I really wanted to mention Mindful Social Club which is run by Chris Emmer (who was on a couple of episodes of this podcast -- episode 5 and 34). Mindful Social Club is an amazing resource, accountability group, and overall HAVEN of advice, guidance, and support around Instagram. I love it and totally recommend that you join -- I think I have a code that will get you a discount -- DM me for details.
Facebook: I do also use Facebook for business -- but my primary focus on Facebook is my Facebook Group, the Good Business community. To plan posts in advance, which I sometimes do (but not always!), I use Facebook Creator Studio.
Clubhouse: One of my favorite social media platforms right now is Clubhouse, which is a place to have live audio only conversations. I participate in live conversations many times per week and have found it an awesome way to build community! If you join, connect with me @laurentilden -- I talk about very similar content as I do on this podcast :).
Pinterest: I’m newly intrigued with Pinterest and how we can use it to get A LOT more eyes on our work. There are tools you can use -- a popular one is called Tailwind -- but I’ve been getting by just fine scheduling my pins in the Pinterest website itself.

I had an awesome episode with Renee Dick about Pinterest -- listen to episode 62.

Website

Squarespace: For my Good Sheila website, Making Good website, and Lauren Tilden (marketing offerings) website, I use Squarespace. Squarespace is a very easy way to create a well-designed website without any technical background. I use Shopify’s upgraded plan that includes commerce so that I can sell things through Good Sheila and laurentilden.co. There are lots of Youtube videos you can reference, and plenty of good looking free templates to choose from.
Shopify: We use Shopify for our Station 7 website. Shopify was really built originally for eCommerce, so it’s much better set up to handle the higher volume of transactions that we have for Station 7. We sell through our website, but Shopify also has a point of sale so that we can sell in person at the store -- which is actually where we do most of our sales. I will say that in my opinion, Shopify is not as easy to make a beautifully designed website as Squarespace, but it’s much better able to handle the large inventory that we have.
Google Analytics: No matter what tool you use, you’re going to want to set up Google Analytics so that you can track how your website is performing -- how many people are going to the website, where they’re spending their time, etc. Again, super easy to Google and figure out how to set this ups (it’s free).
Tidio for Chat: One more website-related tool I thought I’d mention is Tidio. Tidio is an app we have installed on our Shopify website for Station 7 that creates a little chatbot on the bottom right of the screen. You can do this for customer service -- we mostly use it to offer a discount code in exchange for an email address.

Email Marketing

I’m a huge proponent of email marketing. It’s one of the most powerful tools any small business has for building relationships and generating sales.

However, I think it’s really important that we don’t get too hung up on WHICH tool we use -- most of them have very similar capabilities. The important thing is that we just START.

All that said, I’m going to tell you about the different tools I use for my businesses.

Mailchimp: For Good Sheila, this Making Good podcast, and my marketing list, I currently use Mailchimp. I’ve been using Mailchimp for years and years -- in fact I even had a Mailchimp list to communicate about my wedding back in 2016. Mailchimp definitely gets the job done, but many people feel like it isn’t super intuitive to use. If you’re brand new to email marketing, you might consider a tool called FloDesk which many people also use. The other recommendation I’ve seen many people use is MailerLite.
Klaviyo: For the retail shop, Station 7, I use Shopify for our website and point of sale. There’s an email marketing tool called Klaviyo that very closely integrated with Shopify, and I would recommend it to any ecommerce business that uses Shopify. Klaviyo has super detailed information about customer behavior on your website, their purchase history, etc. and enables you to send extremely targeted emails.

I want to reiterate again that it really doesn’t matter which of these tools you use -- the important thing is to get started with email marketing! If this is something that holds you up, check out one of these episodes of the podcast:

Episode 59: How to Get Started with Email Marketing (https://www.makinggoodpodcast.com/episodes/59)
Episode 21: 9 Rules of Writing for Business (https://www.makinggoodpodcast.com/episodes/21)
Episode 15: How to Write Effective Emails (intro to email marketing) (https://www.makinggoodpodcast.com/episodes/15)

Art

In case there are other artists looking to figure out how to digitize their on-paper artwork, I want to share some of the tools that help me. They are ALL a part of Adobe Creative Cloud, and the main three tools I use with my art are Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and Adobe InDesign. Here’s how I use each.

Adobe Photoshop: When I first scan my artwork (I do high quality scans as JPG files), I pull it into Photoshop. To digitize it, I do a few important things: First, I remove the watercolor paper background. So any white/unpainted area gets removed so that I don’t accidentally print paper texture. Scanners can also distort coloring, so I’ll usually play around with the colors until they are closest to the actual piece of art. And finally, sometimes I paint things separately in different elements, so if I’m creating one piece out of a bunch of different painted elements, I arrange them all in PhotoShop. These kind of edits would be difficult to do at the same level of precision using something like Canva.
Adobe Illustrator: When I have the final piece ready, I pull it into Illustrator to create a print-ready file with the right bleed settings for the printer. Also if I’m adding any text or other non-art elements, I’ll add those in Illustrator. If this file is being sent to a printer, I save it as a print-ready PDF from Illustrator and that is the end of the process.
Adobe InDesign: I use Adobe InDesign primarily for my wholesale catalog. This is where I add all of my products with photos, SKUs, prices, terms, etc. This is a booklet that is many pages long, and InDesign is a very powerful tool for arranging hundreds of images and different pieces. You could do something similar in Canva as well, but I use InDesign which is a bit more sophisticated. I save the catalog from InDesign as a digital PDF for my digital catalog and then as a print-ready PDF with bleed settings for the catalog that gets printed.

Podcasting

Finally, I know some of you are interested in podcasting, so I also thought I’d share the online tools that I use for podcasting in case that is helpful as well!

Buzzsprout: Unless you’re much more tech savvy than I am, if you’re starting a podcast you’ll want to get what’s called a podcast hosting service. This is where you upload your audio feeds, and it will send it out to podcast directories like Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, etc. There are a variety of options for this, but I personally LOVE Buzzsprout. It is super user friendly, has great statistics I can look at, and I’ve never had any issues with it. It’s very affordable.
If you are interested in starting a podcast and choose to go with Buzzsprout, I have a referral link you can use that will get both of us $20. To learn more, head to makinggoodpodcast.com/buzzsprout

https://www.buzzsprout.com/?referrer_id=647940

Adobe Audition: I record my interviews directly into Adobe Audition, and used Youtube to teach myself some basic editing skills. I had access to Adobe Audition because I have Adobe Creative Cloud for artwork, but if you don’t there are free tools you can use -- one I’ve heard many people use is called Audacity.
ZenCastr: As you probably know, every other episode of this podcast is an interview. I do these conversations remotely, which means I’m sitting at my computer, and my guest is somewhere else in the world on her computer. I use a tool that is currently free called ZenCastr to record these conversations. The important capability that ZenCastr has is that it can record audio files separately -- meaning I have a separate file for ME and for my guest. So if my dog starts barking in the background a lot when my guest is talking, I can simply silence that part of the track with my voice on it -- without affecting my guest.
Audio Jungle: I purchased rights to the music that you hear in the intro and closing of every podcasting at Audio Jungle. If you’re thinking of incorporating music into a podcast or another project, it’s important that you use music you have the legal right to use -- Audio Jungle is a great place to do this. Another site I’ve heard is commonly used is Premium Beats.

So there you have it! My roundup of alllll the online tools I use in my various businesses. You can find the full list with links at makinggoodpodcast.com/65.

Again, if you’re interested in the PHYSICAL tools, like the scanner I use to digitize my artwork or the specific podcasting microphone I use, DM me on Instagram @laurentilden.

If you enjoyed this podcast, here are a couple of ways to keep the ball rolling:

First, I have an awesome guide to creating great marketing content and coming up with new ideas. Download it (FREE) at: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, there’s a Facebook community of amazing other small business owners and great content just for the group that I would love for you to join. makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

If you found this podcast episode helpful or valuable, I would love to hear from you! Take a screenshot of this episode in your podcast player and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden.

You can find the full details from this episode, including links to every tool, over at the show notes page at makinggoodpodcast.com/65.

If this is your first time tuning in and you’re interested in hearing more about my businesses, check out:

How I can help with your small biz marketing, laurentilden.co
My plant-inspired greeting cards, vinyl stickers and art prints, goodsheila.com
Seattle retail shop Station 7, station7seattle.com
Of course the podcast website, makinggoodpodcast.com

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/24/22 Lauren Tilden 5/24/22

67: A Few Things I Think You Need to Hear (Hint: It's About Your Mindset)

67: A Few Things I Think You Need to Hear (Hint: It's About Your Mindset)

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 67.

I’ve been in business for almost 4 years now, and if I have learned anything, it’s this:

Our mindset is the most powerful tool we have as business owners. In this episode, I’m sharing 9 things that I think you, and every small business owner, needs to hear when it comes to your mindset.

BUT. Before we get into the episode, I have a few of things I wanted to chat about:

Okay, let’s get into this conversation about mindset.

I like to think of your mindset as the lens through which we approach life. It’s a set of beliefs and attitudes, that consciously or unconsciously affects how we think, feel and act.

It can be our greatest asset and closest ally…. Or it can be a real bully that slows us down or stops us altogether.

Your mindset is your daily companion in running your business, and I’ve learned that it’s really worth investing the effort in figuring out how to make your mindset something that works for you and serves you well, and doesn’t hold you back, stress you out, and make you feel bad about yourself.

As I prepare my thoughts for this episode, I’m running late. I should have already released this episode earlier today, but here I am. So, I’m sitting here with my lukewarm coffee, trying to work on this episode, and trying to get my ideas together, and I’m noticing the thoughts that I’m experiencing as I try to put this together….

I’m feeling overwhelmed. I’m annoyed with myself that this episode is coming late in the day instead of first thing in the morning like I like it to. I’ve put too much on my plate and I’m not really sure what to do about that. I want this episode to be as AWESOME as possible and I’m feeling a little bit of perfectionism creeping in to get it right.

But, I’ve been in this game awhile, and I’ve worked a lot on my mindset. So I also notice that I’m giving myself some kindness and leeway -- life has been wild. I accept that I am not going to get everything done, definitely not today, and that’s okay. And, deep down, I believe that even if this episode isn’t perfect (which… it won’t be), it WILL be helpful to someone and that makes it worth doing, even imperfectly.

I’m not a mindset coach, but I am someone who has been working on my mindset for years. So today, in this episode, I’m sharing 9 things that I believe will help any small business keep a strong mindset.

These 9 statements are beliefs that I lean on and remind myself as often as I possibly can. They cover topics like perfectionism, procrastination, making an impact, comparison, and much more.

They help me stay focused on what matters and making the impact I want to make, instead of getting wrapped up and distracted by some of the unhelpful thoughts that come up.

Let’s start with #1: You don’t have to have it all figured out before you start.

Raise your hand if you’re a perfectionist. Anyone else have… both hands up in the air?

My natural tendency is to try to feel like I have to figure everything out and plan down to the most trivial detail before I get started. What happens when you have this mindset is that you tend to…. Put things off. Sometimes forever.

I can’t tell you how many great ideas I’ve had that I got super excited about until I started planning. Then I let myself get overwhelmed and eventually jump ship and abandon the project altogether.

I’m definitely not saying that there’s no place for planning -- there is, for sure.

But sometimes you need to let yourself just take action and follow your enthusiasm, even if you can’t see the end.

Some of the most amazing things I’ve done in my business and life have happened because I finally let myself do something I was excited about -- even if I didn’t have every last detail figured out. For example, this podcast.

My second mindset reminder is: The first version isn’t the final version.

Alright, while we’re talking about perfectionism, here’s a mindset reframe that has been SUPER SUPER helpful for me.

The first time you release something into the world doesn’t have to be… and almost always ISN’T the final version.

Some things that are CONSTANTLY evolving and changing:

Your website
Your value proposition
Your understanding of your ideal customer
Your product catalog
Your product descriptions
Your social media bios
Your branding

Seriously. Pretty much ANYTHING you put out into the world can be tweaked and adjusted later… and in fast, most of these things *SHOULD* be updated and improved as you go.

Sometimes the fear of getting it wrong or making a mistake will stop us from putting things out there… but let me reassure you.

You will get it wrong sometimes. And that’s a good thing.

The process of putting things out into the world, getting it not quite right, and having your audience react to it and help you make it better is priceless.

The third thing I want to tell you is that Business feels a lot better when you involve others.

I’m an introvert, and I LOVE being by myself. I love working on things by myself. I even love traveling by myself.

So, when I started my business, I figured that the “solo” aspect of being a small business owner was going to be such a great fit for me.

But over the last few years, one thing I’ve learned is that there’s nothing quite like comparing your small business experience to someone else. Being a small business owner is HARD, and it’s also an experience that only other small business owners can really relate to.

Finding community has been an absolute game changer for me when it comes to feeling excited and lit up by my work. Even as an introvert.

If you’re looking to FIND your small business community, I did a whole episode on this that I would definitely recommend you check out. It has a bunch of ideas on places you can find your community.

And, if you’re interested in a community of small business owners focused on making a positive impact in the world (other listeners of this podcast), check out my private Facebook group, the Good Business Community. You can join at the link in the show notes, or head to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to be redirected.

My 4th mindset reminder is to Focus on who you can help.

It can be really easy to get wrapped up in our own heads and let ourselves go down a rabbit hole of negative self-talk. From time to time, most of us doubt ourselves. We feel not good enough. We wonder who even wants or needs what we have to offer.

But here’s a mindset hack that will snap you right out of this unhelpful mental dialog.

Instead of focusing on yourself and all the ways YOU’RE not good enough, focus on your ideal customer. What do they need to hear right now? How can you help them?

This can be as simple as a quick check-in email with a customer, posting on social media that you think will uplift your audience, or putting some extra care and attention into an order that you’re packaging up for a customer.

This brings us to #5 on my mindset list is that You can have negative feelings and self-doubt, and move forward anyway.

I’m constantly reminding myself that I can feel inadequate or like a fraud or wonder why anyone would want to listen to what I have to say… and still take action.

I can still release the podcast episode. I can still create the course. I can still host a room on Clubhouse or share my expertise on Instagram.

For some reason, I think I used to believe that if I had a negative thought about something, then I had to believe that thought and let it dictate my actions.

But really, we may not always get to choose all of the thoughts that pop into our heads, but we DO get to choose what we do about them.

It may seem simple, but it’s actually a pretty powerful reframe to realize that even if you’re doubting yourself, or not good enough… you can still move forward and do hard things anyways.

It’s just a matter of choosing to do it.

#6 on this list is: Action creates confidence.

I think I have spent most of my life seriously confused about the relationship between confidence and action.

Consciously or subconsciously, I used to believe that when you felt confident -- that was when you could take action.

So, when I felt confident as a watercolor artist… then I would share my work publicly.

When I felt like a good public speaker…. Then I would start my podcast.

When I felt confident posting photos of my face on social media… then I would post selfies.

However! The truth is the exact opposite. Taking action creates confidence.

The only way to get GOOD at the thing you want to be confident at… is to do it. Over and over again.

In other words… to get GOOD at something, you have to be willing to be bad at it first.

Part of this is about expectations. We have to be willing to try new things without expecting that we’re going to be amazing at it right away.

Confidence and competence is developed through practice… through taking action.

My seventh mindset reminder is to Look at others’ success as an example of what’s possible.

It’s human nature to compare ourselves with others. We look around at what other people are doing and experiencing, and we try to evaluate how we measure up.

Particularly in our current world of social media highlight reels, it’s easy to look around at everyone else and feel completely out of your depth.

When I get stuck in comparison, one helpful reframe I find is to look at what other people have experienced or achieved as examples of what is possible for me.

Instead of feeling “less than” or not good enough, I try to approach it from a standpoint of, ‘look at this incredible experience of prosperity and impact that this business owner is!”

In other words, rather than making it mean something about ME, I let it inspire me and instead make it mean something about what is possible for me.

The eighth mindset reminder is to ask yourself, What can I learn from this?

Spoiler alert that no one wants to hear: Things go wrong in business. Mistakes are made. Launches flop.

If you’re taking action… which is critical to running a business, things are going to go sideways sometimes.

When things go wrong, it can be tempting to want to throw in the towel and give up…. Or we can find a way to find the silver lining.

In business (or even life in general), when I’m faced with disappointment, I try always to remember to ask myself, “what can I learn from this?”

Many small business owners are lifelong learners -- in fact, I would guess that if you’re here listening to this podcast in your spare time, you probably love to learn new things that might be able to help you in the future. I definitely do.

So when something goes wrong and I ask myself “what can I learn from this?” we’re finding a way to pull something good out of an otherwise tough decision.

And sometimes, looking back, we’ll even be GLAD that things went wrong, because we learned something that helped us make a change for the better.

Finally, my 9th mindset reminder is that The right time is now.

I saved the hardest, and in my opinion the most important, one for last. I probably should (and now that I’m thinking about it, maybe I will) get this tattooed on me.

This one is all about one of the great enemies of my life: Procrastination.

I have been procrastinating on things for as long as I can remember. Doing my homework, writing the essay, starting the project for work that was really important to me, starting to eat healthier… procrastinating has been a constant companion to me for most of my life.

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about WHY I procrastinate, and usually it’s because I feel like for whatever reason, I’m not READY to start yet or I’m not able to see the full picture.

When you’re procrastinating on something, look at the task closely, and break it down into the smallest possible steps. And then take the first step IMMEDIATELY.

Even if you don’t feel like it. Even if you don’t feel ready. Even if you have your doubts. Do it.

The right time is now.

So, to recap, my 9 mindset reminders that I think we all need to remember

You don’t have to have it all figured out before you start. (perfectionism)
The first version isn’t the final version. (perfectionism)
Business feels a lot better when you involve others. (support)
Focus on who you can help (impact).
You can have negative feelings and self-doubt -- and move forward anyway. (imposter syndrome)
Action creates confidence. (impact)
Look at others’ success as an example of what’s possible (comparison).
Ask, “what can I learn from this?” (resilience)
The right time is now. (procrastination)

So there you have it! I hope I’ve convinced you of the power of mindset in your business -- and if so, I hope these 9 reminders will help you keep your mindset strong and of service to you as you run your business.

What are your thoughts on business? Do you have any other mindset reminders or mantras that are helpful to you? I would so, so SOOOO love to hear them. DM me on Instagram @laurentilden.

If you enjoyed this podcast, here are a couple of ways to keep the ball rolling:

First, I have an awesome guide to creating great marketing content and coming up with new ideas. Download it (FREE) at: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, there’s a Facebook community of amazing other small business owners and great content just for the group that I would love for you to join. makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

If you found this podcast episode helpful or valuable, I would love to hear from you! Take a screenshot of this episode in your podcast player and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden.

You can find the full details from this episode over at the show notes page at makinggoodpodcast.com/67.

If this is your first time tuning in and you’re interested in hearing more about my businesses, check out:

How I can help with your small biz marketing, laurentilden.co
My plant-inspired greeting cards, vinyl stickers and art prints, goodsheila.com
Seattle retail shop Station 7, station7seattle.com
Of course the podcast website, makinggoodpodcast.com

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/24/22 Lauren Tilden 5/24/22

69: Added-Value: The foundation of my marketing strategy

69: Added-Value: The foundation of my marketing strategy

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 69.

Today we are talking about what I believe is the philosophy behind a GREAT marketing strategy for your business, and that is VALUE ADDED.

But. Before we get into the episode, I have a few of things I wanted to chat about:

Alrighty, let’s get into the episode.

As I mentioned, today’s episode is all the philosophy that underlines ALL of my marketing strategy, and all of the marketing guidance that I share with you here on the podcast.

And that is this: Value-Added Marketing.

In this episode, we’re going to talk about what I mean by value added, and what value added looks like. I’ll get into some practical tips about how to make sure your content adds value, and also talk about boundaries and making sure not to cross the line into giving too much away for free.

What does Value-Added mean?

If you don’t already have a deliberate philosophy that underlines your marketing strategy, this is a great time to think it through.

Let’s peel back the layers of marketing tactics, platforms, posts, emails, sales, promotions, campaigns, etc.

What’s left is marketing, in its simplest terms. And that is simply finding a way to sell your goods or services.

Figuring out how to design a marketing plan gets a whole lot easier when you have a strategy that underpins all of your marketing activities.

This strategy should be the foundation of every marketing decision you make: what to post, how often to post, where to post, and on what platforms, and how to spend your limited time, etc.

For example, you might have a marketing strategy of VOLUME, as in -- create AS MUCH marketing content as you possibly can, produce it as quickly as you can, even if the quality suffers… in hopes that some of it will stick.

You might have a marketing strategy of AGGRESSION, believing that the pushier you are in your marketing and sales tactics, the heavier hand you take in your persuasion, the better your business results will be.

Or, you might have a marketing strategy of ADDING VALUE.

So, what do I mean by Value-Added Marketing?

In short, Value Added marketing is marketing that believes in treating our ideal customer well is the best approach to business success.

In Value Added marketing, we view our ideal customers as humans, not just dollar signs.

Also sometimes called empathetic marketing or customer-centric marketing, Value Added marketing puts the customer and their needs, hopes and dreams FIRST.

How do you add value?

There are two steps to Added Value marketing.

STEP 1: Get to know your customers

The first key to Value Added marketing probably won’t come as a surprise to you if you listen to this podcast. The key to Value Added marketing is knowing your ideal customer as well as you possibly can.

Who are they? What do they care about? What are their problems and challenges? What do they struggle with? What are they proud of? What are their dreams? What are their ambitions? If they could SNAP their fingers and something would be different about their life, what would that be? What’s their favorite social media platform? What do they want to LEARN?

ASIDE: It is important to note that we are not looking to understand their pain points and problems in order to prey on their emotions -- I know that is a strategy for many marketers, but we don’t do things like that here.

And how do you get to know them?

Well, the EASIEST way to get to know your ideal customer is to ask them directly. If you already have customers, pick a few of them who you resonate with, who love your products, and who you just wish you could CLONE and work with over and over again.

Ask them for 20 minutes of their time and interview them to get to know them better. Ask them some of the questions I just listed, or go and google Ideal Customer Avatar Interview questions and you will come up with some great ideas. The point is to get to know this person as well as you know your best friend.

STEP 2: Content marketing

The SECOND step to Value Added Marketing is to use what you know about your ideal customer to create content that will genuinely serve them in some way. Give them something they want.

In other words: step 2 of an Added Value marketing strategy is content marketing.

For the most part, this helpful, useful content we create for our ideal customer should be related in some way to the product or service that we sell.

So, what does content marketing LOOK like?

Well, a lot of content marketing is educational: it’s teaching your ideal customer something they want or need to learn. Some content marketing is inspirational: it’s a quote or a mantra that will help your ideal customer get in a better frame of mind. Or, it could be entertaining -- a meme or a photo of a tropical escape that makes them laugh or dream.

I thought I’d provide some content marketing ideas for a couple of different fictional businesses.

Fictional Small Business #1: A person who sells knitted hats and scarves

Some content ideas:

Talk about the materials you use and why
If you have products in specific colors, you could talk about the color psychology of each color
Show the process of you making the goods
Style guide -- 5 ways to wear a knit scarf
Instructions on how to clean and take care of a hand knit hat
Holiday gift guide featuring a product or two of yours plus some of your other favorite makers

Fictional Small Business #2: A person who sells loose leaf tea

Some content ideas:

Share about the history of tea
Share the health benefits of different teas
Teach us how to make the perfect cup of tea
Round up your favorite tea and tea making accessories
Provide recipes of drinks that can be made with your tea
Share what the best way to dispose of tea leaves is
Talk about the importance of a morning or evening routine and how tea plays a part

Fictional Small Business #3: A social media manager

Some content ideas:

At what stage do you need a social media manager
Share tech tips and tricks that your ideal customer may not know
Share content prompts your ideal customer can use to come up with content ideas
Highlight your favorite apps that help you with Instagram
Break down the anatomy of a great
Tell people what Instagram insights to pay attention to

You may be thinking… this feels like a lot of work. How am I going to constantly create such thoughtful high quality content.

And my response is that yes, it is a lot of work. But with content marketing, we focus much more on quality than on quantity. It’s much more important to create 1 truly great, useful piece of content than 5 posts that you put no real effort or heart into and are posting just to check it off your list.

And while MOST of your content in a Value Added approach should be focused on providing your ideal customer with something they want, this doesn’t mean there’s not a time and place to ask them to purchase. The point of content marketing is to demonstrate that you care about your customers. You know what they need, and you speak their language, so that when you present them with an offer to purchase, they trust you and expect that what you have to offer will be valuable (because look at how much value they got for free!) In my book, 80% to 90% of your messages should be something your ideal customer will find entertaining, educational or inspiring, and 10% to 20% of the time you can ask them to buy something.

So, we’ve talked about what a Value Added Marketing strategy means, and the two important steps to implementing one: get to know your ideal customer, and provide them content that’s helpful to them.

Before I wrap up, I wanted to just chat a little bit first about platforms. You might be thinking, OK, so now I know what the topic of content to create… now where do I post that content?

The answer is that this foundation of adding value should apply to every single marketing platform you have.

You should focus on adding value in your Instagram posts.

You should focus on adding value in your email messages.

You should focus on adding value in your blog posts.

You should focus on adding value on Pinterest.

You should focus on adding value on Twitter.

You should focus on adding value on Facebook.

You should focus on adding value on any other platform you use for your business.

This approach of Added Value translates to every single piece of marketing that you do in your business.

One final reminder before I start to wrap up….

This might feel like A LOT, so I want to remind you that you can re-use content across platforms. If you create something for Instagram, let’s say an Instagram carousel post… that could be used as content for an email and blog post. You could pull out tidbits to share on IG stories or Twitter. When you’re putting a lot of effort into your content, I would definitely recommend that you try to give it as much mileage as you possibly can!

WOO! Okay, that’s what I have for you today!

What do you think about a Value Added approach to marketing? I’m so curious. DM me on Instagram @laurentilden.

If you enjoyed this podcast, here are a couple of ways to keep the ball rolling:

First, I have an awesome guide to creating great marketing content and coming up with new ideas. Download it (FREE) at: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, there’s a Facebook community of amazing other small business owners and great content just for the group that I would love for you to join. makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

If you found this podcast episode helpful or valuable, I would love to hear from you! Take a screenshot of this episode in your podcast player and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden.

You can find the full details from this episode over at the show notes page at makinggoodpodcast.com/69.

If this is your first time tuning in and you’re interested in hearing more about my businesses, check out:

How I can help with your small biz marketing, laurentilden.co
My plant-inspired greeting cards, vinyl stickers and art prints, goodsheila.com
Seattle retail shop Station 7, station7seattle.com
Of course the podcast website, makinggoodpodcast.com

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/24/22 Lauren Tilden 5/24/22

73: Marketing With Heart: 15 Prompts for Heart-Centered Content

73: Marketing With Heart: 15 Prompts for Heart-Centered Content

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 73.

If you listen to this podcast regularly, first of all: THANK YOU!

And second of all, as you know, the past couple of weeks I released some replay episodes. If you HAVEN’T listened to episodes 71 and 72, please know that these are a couple of my fave episodes yet, so please go have a listen! Episode 71 is all about exploring different ways you can do good through your small business, and episode 72 is a re-airing of an interview with Chris Emmer of Mindful Social Co… all about getting more results out of social media (in less time).

Over the last few weeks I’ve been traveling a bunch and had some big personal life stuff going on, and I basically haven’t been able to work AT. ALL.

This was weird for me, because as most of you know, I am one of those strange creatures who actually LOVES work. (This hasn’t always been the case, trust me), but these days MONDAY is just about my favorite day of the week.

But, I ended up taking an unplanned 2+ weeks off, and some time off and away from work was really good for me. I slept more, and better. I snoozed my alarm clock and COMPLETELY lost track of time. I paused shipping on orders. I let my team manage things at the store. I went silent on Instagram and email and Clubhouse and creating content for this podcast and EVERYTHING ELSE for 2+ weeks.

And you know what?

Everything was still here when I got back. Nothing burned down, my business is still running, even if some things are delayed.

This has been a really good reminder for me that it’s okay to take a break. Judging by the amount of sleep I got, I would even say, I now think it’s IMPORTANT to take a break, and I’ve learned that I want to schedule breaks into my work and life more often moving forward. So there’s just a little something I thought I’d share, in case you’re feeling stretched too thin, but like you can’t take a break because you’ll lose momentum and what if X, Y, and Z happens, and etc.

So. Long story, short: I’m back this week with a brand new episode, and it’s one that I think you are going to really love.

If there’s one thing I know about you, it’s that you care about doing meaningful work in the world. You want a business that offers quality products and makes a difference in the world.

Well, from my standpoint, this same heart and focus on quality and meaning should be something we carry throughout every part of our business… and that includes our MARKETING.

My approach to marketing is all about honesty and authenticity, being yourself, making a stand for what you believe in, and quality over quantity.

This is a big topic, and one I’m excited to dive into in much more depth on this podcast moving forward.

But, today, I thought we could dip our toes in with 15 prompts to answer that will help you create heart-centered marketing content.

On to that in a second, BUT FIRST!

Let’s talk about content. One thing that I hear over and over again is: I can’t figure out what to SAY in my marketing. If that sounds like you, I have an awesome workbook that will walk you through a process for generating A LOT of content ideas that your audience is guaranteed to love. To download that, head to: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Okay! So, let’s talk about heart-centered content.

What do I mean by heart-centered content? Just like I believe that small businesses can focus on more than just making money… I believe that marketing can be used for more than just making sales.

We can use our marketing skills to stand up for what we believe in, share our values, build genuine connections with our audience, and make people feel less alone.

Of course, a LOT of the time, marketing needs to be used to help generate sales for our businesses.

Now, these prompts are not specific to any one platform. I want you to think outside of the box when it comes to how you apply these content ideas across different social media and other platforms.

The prompts can be used to longer-form content generate blog posts, podcast episodes, or videos… as well as shorter-form content like Instagram posts/stories/lives, reels or TikTok videos, posts in your Facebook group or on your page in general, LinkedIn… etc. Wherever your audience is, that’s where you can use these content prompts.

Also, let these prompts be jumping off points. Don’t feel like you need to stick to these specific prompts exactly as they’re written. Let them give you ideas and make them your own, if you want. Or, use them as is. I just can’t wait to see what you create!

If you would like a list of these prompts sent straight to your email, head to makinggoodpodcast.com/prompts -- and I’ll send the questions straight to you.

Alrighty, let’s get into it.

Prompts:

1. How I got here

We all have stories that led us to where we are now. I think it’s easy to feel like your “origin” story or your background is boring and unremarkable -- at least I’ve felt that way a lot. But the truth is, what’s boring to you is interesting to others.

Remember those magazines that used to have a “what’s in her purse” section? They’d have someone dump out their purse and document exactly what they carry in there -- their sunscreen, chapstick, sunglasses, notebook, etc. It doesn’t get much more boring than that, but it’s interesting to get a peek into people’s lives.

So, share your story. Did you always want to do what you do now? How did you learn? What made you take the leap, if there was a leap involved? What have you learned along the way? Was there someone or something critical to your path?

2. What I want you to know right now

This is a great one for those of you who have really done your homework on your ideal customer. (And if you haven’t, here’s a great opportunity to start!)

If you look at your ideal customer’s pain points and struggles, what can you say -- from the heart -- that addresses one of those things. Can you share a story or a relevant experience that might provide something they need to hear… or at minimum make them feel less alone.

I don’t want to suggest you ever share anything personal that’s outside of your comfort zone, but where appropriate, sharing a relevant story or experience that might speak to what your ideal customer is going through or feeling is always a great way to connect.

3. Something I struggle with

If you’ve been around here a while, you know how much I LOVE email marketing. I especially love inviting my email audience to respond to my emails.

One of the emails I’ve sent that has gotten the most responses is one that covers a list of things I struggle with.

In my case: perfectionism. OCD. putting too much on my plate. Holding grudges. And a lot of other things :).

I have been so surprised by how much people have responded to -- and more importantly connected with -- the things I struggle with. SO MANY OTHER PEOPLE responded saying something like “I could have written this list” or, “are you in my head?”.

Of course, only share things that feel safe to share emotionally and mentally.

4. What I care about

Share what you care about… or in other words, your values. We all have values, but sometimes we just don’t know exactly what they are. If you’re interested in going through a process of getting super clear on your values, I have a free guide to help you go through this process -- head to makinggoodpodcast.com/goodbusiness.

When you’re clear on your values, I say you shout them from the rooftops as often as you can.

5. Where I stand

Take a stand! It’s never been more important to take a stand on the causes and things that matter to you. As small business owners, we have the opportunity to use whatever influence we have, and personally, I view it as a responsibility to stand up for things that I believe in.

I recommend that you have a statement of your beliefs and stances prominently on your website at least, but your content is also a great opportunity share your beliefs more widely. Share a list of values or beliefs that you stand by, or when things happen in the world around you, you can speak up through your business.

6. A dream I have that might surprise you

What’s a dream you have that would surprise your audience… and maybe even your nearest and dearest? Where did it come from?

My dream is to open up an animal sanctuary… for dogs, but possibly other pets and maybe even retired farm animals or circus animals (thinking big here!). In my head, it would be called something like “Puff’s School for Wayward Dogs”, or something like that. I’m kind of kidding.

If I were to share this prompt, I would share that I grew up with a Golden Retriever named Maxine. She was occasionally a little naughty -- stealing food off the dinner table, for example, but she trusted everyone and was sweet to every creature on the planet. So, I just kind of thought that all dogs were like that if you were nice to them.

Then, I adopted my dog Puff in 2016. She’s a shelter rescue, a former stray, and she didn’t have an easy start to life. She’s also a shepherd and working dog mix… meaning it’s in her nature to guard and take care of her people.

Puff doesn’t trust most people until they prove themselves to her, and she’s not really reliably friendly around dogs or other animals either. But I know her, and despite being a bit rough around the edges, I know she has a heart of gold. Learning how to be a parent to Puff has been one of the greatest challenges of my entire life, but also the most rewarding, and has given me such a heart for animals, particularly ones that might be a bit misunderstood… hence the school for wayward dogs :).

I think this dream shows you a little bit about who I am, but it’s also just fun to tell you about and hopefully, somewhat interesting to hear about.

7. What lights me up

There’s a quote that I love so much I actually had it on my craft show sign for a while. It is by Gemma Troy, and it reads:

Whatever makes you feel the sun

From the inside out

Chase that

What makes you feel the sun from the inside out? What makes you giddy with excitement? What lights you up?

Share one single thing, or share a list. Relate it to your business… or not. But enthusiasm is contagious.

Make a list and share it with your audience -- your excitement will come through, and what a gift to share that energy with someone else.

8. What I’m working on right now

Here’s another one of those prompts that might make you feel like you’re sharing something REALLY boring, but actually is interesting to other people.

I’ve done a few timelapse videos where I set my camera up behind me when I’m working on my computer -- editing a podcast episode or working on my email or writing content, and then I’ve shared it to my Instagram stories, and I’m always surprised by how interested people are in watching me do the “normal” things in my business -- seeing how I do them.

So, share what you’re working on today. You could do a timelapse or video of you doing your work… even if you’re not an artist. You could lay out and share your schedule in a super granular way (what is EVERYTHING you are doing today, hour by hour?) -- or, you could share the tools that help you get your work done, or you could dig into one specific thing you’re working on and share how it’s going, what you’re learning, why you’re doing it, etc.

Letting your audience behind the scenes can sometimes feel like we’re letting them into the “messy middle”, but the reality is, the messy middle is often MUCH MORE INTERESTING than a perfect, polished final product.

9. Who I look up to

Who do you look up to? Who inspires you? Why? This could be a family member, another business owner, an author, a historical figure, anyone. But go into detail celebrating why you look up to that person, what you’ve learned from them, what you’ll never forget.

10. Something on my mind

What’s on your mind today? How are you feeling?

Maybe you’re feeling burnt out. Maybe you’re feeling DONE being a people pleaser. Maybe you’re feeling so ON FIRE about something you learned or a new business project you have. Maybe you’re filled with gratitude for the support you’ve gotten on a product launch.

In this prompt, the goal is to just level with your audience, and speak to them like your best friend. Tell them honestly and casually… here’s where I’m at. Here’s what I’m thinking about. Here’s what’s stressing me out, or here’s why I’m giddy with excitement.

11. What I need more of in my life (conversely: what I need less of)

What do you need more of in your life? Or conversely, what do you need less of?

This is a great prompt to reflect on… both to start thinking through changes you could make, and also to give people a window into your life as it is… not just the curated perfection that we see on Instagram.

For example, if I were to answer this question, I might say that I want more: reading really great fiction. Hot tubs. In person time with my business community. Reflection. I might say that I want less: doing for the sake of doing, false urgency, perfectionism, rushing from task to task without ever stopping to get mindful.

There’s no right or wrong way to answer this question, but it’s a great prompt to help you open up and share a little bit of who you are and where you’re at with your audience.

12. What do you wish EVERYONE knew?

What’s something you have learned that changed your life and you just wish EVERYONE knew? What’s something that would CHANGE THE WORLD if everyone knew and believed it?

Share this with your audience. Share what you learned, how you learned it, and if there’s a relevant story or life experience you can include to illustrate, even better.

13. My idea of a perfect morning (or Friday evening, or Sunday, or vacation)

Paint a picture of your perfect morning. Or your perfect Friday evening, or Sunday, or vacation. Where are you? Inside? Outside? Who’s with you? Are you eating or drinking or playing a game? What’s the weather like? What’s surrounding you? The more specific you can get, the better.

This may not sound like it’s going to relate very closely to your business, but for most of us, we’ve built our businesses around ourselves, and the mood and energy of what you describe will probably match your brand pretty closely. But even if it doesn’t, painting a picture like this is a great way to let people in.

This helps people get a better sense of who you are, and also gives them a chance to have something in common with you.

For example, if you describe the Orange Pomegranate San Pellegrino that you’re drinking, maybe that’s someone’s favorite drink. Or that you would be wearing your favorite oversized thrift store sweat pants -- maybe that’s someone else’s perfect morning outfit, too. Or maybe your toes are in the sand and it smells like coconut sunscreen and you love that smell -- maybe someone else does too.

The more detail you provide, the more opportunity you give your audience to connect with you.

14. Why I do what I do

There’s a quote in the book Start with Why by Simon Sinek that reads: “People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it.”

If you haven’t already, it’s worth spending some time and energy getting clear on your WHY. Why do you do what you do? Our WHY is directly connected to our heart, so there’s no better way to put your heart into your content than to share what motivates you in your life and business.

15. What I want my legacy/impact in the world to be

Well, this is a big one. But ultimately, this is the one that everything boils down to. What impact do you want to make on the world? What do you want your legacy to be?

Lately I’ve been realizing that a legacy doesn’t have to be simply how people talk about us after we’re gone -- it’s something e can have a little bit more control over.

But, it takes the magic ingredient to just about everything in life: INTENTION. We have to actually sit down and ask ourselves, what do I want my impact on the world to be? How do I want the world to be DIFFERENT as a result of me being here? What do I want my legacy to be?

The amazing thing about the kind of businesses that I know you are all building is that our small businesses can actually play a huge role in the impact we make on the world -- because they can be the vehicle through which we make that impact.

So, to respond to this prompt, do some reflecting on what you want your stamp on the world to be. Then share that, and more importantly, make sure you’re taking actions and steps every day to move toward that goal.

My advice for you in responding to these prompts is to forget about your strategy and objectives, get a clear picture of your ideal customer in your head, and just answer honestly in the form of a letter or note to that person.

I’d open up a google doc, put the prompt at the top, and just start typing away. Share honestly and freely, and then when you’ve got your thoughts out, go back and edit for sense, and to make sure that everything you’re sharing is in your comfort zone (I never want to suggest you share anything you’re not ready emotionally or mentally to share).

So that is my list of 15 prompts to help you create truly heart-centered content. I really can’t wait to see what you create -- would love to see it if you want to message it to me or tag me, that would make my day!

If you enjoyed this episode, just a quick reminder of a couple of ways to keep the ball rolling:

First, I have an awesome guide to creating great marketing content and coming up with new ideas. Download it (FREE) at: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, there’s a Facebook community of amazing other small business owners and great content just for the group that I would love for you to join. makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

If you found this podcast episode helpful or valuable, I would love to hear from you! Take a screenshot of this episode in your podcast player and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden.

You can find a list of the questions from this episode on the show notes page at makinggoodpodcast.com/73.

If this is your first time tuning in and you’re interested in hearing more about my businesses, check out:

How I can help with your small biz marketing, laurentilden.co
My plant-inspired greeting cards, vinyl stickers and art prints, goodsheila.com
Seattle retail shop Station 7, station7seattle.com
Of course the podcast website, makinggoodpodcast.com

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/24/22 Lauren Tilden 5/24/22

75: The 5 Stages of the Customer Journey

75: The 5 Stages of the Customer Journey

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 75.

Today’s episode is all about the customer journey for product-based businesses.

Customer journey is one of those marketing terms that might make you roll your eyes and want to skip right through to the next episode, but I have one really good reason why I think you should stick around and listen to this episode (and more importantly, consider spending some time thinking about your business’s customer journey).

The reason why I think you should listen to this episode, all about the customer journey, is:

If you have a business, you have a customer journey.

That’s right: Like it or not, you ALREADY HAVE a customer journey. The question isn’t, do I need a customer journey? The question is, are you going to spend some time thinking about and optimizing your customer journey for the best possible business results?

In this episode, which I PROMISE will not be full of marketing jargon, we’ll talk about:

What a customer journey is
The stages of a customer journey (I share a map specifically for product-based businesses)
Most importantly, how to build a customer journey that attracts customers, treats them well, and creates loyalty for your brand.

BUT!

Before we get started, a couple of things I wanted to chat about first..

Second, I invite you to join other values-driven small business owners for inspiration, accountability and lots of business and marketing strategy. That all takes place in the free Facebook community for this podcast, the Good Business Community. The link will be in the show notes, or you can go to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to be redirected.

FINALLY, if you love this podcast, there are a few ways you can help spread the love! First, I’d be so honored for you to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher to help others find the podcast. And second, take a screenshot while you’re listening and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden -- I would so love to connect with you and cheer you on!

Alright, now! Let’s talk customer journeys.

First things first. If you’re like me, visuals might help you learn :). If you want to view the customer journey I describe in the form of a map (which I always think is super helpful for learning), head to makinggoodpodcast.com/journey for the free download.

Okay. So, what is a customer journey?

Let’s go back to basics and get on the same page with a definition of customer journey.

A customer journey is a marketing term that sums up every interaction and experience a custom has with your brand. A customer journey starts when a person first comes across your business in some way. It includes every interaction and touchpoint that guides them from a being a visitor, to learning more about your brand and becoming interested, to ultimately making a purchase.

Many definitions of the customer journey stop at the purchase, but in my view, the customer journey most definitely does not end there. After the customer makes the purchase, the next step is to delight them in the process of fulfilling the transaction, ideally exceeding their expectations. We then work to turn them into a loyal customer who will return to purchase again and even help spread the word about our businesses.

We’re not starting from scratch.

Now that we’ve defined a customer journey, let’s revisit something I said earlier:

Whether you optimize it or not, if you have a business, you have a customer journey.

A customer journey is simply the sum of experiences that a person has with your brand, starting at the point they’re first introduced to your business, taking them through to making the purchase, and including what happens after the sale.

I point this out because I don’t want you to feel like creating a customer journey is one more huge thing to add to your to-do list.

Instead, this is a matter of stepping back and looking at your current customer journey, and finding ways to elevate it.

I’ve explained very briefly how a customer journey runs from the moment someone first comes across your brand to well after they make a purchase. This journey can be broken down into 5 stages:

Awareness
Consideration
Purchase
Delight
Loyalty

Let’s talk about each of these 5 stages.

The stages of a customer journey

Awareness

The first step in the customer journey is AWARENESS.

The AWARENESS stage is when a customer is first introduced to your business.

Examples of interactions that fall into this category:

Customer stumbles upon your business on social media
Customer is searching for web content and stumbles upon your website
Advertisements reach customer and introduce them to our product
Media mentions of our business
Word of mouth

At this stage our goal is most importantly to get discovered by new customers in the first place. We want to make a positive impression, and start to provide the information they need to make a decision to purchase from us. Here it’s important to build credibility and trust as much as we can.

Consideration

The second step in the customer journey is CONSIDERATION.

This is where our customer evaluates our offer and makes a decision on whether what you sell is a good fit for their needs.

Examples of activities that fall into this category:

Customer may be following and engaging on social media
Customer may do research comparing their options, learning more about your product
We continuing to serve customer with content marketing
We can consider retargeting ads, which are ads that track your customer’s interest in something specific and reappear later

Our goal in the Consideration stage is to establish our products as a good solution, and provide all of the information your customers need to make a decision.

Purchase

The third step in the customer journey is PURCHASE.

The Purchase stage is where our customer makes her first order.

The activities that fall into this category are just however we sell our goods. For most of us, that probably means on ecommerce through our websites or Etsy, but it could also be in person at markets, via social media, on the phone, etc. This will also include any transactional details that confirm the purchase, provide a shipping update expectation, etc.

In this stage, our goal is to make the purchase process seamless. We want to make sure our customer has all the information they need before ordering, and that the process itself is easy and simple as it can be.

This is where many models of the customer journey end, but this is very much NOT the end of the customer journey.

Delight

The fourth step in the customer journey is DELIGHT.

In this stage, we’re making sure to provide a very positive customer experience, and to nurture and stay engaged with the customer so that they become a repeat customer. This is my FAVORITE stage, and I think, the one that is the most full of opportunity.

Activities in the DELIGHT stage include

Deliver a quality product quickly… and ideally including some element of surprise
Solicit feedback form customer about their experience
Ask for review if relevant
Follow up with relevant offers
Relationship building on social media or in any other communities
Communications via email
More retargeting advertisements
Continuing to serve them with content marketing

Our goal in the Delight stage is pretty straightforward. We want to DELIGHT your customer. We want their experience to be very positive, and if possible, include some element of surprise or joy. Here we’ll solicit customer feedback, make our customer feel part of a community, engage them, etc.

Loyalty

The fifth step in the customer journey is LOYALTY.

In this stage, our customers become repeat buyers, and more importantly -- ambassadors for our brands, where they’ll help spread the word for us.

Activities in the LOYALTY stage include:

Involving the customer in product development
Engaging on social media and in email
Personal touch from business owner (make sure they know we notice them!)
Customer gets rewarded for loyalty
Customer may create user-generated content
Customer spreads the word about our business

Our goal in the Loyalty stage is pretty straightforward -- it’s to keep our repeat customers happy so that they will continue to support our business, and even more importantly, spread the word and help us market our business.

How to build an elevated customer journey

So. Now that we’ve walked through the five stages of the customer journey, let’s spend a little bit of time talking about how to apply this to YOUR business.

The first step in applying this model to your business is to get in the right headspace: Really put yourself in the shoes and headspace of a customer who is being introduced to your business for the first time.
Do an audit of where you are now.

Go through each step of the customer journey, and ask yourself how that particular stage shows up in your business now.
For example, for AWARENESS -- how do people currently learn about your business?
For CONSIDERATION -- what information or experiences does your customer have to factor into their decision-making?
For PURCHASE -- what is the process of making the transaction look like?
For DELIGHT -- what is the customer experience after the purchase is made?
For LOYALTY -- how is your customer encouraged to purchase and spread the word again and again?

Here’s a pro tip.

The the best way to get the answers to these questions is to ask your customers themselves.

Collect any information you currently have from your customers. What do they love about shopping with you? What frustrates them? What do you hear in your customer service questions over and over again?

A step beyond collecting any current information or comments you can find would be to survey your customers. We’ve all received surveys after making a purchase asking us to review our experience, share how it went, and how the experience could have been better. Put together a quick and simple survey find out what could be stepped up (and what people love), and get it automatically sent out after purchase.

If you’re not up for a survey, another thing you could do to collect feedback would be to just get in touch personally with a few customers and ask them some specific questions.

Next, get creative. Now that you’ve got a better idea what your customer journey CURRENTLY looks like, it’s time to think through how we can elevate it to better serve our customers and as a result, get better results.

Remember to keep your head in the mindspace of your ideal customer, and then for each stage of the customer journey, ask yourself how you could better meet your goals for each stage.

For the AWARENESS stage
-- what other ways are there for your business to get discovered?
-- are you providing all the information people need at this stage?
-- how are you intriguing people to do more with us?
-- how are you establishing your credibility?

For the CONSIDERATION stage
-- how are you keeping your customers engaged?
-- how are you helping them make their decision?
-- what social proof or testimonials can you offer?

For the PURCHASE stage
-- does your customer have all the information they need when making a transaction?
-- is the purchase process as seamless and simple as possible?

For the DELIGHT stage
-- what can you do to make the process of waiting for and receiving the product as positive as possible?
-- where can you add an element of surprise into the product delivery?
-- is there a way your goods could be delivered faster?
-- how can you engage with your customers to remind them of the human touch?

For the LOYALTY stage
-- how are you getting feedback from customers?
-- how can you encourage customers to spread the word of your business?
-- how can you encourage customers to create user-generated content?
-- how can you involve your customers in your business decisions?

Now that you have a bunch of ideas of ways to elevate the customer journey, we’ve arrived at the most important stage by far. And that is TAKING ACTION.

Looking at all of your ideas, I would rank them by the tasks that will make the biggest impact AND are the most doable, and start working your way down the list from the most impactful and doable to the least.

When it comes to the customer journey, remember that no one knows the customer journey for your business better than your customer. So when in doubt, find a way to poll, survey or simply have a conversation about your business with someone

Before we wrap up, I want to say one more thing. Remember that a customer journey is a work in progress -- it’s NEVER finished and there’s always more we could be doing. The important thing is to spend the effort to understand what your customer journey currently looks like, and find ways to elevate it.

Finally, to assist you in this process, I would download the customer journey map companion PDF to this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/journey which will help you lay things out.

So, there you have it! Elevating the customer journey for your audience.

One last reminder: If you would like the visual companion to this podcast episode that maps out the customer journey, head to makinggoodpodcast.com/journey to grab your free PDF.

If you enjoyed this episode, just a quick reminder of a couple of ways to keep the ball rolling:

First, I have an awesome guide to creating great marketing content and coming up with new ideas. Download it (FREE) at: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, there’s a Facebook community of amazing other small business owners and great content just for the group that I would love for you to join. makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

If you found this podcast episode helpful or valuable, I would love to hear from you! Take a screenshot of this episode in your podcast player and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden.

You can find all the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/75.

If this is your first time tuning in and you’re interested in hearing more about my businesses, check out:

How I can help with your small biz marketing, laurentilden.co
My plant-inspired greeting cards, vinyl stickers and art prints, goodsheila.com
Seattle retail shop Station 7, station7seattle.com
Of course the podcast website, makinggoodpodcast.com

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/17/22 Lauren Tilden 5/17/22

77: Getting More Engagement, Sharing Product Photos, + Discounts [Marketing Q&A]

77: Getting More Engagement, Sharing Product Photos, + Discounts [Marketing Q&A]

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 77.

One thing I think about a lot as a small business owner is energy.

How does the energy I bring to a task affect the result or final product?

In the same way you can sometimes FEEL an artist’s emotion in the final work of art, I think that we bring an energy to everything we do.

I’ve noticed this down to the smallest thing, like writing an email. If I put a little bit extra excitement and heart into what I write, things tend to go a lot better than if I’m just trying to slam through my inbox as quickly as possible.

When I can bring a calm and relaxed energy to my watercolors, they tend to come out a lot more free-flowing, and in my opinion, beautiful.

And, when I sit down to write an episode that I’m REALLY excited about, it comes out REALLY GOOD.

Which brings us to today. The topic I had planned for today’s episode is something super important that I can’t wait to get into… in a future episode.

But, I just was not feeling it today, so I’m doing a last minute change of plans to cover something that sounds better to me in this moment.

We’re doing a marketing Q&A episode! I chose 4 questions that I received to my Instagram stories, and will be diving into those today.

Before we get started, a couple of things I wanted to chat about first..

Alright, now!

So let’s get into the first question:

I need help with engagement. I post daily (lives, etc.) but no one engages on my posts.

Okay, first of all -- I want to tell the person who wrote this question that they are so so so not alone in this! In fact, I’m betting that a pretty good percentage of people listening to this podcast episode right now can relate to this.

So, know that you’re in good company.

That said, I do have 6 things for you and any listener on ways to improve engagement:

My first suggestion is to BE HUMAN. People want to engage with humans. Make sure that everything you share sounds like YOU wrote it. If it’s not something you would say on the phone to a friend, we need to go through and do some editing of how you’re writing.
Another part of being human is to make sure you’re not selling too hard. People these days are very good at detecting when they’re being sold to, and it’s not going to do you any favors to sell ALL of the time. Aim to provide valuable content 80 percent of the time, and talk about/sell your product 20% of the time.
Another thing to put some thought into is how you can start to build real relationships. A great place to start with this is Instagram stories -- get people used to interacting with you by using interactive features like story polls, question stickers, quizzes, etc. THEN, take it a step further by actually sending a direct message to everyone who participates to continue the conversation.
Not to directly try to sell something to them… but to just get to know them better. This is almost like “training” people how to engage with you… People will be much more likely to engage on your content when they feel like they already have a relationship with you, and they’re used to engaging with you in the DMs or on stories.
Tell people what to do. One thing that often works is to take the “thinking” part out of it for people, and simply tell them what action to take next. The EASIER the action is to take, the more likely they will be to do it. So for example, saying something like “drop a heart emoji below if you agree!” is a lot easier than “tell me your favorite childhood memory…” which makes people stop and think and put some effort into responding. Giving people super easy ways to engage by telling them exactly what to do is a great way to improve engagement.
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention your ideal customer here. If you’re doing a lot of these strategies and not getting a response, it might be worth spending some time getting to know your ideal customer and making sure that you’re creating content that is exciting and relevant to them… that is directly answering questions or challenges they have, or providing value just for them. And then, when you have really nailed that ideal customer profile, make sure that you’re communicating just to them.
Check out episodes 52 and 75 for more on the ideal customer.
Finally, keep showing up! For most of us, social media is a long game, and results are seen over time… not immediately.

How do you get people to show your items on their Instagram accounts?

OOOH, this is a fun one. Basically we’re wondering, how do we get people to help us do our marketing for us!

For me, this falls into two different categories:

How do we get people to post about our products on their own?
How do we get people to re-share our social media content?

Let’s talk about both of them.

First up: How do we get people to post about our products on their own?

Something I talked about in my response to the previous question is that often times -- telling people what to do can be the most powerful thing we can do.
If you have a physical product, you might consider including a little note in the package encouraging people to share a photo of your product in their home. Some people use a custom hashtag for this, and you could go as far as incentivizing this somehow -- free shipping on their next order, for example? Or, tell them that you’ll re-share when they tag you -- which is a way of getting them some more attention.
I would also recommend that you think hard about the customer experience of receiving your product. If you can make it unusual, or beautiful, ro stand out to them in some way, that might make them more likely to share it spontaneously.
Consider doing a giveaway or contest. Often times this means teaming up with a couple of other makers, but you could do it yourself as well. The key part is to make sure that one of the ways people can get entered into the giveaway is by sharing a photo of your product and tagging you in it -- either to their Instagram feed, Instagram stories, or on some other platform.
Finally, think about working with influencers. This is not an area that I have ANY expertise in, so I have an episode coming up about this, but -- many influencers accept product for free in exchange for posting about it… or request a small fee. Most small, small businesses are going to be looking for what are called micro-influencers --- and the important thing is to make sure that you find someone who has an audience full of people who would be good ideal customers for you. Stay tuned for an episode alllll about this.

Now, digging into the second part of this answer: How do we get people to re-share our content on social media.

Create shareable content. The kinds of content that people love sharing are things that are humorous or entertaining (things like memes, or reels that are funny), OR inspiring content -- quotes work really well for this. It’s much harder to get people to share photos of your product, but even if they’re sharing a photo that isn’t strictly your product, it’s still a good way of increasing your visibility.
Am I a broken record yet? You want to TELL people to share your content -- specifically, ask people to share to their stories which is a LOT easier than posting to a feed. I’ve done this a bunch of times. A fun way to do it is to create a graphic in a bunch of different color schemes, and then ask people to share their favorite to their stories. You can say something like, “Inspired by this quote? Share your fave version to your stories.”

How often do I need to post my products when I’m trying to mix up my feed?

This is a good question for product-based businesses. Basically… when we’re trying to create an Instagram or other social media feed that is interesting and fun to engage on, how do you balance posting product photos with other photos?

There’s definitely not one right way to go about this. You’ll see some (successful!) businesses who exclusively post photos of their products, and some who post only occasional photos of their products.

I think I would say that at least 50% of your photos should include your product in them somewhere.

I know for a lot of us it feels like, how can we possibly keep things fresh and interesting when we’re just posting the same products over and over again?

I would encourage you to get creative about the photos! For example, if you make earrings…. You could post some product photos of just the earrings. Some photos could be of a model wearing the earrings. Some photos could be of a bunch of earrings packaged and getting ready to ship. Some photos could be of a bunch of sets all merchandised as if for sale at a market or in a store. You could take a close up of some earrings in the palm of your hand -- get creative. Even if you’ll be posting the same earrings over and over again, you can make the photos different by getting creative in your product photos.

I also want to remind you that even if you post an image of a pair of earrings you made, the caption doesn’t have to be about those earrings. You could write about the morning you had today, or something that inspired you to design this particular product, or the vacation you’re looking forward to… whatever. Don’t feel pigeon holed to only talk about the same thing over and over again because that’s the product you’re sharing.

Now, how do you think about your non-product photos? That’s up to you. Maybe it’s behind the scenes photos or videos of packaging your products to go out the door. Maybe it’s a headshot of you, the founder of the business, or a member of your team (even your pup who keeps you company!) Maybe it’s an image of something that inspires you.

What do you think about discount codes?

This is a great question and I want to start by saying that there is absolutely not a right answer to this question.

The important thing to ask yourself before using a lot of discount codes is, “what is my intention?”

One use case that I think is pretty good for using discount codes is to get someone to sign up for your email list. Regular listeners know that I am ALL ABOUT the power of email… but sometimes the hardest part is simply getting people to sign up to be on our email list.

Providing a discount code for a percentage off or free shipping is a pretty good incentive to give someone in exchange for their email address. For me, having someone join my email list is WORTH the cost of them using that discount code to spend less money with me that one time.

However, some brands, particularly luxury brands, don’t like to use discount codes -- EVER. And that’s totally fine too!

I will also do occasional sales using a discount code -- occasional meaning a couple times per year. This is another thing you can think about doing as an incentive to buy… but you do just want to be careful about this. We can all think of those brands that you will ONLY SHOP AT when there’s a big sale going on, because they have sales so often you can just wait for the next one.

We really don’t want to train our audience/customers to ONLY BUY from us when there’s a sale going on, and the best way to make sure that we don’t do that is to not have sales/discount code promotions happen too often

One last thought. You could also think about discount/promo codes in a different way. What if someone could use a code, and instead of getting a discount, they got a free sticker or something small in their order?

Alright! That’s what I have for you today. You can find all the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/77.

Did you like this Q&A style episode? Let me know on Instagram by messaging me over at @laurentilden, or take a screenshot of this episode in your podcast player and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden.

A couple things I think you might love before I sign off:

First, I have an awesome guide to creating great marketing content and coming up with new ideas. Download it (FREE) at: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, there’s a Facebook community of amazing other small business owners and great content just for the group that I would love for you to join. makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/17/22 Lauren Tilden 5/17/22

79: One Simple Exercise to Help You Write Better Marketing Content (+ Bonus Tips)

79: One Simple Exercise to Help You Write Better Marketing Content (+ Bonus Tips)

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 79.

For today’s episode, I’m going to share with you my #1 absolute favorite marketing strategy that I pull out of my marketing toolbox any time I get stuck with what to write.

This strategy is pretty much fool-proof when it comes to making sure you never get stuck staring at a blank page again.

And then, because I’m a bit of an over-deliverer, I’m also including some of my favorite easy quick marketing writing tips to help you clean up what you’ve written and make it as effective as possible.

I’ve been excited about this episode :).

BUT. Before we get started, a couple of things I wanted to chat about first..

OKAY! Let’s get started with today’s episode… How to Write Better.

Alrighty! It’s time for me to reveal my #1 favorite exercise that helps me write marketing copy that really connects with people.

It is called: KNOW / FEEL / DO.

Basically, before you sit down to write ANYTHING for your business… marketing copy, website copy, a marketing email, a social media post…. Whatever.

Before you sit down and start writing, ask yourself to answer these 3 questions:

What does my ideal customer need to know after reading this?
What does my ideal customer need to feel after reading this?
What does my ideal customer need to do after reading this?

Now. I want to encourage you not to underestimate this exercise because of how simple it seems.

Answering these 3 questions (pen to paper… not just vaguely in your head) will help you move your ideal customer forward in their journey with you.

Let’s dig in a little bit deeper to each of these questions.

First question: What does my ideal customer need to KNOW after reading this?

This question does two things.

First, it takes care of the practical details. This question is really, at its core, a practical step. This is your chance to get super clear on what the goal of this piece of content is, and therefore what does your reader need to know.

For example, if you’re running a sale… you would want to be sure to communicate the timeline of the sale, what the sale applies to, what the coupon code is, any fine print, etc.

If you’re hosting an event, you’d want to be sure to communicate where it is, at what time, how the person can sign up, etc.

If you’re sharing about a product launch, you’d want to share what the product actually is, how people can buy it if they want, when it’s available, etc.

Making this list of practical details to share is super helpful in helping you make sure you don’t leave something important out.

Making a list upfront of what you want to make sure to include can make sure you don’t leave something important out.

The other thing that this question, “what does my ideal customer need to KNOW after reading this” does, is prompts you to tell your ideal customer whatever they need to know in order to CARE about whatever it is you’re sharing.

In other words, this is a place to share about the BENEFITS of your product/sale/event/etc to your ideal customer.

Let’s go back to a couple of the examples I just used to illustrate what I mean here.

If you’re running a sale or doing a product launch, not only would you want your ideal customer to know the practical details about the sale, but you’d want to share with them how making a purchase of whatever you’re selling will benefit them in their lives.

If you’re hosting an event, you’d want to share both the concrete facts about when and where the event takes place, as well as what your ideal customer would learn or experience at the event that would be worth their while.

OKay, so! We have addressed the “KNOW” part of the equation; let’s talk about FEEL.

The second question is: What do I want my ideal customer to FEEL after reading this?

The way we write and communicate can carry a feeling with it.

For example, have you ever gotten a text from someone who said something simple like “OK” or “Got it”, and because of the way it was written you thought they were mad at you?

I used this example in a previous episode but I’ll share it again:

Imagine you just adopted a puppy, and you go to text your friend about it.

Do you say, “Hello, I just adopted a dog.”

No, I think you’d probably communicate it with a lot more excitement and exclamation points and copious photos.

These are two different ways of communicating the same thing -- you got a dog.

This may feel a little woo woo to some of you, but I hope you’ll give it a shot.

When we write, we have the power to convey an emotion. It could be excitement! It could be a sense of calm. It could be encouragement.

The point of this question in the exercise is to challenge you to think about what emotion you want to convey to your audience, and really lean into that as you create your content.

I want to make a side not here:

I personally believe that we shouldn’t take this power to convey emotion lightly. A lot of traditional marketers will tell you that a great way to approach marketing to your customer is to stir up pain in them… to “agitate” a pain point. Remind them about how much they’re struggling with something so that you can then present your product as a solution. I want to very strongly encourage you NOT to do this. NOT to intentionally create negative emotions in people in order to sell to them. We can market effectively WITHOUT resorting to emotional manipulation and I know that my listeners will be on board with this!

OKAY! Let’s move on to the third, and in my opinion, the most important of these 3 questions: What do I want my ideal customer to DO as a result of reading this?

The final part of this exercise is getting crystal clear on what you want your ideal customer to DO after they’re done reading.

You may have heard of the marketing term Call to Action, or CTA.

A Call to Action is exactly what it sounds like -- it’s when you define clearly what you are asking your reader or audience member to do next.

Just about every piece of content you produce should have a “call to action” with it, usually toward the end.

It probably won’t come as a surprise that Calls to Action START with a verb -- an action word.

Here are some examples:

Comment your fave emoji below
Go to the link in my profile
Subscribe to this podcast
Sign up for my newsletter
Order your free sample
Save this post
Register for my workshop
Click this link to set up a free consultation
Reply to this email and let me know your thoughts how

Here are a couple of “best practices” when it comes to the Call to Action:

First, make it as EASY as possible. As much as we can avoid asking our reader to have to think too hard or to do something more than click a couple of buttons -- they are way way way less likely to do it. So. If you really care about the person taking the action, make it as easy as you possibly can.
Second, Calls to Action really work best when there’s only ONE. For example, if you have an Instagram post that’s full of great, educational content, you might want to encourage the person to take action, and I encourage this! But as much as possible... keep it to just one. Don’t tel them to Comment below, save it for later, and then share it with 3 friends. That’s just…. Too much. IF you simply say “Save this for later”, your audience will be much more likely to comply.

So, there you have it! My favorite marketing exercise to help you come up with what to say when you’re feeling stuck.

There are a few reasons that this exercise works so well.

The most important reason is that it really forces us to sit down and get intentional. Not word vomiting everything we know and could possibly say about a topic… but really thinking about our audience and asking ourselves those 3 critical questions:

What does my ideal customer need to know?
What does my ideal customer need to feel?
What does my ideal customer need to do?

I’ve said this before, and I think I’ll say this again… but intention is probably the single most powerful force in everything we do in our businesses. When we get intentional about how we spend our limited time, we’re acknowledging: HEY! There’s a whole lot I *could* be doing or saying or writing right now, but I’m going to focus on what I think will make the biggest impact.

SO! I hope that you will consider using the KNOW / FEEL / DO exercise th next time you KNOW you have a piece of marketing content to write but you just don’t know where to start.

I mentioned I like to over-deliver, so! I have also rounded up a few of my other favorite marketing writing tips.

These could each have their own episodes (and maybe they will), but here’s a top line summary of my other favorite marketing writing tips:

Be YOU. You should be able to read anything you’ve written out loud to a friend, and they should be able to tell you that it sounds like YOU. The more personality you can include, the more personal touches, the more phrases that you say, the better.
Get VISUAL. The best writing paints a picture in your reader’s mind. For example, instead of telling you about iced coffee, I might describe the tiny bougie cans of cold brew that Kate gets special ordered from the midwest…. Even though she lives in one of the coffee capitols of the world. Or I could tell you about how I take my coffee very-much-not-black (in fact heavy-on-the-milk), and that it is usually very, very lukewarm by the time I finally get to it.
Start with a BANG. We’re exposed to so so so much content every day, and we’ve gotten to be EXPERTS and sifting through things that don’t interest us. You want to make sure what you write stands out in a sea of words, and the best way to do that is to invest the effort into writing a headline that will catch attention.
Make it scannable. One of my favorite writing tips actually has very little to do with writing… and that’s to remember that white space is your friend. Unless you wrote a literal book, nobody wants to read a book on their iPhone. Use short sentences, short paragraphs, and bullet points, and don’t be afraid to space things out.
Edit with a heavy hand. The secret to great writing is very well summed up in Strunk & White’s classic writing book, The Elements of Style: “eliminate needless words.” Anything that doesn’t need to be there… remove. Any word that is unnecessarily long or complicated, replace it. In marketing, simpler is better.

Alright! That’s what I have for you today. You can find all the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/79.

Did you learn something from this episode? I would SO LOVE to hear from you.

Writing is one of my great loves, so if you’d like more episodes about writing, let me know! I’d love the feedback.

Take a screenshot of this episode in your podcast player and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden. Extra credit, leave a review. It would so make my day.

A couple things I think you might love before I sign off:

First, I have an awesome guide to creating great marketing content and coming up with new ideas. Download it (FREE) at: makinggoodpodcast.com/content.

Second, there’s a Facebook community of amazing other small business owners and great content just for the group that I would love for you to join. makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/14/22 Lauren Tilden 5/14/22

110: How to Stop Getting In Your Own Way + Actually Make It Happen

110: How to Stop Getting In Your Own Way + Actually Make It Happen

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 110.

Today we are tackling a SERIOUSLY big topic: how to stop holding yourself back and how to start ACTUALLY making it happen. I’m so so so excited to share some of the things I’ve learned that have helped me do just that.

If I could sum up the single most important thing I've learned as a business owner, it would be this:

👑 Action is QUEEN 👑

You can have all the motivation, grand plans, and courses in the world... but none of it matters if you're not taking action.

It’s the action that changes things in your business, NOT the learning/planning/strategizing by itself.

No one knows this better than I do.

I've spent YEARS of my life dreaming and hoping and planning and wishing... doing everything except ACTUALLY taking the actions that I needed to take to see things change for me.

But, in the last few years I’ve stumbled upon some tools that have really helped me to take consistent action in my business… leading a business I am so proud of and so excited about.

And I can’t wait to share them with you.

So, let’s get into it:

#1 Getting honest with yourself

Well, geez. We’re starting this out with a bit of a doozy. But one of the most important things you can do to start really making things happen is to get honest with yourself.

Are you one of those people who creates these super grand plans… but does not have a good track record at executing them?

This pattern is DEFINITELY one that I’m familiar with. And I have to admit - a little part of me kind of loves this endless optimism I have that things will be different this time!

But, optimism isn’t enough.

When we’re making big plans for our business, it’s so important to be really honest with ourselves and try to pre-empt any possible issues that might get in the way.

When you have big plans, ask yourself:

What might stop me from taking action on this?
Where might I get stuck?
Have I made a plan like this before? How did it go? What could I do differently to make it more likely I’ll follow through?
Is there anything in this plan that feels overwhelming? How can I break that up into more manageable pieces?
Do I have the bandwidth to actually execute this plan? Or do I need to adjust my expectations so that they make sense with the time and energy I have available?

#2 Set yourself up for success

Related to the first tool of getting honest with yourself, let’s show ourselves the ultimate act of self-compassion by setting ourselves up for success.

When you have something you want to do, ask yourself up front: what can I do to make my success inevitable?

One big concept I got from James Clear in Atomic Habits is this: we can’t control motivation - it’s either there or it’s not. We can’t leave our fate in the hands of our own motivation.

What we CAN control (mostly, at least) is our environment. We can set our environment up in a way that will help us achieve our goals, not hold us back.

For example, if we notice we are always going on social media instead of getting other work done, we could install a social media site blocker on our computer. Or if we want to consistently exercise, we could make sure that our exercise equipment is in a prominent place in our house. Or, if we’re trying to eat more healthfully, we can put healthier foods at eye level and store the less healthy stuff in less noticeable places.

So, how can you make your environment specifically designed to help you do what you want to be doing?

Another way to set yourself up for success is about having realistic expectations. I personally tend to bite off WAY MORE than I can chew. I commit to doing way too much, and then I get overwhelmed when I realize that I don’t have the time or bandwidth to actually follow my plan.

Instead, what if you set a low bar for yourself? Get super clear on your available bandwidth, and then commit to things that you KNOW you can handle given the other demands on your time and energy.

I think people hesitate to set a low bar for themselves because they feel like they’re letting themselves off the hook, but the truth is – if you finish everything you commit to and still have more time, by all means do more!

But part of setting ourselves up for success is managing our own emotional state. If every day I create a to do list for myself that I can’t possibly actually get through, I’m setting myself up every day to feel disappointed in myself. Whereas if I set clear and manageable goals each day or in a certain project, I can end on a high, feeling proud of myself and fulll of momentum to go into the next day.

#3 Find your focus

How do we actually sit down and do the things we set out to do, without getting distracted by the thoughts racing through our minds or other projects and tasks?

I’d recommend that you really spend some time thinking about the times you find yourself most productive. What do they have in common? Is it a certain time of day? Are you working in a certain type of environment?

Get really curious and see if you notice any patterns. And then, try to build those elements into your work schedule as much as you can.

But the reality is… sometimes, we’re not in the exact right location or it’s not the best time of day, but we still have stuff that needs to get done.

So, what do we do then?

Well today, I thought I’d share the 2 things I do to get focused… that work EVERY SINGLE TIME. Seriously. Every time.

The two methods I use to get focused are:

The Pomodoro Technique
Focus Music

The Pomodoro Technique is a productivity strategy named for those old plastic tomato shaped kitchen timers.

The old school analog kind that you twist to set the time, and then they ding when the time is up. Most commonly, people will talk about working in “pomodoros”, which is a 25-minute increment.

During those 25 minutes, you don’t check social media or your phone, but you know that when they’re up you’ll get a break.

Then, when the 25 minute timer goes off, you give yourself another timer for about 5 minutes to do whatever you want… before you go back for another pomodoro of focused time. Pomodoros work because 25 minutes just isn’t that long.

Any of us can work for 25 minutes… but it’s surprising how much you can get done when you stack up a few of these pomodoros.

Also, in a sense, the pomodoro technique is a bit of a reward system. After we work for 25 minutes, we are rewarded with the chance to check our phone or social media or email, or whatever we want… which is motivating.

You don’t need any fancy tools to do the Pomodoro Technique – just a timer of some kind that you set to 25 minutes, and then 5 minutes afterward.

There are some free tools you can use online that have these two timers automatically set one after another – I’ll link a couple in the show notes in the member portal.

The second technique I use to focus is for lack of a better word, Focus music.

There’s a lot of this kind of music on Youtube or on Spotify that you can search for, but I actually subscribe to a service that has a bunch of different focus channels.

The service I use and have used for YEARS is called Focus at Will. I’ll link it in the show notes – and I have an affiliate link you can use if you want to sign up.

There are other services too – a quick search just brought up one called brain.fm.

But essentially, these tools (or Spotify playlists or Youtube videos) play music that has been scientifically optimized for productivity.

You can usually adjust the “intensity” or speed of the beat, and select different types of music.

But they tend to be instrumental, with a consistent beat that just kind of gets you in the zone.

I’ll link to Focus as Will, as well as to some free playlists you can check out if you want, in the show notes.

For some reason when I use focus music, my brain just stays in the zone of what I’m doing. I don’t find myself off checking social media or my email, I just power through. In fact, as I prepared my thoughts for this episode, I had my trusty Focus at Will going to power through.

So what does this look like for me? I turn on Focus at Will, set the built-in timer on there for 25 minutes, and then work until the timer goes off.

If you’re not using Focus at Will, you could just set a timer on your computer or phone, and then listen to the music until that timer goes off. Then you set a timer and give yourself 5 minutes to do whatever you want (without the music generally).

Rinse and repeat :).

#4 Be consistent

The next tool that is so critical to making things happen is taking consistent action.

Here’s a quote from Atomic Habits by James Clear:

“You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.

Your goal is your desired outcome. Your system is the collection of daily habits that will get you there.

This year, spend less time focusing on outcomes and more time focusing on the habits that precede the results.”

Setting ourselves up for success is about building the SYSTEM. A system is a set of actions that we repeat consistently. In other words, a SYSTEM is the actions that we do over and over again.

Our results aren’t determined by a big gesture that we do ONE TIME, but by the small things we do consistently. I’ve shared this on the podcast recently, but I just hit 60,000 downloads of this podcast.

This feels kind of miraculous to me, because my pattern is usually to give up on things WAY BEFORE I start to see the big and exciting results.

Taking small actions consistently over time is pretty magical, and I’m now trying to apply this concept to other parts of my business and life. What could happen if I showed up consistently for the long haul?

Whether you’re working on building your email list, starting a Youtube channel, getting better at your craft, growing a social media platform, getting wholesale accounts… whatever it is.

The key to finding success is to take action consistently… EVEN when you’re not seeing immediate results.

One great way to help make sure that you consistently take action is to to create accountability for yourself… which brings us to the fifth and final tool I wanted to share today.

#5 Get accountable

I’ve always been one of those people who is EXTREMELY RELIABLE. If I commit to meet you somewhere, or do something for you – you better believe I’ll be there with bells on. I never struggled to get homework turned in on time or to meet work deadlines.

BUT THEN I started working for myself… and suddenly I was the boss. I found myself setting these grand plans and then simply… pushing the deadlines back… and then back again.

Over and over again - I would make these promises to myself about what I was going to do in my business… and then I would break those promises, time and time again.

This new pattern really affected my confidence. I started to feel like maybe I wasn’t the dependable, capable person I had always thought myself to be… because why was I always letting myself and my business down?

I somewhat accidentally stumbled upon the solution to this pattern of letting myself down when I finally started making some small business friends.

When I made these new friends, I naturally found myself joining accountability groups where each member of the group would commit to what they were going to do in a given week or month, and then we’d all report back on our progress the next time we met.

And lo and behold – when other people were involved, I started getting things done again, and my intense belief in the power of accountability was born.

So why does accountability work? Well, I can only speak for myself, but I imagine this is true for many folks.

When I set deadlines for myself, there was no COST if I missed those deadlines.

I didn’t have to admit it to anyone except myself. However, when I’ve committed to doing something and told other people about it, there’s a cost if I don’t do it!

I have to fess up and admit that I haven’t followed through.

It’s important to me that other people consider me true to my word and dependable, and I risk people thinking otherwise if I don’t fulfill my commitments.

So as a result, when there’s accountability built in, I’m MUCH more likely to follow through. And my guess is that the same would be true for you.

So, over the last couple of years, I’ve built accountability into my business in every way I could think of, but there are three main ways I use accountability that I find most effective, and I want to share those with you today.

The first type of accountability I use is accountability with my peers.

When I’m working on projects, I like to connect with other small business owners and let them know what I’m working on and when I’ve committed to things coming out.
The second way I’ve build accountability into my business is with my team.

Not everyone has (or even wants) to have employees or other people who work in their business, so if that’s not part of your plan you can ignore this part. But if you currently have (or want!) employees, you can create accountability with them. Just like you probably give them deadlines, I like to also commit to them when I’m going to be doing certain things. This especially works when the person I’m working with needs something from me in order to do their job! I know that they can’t do their job without me completing my end of the deal… so I do it.
The third way I’ve built accountability into my business is through sharing with my audience.
This is super, super powerful. When I have a big plan, I no longer keep it to myself. If I’m launching a product collection, I share that with other people and let them know when they can expect to see it.

When I launched my membership program, Making Good Happen, I talked about it for a couple of MONTHS before I finally had a website to sign up with… and even then, I said: ON JANUARY 3, Making Good Happen launches. If I hadn’t set that date of January 3rd, I can tell you with 100% certainty that this program wouldn’t be here.

That public commitment was so powerful. Finally, if you have a piece of content that you release regularly, tell your audience that!

This podcast ALWAYS comes out on Tuesdays, and I pull out all the stops to make that happen, even when it sometimes leads me to a late night…. Because I know people are waiting for it.

The truth is that I don’t always FEEL like doing the things I’ve committed to do.

But when I’ve built accountability in, I do them.

So, that’s my list of 5 tools that will help you make it happen.

Get honest with yourself
Build fail-proof systems
Find your focus
Be consistent even when you’re not seeing results
Get accountable

If you’re looking to really start making things happen in your business, I would LOVE to work with you inside of my membership, Making Good Happen. Making Good Happen is all about going from overwhelm and procrastination to taking consistent action (and seeing results!). Get all the details at makinggoodpodcast.com/mgh.

You can find details from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/110.

If you enjoyed this episode, I’d love your support! Here are 3 ways you can support Making Good:

I’d so love for you to leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player
If you have a friend you think you would enjoy the podcast, send them the link
Finally, I would LOVE to for you to take a screenshot of your podcast player while you’re listening to the episode and tag me on social media @laurentilden. I would love to cheer you on!

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/14/22 Lauren Tilden 5/14/22

117: What to Do About Marketing Overwhelm

117: What to Do About Marketing Overwhelm

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 117.

Something that almost every small business owner experiences from time to time is OVERWHELM.

And there is perhaps no part of our businesses where we are more likely to get overwhelmed than with marketing. In a world where every day there are new platforms, strategies, tactics, things we “should” be doing… it’s a real accomplishment NOT to get overwhelmed.

For me, here’s what marketing overwhelm feels like:

It’s when I feel like I have so much on my plate, and too much on my mind, and I have this feeling like something’s gotta give…. It usually comes from a place of overcommitting myself to doing more than is actually possible given my time, resources and energy. Maybe I created a marketing schedule that was simply NOT attainable based on my bandwidth, so I’ve set myself up for failure.

And so. Today’s episode is all about marketing overwhelm… what it looks like, what to do when you find yourself in this space of overwhelm, and how to prevent yourself from getting overwhelmed in the future.

Let’s get into episode 117.

What does marketing overwhelm look like?

Marketing overwhelm happens when we find ourselves committing to more than we can actually feasibly do when it comes to marketing. Maybe we’ve planned a launch at a scale that we don’t have the resources for. Maybe we’ve decided that we’re going to be very active on MANY different social media platforms every day, but we don’t actually have the time available for that. Maybe we’ve committed to an email or content schedule that is simply unattainable.

Overall, it’s when we get to the point of feeling swamped with work, overloaded, defeated… even burned out. It feels like there aren’t enough hours in the day.

There are a lot of different possible symptoms of overwhelm that you might recognize.

You might find yourself procrastinating and looking for easy things to do instead of the things you feel like you “should” be doing.

Perhaps you’ll look for distractions like TV – something you can do to numb the stress.

You might experience trouble sleeping, a lack of energy, and issues with your mood.

The first instinct that many of us have when we start feeling this overwhelm is to simply push through it. To work longer hours, and to find ways to somewhat ignore reality and power on, despite the fact that we are unlikely to get through everything.But there is a much more productive way to approach overwhelm, and that is to face it head on.

I’m going to share my process for addressing overwhelm in hopes that it will be helpful to you, too. My process includes a brain dump, prioritization, and reflection.

Let’s talk about each of those steps.

A brain dump is the process of writing out everything on your mind. Don’t organize it, don’t filter it, don’t separate by category… just write down everything that’s contributing to that overwhelm. Maybe it’s appointments you need to schedule, and work deadlines, and a birthday party to plan for your kid, and a side hustle… Most likely when you start writing it all down, you’re going to find yourself writing all sorts of different things that you didn’t even realize you were carrying around.

I’d set yourself a timer for 20 minutes. This might sound like a long time to simply write down what’s on your mind, but the truth is, the longer you sit there and wait for things to come to you, more will come.

If you’re anything like me, you will be AMAZED at how long this list can be. This simple act of writing it all down… without even doing anything about anything on the list… this simple act can be so unbelievably therapeutic because it just removes some of the weight of the overwhelm.

When you know you have all of these tasks, items, stressors written down, you kind of remove the stress and pressure of having to keep them in your head all of the time.

But we don’t have to stop there. Once we have our list, we can go through it and try to lighten this load.

The first question I would ask myself is: What on this list simply doesn’t need to happen?? Are there things here that you can simply delete from the list and move on from?

For me this is when I’m wanting to go above and beyond on something in a way that really isn’t necessary.

The next question I would ask myself is: Is there anything on this list that I could delegate or get help from someone else on?

It might be a member of your team for work things, or it might be your partner or a family member for personal life things. But this is an important reminder that you don’t have to carry everything alone.

Then, I’d ask myself: What on this list can go on a “revisit this later” list?

Oftentimes, a lot of the things on your list will be longer term ideas that don’t necessarily need any action taken now… they’re just things we don’t want to forget. For this, I would recommend making a list of “revisit later” - and then actually put it on your calendar or your task management system with a date on it so you make sure to check-in with it and don’t let it just sit on a list you’ll never see again.

Now that I’ve answered these questions, I’d look at the remaining items on the list and rank them in order of when you’ll take care of them.

Now, I would prioritize first the tasks that are most related to your big goals. For example, if one of your goals is to get more wholesale accounts, and one of the items on your overwhelm list was to do wholesale outreach – then I’d definitely recommend that that particular task gets prioritized.

There’s a resource that can help you get your tasks prioritized, it’s called the Eisenhower Matrix. You can download a copy of the template at makinggoodpodcast.com/matrix.

The final step in this exercise once you’ve prioritized your tasks, is to actually put in your calendar when you’re going to tackle each of these items so you can be sure that they’ll get done.

I promise you, if you go through these steps, you will already feel a heck of a lot better.

If you’re one for journaling prompts or reflections questions, I have a couple of other questions you can ask yourself when it comes to processing your overwhelm.

The first is:

Where is perfectionism coming into play? Where could I reduce the scope of something?

If you have perfectionistic tendencies, you might relate to this. So often, we can find ourselves getting overwhelmed because we set ridiculously high expectations for ourselves, for no good reason.

Another question you can ask yourself is:

What boundaries or limitations could I put in place to prevent myself from experiencing this in the future?

Sometimes we’ve simply taken on more than we have time for. If that’s the case, perhaps it’s time to set some limits on how much work or other projects you’ll take on in the future. Maybe this is a number of clients, or doing fewer markets, or reducing your posting schedule on social media.

Finally, you can ask yourself my favorite question:

What can I learn from this?

There is always something to be learned. When you’re experiencing overwhelm, take the time to sit with it and ask yourself, what can I learn from this? What could I tweak or adjust in the future to make this less likely to happen.

So! Once you’ve done your brain dump and prioritized your tasks, you should wind up with a much smaller and more manageable task list to work through.My recommendation on this is to think hard about what kinds of conditions are most effective for you when it comes to productivity.Maybe you tend to get more things done when you’re at a coffee shop, or when you’re coworking with other people.Maybe you’re most efficient when you tell someone else your plan for the day so they can hold you accountable.

Or, maybe you’re like me, and you are most productive when you work in 25 minute increments. Extra credit for focus music like Focus@Will.

Whatever it is, it’s really worth taking your To Do list, and starting to work on it in circumstances and conditions you know are going to be conducive to helping you get things done.

The last thing I really want to talk about now is how to stop yourself from getting overwhelmed in the future.

Anyone who has experienced overwhelm probably likes the idea of NEVER FEELING THAT WAY AGAIN. Because being overwhelmed really sucks.So, what can we do now to prevent ourselves from reaching a point of overwhelm?

I definitely don’t have the magic solution on this, but I do have some ideas that I thought I’d share.

First, don’t push through when you start feeling some of the early symptoms of overwhelm. When you start feeling overloaded, swamped, like there’s never enough time… don’t ignore it! Start to think about lightening your load then, before it gets more intense and difficult to handle.

My second recommendation is to prioritize taking care of yourself. When we’re resting well, getting enough sleep, getting physical activity and otherwise taking good care of ourselves, it becomes a lot easier for us to tolerate stress. In fact many of these activities actually reduce stress levels.

Third, delegate where you can! Make it a practice to consistently ask yourself: what do I have on this list that someone else could do? How can I make that happen?

Finally, my favorite tip for preventing marketing overwhelm and possibly the most effective? Is to set a lower bar. Ask yourself how many hours you actually have available to spend on marketing, and make sure you’re not committing to more than that set amount of hours. If you're unsure, err on the side of committing to LESS.Also, when you’re creating content and pieces of marketing, be an imperfectionist! Recognize that doing something is progress – give yourself a lower bar than you might be inclined to when it comes to the level of polish you expect of yourself and your marketing.

SO! There you have it! My take on managing marketing overwhelm. If nothing else, what I hope you take away from this episode is a reminder that overwhelm doesn’t HAVE to be a fact of life if we pay a little bit more attention to our capacity and commitments.

One more thing before I wrap up: If you are very very familiar with this concept of marketing overwhelm and would like some support, I would love to have you join Making Good Happen.Making Good Happen is a membership program for small business owners who want to spend time doing THE RIGHT THINGS instead of spinning their wheels. There are over 60 members – they are seriously some of the coolest, most talented and kindest small business owners around, and you are so invited to join. There are coworking sessions, accountability, events, marketing training, an incredible community, and so much more. Get the details at makinggoodhappen.co.

Alright! That’s what I have for you today. You can find all the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/117.

If you enjoyed this episode, I’d be so grateful for your support!

Here are 3 ways you can give back to Making Good:

I’d so love for you to leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player
If you have a friend you think you would enjoy the podcast, send them the link
Finally, take a screenshot of your podcast player while you’re listening to the episode and tag me on social media @laurentilden. I would love to cheer you on!

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/14/22 Lauren Tilden 5/14/22

80: Launching 101 (+ Why Launching Is For YOU) with Shannon Vonderach

80: Launching 101 (+ Why Launching Is For YOU) with Shannon Vonderach

Lauren Tilden

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact. I'm your host, Lauren Tilden. And this episode 80. Today's episode is with my friend Shannon Vonderach, also known as Mrs. Vondy.

Today we're going to be talking all about launching and why no matter what kind of business you have, launching is for you. This is a really good episode, but a couple of things first before we jump in.

First, if you struggle with what to say in your marketing, I have an awesome free resource for you. This is a free workbook that will help you come up with a lot of content ideas that your audience is guaranteed to love, to download it for free head to makinggoodpodcast.com/content. Second, I invite you to join other values driven small business owners for inspiration, accountability and lots of business and marketing strategy. In the good business community on Facebook. The link will be in the show notes or you can go to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to be redirected. Finally, if you enjoy this podcast, there are a few ways that you can help to spread the love. First, I would be so honored if you would leave a review on Apple podcasts or Stitcher to help others find the podcast. And second if you take a screenshot while you're listening and tag me on Instagram @LaurenTilden I would so love to connect with you and cheer you on.

Okay, so let's talk about today's episode. My guest is Shannon Vonderach, also known as Mrs. Vondy, Shannon is an email and launch strategist on a mission to bring that You've Got Mail feeling back to email. She helps busy entrepreneurs by offering done for you email list management and VIP intensives. Besides being dubbed an email queen, she has owned a photography business with her husband for over 10 years. And she serves as a business coach for wedding vendors who want to book better clients. In this episode, we discussed all things launching, what is launching, who is for and what is the launch entail? Shannon takes us behind the scenes of a recent launch. And we talked about how to evaluate a launch after the fact. She talks about some of the positive things that can come out of launching aside from the revenue, why email marketing matters and how to bring that You've Got Mail feeling back to email, how to run multiple businesses at the same time and much more.

In our conversation, you'll hear us refer to some technical issues on my end. Hopefully we resolve them and you won't actually notice them here in the recording. If you love this episode, as much as I loved recording it, I wanted to let you know that Shannon and I and a few of our other small business friends have a super fun collaboration in the works. We are still ironing out the details, but make sure you're following along with both Shannon and I, and on our email lists just to be safe so that we can keep you updated when more details are available. Okay, this one is so so so good. Let's get into my conversation with Shannon. Shannon, welcome to the podcast.

Shannon Vonderach

Hey, Lauren. Thanks for having me.

Lauren Tilden

I'm so excited. I feel like this is long overdue. We've known each other for several months now. And I always love listening to everything you share on Clubhouse and just online in general. So really excited to pick your brain.

Shannon Vonderach

Oh, thank you. That's so nice.

Lauren Tilden

I want to have you introduce yourself. And I especially want to know about I know you have two different businesses. And that's gonna be part of our conversation today. But we'd love to hear about, you know, how you got started in the photography business and what that looks like. And then also some about your email business.

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah. Well, thanks again for having me. I'm really excited to be here. And yeah, I'm an email and launch strategist. And then yeah, my story's a little crazy. So I'll try and give you the short version. But essentially, I had been running a wedding photography business for 10 years when COVID hit. And a friend of mine actually needed help with her email business. And so she had two little kids at home, she was just slammed and I'm like, What can I do? I have no weddings on the count for the foreseeable future. And I realized helping her, I mean, I always knew I needed an email list and I had an email as I just didn't really use it very regularly or properly. And so just helping her I kind of discovered this passion and love for email that like I've really always had. I mean, I'm, I know that we have talked about that, you know, we were old enough to remember dial up and being excited to get that You've Got Mail sound and so I've always loved emails.

I've always loved it, but I just never really understood how it would fit into my business. So after helping my friend I thought you know what I'm gonna give I'm just gonna try it. Let's just find out what happens. So I sent one email to my list and I made $2,600. So I was like, huh, this can't be real. I think this is a fluke. So I sent another three emails to that same list, I made another $1,400. And I was like, Okay, do people know about this? Do they understand this exists? Because this is crazy.

So I realized as doing more research and all that, that there aren't really a ton of like email obsesses, helping small businesses with this kind of thing. I mean, sure, there's like courses and things like that. But there's really no one like helping with done for you services. So that's really when Mrs. Vondy Emails was born. I was like, you know what? I talked to my friend, I was like, Hey, is it cool? If I do my own, she was like, yeah, of course, because she really wasn't at a spot to hire me. And so it was like, perfect, kind of just start out on my own. And now I've kind of fallen into in love with launching. And I know, we're gonna go deeper into that today. But so now that the world's opening back up, I have weddings are back. So that's definitely keeping my weekends filled for the foreseeable future. But I was also noticing another little hole in the wedding space. That like, there's just a lot of trauma we're all dealing with from last year. And so I couldn't not help. So now I'm also offering some business coaching for wedding professionals, because it is something I've been doing 11 years now. So I'm like, you know, what if I can help them book better clients and have a better business and learn more about emails, like, I'm all for that. So that's kind of my crazy, multi passionate story for you.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, I am so, I'm even more excited. I don't think I knew you were doing the business coaching. But like, I also have three sections to my business, stationery line, the store and like marketing stuff. And I have a really hard time balancing them all. So I am really excited to hear how you do it. Okay, really excited to get into this, we're not going to spend a ton of time on email, because I just there's some other topics that I really want to pick your brain about. But I do want to just take the opportunity to remind people that email marketing is so important. You shared some really incredible results you had right off the bat. Do you just want to talk a little bit about why every small business owner should have a email list? And I mean, sort of like very intro tips you have for someone maybe right, who's brand new?

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah, for sure. I mean, honestly, the biggest one is, you know, you don't own your social media. Like I mean, how often do we have, especially lately, I feel like Instagram's just been glitching. And it's like, what would happen? If I couldn't contact? Like, even when we DM I'm like, how would I contact Lauren? And I'm like, wait, I have her email, like, it's all good. So like, that's obviously a really big reason to have collect emails, but honestly, it's a direct line to your clients, or customers or whoever you're working with to. And I also just, I mean, I get DMS all the time have I actually missed an email recently, because I was on vacation, and I just forgot to set one up. And one of my friends was like, Hey, I didn't get an email Did you forget to send it and like, you know, it's just, it's just a really cool way to connect with people on a different level that isn't the same that everyone else is doing. So I think those are some really great reasons to get into it. And obviously, making more money is great, too, because, sales. And then what's the stat to maybe you know, more than I do learn but like the what is it 6% of your audience sees your Instagram and what is it 20% on average opens your email. So it's like, that's a way better return on your investment of time.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, totally. Yeah. I love these points. And I also want to call attention to something you said in the intro, which is, you want to help people bring back that You've Got Mail feeling from like AOL dial up days, which if someone is, let's say, for example, not as old as I am, who doesn't like really know what that means, like, it's really all about just like, we want people to see our emails in their inbox and feel like genuinely excited to open them and feel like there's something really awesome waiting for them. And then obviously, for when they open it, to, feel that that promise has been fulfilled. I think there's probably some people listening who are like, well, how on earth could I do that with an email? Could you just share a little bit about your approach? Like how do you create that kind of like getting excited? Like, oh my gosh, this is so great feeling with the emails that you send to your list, like creating an email that is so good that when you miss it for one week, you have people say, Hey, where's my email? Like that's cool. So how do you, like how does that work for you?

Shannon Vonderach

So for me, I tend to try and just do a good balance of different things in my email. So I know a lot of people think email is just selling and while it can, you can sell in every email if you want to. It's your email list, you can do whatever you want. And that's kind of the other fun thing, right? There's no real rules. I mean, obviously, like basic rules, but nothing like you know, you can't write this or you can't say that it's your email list. But I also like to include fun things too. So like, I'll include, like, I did one email one week, that was like different yogas I like on YouTube. And there it was, people loved it, or I'll talk about enneagram or I'll talk about something fun. And then I'll talk about email tips, or I'll talk about business things are just, you can intertwine a lot of these things so it's personal and it's exciting for the person, because it's something they didn't know, you can tell a really cool story.

But you can also drive that back to whatever you are offering or what your business's about, or just even make them feel good. Like I love making people feel like happy and like, just if I make them smile, like that makes me happy. So it's, I just always try and think of like, what would make me feel good? How can I present this in a way that's positive? Because obviously, we all deal with things that are a little bit negative in the world, especially this past year, things have been really tricky. So it's like, how can I take what's been tricky and look at it in a better light, right? Like, how can I make it look better? And feel better for somebody who might also be feeling the same way you're feeling discouraged or struggling with something in business or something like that? Does that kind of make sense?

Lauren Tilden

Totally. And I feel like part of that, which I think you touched on a little bit. It's like the way that you present that information to it's not being corporately, and like big words and fancy jargon. Like, it's about talking to your friend. And like, really imagine that you're writing? Like, I would write an email right now I could imagine it was Shannon. And like, I would try to use the same language and like, energy that I would put into a communication with a friend as I would to my email list.

Shannon Vonderach

Sorry, go ahead.

Lauren Tilden

I was just gonna say ultimately, when you open an email, it's just you reading and it's not you in an auditorium of 5000 people on the email list or whatever. It's like, exactly, just you.

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah, I was actually exactly what I was gonna say like it. When I write my emails, I think of one person in mind, I try not to, like write it to Hey, everyone. I'll be like, hey, I'll like if I'm really stumped. I'll go through my list. And there's always one person I know that's on there. And I'm like, Hey, Lauren, like, I hope you're doing great. You know, obviously, I wouldn't say I hope you didn't. Great. Sorry. I don't know why. So that I guess I'm thinking my inbox. But I would just say like, you know, have you been feeling this way recently? Because let me tell you, I have and here's what helped me feel better, you know, are just like, how can you make it personal? And not just like, you're saying corporate and like, Hey, you have to, you know, buy my stuff? Or just sounds so sleazy. Just be do and it's, your people are going to love it.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah. Or like, something just sparked for me is like, if you were to be launching something, which we're going to be talking about, you wouldn't say, or you shouldn't say in my opinion, something like, we are so pleased that we have a new product to announce to you today, like and you actually will get email, like a lot of emails like this, because people don't really understand how to do email marketing effectively. Instead, you would want to say something in your own voice that is like, oh, my gosh, I am so excited about what I have to share with you today. Like, if that's how you talk, if it's not like say something that would be genuinely you. So it's really an opportunity to just like translate how you speak into words and don't try to upgrade or censor or make it fancier.

Shannon Vonderach

100% Agree.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, so let's talk about running multiple businesses. This is obviously not something that everyone's going to relate to. But I think for those who do have multiple businesses or have multiple, like, very separate arms to their business, it's something there's not a lot of like content out there about how to do it effectively how to manage. So do you like, what is it like to ru, I guess so it sounds like you have three like pretty disparate arms to your business. What is it like to run on three? Do you have any tips for doing that effectively for any of us who also have multiple businesses or arm store business and may not always feel like we're doing it that well? Yeah, looking for a friend.

Shannon Vonderach

I know, right? Friends me, yeah, I mean, obviously, it's challenging, right? Like, you know, it's not always easy. And but honestly, at the end of the day, I realize I love running a business. Like I love running a business. It's one of when I became a photographer, a million years ago, officially, like officially a paid professional photographer. I was like, oh, I'm gonna just take pretty pictures. And then I realized that no, it's running a business. And so it took me years to figure that out.

And so I would obviously recommend if you're starting, thinking of starting a new business, make sure your first one is like working or if it's not working, what isn't working, and like really identify those things so that you're not bringing that into your second business, because then you're just going to overwhelm yourself and overstretch yourself. I had, luckily had a relatively like, very successful full time wedding photography business with my husband. And so we were able, when I started a new one, it actually came pretty easy to me at first, and obviously, you hit the same business struggles. I'm sure you can relate to this learn, you hit the same business struggles in your business over and over, you just hit them at a different level every time. But I heard something the other day that was like, if you've overcome that once in your business, you know, you can do it. So if you're at a tough level, again, if you're leveling up, you can overcome it.

So things I recommend doing when running multiple businesses at the same time is what has saved me is outsourcing like 100%, outsource anything you can. I have an amazing VA who I could not do most of this stuff without. And then setting up systems in your businesses to especially like I said, making sure that the first one is really set up well and like your systems are going because that's the only reason I can keep my photography business going right now is that it's kind of on autopilot. Like I've done it so many times I know what I'm doing. And that goes into another tip, which would be workflows, making sure those are set up. And I always, I use Asana to organize everything. So I recommend finding, a great, a lot of people use ClickUp, I'm sure you use something to learn just something to organize all of your tasks, so that you're not going wait, did I forget the deadline for this client? Or did I forget to send something or what have you that way you're you're as organized as you can be.

Such good tips. Do you have like, in terms of just dividing your time up? So you know, we have our weekdays, you might work on the weekends too. But like is it like these two days a week you do this business? Or is it more fluid just like what needs to get done gets done kind of thing?

Yeah, I wish I was that organized. I mean, I feel like I'm a somewhat organized compared to maybe above average organized, I guess I should say, but not like, you know, excellent at organization. But yeah, I do. Weekends are usually for weddings. And then you know, I try in the few I have off, sometimes I'll just work on other things. I am trying really hard to not constantly be working too. So that's also been a little tricky. But really just outsourcing, like I said, having my VA kind of managing some things for me and letting me know like, what are like if somebody's emailed and I usually see them, but if I like missed it, or she can handle it, that's awesome. So that way, it's like one less thing I have to think about. But yeah, I mean, it can definitely be challenging to figure out how best to do it. But I'm very intuitive too. So I tend to work a little bit more flowy than some, which I know is kind of not the standard in the the space we're in. I feel like everyone wants a system or checklist for everything. And I've kind of had to come to terms with it's okay, that I do it differently. If it works for me, that's okay.

So I say just figure out what works for you. So if you are somebody who needs a rigid structure, set it up, that'll work for you. But if you're kind of more like me, and you're like, you know what, I'm going to work more fluidly. Just let it go, you know, let go of that control of worrying what other people are doing.

Lauren Tilden

Totally. Yeah, I've heard you talk about coming to terms of just being a little more intuitive. And in the moment when it comes to content creation. And that's something I really relate to. Also, like I do create some things in advanced podcasting, you kind of have to, for example, but a lot of my emails and social media posts like I, it just feels more right to me to kind of do it more in the moment and just kind of articulate what I'm feeling right then rather than like planet ages in advance, and like not even remember what I wrote when it comes out. So yeah, I like the permission that you give people. So just really lean into what works best for you and how it feels. And yeah, if it's working like don't, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Shannon Vonderach

And I mean, I had to give myself that permission to I'm like you, like I see people that are like, you know, I think actually just heard this on a podcast this morning that somebody was like, if I don't plan my stuff out, I'm stressed out and I'm like, Well, I am too a little but I'm also like, I got to do what works for me. I can't, you know, it's like those ones. I'm sure you see those ones that they're like, do this wake up at this time. Don't touch your phone, workout shower, like all those rules. And I'm like who made these? That may not work for everyone. And I personally had to give myself that permission and I hope other people will also give themselves that permission to figure out what works for them and not be like, Oh, would it work? But you know, could I be better? If I did it like this random person? I don't know that well, like, no, just do what works like stop making it harder.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, totally. Do you have any tips for or just any guidance on anyone who might be thinking about starting a secondary business or a third business? Is there? Are there certain types of industry or types of people that you would especially recommend this to? Or not for? Or is it just kind of, like, do what feels right for you.

Shannon Vonderach

I mean, obviously, I love doing what feels right for you. But I also feel like kind of anyone can do it, it's just you have to have that motivation and drive. And I think you have to really, like I said, love business. And I mean, gosh, there's people who have probably done it without loving certain things, or just hire the right people are that kind of thing. But you, you have to really assess what you're good at, what your strengths are, and what your weaknesses are, and hire for your weaknesses, and, you know, fill in the gaps there. But like I said, I, I'm sure anyone can do it.

But I think it's truly important that you love running a business and that you like, again, I can't say this enough, I feel like is just making sure your first one is set up, right. Because if it's not, and you start a second, your things are gonna fall through the cracks, and they both could crumble. So you just want to be sure you're built on, you know, a good foundation, and then moving forward, you can move into that kind of thing. And again, that's not the set rule. I'm kind of did this not expecting to run a whole new business? When I did, but it's, I love it, it's really fun. But like I said, it may not be for everyone, especially if you're not really a maybe if you're not super organized, or if you just really hate organization. But then again, you could hire somebody that is really good at that. And you could still live in your zone of genius. So it kind of anything goes these days. And that's actually kind of fun, I think.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I love the point to do what you're within your zone of genius and what your great, but then hire for your weaknesses. I think it's a really good point that whatever your weaknesses are, when it comes to running a business, and we all have them, it's gonna kind of multiply when you're running three different businesses. So if you're, if your weaknesses, you are really always behind on your email, like now, you're going to be really always behind on three different emails or like types of emails. I love that reminder to make sure that you're like kind of filling in for your weaknesses, probably before you add too many arms to what you're doing, because it's only going to compound.

Shannon Vonderach

Exactly, exactly. You don't want to put too much on yourself. That would not be fun.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah. So I'm really excited to dig into the concept of a launch strategy. And I have a lot of different kinds of listeners to this podcast. But I would say maybe like two thirds are product based businesses. And I don't think that product base, I think we think of a lot like, launching for like I'm launching an online course or I'm launching a retreat or whatever it is. But I don't think product based businesses necessarily think about launches in the same way they might think of like, release, like the release of a new collection. But I think thinking about this kind of thing as a launch is really helpful. Because there's a lot of things that we want to include in a launch to help our whatever word push it whatever initiative it is to help it perform as well as it can. So let's start with just some definitions. Like what is launching and who should be thinking about launching.

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah. So I mean launchings, when you have an offer, or a product or something coming up, an event could even be this, that you want people to buy, enroll, attend whatever it is, you're going to, you know, your end goal is that's essentially launching in my mind. I mean, obviously, I'm sure there's a more Webster definition of this. But I honestly see now that I've like fallen down the rabbit hole of launching, and I'm obsessed with launching. I've seen like, movies launch, right? Like they literally like, hey, we have a new movie. So you see the preview, you hear people talking about it, celebrities go out and interview. And you you know, that's launching.

So like, even if you are a product based, like you're saying, like I helped a client launch a book and she was going to just throw it out there. And I'm like, You need to warm them up and like get people excited about this. Like, like I'm saying like a movie premiere or whatever, right? Because otherwise, like who wants somebody in their face being like here, buy my thing, buy it and you're like, I don't know anything about it or you or why I shouldn get in here. So I think that it's I think anyone can launch. And I like what you're saying about looking at it in that way, because I think you're gonna see a lot better results on that release, when you look at it this way.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, a product release is what I think about doing. When I have a new, let's say, like a new line of stationery, it's like I release it. But that is like a really passive language. It's just like, you know, basically, like, I'm opening the door, and you can come in if you want, but like, I'm not pushing it very much. Whereas I would like to get better at launching my product. So I think just that reframe of like, a launch is active, it has a lot of planning, it has a lot of work in advance. And I think all of us whenever we have something that we're going to be coming out with to sell, I think launch, just the concept of launching is a really helpful one. So love this. Let's talk about what is, what is in a launch, like I know, there, you talk about different components, but could just break down what a launch is, and maybe, or a successful launch what does a successful launch happen?

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah, I mean, honestly, I think the most important part of a launch is a pre launch as some semantics, that may sound, but it's like, it's so important that you want to make sure people want this thing you're going to be selling, you know, and you also want to tell them why they want this thing that you're going to be selling, right? So if they, if somebody puts something in front of you, and is like, Oh, you're gonna love this here, you know, have it you're like, or buy it or whatever, right? You're like, okay, but if they're like, I have this really cool thing. And I'm gonna tell you about it, but I need first, you know, it's like, you're much more interested, because you're, like, excited to watch this journey unfold. And what's what's going to be this thing, you know, what I mean? Like, what do you have in there is, it's just like, far more interesting than if you're just like, Oh, here's, here's a lollipop and joy.

Whereas, you know, you're like, I have something, you know, it's a good example of little kids, right? You're like, here's a lollipop. They're like, Oh, great, yay. And then if you're like, oh, I have something for you, and you're hiding it behind your back and you want and they're like, what is it? Oh, my gosh, I need it, you know, they're even more excited about it. So I think that that's kind of like really, really important to make sure you're setting your audience up, to be excited about what you're going to be offering. And then of course, there's the launching part of it. But if you've done your pre launch correctly, your launch should actually be pretty, relatively easy. The hardest part is just, you have to talk about it a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot to the point that you're gonna be tired hearing yourself talk about it. But I mean, you never know who is that one person that's sitting on the fence, and they hear that one post or one story or whatever, wherever you're launching, and they're like, fine, I'm gonna get it. You know what I mean?

Lauren Tilden

Totally. So practically speaking. I think we've talked about like the, what a pre launch achieves, which is like, introduce yourself and your product, get them excited about it build some anticipation. What for most small businesses like practically speaking, what does that include? Is it like, you know, social media posts, emails? I mean, how would you break that down? In terms of like, practical steps?

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah. So I mean, I think a pre launch, it depends what you're launching, right? It depends what you're launching, how much you're launching, like your product is. So if we're talking like a relatively low ticket item, that isn't, you know, I'm talking like under $200, or something. You don't need the longest sequence in the world. So you'd have a pre launch. And honestly, again, that can determine different timing and stuff like that you can go anywhere from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, it just depends on again, what you're launching what your brand is about that kind of thing. And how much of it you want to probably sell. And then the launch itself, I don't think necessarily needs to be that long, unless you're honestly, it really doesn't, I can't honestly think of an example that it would need to be super long.

So you have your pre launch, your launch, and then I like to do this. I personally use Instagram and email. So that's kind of my two things. But obviously, if you use other social media channels, you can do the same things. And these, the only one that's a little tricky is if you're using Pinterest, obviously, Pinterest doesn't pick up stuff for a while. So you have to kind of plan that way out. That's better for more evergreen content. But yeah, I use Instagram and email. So emails that usually send one once a week so you really don't have to do more than that. You could do two a week. If you wanted in a pre launch or during a launch, you can definitely send a lot more. Send probably one every other day or so.

And then for Instagram or whatever social channel you're using, it really depends what feels right for you. But as much as you can, is probably the best, but you don't want to also just word vomit on people. So I, you know, three times a week on posts, maybe stories daily, like that kind of thing through this process. Again, timing is tricky, right? Because we really have to like, know what it is. But I'd say, you know, if you're doing a short launch something like two weeks pre launch, a week to five days to seven days for launching, and then your post launch is also kind of an interesting thing, too. Which I know, we're probably going to get into, like how to evaluate a launch and things like that. But I didn't know if you also had some components you wanted to add in from some of your launches that you've done?

Lauren Tilden

Hmm, good question. For me, it's kind of all about like the actual content, I'm not sure that I have like a very structured approach to launching, I put a lot of effort and energy into all the content I produce, like, for example, podcast content, and then I have a lot of free content also.

So I really, my I would say like the backbone of my approach to launching is value, and just providing as much value as I can, that will demonstrate my credibility and why I or my business is worth investing in. So I kind of want to give people this feeling of like, oh, my gosh, I got all of this for free. Like, I wonder how much I would get out of like the paid offering or working with Lauren, or whatever it is. So I would say like, that would be the main thing I have to add. It's just in terms of, of like, what is the content that we're doing and the launch?

For me, it's all about, you know, obviously, the content that you are creating in this time should be related to the launch is offering but just like really good value for free, like I don't really do a ton of well, actually, let me back up. My thinking is that in the pre launch, I do a lot of like proving that I have a lot to offer, providing a lot of value. And then in the launch, I do some of that too. But then you would also want to do some like actual selling like talking about the product. And, and that kind of thing, would you sort of consistent with your approach?

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah, and I mean, you can also use other things too, right? Like, you can use social proof. Like if people have raved about if it's a first time product, that's a teeny bit harder, but you can talk about different things too, right, like, so, I'm specifically thinking of this one, like, if you're selling a course, or even if you're selling like for you, if you have new cards, you could like share something that somebody is saying like, Oh my gosh, the cards are such good quality, or, like testimonials are great things to also include. And that's a great point of like, value value value value, because you want to set yourself up as the person that you're the go to and the authority of this particular thing that you're offering. Because I think that that's really what sets you apart too. Right? Like, that's another really great thing to include. If like if your cards are drawn by, you know, local artists or something that's, that's very unique. And for you, does that make sense?

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, totally. I know that you are going through a launch right now or you have on coming up. I wonder if you would be willing to take us behind the scenes a little bit of like, what are you doing to prep? What is the pre launch look like for you? What is the launch gonna look like? And how will you evaluate, like the success of the launch?

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah, so I am launching a workshop for photographers to help them with print sales, because that's what I sold, the one email I sent that made $2,600 was print sale email, and then the $1,400 is the same one. So I was like, I need other photographers to know about this. So I'm going to do a live workshop for that. So I am currently trying to post some content that will attract photographers as well as just content that will help them and make them maybe want to share as well to help spread the word. And I'll do that the rest of this week. And then next week, I'll start sharing some more value. Like we were talking about how important it is to share value and things that will really help them understand why print sales can make such a huge difference in their business.

And then as far as and then I'll do enrolling and that kind of thing. And then we'll do the actual workshop. And then what comes after is evaluating the launch, which can be a little bit tricky, because I think the first thing people would think of to about evaluating a launch is how much did you sell, which obviously is a good thing to know. But it's kind of surface level like you could have an okay launch without selling as much if there's just so many different things that go into it.

So essentially, obviously selling good, but I heard somebody actually shared, I really wish I could remember who it was. But they said something about a launch is really something that can help grow your name and your brand and like give you more recognition, because you're amplifying your brand, essentially, during the launch. So if you're pulling in a whole lot of interests and getting a ton of emails or something like that, during your lunch that could actually be looked at as somewhat successful. Even if you don't sell, if you don't sell as much, you can look at like, what? why didn't I sell? Like, what can I do next time? Or what can I tweak that would make that sell more the next time.

So just because a launch doesn't do well, the first time doesn't mean it can't do well. So I say always look at like what you liked about your launch? What worked, what you didn't like, what didn't work. If you only get a few enrollments, you can use those to get testimonials, or ask for feedback for what sold them or what they would really love to see in your product. Or if it's like a workshop, like I'm doing like, what would you like to see in this? What else? You know, what other questions do you have? What do they love most? Right? Like what do they love about your product or service or whatever it is you're offering. So that way you can use their words to sell it better next time. And then also you want to sit and figure out like what did you learn? And what would you do differently if you had it to do over again.

Lauren Tilden

I love thinking about launches as something that can yes, obviously generate sales, that's probably our number one motivator most of the time for launching. But it's also a great way to grow your email list, grow your community, develop a lot of brand awareness, refine your products also like test something out, launch it, see what people think of it, use their feedback the second time around.

So I was bringing this is bringing to mind for me is just a reminder that don't want things just once like launch at once, see how it goes, figure out what you can learn from it, make any changes that you need to and launch it again, the second time, and I don't have the data on this. But I feel like almost universally, like the first launch is not going to be your best launch, it's only gonna get better when you have more information, a bigger audience. So that's such a great point that like even if the revenue numbers aren't maybe what you hoped they would be. That doesn't mean that the launch doesn't have a lot of other positive outcomes.

Exactly, exactly. And you can try and find those holes and figure out where they are and what you can try next time and launching is just an interesting, the it sounds overwhelming, but don't let it get overwhelming. Just go for it. Just try it, and keep trying it because it definitely is successful. It's just finding the right thing that works for you.

What have, do you have any like fun things you've done during a launch that people may not be thinking of? Or like me? I don't know, like, any elements to your launches that that you might recommend people try?

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah, I mean, I helped a friend of mine, who's also was a client, launched a book earlier this year, and like she went from zero email list to like 600. But originally, I think I said she was just gonna throw it out there and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, I'm gonna tell people, tell people about it and get them excited. So I think if there's any way you can get them involved, right so like, let's get them involved in this so like she shared the cover of the book or the title of the book before it went live and ask people what they thought of it and like got their feedback and stuff like that.

And then she also like we did like kind of fun things that people could participate in, we did giveaways like this one is a little bit different because it's like one big product whereas if you're, but you could still do that I suppose if you had like, like free learn if you had cards like you could give a pack of cards away to somebody or something like that. Just like have some fun with like, what do you like what makes you purchase things? What makes you excited to watch somebody do something like I just kind of pay attention to what other people are doing and try and tie together different things that make me feel excited and into it so it's a little bit hard if you're not used to paying attention to those things but just see like what do you love buying what do you always buy when something drops or like even you can even look at like some of your favorite like I feel like purse brands actually always do a good job of this like you can look at like what is Kate Spade dropping you know right now or like how are they selling this new product like just just spy on people a little just be a little stalkery you know I'm giving you permission just to be a little stalker, It's okay.

Lauren Tilden

Yes, stalkery with some limits great permission to give.

Shannon Vonderach

Good stalkery, not creepy stuff.

Lauren Tilden

I like that you're reiterating something. You mean the point you made when we were talking about emails earlier, which is like, really put yourself in your audience's shoes when you're trying to write a piece of content or come up with ideas like I think too often we just try to jump in and be like, Okay, I need to send an email today, let me just type something. But actually taking the extra time and intention to kind of step back and say, well, it would feel so fun to receive in my email today, like what would be just, like exciting and like, I don't know, what would make my day to receive. And really trying to put that energy into things that you create will make all the difference. And I feel like that kind of, I don't know, philosophy to email marketing, but marketing in general. And certainly launching is what makes your launches probably so effective is just that like extra ingredient of like, let me like, sprinkle some, like fun and like, excitement into this. Rather than just like, I'm gonna go through the motions, just because I read online that like, these are the six emails you need to send out during the launch.

Shannon Vonderach

Exactly. Yeah. Cuz I mean, I kind of have a love hate relationship with email templates. I mean, there's definitely a great use for a lot of them. But launch ones can be tricky because they're written for not your audience, usually. Right.

So I've like I actually had a client, there was like a launch program. And I helped a couple girls with their launching, and like, they use the same templates. And there was one email in it, it always felt weird to me, but they both wanted to send it and it never did well, because it just wasn't their people. So I think it's just you have to really understand, like the best, like tweak things, right? So like, you can try it. And if it doesn't do well, that's okay. It doesn't mean it's failed. It's just like, Okay, next time, I'll change that subject line, or I'll use a different caption. Or I'll do something a little bit different, because they that didn't resonate, but like no one really wants you to just be like, shoving down their throat what you're selling. So it's like, how can you sell it in a way that like, benefits them? Like, how can you give it to them in a way that's like this is going to make your life better? Or this is going to make your life easier? or what have you?

Lauren Tilden

Mm hmm. Yeah, I like to think of it as like, when I'm selling something like, what kind of marketing would make it would be useful and interesting to my audience, even if they don't buy the product? Like, what would still be worth sending, even if the person doesn't buy? And for me, that's like a good kind of barometer for, like, is this marketing? Is it value added marketing? Is it content marketing? Or is it just like, buy my thing right now? Marketing?

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah. And sometimes it's a good thing to do a mix of all of them, right? Like, sometimes people need to be told exactly what to do. And they'll go do it. Like, look at, you know, even like Old Navy emails, like every frickin day. And they're like, hey, buy these shirts. And you're like, oh, okay.

Lauren Tilden

Let's start to transition. I want to be respectful of your time. So how do you approach doing good through your small business?

Shannon Vonderach

Oh, I love this question. I mean, honestly, I started my business to make people's lives, my email business, especially to make people's lives easier and like, help them with their businesses, they can make more money, because I feel like money in the hands of good people is a good thing. So it's like, Can I help you launch something so that you make more and that you feel empowered to go out and maybe change someone else's life? I love to cheer people on. I mean, it's probably part of my Enneagram seven that I'm just like, always wanting to make people feel good.

And I, you know, I lift them up, even if they're never going to be clients, like I'll just cheer people on. Because I really think we just need positivity right now more than ever, especially after this past year and a half. We've all been like stuck at home. So, I mean, I just think it's really important to the biggest thing I feel like, it's a struggle for small business owners, especially online business owners, is that you see so many people doing things, right. And so it's like, when you see somebody doing something you want to be doing, it's easy to slip into that impostor syndrome.

So the thing I've really tried to fall into instead is like, what if instead of looking at this as something that I'm lacking, I look at this as something that's possible, like good for her. She's done something awesome. I could do it too. Like she's proven it can be done. So maybe, instead of feeling bad about myself, I can cheer her on. Because I feel like if you can just share like one positive thing with people and, I'm sorry, if you can share positive things with people and it changes one person's mindset, like I've done my job, right. So I always try and just share what's on my heart and be honest and true and make people feel good if I can.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, that is a very real way of doing good. I love that answer. What is one small business that you admire?

Shannon Vonderach

Can I only pick one? It's such a hard question.

Lauren Tilden

If you need to go more than one you can.

Shannon Vonderach

Gosh, there's just like so many good ones. Obviously, I love your business. And I love all the people that like you and I run in a circle with friends and like, I'm just always so in awe of how you guys hold yourselves with grace and are just so incredibly impressive with what you do. And, you know, running lives with children and all of those things. It's always really impressive to me.

One that I actually just shared this week actually was a hand sanitizer company. They because they sent me this is like, the third time I've ordered from them and they like send me a handwritten personal note every time and they're like, Thank you for reordering. So they're like paying attention. And they're, you know, it says, Hey, Shannon, and he signs it. And like the other one I just got, he's like, over like, because it was on a card and he ran out of room, he goes flip over. And it felt like a kid again in school. And I was like, and he's like, I gave you an extra bottle because we were out of the one size you ordered. So enjoy the extra ounce on me or something. And it was just like such a cute personal touch. So I you know, if anyone is out there kind of like how do I make something more personal or maybe my personal touches don't matter or things like that they do. So keep going. Because I think that they're really important to have. And that's what makes small business small business.

Lauren Tilden

100%. I love that. And it's, I just want to point out like you, all this person did it on one sense, like write a little note and say thank you, like he noticed that you reordered. And he said thank you for reordering. And like even that, by itself stood out to you so much that you're like sharing about it. So it doesn't have to be these like huge elaborate gestures. Like it can be as simple as noticing things about your customers and paying attention. And just like yeah, the handwritten touch the hand written or personal touches is what is magical about small businesses. It's what makes us different from like, it's why people shop at small businesses is that thing, so give people what they want. What is the name of that business?

Shannon Vonderach

Their Scully Wonderful. They're like a little small business in Brooklyn, my friend who's a teacher referred them to me for when you know, all this stuff went down. And she's like, they're the best hand sanitizer, it's not sticky or anything. They have some other stuff too, that I think they have like a deodorant, like natural deodorant and something else. But yeah, so highly recommend them. They're very, it's, again, you'll get a cute personal note.

Lauren Tilden

So yay, love. Cool. What is a book that you would recommend?

Shannon Vonderach

Oh, gosh. Alright, business wise, because I'm such a nerd. I read a lot of like, young adults, so don't judge me.

But business wise, one, the concepts from the book Profit First really changed the way I run my business. And like how I set up my pricing and kind of helped me figure out a lot of my own, like making sure I'm taking care of myself first. The book itself is a little lengthy, maybe in parts or like, you know, redundant in parts, I guess I should say. But the concept of it and like some of the way like I think they say like it like 15 bank accounts, and it's not that many, but it's like a bunch of bank accounts. And I'm like, Yeah, I'm not going to do that. Because I'm, well, I'm not going to spend all my money. But some people need that because they do. So I kind of modified it for myself. That's like my only disclaimer, but it's a great book, you should definitely read it. And I also just started one, I feel like you'd like this one to learn if you haven't read it called Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself.

Lauren Tilden

I haven't.

Shannon Vonderach

It's kind of about like your brain and like keeping your brain healthy. And how it's kind of like manifest, it is about manifesting too. But it doesn't go into that woo woo ness, it's more the scientific part of it. I haven't finished it. So maybe it's terrible, but I'm excited to get through it because it does seem like it's going to be an interesting read.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, well, hopefully you'll finish it before I air the episode. And if you want to take it back, you can take it back. But otherwise, we're gonna include it as your second book recommendation. And I'm actually really excited to check that out. And yeah, Profit First. So, so important, I think for small business owners, at least to just like, kind of reframe how you think about is profit something you decide you're going to have or is it like, what's leftover after everything you spend and it's just like, it's a great thing to read to kind of reframe your, your approach to how you spend your money. I would love for you to share a little bit about where people can find you online and I know you have some great resource says if you want to share any of that, I would love for you to let the audience know.

Shannon Vonderach

Yeah. So I'm on Instagram, I basically live there. You can find me @Mrs.Vondy, I'm sure Lauren will provide you a link if you need one. And you can also get on my email list, which I send those weekly on Friday mornings. So most weeks, my one friend called me on that one I missed, which is nice and accountability. And then if you need one of my freebies, I do have three simple ways to grow your email list, which I'll give you a link that you can put in the show notes as well, Lauren, but yeah, that's kind of like where to find me. My DM's are always open. If anyone wants to connect, I'd love to chat with you.

Lauren Tilden

Amazing. Shannon, thank you so much for coming on the show for bearing with me and my technology issues. And just like your generosity, with your knowledge, I feel like not everyone has the same approach that you do of like, I learned these magical things that changed my business, and I'm going to turn around and share it with people. I just really admire that approach. So thank you for everything you shared here and for all the work you do and yeah, everything you mentioned, I will link everyone go check out Shannon. Shannon, thank you for being here.

Shannon Vonderach

Thank you for having me, Lauren. It's been really fun and no worries I tech is our best friend and worst friend at the same time. So we made it.

Lauren Tilden

Yes, we did.

Shannon, what a blast this conversation was, thank you so much for everything you shared. There are so many magical gems in this conversation. Listener, I know that Shannon and I would both love to connect with you on Instagram. Take a screenshot of you listening to this episode and tag us both. Shannon is @Mrs.Vondy and I'm @LaurenTilden.

Everything mentioned in this episode, including Shannon's free resource about building your email list can be found on the show notes page at makinggoodpodcast.com/80 If this is your first time tuning in and you're interested in learning more about what I do check out the Good Business free Facebook community for this podcast with accountability, exclusive content and great community at makinggoodpodcast.com/community. How I can help with their small business marketing at Laurentilden.co. My plant inspired greeting cards, vinyl stickers, and art prints at goodsheila.com The Seattle retail store Station Seven at stationsevenseattle.com And of course the home for all things Making Good makinggoodpodcast.com Thank you for being here and for focusing on making a difference with your small business. Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/9/22 Lauren Tilden 5/9/22

82: Email Marketing for e-Commerce + Planning for Q4

82: Email Marketing for e-Commerce + Planning for Q4

Lauren Tilden

Welcome back to Making Good, podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact. I'm your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 82. In today's episode, I'm joined by my friend, email marketing strategist Kris Daria. This episode is an absolute goldmine of information and actionable takeaways when it comes to email marketing and planning for Q4. But a couple of quick things before we jump in. First, if you struggle with figuring out what to say in your marketing, I have an awesome free resource for you. This workbook will help you come up with a lot of content ideas, your audience will love to download it for free head to makinggoodpodcast.com/content. Second, I want to invite you to join other values driven small business owners for inspiration, accountability and lots of business and marketing strategy. Join the free Facebook community for this podcast the good business community. The link will be in the show notes or you can head to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to be redirected. Finally, if you enjoy this podcast, there are a few ways that you can help spread the love. First, I would be so honored if you would leave a review on Apple podcasts or Stitcher to help others find this podcast. And second, take a screenshot while you're listening and tag me on Instagram at @ LaurenTilden. I would so love to connect with you and cheer you on.

Okay, so let's talk about today's episode. My guest today is Kris Daria. An email marketing strategist who helps ecommerce beauty and wellness brands grow their online stores with automated email marketing. After spending over 10 years working with multimillion dollar ecommerce brands, Kris has become a pro at automating her clients email marketing in a day, so they can save time and bring in more sales on autopilot without lifting a finger. Her focus is on helping purpose driven entrepreneurs build impactful and automated email systems while giving them the tools to operate with more clarity, ease and flow. In this episode, which is amazing, we discussed why it's important not to depend on social media, where to start when it comes to email marketing.

The difference between scheduled and automated emails, the email automations every ecommerce brand should think about implementing, how to make an email marketing plan, how to plan for Q4, Apple's iOS 14 update and how that affects email marketing data, the importance of creating accessible content and much more. The timing of this episode is really interesting because this episode comes out on October 5, just one day after a massive Facebook Instagram and WhatsApp outage that left us unable to connect on Instagram or Facebook for much of the day, there couldn't be a more important reminder of the importance of building your email list and this episode will show you exactly how to make that happen. Okay, let's get into our conversation.

Kris, welcome to the podcast.

Kris Daria

Hey, Lauren, thank you. So happy to be here.

Lauren Tilden

I am so excited to have you on the show. Kris and I met on Clubhouse and we were just chatting like, kind of immediately connected over our love of marketing and email in specific and I just, the first time I heard Kris talk about email, I was so blown away by just like how actionable and valuable everything she had to share was, it's just like, everyone get your notes ready, get your pen and paper ready because she just is gonna I know this is just gonna be so full of things you can just take right now and go put into practice. So, Kris, now that I've hyped you up, I would love for you to introduce yourself and share a little bit of your story of how you got to run your own business focusing on email marketing.

Kris Daria

Yeah, sure. So I I've been working in like the digital marketing ecommerce space for almost 10 years now. And before working as a consultant, I had a position at a big corporate company, where a big part of my role was to kind of be more like the head of the brand and design the customer journey. So I was basically the ecommerce brand manager and I was overseeing the online operations and the offline marketing operations. So in that role I had, you know, I learned a lot about building a business online and offline. But really, one of the easiest and most profitable revenue channels for us was our email marketing. It was generating, you know, 25 to 30% of our sales were generated by email alone.

So we like for us, it was like, because we didn't have to pay Facebook or another media agency to reach our customers. And we're dealing with email internally, it wasn't, you know, outsourced to anyone, it was a really, really low cost way for us to reach our buyers. And you can see the performance, we can measure it, and it was one of our highest converting channels. So for us, email was a super key thing for us to have. And when I started taking on clients and working with smaller businesses, the one, one another thing that stood out to me was the fact that they were, there was a great need for more education and more help around email marketing. There was, most brands, you know, most small brands, when they start out the immediate, easiest thing is to start with social media because it's easily accessible. And the only thing I saw about that is that they were only focusing on social media to grow their audience, and they were not sending the clients I was working with, they were not dabbling in email at all. And for me, that was a bit problematic, because you know, with Instagram and Facebook, it's, you know, you're always at the, you're always depending on how the algorithm is going to show your content, you don't know, you don't know if one day and it happened before that, you know, Facebook and Instagram, like you know, disable your page, and then suddenly, you have no connection with your followers.

So like, that's why it's important for me to teach my clients how to build and monetize your email list. And so that's what I started doing, since I would say over a year and a half now. And what I focus mainly on with my clients is really email automation. So automated sequences or flows. Those are the many ways you can call email, automated email marketing, because most of my audience, they're, they're busy mom, entrepreneur, entrepreneurs. So they have to, they have balance it all, know all the things in their mom life and their business. And so for me, it's really important, I really believe in helping women just make more money, make more sales by working less and having less stress in their business. And if I can help with email automations to make their lives easier, so that they can make more money in sales while they sleep. I'm really all for it. So yeah, that's me in a nutshell on how I got started with email marketing.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I love that. And I love that you kind of make the connection between the results that email can generate and the kind of like lifestyle implications of that if you're not having to, you know, spend all your day on social media to make the same sale that are the same sales. Let's say that one email could send automated, you know, that frees up a lot of time. So is there anything else you want to say on the question of like, why is email an important part of any business owners Marketing Toolkit?

Kris Daria

Yeah, I mean, I think when you look at your website conversion rate, on a good day, and I always say this example, because on a good day, your website conversion rate is maybe what like 3% on a really good day, like maybe 5%. So but like when you look at that, conversely, means that 95, at least 95% of the people who come to your website are going to leave. And so if a person visits your website, they look at products, they don't add it to their cart, and they don't buy and they leave, what do you do next? Right. There's no way for you to communicate and get them back unless you know, you try to catch them on Instagram again, right. So it's important to capture the person's email address so that you could continue that conversation continue building that relationship after they leave your website.

And I feel like email to that point, email, I feel it's not just for selling. I know a lot of people they don't want to send email because they don't want to feel spammy. They don't want to bother people. But in reality, if you use email the right way, it's a really I see it as a really foundational tool to build that close bond with your customers and that and like sending out emails showing up consistently in the inbox is a really good way to build trust with your brand as a small business. And when I started working with small business clients, they would maybe just send like one email a month or they didn't have any automations in place they were really just like spending all their time on social media you know, you know how that can get overwhelming, right? also I see social media as like the big you know, party outside, and your email inbox is like this cozy living room where you can have a nice chat. So looking at your logs that way where you can have like that one on one conversation with your buyer with their customer. And I feel like when you treat the, like I had a client okay, let me give you a concrete example.

So I had a client who was, this was at the beginning of the pandemic, right. So I started working with her when things were, you know, going on lockdown and the whole world is getting crazy. And she was selling skincare products that were mainly sold offline. So they were sold in only retailers and only she had a physical location where she was giving skincare treatments. But only like 5% of their sales were done to her online store for her ecommerce storefront. And she had a large number of followers on Instagram, and she had a big social following for her brand. But it was taking a lot of her time now she just had like a six month old kid and she was like a little baby. And it wasn't, she wasn't seeing the effort to put that she was putting online on her social presence wasn't converting into sales for her online store. And when everything kind of, you know, went crazy, she had to learn to pivot online. And so now when I, when I started working with her, we implemented weekly email campaign, she had a really good follower base, and you just tried to get them on to join her email list and the implemented basic email automations. And now, now that she's 100% online, like all her sales come from her online store out of that. Now there's around 3% of her sales coming just from her emails alone. So it's not just for selling, it's also for email like for building that relationship with customers.

Lauren Tilden

I really liked that you said that you think of social media as the big party outside, and then your email inbox as like the cozy living room sort of intimate setting. I think so much of approaching email marketing has to do with kind of reframing what email is all about? And if you can really get yourself in this headspace of like, how can I give people an experience that is like, they're in this cozy living room party, instead of just being shouted out in this huge, I don't know, warehouse party outside with 1000s of people. It really is all about the mindset that you apply to it, right? If I am sitting down to write an email, and in my head, I'm imagining this being like a big email blast to 1000s of people, the kind of email I'm gonna put together is so different from them if I sat down and I imagined Kris sitting on my email list getting it, and I literally wrote it to Chris, because let's say she was my ideal customer. I know her I'm like, you know, want to write something that she's going to just be delighted to get in her inbox. So I just love that you made that point so strongly that so much of this is really the intention that you apply toward this platform. And it's not, I don't know, email just I think people they think of all the spam emails they get, and I think that's a not marketing. And it just isn't.

Kris Daria

Yeah, and that's the thing, what you said is so true in our, a lot of our perception around email marketing is what we see coming in our inbox from bigger brands, and a lot of ours, like a lot of items will your audience is hired to come like those bigger brands, right. But the reality is, as a small business, the way that you stand out from the competition from other people, other brands in your space is to really align with their customers values. And the best way to do that is to just speak to them from email marketing. I mean, there's other ways to do that, too. But I feel like email is a way for you to approach it in a different way, in a more one on one on one way, you can literally personalize your email, like, hi, Lauren, this is what happened with me and my family this weekend. You're like, you know, with your skincare brand, you can say we spent all day in the sun. And I just wanted to share five tips to protect yourself, protect your skin from the sun, hope this was helpful, have a great weekend, you know, like it can be as simple as that. And you know, link to a blog with your five tips.

Imagine having someone send that to you versus just like a Zara email you get with like, 10 pictures of the latest tops. And by now like that's not personal at all. I don't do email marketing, I don't see email marketing in that way. So that's how I teach my clients to approach their list when they send out emails is to write their email as if they're writing to their BFF, to their business, to their bestie. And one way that you can do this more easily, If you really hate writing or typing it out, you can use an app on your phone to dictate what you're like talk to your phone, write out your email as if you were talking to your friend like I mean, say your email is if you're talking to a friend and have your phone transcribe it and then just edit it and use that.

Lauren Tilden

Huh that's such a great tip for people who have that kind of like blank page feeling when they sit down to write an email and they just don't know, they can't figure out how to do it, dictate it to your phone as the way, the exact way that you speak and pretend that you're talking to a friend and that's going to generate something so much more personal and easy to connect with them, you know the sort of like blast email mentality that a lot must have.

Okay, so let's talk about, let's talk to the people who maybe are realizing that email marketing is something worth doing, but they really don't know where to start. So this is someone who let's just paint the picture for you so that we can talk directly to that person. Let's say I make greeting cards. And I have, you know, I have my handmade business, I'm pretty active on social media, or at least, kind of know how to approach social media when it comes to marketing my business. And I'm starting to realize that email is something that is worth my time. But I really don't know where to start, how would you guide someone to kind of get the basic setup?

Kris Daria

Yeah, I actually worked with a client like that. So she was an artist, and she was selling, you know, painted goods and like cards and stuff. So I have a good example for that. So what we did is we started, I would recommend you start capturing emails on your website. So you can do this through a landing page on your website with a signup form, you can do this to a pop up or a fly out in play, do you have pop ups that would just like you on your screen, and you had a fly out form that would just like slide into your screen. So you can test those out. There's different ways that you can set up forms on your website to capture your emails, but at least have a way for you to direct people to a page on your website. So you can sign up to your newsletter list.

A lot of the brands that I start working with didn't have that form on their website. So and I'm talking about more than just like the footer, at the bottom of your Shopify website, it's where to capture your emails, I'm talking about like your brand.com/newsletter sign up, you know, like a page dedicated for sending to newsletters. And that way you can and the way you need to do that is to start by offering what in the industry we call a lead magnet or a freebie for typical ecommerce brands, you can do an offer of like free shipping or 10% off, you can test that out if you want to whatever works for your brand.

But for this specific brand that I was working with, she was an artist and one thing she started doing was offering free virtual Zoom backgrounds as a lead magnet. And so people would opt in just to get the Zoom background and she would give to her and get people to download a version of her art in the form that you would put it on Zoom in your background. So that was pretty cool. And other ideas that you can have are outside percentage or discounts is if you're like, if you're a candle brand and you're all about you know cozy being like mindful, you can do like a seven day meditation challenge where every day you opt in and then everyday to deliver an affirmation or different meditations and practice for five minutes a day. If you sell, like health products or supplements, maybe you can do like a seven day video guide, or where you show them how to do healthy recipes every day or a healthy juice challenge every day, you know, you can also do like free trials like free trial kits or samples that could work to depending on what you have in stock. So there's different ways you can test out to start capturing emails on your website, that's basic, because if you don't have emails in a list, then you can't send out emails.

And then I would say you need to set up email automations to basically once that person signs up to your list, have a welcome sequence and welcome flow that sends a couple of emails welcoming the subscriber and nurturing them to me and introducing them to your brand. You know, send one email that talks about how you got started, what inspired you to start your business, you can send another email that talks about you know, talk questions that customer, top five products that customers have bought and they love all the time and you know feature customer reviews. And then another email could be a frequently asked questions or top customer objections that they have around using your product. So all of this is kind of like a customer journey, you're turning a stranger into a first time buyer, what do they need to know about your product before they buy.

And so having that wealth and flow that automated welcome sequences already enough for you to welcome a new subscriber and turn them into a first time buyer, I would say start there. And then once you have that automation has a like welcome flow setup. You can think about now sending a weekly email campaign to your list. So I suggest sending out one weekly email like minimum once a week I would say because if you wait too long between your emails, people tend to forget about you and then unsubscribe. So you don't want to lose out those harder, you know emails on your list so at least send it at a consistent rate like if once every two weeks, that's fine. Just be consistent about it as much as you can. You know, progress, not perfection is what I like. Yeah. So that way, it's not like overwhelmed one week is once a week is really overwhelming for you start once every two weeks. And that way you have like a regular cadence set up, you start to build a routine, you start to think about the content we want to share. And a lot of the times a lot of the brands that I work with, are you putting a lot of good content under social media or Instagram, you can totally repurpose some of that content into an email, you know, and so that way, you don't have to make multiple content pieces every week. So think about that, you're fine.

Lauren Tilden

That's such a great point. So many of us put so much effort into social media, and really not that much effort at all into email. But when we look at like, what actually drives sales, a lot of times it's the email. So you talked a little bit about, you know, one of the first steps in getting set up with email marketing being, you know, creating that first welcome automation. And I love that you sort of prioritize that first, I think that's having automations is something that can be easy to just put off, but it's so important. So that was one of the first steps that Kris suggested, and I just want to draw everyone's attention to that, that it was really worth putting some effort into your welcome sequence right off the bat. Could you talk a little bit more about the two different types of emails, so scheduled emails and automations. And maybe talk a little bit about other automations that you would recommend for product based businesses?

Kris Daria

Yeah, definitely. So scheduled versus automated sequences. So scheduled emails are email, they're, they can be known as email campaigns. I know in Klaviyo, the platform that I use with my clients, they call it, you know, the campaigns. So those are sent whenever you want to a list, right, or a segment of your list. So those are Manually Scheduled. So you could, you create a content plan, and you send them according to your plan. Whereas with automated emails, they're based on the actions that your subscribers have taken, whether they just joined your list, whether they visited your website, and they saw specific product, you can trigger an email to tell that person Hey, we saw where you were just looking at, you know, product A, maybe you'd like to add it to your cart. So that's called a browse abandonment email. If they added that product to their cart, but they didn't check out, maybe the next day, you can send a cart abandoned trigger email. So that's a an automated email flow that would get people who added things to their cart, but didn't complete their checkout.

So having those types of triggered emails along the customer journey is quite important, because you want to make sure that those triggered emails are present to really send the right message to the customer at the right time. So if they just place an order, you might want to send out a thank you email and then tell them then following that, you might send an email to ask them for a review. Following that, you might send out an email asking, you know, providing advice and tips on how to use the product that they just received, you know, that might be good for like a new first time buyer customer. But what I like to do with my clients is I like to segment it out. So for, if somebody just placed an order we look at whether it's their first time purchase, or if they're a repeat customer. And if they're a repeat customer, we treat them differently, we send out a separate set of email automations. So, when I look at scheduled and automated, definitely you should have automated because automated first because that way, whenever you invest in Facebook ads, you go on like media appearances or interviews or you promote your business on Instagram or whatever, you're driving people to your website, they sign up to your list and you have like a funnel to catch them and convert them into whatever the next step is. And you need to have consistent email campaigns weekly, I suggest to keep up to follow up with them and stay present with them on a consistent basis and to build that relationship. So that's having automated and scheduled both integrated in your plan is really important.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, love that great explanation. In terms of automations, you talked a little bit about a welcome email about post purchase series. And you even said that that might be different for new customers and returning customers. Browse abandonment, or CART abandon email. Are there any other automated sequences that you feel like every product based business owner would benefit from?

Kris Daria

Yeah, so those are the I would say the three four emails trigger flows that you should start off with. And if you want to go further, another sequence you can set up is after, you know, after somebody places an order. And if you understand the average number of days between the first purchase and the second purchase, you can send out an email, maybe 180 days, six months after the last purchase of a buyer send out a win back email to try to reengage with them and get them to come back to your store, you know, hey, it's been a while since we saw you come back, you know, you can offer a discount you could offer a gift with purchase quarter, just even doesn't have to be an offer, just remind them Hey, like, we saw that you haven't been here in a while, here's some new things that we have in our store. And it could be an automated triggered flow that targets, you know, lapsing customers. So that's what I call a win back flow.

And another important flow to me to have setup for people, and not a lot of brands have this, it's called a sunset flow. Well, that's what they call it inside Klaviyo, a sunset flow. And it's basically a triggered automation that slowly breaks up with the people who stopped opening your emails. So it's a suit, let's say you you sent out an email to the customer, but it's been like six months that they haven't opened or clicked or visited your website at all, you need to have a sunset flow that tries to you know, it's a series of emails that get sent out to try to get them to come back and open and click or come back to your website. And if after, you know, through emails, they have not, you know, it's like they're not dead. But they're, there's no response at all. You can tag them as being an unengaged contact in your list.

And you would then segment them out of your weekly campaigns, so that you, you maintain a good open rate. And you would just, you can keep them subscribed to your list, but maybe just send, send out an email to them when you have a big product launch or a big sales event or something of that nature. And the reason why it's important to continuously keep a list that's healthy and engaged, is because when you send out an email to your list, the email platforms out there like Google, Yahoo, Hotmail, they look at the open rate, they look at the engagement that their users are having with your brand. And if your brand is sending out emails that nobody opens, then they're going to start putting your emails in the spam box and not in the inbox. And so that type of deliverability is something that a lot of brands ignore, they tend to think of I had a client who had 10,000 people on her list. But when we looked at there, there was only like 40 people 40% of the list that was opening and clicking on her emails. So she was paying Klaviyo, like, you know, the cost to send to 10,000 people, but only 40% of the people were opening. So you have to, it's going to be cost saving for you to maintain a healthy list. And it's going to be better for your deliverability your open rate, you know, so that's why it's good to have that sunset flow. So the win back flow and a sunset flow are an extra set of automations you can put in place when your store wants to have like the basic automation set up for you.

Lauren Tilden

So good. I'm so glad we talked a little bit about maintaining the health of your email list. So like Kris said, it's not just all about like having as many people on there as possible. What's way more important is having a good sense of who's actually engaged, like, we want as many engaged subscribers as possible, like having a subscriber for the sake of it doesn't do us any good. And in fact, if they're not opening, could actually kind of penalize you in some way. So I love that you made that point, Kris.

Let's talk about an email marketing plan. So we've sort of shared a little bit about how to get set up on what some of the most important components are, in terms of like having a marketing, like having email as part of your marketing plan, like how do you approach I guess, maybe with your clients or even your own business? How do you approach planning and having a plan over time with your email?

Kris Daria

Yeah, so this is something that I teach my clients and that I teach other, you know, students who sign up to my workshops is around how to plan for your email content. Because the way I teach it is not just like what stories to put in your email or what to say in your email. It's more about the process around what type of email content strategy is going to help you achieve your goals. So when it comes to planning your email content, the framework I like to teach covers a brand's story, their strategy and their systems. So when it comes to your story, you kind of want to the way I look at it is, you kind of want to start understanding what does your audience want to hear from you right now? So let's say you're trying to come up with a month of your email content for the month right. And you want to take under you want to look back at right now what period of the year Is it's maybe you know, back like right now we're recording this in the early end of summers with my view, like back to school. And a lot of Mama's there, you know, like looking at preparing their kids for school, maybe like I had a client who was a lunchbox brand. And she had like, she sells lunchbox on her websites. And so that would be a good time for her to think about what are the things that mamas are looking for when preparing their kids for school? So have that in mind, and then, then when it comes to your strategy, you know, look at what's happening around your business, what are your goals? What are your sales goals for the month,? and I teach my clients how to set those sales goals, because when I was managing a brand and ecommerce brand, it's not just enough to send out emails, if you're not, if you're not looking at your numbers, when you're running a business. For me, it's important to understand your data, your numbers, and that way at least be comfortable with managing money, basically.

So I'd like to say teach my clients how to set up a monthly sales goal and break down that sales goal per month, and come up with a content strategy every week to hit those sales goals. And then when it comes to systems, How are your operations organized? How are you automating or setting up a process that is repeatable, that will allow you to scale? Or how can you delegate this to a VA or a team member to kind of make this more easier for you, if you're a bigger brand with a team that might be interesting to set up. Because it's not, it's going to be complicated. If you just keep on, you know, figuring out last minute what type of content you want to send out to your list, it's not going to be scalable and repeatable. It's just gonna, you know, have a bottleneck in your content process.

So, let's say for example, because I see a lot of brands, so the thing I see is that they make the mistake of only sending one email, and for when they have a sale, and they think that's enough. So the way you can do this more strategically, to plan a launch, an email campaign for launch, for example, is to say, look, okay, if this is the month where you want to make, we have, we want to hit this number in sales, let's plan out our content. So we're launching our product, you know, on the on the at the end of the month, maybe one week before, we'll send out a teaser email that announces something big is coming very soon. Stay tuned, you know, you have to warm up your list, you have to tell them what's coming up. You know, I like to tell my clients, not every brand can be Beyonce, you can't just drop an album out of nowhere and expect people to buy from you. So you have to warm your list up, you know, maybe even a month in advance. So start sending out telling people behind the scenes, this is what our team is preparing for. And maybe one day or a couple of days before you launch your product or your new collection, allow your VIP customers to access early access to that launch and try to make these high value customers feel like they're special just or maybe maybe maybe try sending them an extra gift when they make that purchase, you know, like a small gift with purchase, or maybe just even complimentary shipping with their order.

So that way, giving them early access with you know, get them to come, make them feel special, and they'll maybe come back and make a purchase before everyone else. And then on the day of the launch, that's when you send your offer to the majority of your database. And you know, present a few days later, you can present the product in more detail, like targeting people who have opened the email, but haven't purchased yet, you know, tackle customer objections and talk about, you know, like top questions that you got from social media when you announced the launch of your product. So that's how you, I like to look at the content plan is to understand what's happening in your business, you know, understand the segments of the audience that you want to reach, and then customize the messaging around what you want to say to your audience in that segment. And that way, you can end by under doing that and parallel to managing your sales and your targets, you'll be more prepared and more set up for success for not just your content plan but for making and achieving your sales targets.

Lauren Tilden

So good. I love that three part strategy. So on this topic of planning, this episode is going to come out in October where in the product based business world, especially people are gearing up for the holidays, which for most of us is by far the biggest sales time of the year. What advice do you have understanding that this episode will come out in October? I think probably a lot of listeners don't necessarily have their plan all ironed out. So what advice do you have for people to get ready for this holiday rush and kind of set themselves up to have the most successful holiday season possible?

Kris Daria

Yeah. So if you're listening to this in October, I think one thing to keep in mind is that with Black Friday, it's been a trend over the past few years to start your sales earlier, if you decide to have a Black Friday sale, don't wait until Black Friday to launch your sale. A lot of the brands that I work with and that we've seen a lot of success during q4 is to start earlier, maybe don't even call it a Black Friday sale, maybe call it a lot of them, they call it like a VIP sale ahead of time. Because what happens is that when you're in the marketplace, on Black Friday weekend, everyone has like aggressive discounts and offers and that are super competitive, it's hard to stand out, right.

So one tip, if I can, if I can give you advice is to try consider starting your sales a few weeks earlier than Black Friday, like maybe beginning of November, and to get your audience engaged as much as possible before. Because like I said, you can't just you know, drop an email out on Black Friday or the stop of drop off at the start of your sale and expect people to buy you kind of want to warm them up. When it comes to q4.

Another thing you want to think about is revising the customer journey across your flows. So during q4, you may have some welcome flow in place, you might have a post purchase flow and pays a cap on an abandoned cart flow. So you want to think is there anything among these emails that would need to be updated for the q4 season, maybe there's some products that you put in there that are out of stock that you need to like, you know, refresh, replenish, maybe you want to change the offer in your welcome flow to reflect the discount that's shown on your website. Think about updating those temporarily so that you know you don't launch a sale that offers 25% off on your website. But then when they sign up to your email list, they get a 10% discount, you want to have that you want everything to be consistent with each other. And so that also applies to your pop up forms your newsletter signup forms, make sure they're reflecting the same offer that you have ongoing for your holiday campaigns, you might even want to update the look and feel for your flows to make them more festive for the holidays, that's your if that's something you really want to do.

Just keep it keep that in mind, because a lot of brands do forget, and then it gets all like distorted when people start getting random emails with different offers. So you want to keep that in mind. And think about segmenting. So like I said before, you're gonna have your VIP clients, you're gonna have people on your list who've never bought before from you. So now, as much as possible, you want to grow your list, but then you want to look at who are the people on your list at this time, and what type of messaging you want to send. So let's say for example, if you're speaking to a segment of your list who are non buyers, they haven't made their purchase, get on your run, think about answering their top questions, FAQ style, or send them user generated content images that they can see how other people interact with your products and how they like it, or send out more social proof more customer testimonials, you know, to try to get them more engaged to so that they can make their first purchase during this period. Because now's the time, right?.

And then you want to also think about obviously re engaging past customers. Look at what's one thing I can offer. One other tip I can offer for you is for your listeners is look at if you've been doing black Friday and holiday for a few years now look back at last year and see who are the people that bought last year? And how can I get them to come back again this year during this period. Right? So be mindful of understanding also your data, look at past historical years, what happened, what were the peak traffic periods so that you and your team can prepare for that. So I know that covers more than email, but it's important because it's as someone who used to really like be in this q4 was our biggest spike of the year was super, a lot of things were flying around and all that. So it's very important to have your team ready, you know, come up with a plan in advance, plan as early as you can. So that your team is ready to handle anything that happens. So when I know when certain times it's hard to plan in advance, but having that as a first step, I think would keeping all of this in mind would, I think put them in a better path to success during q4.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, so good. So many great things there. I'm, I hadn't really thought about updating your welcome sequence, for example, during the holiday season. But that's such a great point that maybe something you're talking about won't be relevant or you know, when things go out of stock, you don't want to also be promoting them at the same time, like in an automated flow. So, great suggestions. I'm totally taking notes. We've talked a lot about, you know what to do with your email lists. And we've talked about how to maintain a healthy list in terms of kind of making sure that we're mostly emailing to people who are pretty engaged.

One thing that we haven't talked too much about yet is how to build this email list. So obviously, the more engaged people on the list, the better, the more sales we're likely to make. So how would you advise people to start thinking about, I guess incentivizing people to sign up for their list to begin with?.

Kris Daria

Yeah. So in terms of crafting a more like strategic often strategy or email capture strategy, there's different ways you can go about it. Like obviously, earlier, I mentioned having forms and pop ups to at least be able to catch you know, the people's emails when they're coming on your website. But if you want to go up, if you want to drive more people to your website, to capture their emails to have like an email acquisition campaign, you can definitely, you know, run one of the there's a few ways.

So one of the things I like to do is to have a giveaway. So when you run giveaways, you can be you know, $100 gift certificate, or like free products, you know, 10 winners are gonna win this product, and then highlight the product, and then have an automated flow, obviously, for people who sign up to that specific giveaway. But that's going to be something that's going to be good, because giveaways will attract maybe new people and also reengage past customers. So when it comes to giveaways, one thing that I suggest you do, though, is it's really it's a really popular method at capturing new emails. And like I said, set up a flow to send people to welcome people when they sign up to your list. And if you see that there's people who haven't opened any of those emails, a lot of brands do not think of cleaning them out, after so removing those who haven't opened your emails. So that's one caveat, I would say about the giveaways. It captures a lot of emails, but also it tends to capture a lot of freebie hunters, like contest hunters. So just that's just like, you know, disclaimer on that.

Lauren Tilden

Great tip.

Kris Daria

Yeah. And then one thing I want to also mention is Klaviyo, which is the email platform that I use with my clients who are on Shopify, Klaviyo they just announced, optimize multi step forms for you to make it easier to capture SMS. And so I don't dive a lot into SMS. But you could totally have a form that captures person's email and then ask them like, it's an easy way for you to ask them to opt into your SMS and then build out flows with SMS and email. That's a whole other topic. I know we might not have time to do that. But I think it's important to start also collecting SMS in your, in your marketing strategy, because right now SMS has like a ton of like it's a highly open channel to highly engaging channel. Don't go crazy about it. But it's good to at least start gathering your people's mobile opt ins, like SMS opt ins.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I've seen. So I also use Klaviyo, for Station Seven, the retail store. And I have seen them kind of pushing SMS as a functionality. I have not even dipped my toe in yet. So I'm glad you brought that up. That's definitely something that I want to explore. Because if you think about it, like, think about your text messages, and think of your email inbox, like where is something more likely to get opened? For me, it's definitely my text messages. And so not to say I mean, email is still a huge, obviously, this episode is about email. That's how powerful it is. But I think text, there is something there and you have to find a way to do it that's not like spammy and wise, where am I getting texts from this company? But yeah, I'm glad you brought that up as a as an opportunity.

Kris Daria

Yeah, start covering your email base first. Like I think if you want to, you need to, before you dive into SMS, like I suggest really just like nailing the basics of what I mentioned, we explained here and our conversation around email marketing, and then dive into SMS. But yeah.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, so those who kind of follow the marketing, and marketing technology knows, may know that Apple's new operating system has changed the kinds of analytics that are available to us. For anyone who will, actually for everyone, could you explain a little bit about what Apple has done and how that might influence the way that we think about the open rates that we get?

Kris Daria

Yeah, so what's happening with Apple iOS, which is supposed to roll out in September. They're giving the ability to users who use iPhones to who use Apple Mail to hide their mail activities. So that means that brands will no longer see whether or not their customers opened an email if they're using Apple Mail on their iPhone. So if you're using Gmail on your iPhone, you're not affected. But because Apple is very, you know, used by like a percent of the population or something like that, it's most likely that a lot of brands are going to be affected by this open rate not being reliable.

So what will happen is, Apple will maybe preemptively open the email, it clicked like Klaviyo would record, the email is being opened, even if the customer didn't really open the email. So that's one thing. Meaning that your open rate may not be on no longer be a reliable measure. And so this is why it's important to also look at other metrics, like clicks and conversions. Because in reality, your open rate is just a vanity metric. It doesn't indicate whether or not people are going to buy from you. So you want to optimize more for the click and the conversion rate than the open rate at this point. That with Apple coming up with stuff like this, I'm not, I wouldn't be surprised if down the line, Google Gmail come up with something like this, because privacy has been super on the minds of these big tech companies now. So it's good to have the practice of understanding Okay, outside of open rate, how can I measure my emails effectiveness, look at your Google Analytics, see how much traffic is coming from your emails, you can see the conversion rate and your Google Analytics from your email campaigns.

Look at the like I said, look at the click rate, look at the conversion rate. And try to during this period, it's good to kind of also look at the percentage of people in your list that use Apple Mail that open your emails using Apple Mail. And that would be a good way for you to gauge how impacted your open rate might be. Because if you see there's only you know, 5% of your list using Apple Mail, then maybe this might not affect you, but I think it would.

The other thing that would happen now with the new iOS updates, though, is the fact that if somebody comes to your website on their mobile phone, and you know when you come to your website, have a pop up asking people if they want to leave their email address to sign up to newsletter, when you know, when you enter your email sometimes it will auto populate your email address automatically. But right now Apple is going to have the ability for paid iCloud users to use a proxy email address.

So for example, if I come to your website, Lauren, instead of putting my personal email address like kris@gmail.com, Apple might say, Hey, do you want to use Kris@iCloud123.com or some other email address. So that way I the email, I would still be receiving your emails by through that proxy. But then when I come back to your website, you know later on and I want to make a purchase, most likely I will use my personal email address to make that order. Right. So what's going to happen is that a lot of I don't know to what extent this will be happening, but it's possible that there will be duplicate profiles of the same person in your email list. And right now there's no way to kind of reconcile who signed up with the proxy email and who made an order with your personal email. There's no way right now at this point in time to reconcile but I'm sure all the email platforms aware of this, it's a big game changer in the email industry, there's going to be something that's going to, I'm sure there's going to be a way to work around it. But nevertheless, it's still good practice to optimize for click, look at your conversion rate, and that's the way I think, like not having access to reliable open rate data shouldn't stop you from sending emails.

It's like back in the day when Instagram stopped showing the number of likes on their posts that didn't stop people from posting on Instagram, right? So it's the same thing. So I have a training, I did a full training on what to do exactly with like your segments and that on my website, if people want to watch the replay on that they can catch that training on my website.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, will you share that link with them?

Kris Daria

Yeah, everything will be I have a free resource page for all the freebies that I mentioned here. So it'll be on makingkrisdarya.com/makinggood. Everything that I mentioned on this show will be on that page. All the resources, there a bunch of helpful email resources there for you guys.

Lauren Tilden

Awesome. I am going to be headed there myself. So recommend that everyone else does as well. Okay, so I just have I just want to pick your brain about email forever. I will have to have you back on the show to talk about things like segmentation, for example, and reading our email analytics. Those are both two topics that we just don't have enough time to dig into more but that would be a super fun follow up episode.

Kris Daria

I would love to tell more email marketing with you, Lauren.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, okay. Okay, let's set a date. Before we sort of wrap up our chat about email. I have a few kind of last minute rapid fire email questions that I feel like come up a lot. So the first one that you have touched on a bit is how often to email your list?

Kris Daria

I would recommend at least once a week.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, text versus photos in your email content.

Kris Daria

So, I'm not a fan of sending emails and look like glossy magazine ads. I like to say to my clients pretty emails don't pay the bills, you know, because image heavy emails for people after a while, and it's like, as if you know, I don't know, how about you, but I kept keep on getting marketing promo files in my flyers in my mailbox, and I never opened them. So I like to have a nice eye catching photo or an animated GIF at the top headline of my email. And then just to grab their attention and make it more text based. And the way I see it is your images, your photos should support your copy and your text, not the other way around. So if you have like a promo code or the description of your sale offer, try not to put that in the image. Because what happens is some email inboxes don't render the image, so they won't see your promo code. So that's one mistake that I see some brands do. So I would, I'm more of a fan of a mix, I would say like more text and photos, but have a photo there.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, that's a true great point. Because a lot of email inboxes, like, if you don't choose to display the images, you're not seeing anything that's only in the images. So make sure the text stands alone. Exactly. Any tips on good subject lines?

Kris Daria

So I recommend to have your subject lines look like they're coming from a friend. So, some subject lines that have worked really well with my clients, and you may have seen them around are like, I never thought this would happen dot, dot, dot, you know, when they kind of explained what inspired their business, you know, in when they put an email under welcome flow, that's a good subject line to put in. Or I have a confession dot dot, dot, you know, having like, you know, things like that, or like, first name, what would code Add to Cart give you, for example, that's one that really works really well. So yeah, make them look like they're coming from a friend. Like there's some from some from time to time, you know, you can put your sale offer there. But if you just keep on putting sales percentages and discounts in your subject lines, people will stop opening them. So yeah.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, more personal. Love, love that. Finally, any specific tips you have for increasing conversion rates for your emails? maybe define what a conversion rate is just in case. That's helpful.

Kris Daria

Sure. So the conversion rate is looking at how many people made a purchase over the amount of people who came to visit your website. So that would calculate your conversion rate. So what you look when when you want to maximize the type of the number of people who come to your website to make a purchase, some of the tips I offer is, if you're on Shopify, you could use, you can, you can insert in your email a specific link that contains your coupon code. And when the person clicks on that link, that coupon code will be automatically added to their checkout. So it's easier for them to if they forget the code, it's automatically they're going to have to go and find that code after. So you can use like your brand.com/discount/coupon code, like coupon, replace coupon code with the with your coupon code in your link. And that will be that could be your text your, sorry, your link that you would put in your email.

Another tip that I suggest having is adding a product block in Klaviyo. They're called product blocks. But they're essentially like three to six, you know, images that direct people to the specific product page, put that at the bottom, put a product block at the bottom of your emails when you feel it's appropriate. So that way, it's easy for you to kind of get them to come to your website to shop related products to your email. So like if I like I said in the beginning of our conversation, if you're writing an email about five tips to care for your skin this winter, list the three products that they can check out at the bottom of that email with that product block there. And an easy thing that you could do is just when you have a sale, send out an email maybe like six to 12 hours before the deadline is over. And that really boosts conversions. Not to put so much pressure on it but you can instantly see the boost in sales. And I know they're like the most boring emails you'll read because it's basically just saying hey, like we have a RC list ending just a reminder, but you have to remember that a lot of people they get a lot of emails in their inbox and they're busy they don't have time to remember if your sale is when your sales ending when they're not, just just having that last minute email reminder like a couple of hours before it can help easily boost conversions. So those are my tips.

Lauren Tilden

So good, so good. Well, I just I was taking notes as we've been recording, I feel like listening back to edit is just gonna be such a goldmine. So I'm really excited to share this episode with everyone. Before we start to wrap up, I do want to talk about doing good through small business. And this is something that I know is deeply personal to you, we talked a little bit about your son. So I would love for you to share just where you stand on this topic of using business for good.

Kris Daria

Yeah, so what happened with my son, so my son currently he, he just had a cochlear implant operation, he's deaf, we found out when he was 18 months old. And so we've been going through this process. And as I've been going through it, and learning more about Deaf culture and the deaf community, it became more important for me to make my content accessible in terms of being able to add live captions, or providing transcriptions to my content, like my trainings, my workshops and stuff like that.

So for me, one way that I want to, that's what I do kind of to make my content and the knowledge and the expertise that I have more accessible to everyone in the community. So that if ever, you can't hear me properly, because I have like faulty air pods, or whatever, at least you have the transcription and you can read the captions while I'm delivering a training. And so, so I've been more mindful of that. As I've been navigating through this journey, because I'm learning American Sign Language, we're learning sign language with my son. So we're giving, I'm just, it's important for me to just give as much, you know, communication tools for him to thrive as much as possible. But that also made me more mindful about providing, like captions and, and transcriptions through my content. So, so yeah, I keep in mind.

Lauren Tilden

Yes, and I would love to just dig in here a little bit in terms of accessibility, this is a topic that I definitely want to talk about more on this podcast. What kinds of things when it comes to accessibility, particularly for the deaf community, what are the kinds of things that any business owner could be doing to kind of facilitate making their content more accessible?

Kris Daria

Yeah, so I'm still in the beginning of this journey, I'm still learning. But one of the things that I've, one helpful tool that I've been using is on an app called otter.ai. And it's been super helpful to have an app on my phone to dictate my stuff, but also to when I host zoom rooms, there, it can join my Zoom Room and automatically transcribe my meetings. And if I forget, I can even take the resume recording uploaded to otter.ai. And it has really accurate transcription on the on, on their app to give me the to be able to upload that on my, you know, learning platform. So otter.ai is, there's a free version, and there's a business version, so you can definitely start using that. I'm sure there's other tools out there, but that's the one that I use right now.

Lauren Tilden

Such a good recommendation. And I just also want to say even something as simple as like, your videos on social media, like caption them, there's, there are really easy tools to do that now. Some of them even built into Instagram. And if you can, so I'm so glad you mentioned that, Kris. And I know that you've also been doing some like monetary donations to this cause as well. Do you want to share anything about that?

Kris Daria

Yeah. So there's a local rehabilitation center that my son attends to do his therapies. So they have a foundation, it's called the math MCI Foundation. And so that's the magnet Chi Foundation is like the name of the center. So I applied Profit First to my business so I don't I know, I'm passing around that so I because I've been doing that this year, I'm able to donate, like 5% of my profits to this cause that I really, that I really care about. And I encourage a lot of other businesses to see if they can do something like that. And profit first. There's a book actually called Profit First for E commerce sellers by Cindy Thomason. It's a book that I give to all my all my VIP clients because I feel like after the work with me for automations, it's good to kind of look at the finances of your business. And it's a really great book. I recommend it to every ecom owner out there.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I don't know about that book. So that is a great recommendation.

Kris Daria

It's quick read. It's a quick read. Yeah.

Lauren Tilden

Okay. Music to my ears. Let's go into our wrap up questions. This has been probably a longer episode than usual, but so good. So I'm so glad we got to everything.

Kris Daria

I know. It's awesome. I'm sorry.

Lauren Tilden

No, no, it's like I just kept asking your question because you know everything about email. Um, one question I want to ask for you is one of my favorite questions to ask all of our guests and that is, what is one small business that you admire.

Kris Daria

So one business that I admire in terms of great emails, I love the way Truvani you how they use text and copy in their emails to sell their their health products. They don't shove promos or discounts all the time in my inbox, it has a very conversational personal tone. They talk a lot about company updates, behind the scenes of the making of their their product, but they also take the time to educate their customers on how to read labels for health products, and how they, and I feel like doing it in that way it makes like sending emails like that, you know, messages like that makes people feel more empowered when it comes to choosing their stuff on their website. So I've tried like their, their Tumeric powders and vitamins and stuff. So I'm into that type of thing. So I'm very into iron Veda and all that things. And they don't use, if you sign up to their list, they don't use any fancy graphics or design or coding. It's just some plain text emails. Sometimes there's an animated GIFs with some photos, and it's very simple. You don't need to hire an expensive graphic designer to do your emails. So in terms of email marketing, for just conversation, I'd like to just highlight Truvani, either whoever writes their copy is amazing.

Lauren Tilden

Amazing, I'm gonna go subscribe. What is a book recommendation? I know you just mentioned the Profit First for E commerce sellers. Is that the one you want to feature? Or do you have any other book recommendations?

Kris Daria

So that's a great book. But one thing that a book that recently changed the way, that deeply affected me I would say transformed my life. It's a book called Do less by Kate Northrup, I don't know if you've heard about it. So Kate, Kate's book came into my life, the book duelists on the cover, it says a revolutionary approach to time and energy management for ambitious woman. So her teachings came into my life at a time where I was breaking up with my corporate hustle mode working habits. So I would like, I was working in the corporate office environment for the longest time and you know, that tends to be very high pressure. And when I started my business as a solo consultant last year, after having a baby leaving my job, during the pandemic, it I had to really heal my relationship with my work and my productivity. And as women business owners who are running their business and balancing all the things, I think it's a great book to read, because it makes you realize, like reading this book and being her in her origin online membership, like I've really learned how to invest my energy and operate my business in a way that feels more aligned. And in a way that makes me feel good and happy.

Like, for example, one of the things that she teaches is how to try to manage your time and your projects around your cycle and the moon calendar, I'm really into that stuff. So being aware of that for cyclical people, like we don't operate in a linear way. And that's all her teachings are about, about how you can achieve more by doing less. And that's why email automations for me is like one of my, my key my core offerings is because it's a way to help women business owners to grow their business without lifting and make sales without lifting a finger. So it's really just book. It has so many. It's it's been life changing this book for me, I cannot recommend it enough. So definitely we do less. Yeah.

Lauren Tilden

Awesome. That has not been recommended before on the podcast. I'm excited to check it out. Kris, let everyone know, again, the website that they can gather all of your free resources, and just where else online, they can connect with you and learn more from you.

Kris Daria

Sure. So on my website, if you go to krisdaria.com/makinggood. You can download a bunch of free resources there. I have a guide that talks about nine email mistakes you can avoid too, you can avoid to sales on your website. I have like I said earlier replay of that iOS 15 training, and it's a page I'm just going to fill with a bunch of helpful resources over time. So I just launched my website recently. But if you go to Chrisdarya.com/makingGood, you'll find a lot of good stuff there for you guys, and I'm sure that will be helpful for you. And otherwise, if you listen to this podcast DM me on Instagram @KrisDaria, I'm always happy to chat in the DMS over there so so yeah.

Lauren Tilden

Yes, yes. If you listen to this episode, and loved it as much as I loved everything, Kris shared, tag, take a screenshot while you're listening and tag, both of us on Instagram and we would love to hear what you thought. So yes, Kris is @KrisDaria. And I am @LaurenTilden. And that will be linked in the show notes to. Kris, oh my gosh, what a goldmine this whole episode is I can't wait to share it. I don't know how I'm gonna wait another month and a half before I really get. So thank you so so so much for just, I mean, just being so generous with pulling back the curtains. I'm sharing so many, just awesome strategies and tips when it comes to email. I think this has been such a fantastic episode. So thank you so much.

Kris Daria

Thank you for having me. Lauren. I'm so excited. Thank you. I feel so honored for you to have me on your podcast. I was so I was so when I first met you on Clubhouse, I was like, it would be so awesome if her and I can just chat and geek out on email marketing on her podcast. And now it's happening and I'm so grateful for today and for you. Thank you.

Lauren Tilden

Kris, you're the best. Thank you so much for having this conversation with me.

I know Kris and I would both love to connect with you on Instagram. Take a screenshot of you listening to this episode and tag us both. Kris is @KrisDaria and I'm @LaurenTilden, everything mentioned in this podcast episode can be found at the show notes page at makinggoodpodcast.com/82 You can find Kris's resource page at krisdaria.com/makinggood. If you're interested in learning more about my small businesses Good Sheila and Station Seven the links are in the show notes. And again, I would so loved to have you in the Facebook community for this podcast had to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to join. Thank you for being here and for focusing on making a difference with your small business. Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/3/22 Lauren Tilden 5/3/22

115: Showing Your Face, Perfectionism, and Finding the Time [Marketing Q&A]

115: Showing Your Face, Perfectionism, and Finding the Time [Marketing Q&A]

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 115.

It’s been a while, but today, we’re doing a marketing Q&A episode.

Today I’ll be answering 5 questions that I received to my Instagram stories. We’re covering everything from improving your marketing, handling fear, the most effective marketing platforms, time, and perfectionism.

Alright, now!

So let’s get into the first question:

#1: How do I get over the fear of putting yourself (and your face) in front of your business?

This is such a great question! And I want to answer this question in two parts. First, let’s talk about why I think it’s so important that you put yourself and yes, even your face, in your marketing.

Then, let’s talk about that fear.

So. Why should we all seriously consider putting ourselves into our marketing?

It’s because people connect with people. We build relationships with people. And we become loyal to people. This is especially true for small businesses… part of the reason that our customers are shopping with us is BECAUSE we’re a small business. Because we’re not the big mass-manufactured corporate option. So reminding them of the human behind things is really important.

Sharing about you as a person – and yes, even showing your face – is something that helps build the know, like, and trust factors that are so important in marketing. When people know, like and trust us – they are much more likely to feel confident making a purchase with us.

And you can take my word for it… or you can look at the data. For most of us, some of our best-performing content is the stuff that has a photo of us in it, and/or includes some personal details or insight from us. Look at your marketing insights, whether that’s on social media, email or another platform… and I would wager that some of your best performing content – the stuff that gets the most engagement and response – is content about you, ideally featuring a photo of you.

Of course, be safe about this. I hope it goes without saying that I don’t want you to put your physical address or share anything super personal that doesn’t feel safe to share.

One bonus tip here on this topic is to get really specific. For example, instead of saying, “I like to relax by watching TV”... say, “you can find me watching back-to-back episodes of Murder, She Wrote”. These both convey essentially the same things, but getting specific gives people the chance to have something specific and unique in common with me. If you don’t LOVE murder, She Wrote, cool! But if you do, you are going to feel more connected to me, even just based off this tiny little thing we have in common.

Okay, so. That’s WHY I argue you should show your face and share about you as a person in your marketing.

Now, let’s get directly to this question, which gets at the heart of something so many of us experience: How do we face the fear of putting ourselves (and our faces!) out there.

The fact is, it’s scary to put yourself or your products and something you personally made out into the world for other people to react to. Let’s talk about Instagram Stories for example. When I show my face or talk to the camera on Instagram stories, a lot of things go through my mind:

Ugh that is really not a flattering angle
Why did I say that?
What is RANDOM PERSON from high school or college going to think when they see this?
I should go put some makeup on

You might have similar thoughts when you put your products out there:

This is so amateur
Why would anyone buy this
Other peoples products look better

The fact is, the mental conversation inside of our heads can be seriously negative and just MEAN. So, what do we do about it?

Well, I’m afraid you’re not going to like this answer.

But the best way I’ve found to handle the fear that goes with putting yourself out there is to simply let it be there.

In the beginning, when I felt these kinds of feelings or fear, I took that to mean that I wasn’t ready. That maybe I needed to learn more, and get better, before I should go ahead and put myself out there. Because the fact that I was feeling this fear must be a sign that I wasn’t quite ready for that.

And I’m going to be honest: This really held me back for a LONG time.

I held myself back SO MUCH from putting anything out into the world because I let my fear run the show – and I took it to be the truth.

But, the most revolutionary thing I probably have ever done in my business is decide that the fear could be there… and I could take action anyway.

I could post the Instagram Stories of my face… even if fear told me I sounded and looked silly.

I could share videos of my work… even if fear told me that other people were better than I was.

I could share my expertise… even if fear tried to convince me I wasn’t qualified.

These days, I’ve come to see fear as a signal that I’m probably on the right track! It usually shows up when I’m doing things that are outside of my comfort zone, and I am constantly working on taking action even (and especially) in the presence of fear.

#2: What’s the most effective marketing option besides email?

Okay, I LOVE THIS QUESTION because the question asker (hi Holly!) has definitely been paying attention to my obsession with email marketing.

So, for anyone new to the podcast, let’s start with WHY I believe so, so strongly in email marketing.

The truth is that the data shows email marketing to be more effective than any single other marketing platform. With email marketing we get better reach (4-5x that of social media), and we see a higher return on investment.

So while I’m not suggesting that email marketing needs to be or even should be the entirety of your marketing strategy, it’s definitely something that I would recommend you prioritize, no matter who you are. If you’re listening to this and you are thinking –

Yeah… but I don’t think email marketing is a good fit for my particular business. Let’s chat! DM me over on Instagram and let’s talk it out to see if I agree :0).

So, back to Holly’s question: What’s the most effective marketing option besides email?

I’m not going to answer this question with a list of most effective social media platforms or snazzy marketing tricks… instead I’m going to give you that super annoying answer: It depends.

And what does it depend on? It depends on two things:

What your goals are. In other words, what do you want your marketing to do for you? Different marketing platforms are good for different things. So looking at your specific goals and strategies will help you narrow down the best things to focus on when it comes to marketing. For example, let’s say you have a good number of customers, but you don’t tend to see very many repeat-buyers, and you think that’s a big opportunity for you when it comes to increasing your sales.

In that case, I’d focus on strategies that are geared toward providing a stellar customer experience and strengthening your relationships with your buyers. This is going to look like email marketing, one on one conversations in the DMs, special campaigns just for past buyers, expressing your gratitude, following up after purchase, etc.

If you are more focused on reaching more people, I’d look at strategies that are specifically geared toward getting discovered by new people. Things like long-form content (blogs, podcasts, videos), SEO and Pinterest are great for this, as are collaborations and PR.

The second thing you want to make this decision based on is:
Who your ideal customer is?

The better you know your ideal customer, the better decisions you’re going to be able to make when it comes to marketing… and just about everything else in your business, too.

When you know your ideal customer, you know how best to connect with them. You know what platforms they love and what platforms they hate. You know when and where they show up, and what they’re looking for.

So for example, if you’re trying to select the social media platforms that you’re going to invest time and effort into (and I’d recommend you stick with 1 or 2, 3 at the most), you want to make that decision based on how your ideal customer uses social media, what platforms she uses, and how she shows up there.

#3: What do I do if I don’t feel like I have enough TIME to do everything I want to do for marketing?

YESSSS such a good one. Look, I’m a marketer. I *LOVE* marketing. I think it is one of the most powerful tools that any business or cause has at their disposal to help them make a bigger impact.

However, there’s one thing that I find really annoying about marketing, and it’s this:

With marketing, you never “arrive”. You never check everything off your list and feel like, OK! I did marketing, let’s move on! It’s an ongoing process. When it comes to marketing, we could always be doing more. This is true for every single business on the planet.

So the reality is, it’s very very likely that you’re going to be in the position of wanting to do more than you have time and bandwidth to do. If you are experiencing this feeling of not having enough time and bandwidth… welcome to the club.

The important thing here is to acknowledge that you don’t have enough time to do everything you want to do.

The critical step that not enough of us actually take is to acknowledge our limits… so that we can prioritize what to do within those limits. I tell members of my membership to get super super specific about their bandwidth… to the point where they define exactly how many hours they have each week to devote to marketing.

If you struggle with overcommitting and having way more on your marketing list than you have time for, I’d recommend you do exactly this. Ask yourself, in an average week, how many hours can I devote to marketing? Keep that number top of mind as you move to the next stage.

Now, we’re going to make sure that our marketing activities we’ve committed to easily fit within that number of hours per week.

The next step is to prioritize all of the things we WANT to do when it comes to marketing. I’d recommend you make a list of everything that’s currently on your marketing “to do” list. Get super specific about what needs to get done each week. Don’t write “Instagram”, write “ 2 feed posts, 1 reel, and 3 IG stories”. Don’t write “email marketing”, write “1 email per week”.

After you’ve listed everything out, estimate how much time each item will take you per week. My guess is that you’re going to find that the list of things you think you “should” be doing per week takes A LOT MORE hours than you have allocated for marketing.

So this means we need to prioritize. How do we know which of these tasks to prioritize? By going back to our goals. What is your #1 or your #1 and #2 goals for the year? Looking at those goals, ask yourself – which of these marketing activities are most in service of that goal? Which of these are most likely to move me in the direction I want to be moving?

Choose your top priorities, make sure they fit within the allocated # of hours per week, and stick with that for the month. You can always re-evaluate when the next month comes, but I can’t wait for you to experience the peace of mind that comes with KNOWING you’re doing the things that matter the most.

#4: How do I handle perfectionism?

To answer this question, I’m going to share an excerpt from an episode of the daily private podcast for members of Making Good Happen. (If you’re a member, head to episode from January 7th)

If you’ve ever had a job interview before, chances are pretty good that you’ve come across the questions “what are your strengths?” and “what are your weaknesses?”

I remember feeling like a really “SMART” answer to the “what are your strengths” question was to say “I’m a perfectionist”.

Because I thought it was mostly a strength and spoke to someone’s attention to detail and how much they cared about the quality of their work.

WELL. I’ve come to see that that was DEFINITELY a story I was telling myself… as someone who was (and in some ways still is) a perfectionist.

While aiming for quality is a strength, perfectionism is not.

Because of perfectionism, I’ve spent a lot of my life holding back.

Not putting things out into the world, not sharing my work, not showing up.

Overall.. Not taking action… because I didn’t feel like things were quite right yet, or I wasn’t quite ready yet.

Here’s the interesting thing about perfectionism.

The only way to get better at things… in other words, to get close to “perfect”... is to do the thing imperfectly.

To possibly even be pretty bad at it at first, but still do it over and over again until little by little we get better.

I’ve come to see that there is absolutely no place for perfectionism in the life of small business owner who wants to get results and see growth. Because being a small business owner is ALL ABOUT taking action.

It’s all about trying brand new things, all the time.

When you run your own business, in the beginning at least, you have A LOT of job titles… from product designer to marketer to finance to systems to customer service.

You’ll be doing a lot of things you have never done before… which means you might not be good at them yet.

But the only way to GET good, to GET more capable and skilled at things is by doing them imperfectly.

This concept is perhaps the most true and relevant when it comes to marketing.

Marketing is a creative process.

Often times we’ll have a marketing campaign or piece of content in mind, but then when we try to create it – when we try to write the email or create the graphic, it just doesn’t come out like we had in mind.

So then we have a choice. We can decide we’re not good at marketing, and just not put ANYTHING out there….

Or we can do our best in the moment, put it out in the world, day after day, and week after week, until all the sudden, the things we’re creating look a lot closer to that ideal we had in our heads originally.

#5: What are the top 3 things we should be doing right now to improve our marketing?

We’re wrapping up this Q&A session with a question that I loved! What are the top 3 things we should be doing right now to improve our marketing?

I have to say, the answers to this question came pretty immediately to me, and I stand by them. I think if you focus on these 3 things, you’ll be setting yourself up for a lot of marketing success.

Get to know your ideal customer

We’ve touched on this a little bit, but the reality is that there is no one-size-fits-all marketing solution. Every single business is different, and therefore every marketing plan will be different.

I would argue that the single most important thing that any of us can do to improve our marketing is to really get to know our ideal customer. We want to know as much about them as we possibly can – how they shop, where they shop, where they spend their time online, what keeps them up at night, what their ambitions are, what their values are… and on and on and on.

You might be wondering – well, HOW do I get these questions answered? And there are many ways. You can do Instagram Stories polls if you feel like a lot of your followers represent your ideal customer. You can do a survey sent to people who represent your ideal customer. You can pay attention to questions they’re asking you. And you can do what are called “ideal customer avatar interviews” where you literally get someone on the phone or a Zoom call who is an example of your ideal customer, and ask them as many questions as you can to help you get to know them better.

Getting to know your ideal customer really, really well, will make all of your marketing better. It will help you be able to show up in the right places.

It will help you create products and offers that your ideal customer actually wants.

It will help you write content that resonates and really speaks to people.

I also want to say that this work of getting to know your ideal customer is ongoing. It’s not something you check off your list one time and then be done with. As time goes on, we’ll get to know your ideal customer better and better, so our approach will change, and that’s okay. Just do the best you can at this point, and keep finding ways to learn about them.
Get crystal clear on your goals
The second thing that I think is a huge opportunity for so many small business owners to improve their marketing is to get crystal clear on your goals. This might sound simple and straightforward, but the fact is, different marketing activities help us do different things. We need to get strategic about what is most important to us at this particular moment so that we can narrowly focus our efforts on activities that will move us toward that goal.

For example, if you’re focused this year on increasing your sales that come from wholesale accounts, it wouldn’t make a lot of sense to spend 90% of your time on Instagram and 10% of your time on reaching out to and nurturing wholesale customers.

One thing I’d add here is to make sure you don’t have 500 things on your list of goals. I would recommend having one, maybe 2, and 3 at the absolute MOST primary goals for the year so that you can really focus in on those and start to see progress.
Show up consistently

This one is the hardest! COnsistency is so, so hard. Why? Because consistency means continuing to do the work on the days where we’re not seeing results or progress coming in. Continuing to send emails even when for a while, it doesn’t seem to be doing anything for us. Continuing to post Reels, even when they’re not getting any traction. Continuing to send wholesale outreach emails, even when we’re not getting any responses.

Marketing success doesn’t come from the one-time-post on a fluke that did super well. It comes from showing up consistently, day in and day out, doing the activities that you know will move you toward your goals… even if you can’t see that in the short term.

So! There you have my answers to 5 listener-submitted questions. If you want to get in on asking questions for next time around, make sure you’re following me on Instagram so you get a chance!

Alright! That’s what I have for you today. You can find all the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/115.

Did you like this Q&A style episode? Let me know on Instagram by messaging me over at @laurentilden.

I can’t help but throw in a plug for my membership program, Making Good Happen. Making Good Happen tackles topics like the ones we discussed here in this episode every single day. You have the opportunity to ask me questions, as well as ask questions of the over 60 other members of the program. There are coworking sessions, accountability, events, marketing training, an incredible community, and so much more. Get the details at makinggoodhappen.com.

If you enjoyed this episode, I’d be so grateful for your support! Here are 3 ways you can support Making Good:

I’d so love for you to leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player
If you have a friend you think you would enjoy the podcast, send them the link
Finally, take a screenshot of your podcast player while you’re listening to the episode and tag me on social media @laurentilden. I would love to cheer you on!

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 5/3/22 Lauren Tilden 5/3/22

84: The Power of Local with Sarah Frost

84: The Power of Local with Sarah Frost

Lauren Tilden

Hi, Sarah, welcome to the podcast.

Sarah Frost

Hi Lauren, thank you so much for having me.

Lauren Tilden

I'm so excited about this conversation, I would love for you to give an introduction to yourself and kind of the evolution of your journey to get to Making Local, which is your new initiative. But I know you have a background as a maker, which a lot of listeners will relate to. So we'd love to hear a little bit about what you're doing and what brought you to here now.

Sarah Frost

Yeah, so my name is Sarah and I have always been doing something with my hands, whether it's knitting all through college or making wedding invitations, I did that for about 10 years on the side. I've always been doing stuff that's not my day job. And that sort of evolved into me making making macrame and selling that as collectanea shop and doing a bunch of markets and all this stuff. And I loved it. And then I was like, Ah, maybe I don't love macrame as much as I did last year. And it doesn't really make sense as a small business owner or maker to keep changing up what it is you're doing. I mean, to some extent, yes, absolutely. But if you're going to be a maker, like be a maker and stick to it, and develop your brand and build your business, and I'm not really good at doing that. What I realized along the way is that I loved connecting with other makers and small businesses and I loved hyping up other makers and small businesses way more than I liked running my own. And so that's where Making Local sort of came out of was like, how do we make local, more attainable, more sustainable? How do we make shopping from other local businesses and makers? more noticeable? Like how do we develop that initiative, that lifestyle change from shoppers, to sort of point them back to all these incredible humans that I've met along the way making just insanely cool and high quality products?

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I'm so excited about what you're doing. Because I feel like it's, it is really needed and are kind of like high tech, very corporate world. It's become so easy to just like order things online from Amazon and have it delivered and not know anything about where it came from, how it was made, where it was made, you know, the values of the specific business that we're shopping from, like, we just kind of like stopped having any of that information in for the sake of convenience. So I love that you are like you understand people want that convenience. And so you're kind of looking to bring the convenience factor into helping people find and connect with local businesses. So, so awesome.

Sarah Frost

I was talking to I was like polling my Instagram followers, which is not a huge following. And that's totally fine. I was trying to get a gauge for what the hurdles were for people shopping local, like, why is it that you're not shopping locally? Like if you know that you can buy handmade jewelry? And it's dope? Why are you like, why are you still buying jewelry at Target or whatever. And they were like, well, I can't go look at a bunch of different types of jewelry all at one time, or I can't find you know, housewares all in one place by different people. And so that's where the idea of this like directory this resource came from, that's searchable, filterable, you can filter by your values, you can filter by what product you're looking for, you can search directly for a business name, there's tons of different ways to use it. And ultimately, the shopping always goes back to the makers, small business themselves.

Lauren Tilden

I feel like it's just solving so many problems in one, in one fell swoop. So obviously, we have listeners of the podcast are probably almost all small business owners, a lot of them product based business owners. But we're also all consumers in some way. And so I would love for you to just talk a little bit about Making Local, like, how does it work? How does it serve me as a maker? And how does it serve me as a consumer? Like how would I use it in each of those cases?

Sarah Frost

A great question. From the maker small business standpoint, you're getting new eyes on your website or your Instagram or your product, whatever that is. You're gonna get new eyeballs there that are going to be looking for exactly what it is you're selling. If you're a candle maker and somebody types in I want candles, It's going to pull up the you know X amount of candle makers that are on this directory and they can, maybe pick the one that's located closest to them or that they think has the right value aspect that they're looking for. Maybe it's a BIPOC maker or an LGBTQI maker or something. So from from the small business standpoint, you're getting a whole new audience that would otherwise not be able to find you.

And from the shopper standpoint, you have a way of shopping for exactly what it is you're looking for. With the filters that you want to have on it, like are you looking for in AAPI business maker who sells jewelry? Guess what, you'll find those. Are you looking for somebody who's specifically located in Edmonds, Washington, or Seattle or Portland, you can find those small shops that are going to be in that city near you, where you're taking a weekend trip. So it's, it's very customizable to what your needs are. So if you're looking for something specific, you can literally find the keywords that fit what you're looking for. And it'll pull something up.

Lauren Tilden

Love. Yeah. And I feel like I've tried to do this a lot in the past. And what it normally looks like is me googling like, Seattle based candle maker or black owned clothing companies like it's, there's really not a great place to go for this.

Sarah Frost

And you don't know necessarily what the quality is, I think one of the things that is nice about the Making Local directory that I'm aiming for is a curated marketplace. So not everybody and their mom is going to be able to be on there. And I don't mean that from an exclusionary standpoint, I just mean, all the products on there are going to be quality goods, either I've seen the products or I've been in the shop, or it's somehow vetted. Like, you can go to Etsy, and you can shop for all those things in. Yeah, but anybody can be on Etsy. They'll pay a fee for it. But you can sell whatever you want there and people will buy it. I really wanted to keep Making Local, curated so that it was a more trustworthy resource, if that makes sense.

Lauren Tilden

Totally, yeah. Vetted is a great word for it.

Sarah Frost

Vetted, great word.

Lauren Tilden

So we've talked about like, here's this awesome solution to people wanting to shop local. If we're backing up a little bit, and maybe there's someone listening, who hears people talk a lot about shopping local, and like support local businesses, but maybe hasn't done quite into like the why of it. Yeah. Why should we all be considering and maybe even prioritizing shopping local?

Sarah Frost

Ah, so good. One of the things I was reading in an article online, I don't remember where I read it, but it was written by the Better Business Bureau and the statistic was something like $100. If you spend $100, locally, $68 of that stays in the community versus when you shop and spend $100, not locally, only $48 of that stays in the community. So I think just if we're talking money, spend your money where you want to make change. If you're going to shop locally, what is that 20 more dollars out of 120% more stays in the community, when you shop locally, that's huge. And that's because small businesses tend to support their local community more, they tend to give back to the community more. And they're paying local people a living wage in the community. So that's, I mean, that's, that, to me is like, so incredible. It's a huge change, and also is more sustainable from a save the planet standpoint. Most small businesses are more conscious of eco friendly packaging or reusable materials. They're more conscious of sustainably sourced ethically sourced products, you're gonna get a higher quality product most likely, and it's going to be better for the environment overall and long term.

Lauren Tilden

The first one you mentioned. Like the the the money going into the community. It's easy to sort of like condense how important matters but yeah, it's like it's paying people to have jobs. It's those people who are, I mean, let me back up. I feel like one thing we talk a lot about on this podcast is the ripple effect. So the tiny um, act of you choosing to buy your candle from Particle Goods, let's say who's an incredible Seattle based candle maker from them, instead of like mass market producer online is that she's a local maker, she's paying her staff locally. Those people get to earn wages and like are paid fairly. And they like have families and lives to support. So like that the impact of making a purchase. It's you can really, if you want to trace, like every step of the ripple, and that that decision, so yeah, I love, I love everything you're saying.

Sarah Frost

1,000%. And I'm like, London, the owner of Particle Goods, I know that she sources things locally, as often as she can. So she in turn is turning around and also supporting not only local agencies, but also other local businesses. And like, there you go, you're just you're, you're turning that ripple to infinity. I mean, it's amazing.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, it's really amazing. So let's say we've convinced people to shop local at least more often. Yeah. What are some ways or like parts of your life that people can think about? Shopping? Or spending locally? So we've used a couple of examples of like, different makers, but what are some different, like, let's broaden our definition of local, like, how are the ways that it could be shopping local?

Sarah Frost

I think some of my biggest hurdles are things like technology, like I'm never gonna be able to find a piece of tech neurological equipment. I sound so old, I'm not going to be able to find a piece of equipment that's like handmade. But if I could find a local shop to go into and support them, then I can bring my reusable bag, and I can purchase directly from somebody who is paying people locally. right things to think about are things that you use every day, like how, where do you get laundry soap? Do you get it at your local grocery store or from some giant company? Or do you get it from maybe a local boutique who's working with a maker who's in the area? Changing how we make decisions to buy things, I think is even more important than doing the actual buying. Maybe not more important, but equally important.

Lauren Tilden

That's a good point.

Sarah Frost

I haven't been to a restaurant that was like a chain restaurant in years, okay, that's probably not true. That's fine. I, I try really hard to prioritize going to a food truck or going to a local restaurant, or a local coffee shop, rather than the chain restaurants or whatever that are all over the world. Because those businesses are going to be fine. They're gonna be around for a long time. They don't need my $20. But the local coffee shop that's around the corner from me definitely does because they, they're paying their employees well, and hey, those employees know my name when I walk in, and they know my order. And like, that's so much more special than going and through a drive thru where nobody cares.

Lauren Tilden

Mm hmm. Yeah. I think that's one of the, I mean, yes, there are all these awesome reasons to shop local and to shop small but, and like they're good for the world. It's making a positive impact. You can feel good about that. But the experience a lot of the time I'm shopping from a small business and or a local business is also like, way better. Like there's a personal touch, they know your name, they might write you a thank you note when they send your order, if it's a maker, and note to all makers listening, like I totally would encourage you to just add that extra personal touch. Because it really makes a difference, right? You notice, it stands apart.

Sarah Frost

You know a robot did not make your order.

Lauren Tilden

No, like a person with a name who like put the sticker on it and like sign their name like, yeah, it just feels good to be like, oh, there's a human on the other end of this transaction.

Sarah Frost

Yes, for sure. I think of it like the TV show Cheers too, you know, like, hey, Norm, I'm like Everybody knows. That's such, we just, we're not used to that anymore. We're used to that. Hi, welcome in how are you doing today and it's like you don't care who I am. I love that I can go into some of my immediate vicinity locations in Boffo where I live. And they 1,000% know who I am, like most of the staff I can tell when there's somebody new, I haven't met you yet, what's your name?

Lauren Tilden

Who are you? What are you doing in my coffee shop?

Sarah Frost

Yeah. Oh, you don't know my order yet? I'm just kidding. I used to work in a coffee shop. And you know, the regulars as you call them. Like, they're so fun. Like, you get to learn about their family, you get to learn about their life, you get to hear what they're doing. And in turn, they hear you. And I think that's just a really special connection that, especially after 2020, that I think we're missing a lot of. And I think that's one of the things that we miss out on a little bit with all the digital communications we do now too, both miss out on and experience in differently maybe is a better way of putting that. Because I've also made a lot of connections with people online from interacting with something that they've posted or said or a product that they've made or whatever, that maybe ordinarily I wouldn't have met. So I guess that can go both ways.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, the word that's coming to mind, just with a couple of different things I've heard you say is intention. I feel like with shopping small with shopping local, really, all we're asking you to do is to like for a second before you make the purchase, before you go to the website that you're used to going to or, you know, into the big box retailer, like just say to yourself, is there a way that I could like support a smaller local business with this purchase? instead? Sometimes the answer might be no, sometimes there are gonna be like costume locations. Like we definitely acknowledge that a lot of times shopping small or shopping local is more expensive, because of a lot of reasons. And so sometimes for a lot of us, like it's not a decision that we can make all the time to support the smaller local business.

And like, I know, I speak for Sarah and I like we're not here to shame you about that at all. Yeah, I just want to come out with that. Because like, sometimes I think this can be like a shamy topic. Like, we're not here to do that at all. We're just asking you to, like apply that extra bit of intention to your shopping decisions. And if it's possible, like, might it be worth spending a little bit extra money or waiting an extra day to get it or whatever? If that's possible, if that's like, not a hardship for you, like, consider doing that.

Sarah Frost

Absolutely. I think I even wrote that down on my piece of paper when I was going over some things I was like, It's the intention like you said, it's the decision making process. Like where can we make those small changes because they have a really big impact? And it's not knowing all the time like good luck finding a pair of shoes that's handmade I mean, like yeah, they exist, but it's not like he can't pair a running shoe you know what I mean? Like there there are certain things that that's just not possible for or just not feasible for but with the things that are those are choices that you can make and and really make count and I think that that's so great. Like one of my favorite examples is like jewelry and mugs like I never need to buy a mass produced mug again in my life because there are so many cool mugs out there. Like I do not need more mugs, but I regularly enjoy being able to make that uh you know make that a small business purchase. Yeah.

Lauren Tilden

And it just like it feels good to like look around your home or like the possessions that you have or like you say like the laundry soap you use. And to be like oh like you know this , I bought this from a small local business or small business or local business, whatever it is, who like really put a lot of thought and care into the materials that they use and what it's made of and the process of making it and you know, I can just feel good about it and like, so. It just feels good to like kind of observe those items in your home I guess I would say and I know from having seen a lot of zoom footage of your home Sarah, you're a very good like, I guess supporter of small and local businesses yourself.

Sarah Frost

Yeah, connoisseur.

Lauren Tilden

We've alluded to this a little bit, which is like, sometimes it costs more to shop local shop small, right? So let's talk about, are there ways that we can support small and local businesses without actually buying from them?

Sarah Frost

Yes, I think one of the best ways to do this, that is probably the least utilized is leaving a review, say you bought something from somebody two years ago. And it's like your favorite t shirt in the whole world, like, go snap a photo, upload it to their website, or their social media, or whatever, or tag them in it. And leave a review, I think that can be so powerful for spreading the word about a quality product are a really fantastic small business. Like, I'm probably, I need to be telling myself this more often too, because I don't remember last time I left a review, but it can be a really powerful tool. I mean, people, especially in this digital day and age are reliant on other people's feedback too, to vet if something is worth investing in or worth purchasing, or if that restaurant is worth going to. So leaving a review can be really powerful. Also, Instagram, social media, go follow them, go share their work, you know, tag them in something or, you know, show off your new mug, and tag that maker, or when you visit a small business, like take a picture outside and tag them, because it brings awareness to to that business and that you like it. And those are both free.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, yeah. And I think I just want to like, call attention to the fact that if anyone's listening, and I know a lot of people are listening, if you're listening, and you are like, a small business owner who makes things or even has a service, and you can think of one of those instances where someone took a picture of your product or like unsolicited went on Instagram stories and said, You know, I just worked with Sara as the photographer, she was incredible. Like, she made me feel so comfortable and beautiful. And like, I love the photos or someone out of nowhere, like bought a bunch of your stuff at a market. And like when they got home, they took a photo that's like up everything they got and was like, I'm so excited about these new things I got from local CardMaker, Lauren, whatever it is, for me, a lot of times it's people who listen to this podcast, and they'll like, tag me on Instagram and say, I've been listening to this podcast, this is what I like about it, you should check it out.

Like these things feel so good when someone takes the time to do for you. Yeah. But I think and they're not hard, they're really not hard to do. No, I just want to encourage all of us to channel, that feeling of how good it feels when someone does it for you. And just realize, you can create that for people like every day of their life by just, you know, appreciate or it could be like go around your house. And if you see something small or handmade that you bought, it doesn't have to be yesterday, it could be like two years ago. Like that's a perfectly appropriate moment to admire it and give that person some credit. And, you know, attention, hopefully, so yeah, just wanted to play to that like, feeling like I know, we can all relate to that, like how good it feels when people express their appreciation without us asking them.

Sarah Frost

Yeah, well, and that can make all the difference for the business owner to right just like mentally or emotionally like maybe they're having a crap day. And you know, they're not feeling the love. They're brought up in that moment. Maybe they're like ahh taxes, great. And then somebody posts something and they're like, Oh, my goodness, I love that. So it's all made this fits so great with my plans that like totally changes, attitudes. And I think we all need a little bit more positive reinforcement these days.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah. Well, I'm really glad you said that. I feel like that segues perfectly to the next topic that I wanted to dig into with you, which is like business mindset. Something you and I have talked about a lot together. And yeah, you just made the point of like how sometimes it's the most simple gesture that can like completely flip the switch on your mindset and your energy and make you feel completely differently about what you're doing as a small business owners. So, I just would love I know that I've shared on the podcast a lot about my own mindset journeys and like ongoing. I don't know contending with mindset. But what is your take on this? Why is mindset important and relevant in your small business journey?

Sarah Frost

I think mindset can be absolutely life changing. I, so, Lenin, from Particle Goods is one of my dear friends. And we sort of accidentally coined this term, for me, called surprisingly a upbeat. And sort of my general mindset, I'm typically surprisingly upbeat, but doesn't make me an optimist, that I'm still very much a realist. But I, even when things aren't super great, there's always something to find in it, but to be upbeat about. And for me, that came from a place of, of making.

For most of my life, I made a lot of excuses. And I didn't make any change to my lifestyles, because I was making excuses. And I realized that, hey, that's not super productive, and be that it was all in the way that I was thinking about it. Like my responses to every situation, in small business, and life and family and whatever, was because of the way I was looking at it, it was because of the angle I was coming from it was because of that mindset, that it was just like, oh, everything is terrible, and I can't do it. And I was like, well, that's nuts. Like, what if it wasn't that way? What if all these things that I was making excuses weren't real? Or maybe they are real? But what if, what if they're not overcome? Like, what if they are overcomeable, and then it becomes a position of an, then you come at it from an angle of possibility, rather than an angle of impossibility. And that just felt amazing. I was like, Oh, well, if this is just something that I've put in my own way, that means I can get rid of it. Or that means I can work towards something or that means I can change the way I'm thinking about that. And all of those things became a lot more manageable, a lot more achievable.

With this small business right now I have a full time job, I'm, I totally have a day job, I work 40 hours a week doing that. And then there's the side project. And so one of the things that I'm not super great at is setting deadlines for myself that I have to stick to. And that's okay, because I will get done when I need to get done when it gets done. And that permission that I've given myself, because otherwise, I would be stressed and overwhelmed. And ultimately, that's not going to make me better at what I'm doing. And not everyone has that luxury and not and that doesn't apply to everything. But for me, that's how it's working right now.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah. Well, I we were just chatting a bit earlier, before we hit record about like, getting things done, essentially. And we were looking at like a list of stuff that you were working on Sarah and you, It was like I was like, Oh my gosh, look at all these things you got done. And we were able to, like have that approach to it. Where like, there were some things you didn't so it's just this perfect example of mindset. Like you can look at a list that has 80% of the stuff checked off it and say, oh my gosh, I didn't get everything done. Like what a failure. Like, yeah, what was the point of doing anything? Where you could look at that same list and be like, Whoa, like, look at all the shit we got done. Like that's, you know, so. And it's the same list of stuff that either got done or didn't like, nothing changed, except the way that you decide to think about it. Yeah. So I love, I love this. And I feel like mindset just it's so easy to underestimate how like, ridiculously influential it is over how we feel and how we act. But it really is everything.

Sarah Frost

Well, and I feel like too, we're so conditioned to look at an unfinished to do list and think that we're failing. Or we're so conditioned to say, Oh, well, I didn't I didn't get XYZ done. You know, shame on me. And it's like, you know what, no, you did something today. You did it girl, guy, whomever, you did it and I think we get so conditioned to be so hard on ourselves. And it's like, no, give yourself permission to look at something and call it a win. Even if it's not perfect, even if it's not 100% done, even if it's not exactly the way you thought it was gonna turn out. You did it.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah. Yeah. And something I remind myself of a lot is done is better than perfect. Yeah, like another way of saying that is perfect is the enemy of the good. Which is just like, if I'm aiming for perfect and only celebrating and, like giving myself any credit when something is perfect. Generally, what that means is I just don't do things, or I do them a lot slower or I like...

Sarah Frost

You and me both.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, keep at it over and over and over and over again, like tweaking, refining, and like not actually making progress. So I just want to encourage anyone who relates to this, like perfectionism is for me, this perfectionism has probably been like my number one hurdle when it comes to comes to mindset and business and just like, being willing to be like 80%, good, like, be solid B quality, B paper, if you think about it, there could still be a lot of like, really great useful content on there.

Totally. And like, once you finish that paper, you can go on to write the next paper, which might be an A, so you just have to, like, kind of create stuff and like, keep moving. And that has been my big mindset thing. Do you have any other specific mindset challenges, Sara, that you would share about, like kind of your experience with them?

Sarah Frost

I think we get into comparison a lot. Yeah, like I was okay. I was making a macrame before this. And one of the things that when I first started getting into it, I was making all this macrame, I was like, Oh, this looks like everyone else is macrametic. Why would somebody buy it from me? Like, what's the point? And I realized when I went to go try and take photos of it, that it didn't go with any of the stuff in my house. I was like, well shoot, if I'm not even gonna buy it, and I'm not gonna hang it up on my walls. Why am I making it? And that mindset shift there was like, what's my alternate point of view? Like, what is it about the thing that I'm making that maybe 1000 other people have made? What about my point of view, my experiences, my style, my whatever makes that product or service unique? You know, there's hundreds of people 1000s of people making macrame in Washington, why would they buy my macrame? And it was because my point of view is different than theirs.

I switched and started doing a very like mid century style Macrame, which wasn't as common. And I'm using this as an example because most people when they think of Macrame is very specific type of thing pops in their mind. We, you know, go back to London again, with the candles like, what is it? There's a bazillion places to buy candles, What is it about those candles, that perspective that makes it unique, and it's where she's coming from. So I think the other mindset that's especially for makers and small business owners, is that your point of view is unique, and that's your superpower. So take it and run with it and celebrate it and develop it and embrace it. Because that's what's really going to change how you think about your work, which is going to change how your work is and people are going to be excited about it and buy it because it is your point of view.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I love this idea of just kind of like leaning into your unique point of view or your unique style. I think it's something we can apply to, like not just the actual products we create, but like everything in our businesses. Yeah. Something I see a lot of comparison with is like social media, for example, like oh, so and so said you have to post 10 stories a day and three feed posts, so you can two reels and so like that's what I have to do. Well know if that doesn't feel good to you if that's like overstimulating or you just don't enjoy creating that type of content. Like that energy is not going to translate into something that people like react to that well to so I think you have permission from Sarah, and also to like, really do your business your way and lean into what feels right and aligned with you. And that's really what's gonna pay off the best is just like letting yourself do it your way.

Sarah Frost

Yeah, totally.

Lauren Tilden

One other thing I think we sometimes overlook as small business owners is that we have expenses as business owners, right. So if you are a maker, you probably have supplies that you use, if like your macrame you have the string and the wood, and whatever, I don't do macrame as you can tell. Like me, like I have a greeting card business. So I buy paper and envelopes, and I used to print things myself, now I use a local printer, packaging supplies, like all sorts of different business cards, lots of physical materials, and then also services. So people who I work with to help get stuff done and my business. These are all opportunities to, to think about shopping small and shopping local. And a lot of times we just don't really apply that same thinking to our business. So how would you? What advice do you have for people to approach championing local businesses as a business, not just a consumer?

Sarah Frost

Yeah, I think one of the things you mentioned already was like getting things printed locally. Like as much as you can go support your local print shop, or your local package packaging maker. Like there are places that print and die cut boxes for, you know, whatever, for necklaces, or anything, you can get a lot of those things locally. And they're not necessarily more expensive than getting it from some huge nationwide manufacturer manufacturer. The other thing would be like, I know you do this at Station Seven is if you're a small business, support other small businesses by selling their product wholesale, while retail, but my wholesale, that can make a massive difference for other small businesses. And then lastly, lastly, I'm sure there's a gazillion more, more ways and more reasons, but packaging, like sustainable tissue, and all that. Like there's some big companies doing really amazing things. And then I hope more small businesses start doing that also. But if you can find something that's sustainably made, even if it's not local, that's still a huge way of continuing that proponent of all the small business things.

Lauren Tilden

It just brings us back to kind of this thread that has carried throughout this conversation, which is about intention. So you know, maybe there isn't a tissue paper or like a eco friendly tissue paper supplier, locally, but like how, what is another way that you could apply some intention and some of your values to that purchase? And yeah, like you say, choosing a sustainable and eco friendly supplier who's whose work values you align with, like, that would be another great option, even if it is a big company or something that's not local or whatever. There are so many ways to just apply intention to your business decision making.

Sarah Frost

Yeah, oh, I just thought of another way, another way, partnering with other small businesses. So maybe you do something where you feature small business that you love on your social media, or maybe you do some sort of seasonal box, subscription box or something where you you connect with other small businesses and put together this one box that is sent out with those items all together. That'd be another.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I mean, I think it's really just all about creative thinking and also putting yourself in other people's shoes, right? Like when would feel good as a business if someone did this for you, like go do that for other people? Yeah, and that's a pretty good surefire way to you know, be showing some level of support for a small local or just do good business. So okay, this I feel like we've sort of spent our entire conversation answering but how do you approach doing good through your small business?

Sarah Frost

I am your small business hype girl like me and you need a little shout out like I'm your girl and I will do the hyping. And that's I mean, I want to bring connection and community to the small, I mean, the small business community already is a thing, but I want to connect more people to it. And I think that that just does a ton of good. It does a ton of good for the shopper as it does a ton of good for the makers and small business owners and restaurants and event hosts. That sounds like I'm tooting my own horn, and maybe I am. That just, it like brings me so much joy to be able to do that.

Lauren Tilden

That it's totally rewarding. I mean, yeah, and I think I love asking this question on the podcast, because it is asking people to toot their own horn, like, what are you doing? It's good for the world. But the thing about having a business that has like some sort of social good or mission, or values orientation is like, you can really stand behind that, right? It's like, it's not just buy my products, because I have the best business ever. It's like, buy my products, because I genuinely believe and know that through your support of my business, like the world is somehow in some small way becoming better. So I love this. I love that answer. And I love asking that question. What is one small business that you admire?

Sarah Frost

Well, we've already talked about her a couple of times. But my dear friend, London makes incredible scent based goods, she makes primarily candles, but she makes a ton of other stuff. Her company is called Particle Goods. I know that you know her also. But we have been she, she was actually my boss. Many, many moons ago when we worked at Paper Source. And I just totally respect the way that she does business. I think she is growing and scaling in such an honorable way. And she sticks to her values and has since the beginning. And I think that that's so important. So yes, she's my friend. But the way she does business, she also gives back to the community every quarter, she does a percentage of her sales to a local like community program. She changes it up, but so she does a lot of good with her business. She's has incredible products, and I just think she's doing everything. Even though it's hard. She's doing it the hard way because it's better.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, yeah. Great recommendation. I totally cosign that one, we carry her products at Station Seven. They're huge sellers. But like, more importantly, they are just things that things to buy that are beautiful, but also, like actively doing good and through buying them. So yeah, great suggestion. Sarah. What is one book you would recommend?

Sarah Frost

So I was thinking about this and I don't know. I feel like somebody has to have already said this. But um, Untamed by Glennon Doyle has been pretty magical for me of late. I don't know if you're familiar.

Lauren Tilden

I know. I am familiar. I haven't read it though. And it has been recommended, I think on this podcast, maybe once. Okay. It still didn't make me read it.

Sarah Frost

Talking about mindset, I think I think that Well, first off, Glennon Doyle just has a way with words. And she's an excellent storyteller. She's just she's very clear. It's not a hard read, but it makes you stop and think and without feeling achy. Like it's all. She talks about hard things, but makes it approachable enough that you're like, oh, yeah, okay, that's doable, or Oh, wow, I hadn't thought of it that way before. And sort of gives you a little spiel on mindset, like a mindset shift. Yeah, and I loved it. I totally think it's awesome and empowering and a great book. Perfect.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, before we, before I end recording, I want to make sure that we talked to all of the makers in the room in the proverbial room. You should join this directory like this if you have a local as I'm like small, alright, really business. This directory is something that I think you should really consider joining. There's no reason not to. It's really easy to join. But Sarah, do you want to share a little bit about how to do that and when where to direct people and I will also link this in the show notes, but Sarah is gonna walk you through how it's done and how easy it is.

Sarah Frost

Yeah, so if you go to makinglocal.com You can either click on directory on the top of the page or just type in makinglocal.com/directory. And that's going to take you to the hub. And if you're a maker or a small business owner, food, wine, whatever owner that's basically a small local shop of some sort, you're going to click Add Entry. And it takes probably two, three minutes. And you'll just type in your, your name your business and upload and logo. And that's it. And then you click apply or send, I think is what it says. And it comes to me for basically filtering to make sure that I don't have like weird bots signing up, because nobody wants that. But yeah, it takes like three minutes, you just go to making local.com/directory and click Add Entry.

Lauren Tilden

Amazing, amazing. Everyone go do it. By the time this episode airs, I will have done it for myself, I think you should do it. Sara's gonna be putting a ton of work into promoting it to consumers. So this is just a great kind of no brainer way of getting more eyes on your business, which is what we're all wanting. So definitely go do that. And again, it's making local.com/directory and then add entry or I will also link that in the show notes. Sarah, where can everyone connect with you and learn more about your work online?

Sarah Frost

Yeah, I'm mostly on Instagram. So Instagram is @makinglocal so either there or the website and I would love to chat I'm on there probably more than I should be.

Lauren Tilden

We all are. Well, Sara, thank you so much for having this conversation with me and like just letting me geek out and pick your brain about all things small business. I love what you're doing. I think you're such a great example of like, following your interests and like really pursuing what lights you up and what you're most passionate about in a way that I feel like we can all kind of learn from so love watching you develop making local and really excited for everyone to listen to this episode and join the directory.

Sarah Frost

Thank you so much for having me. You know I always love chatting about all things small business and I have loved chatting about other things with you like mindset all the time. I can do it all day long.

Lauren Tilden

So well we'll have to do it again.

Lauren Tilden 4/26/22 Lauren Tilden 4/26/22

86: Influencer Marketing for Small Businesses with Charmaine Charmant

86: Influencer Marketing for Small Businesses with Charmaine Charmant

Lauren Tilden

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact. I'm your host, Lauren Tilden. And this is episode 86.

In this episode I am so honored to have an amazing woman I've known for a long time on the show Charmaine Charmant. Charmaine is a fashion influencer and published author with the mission of empowering women to live confidently. In this episode, we talk about influencer marketing and what it looks like for small businesses and I cannot wait for you to hear this one. Before we dig into the episode though, I have some super super exciting news to share with you. And that is this Making Good is going pro. This new monthly membership is called Making Good Happen. And it's for those of you who wants to take everything you learn here on Making Good to the next level. Making Good Happen is designed to make sure that we're taking the actions we need to take to move the needle in our businesses.

In this monthly membership we'll work together on creating and implementing a marketing plan that will take your business where you want it to go. Private podcast accountability and focused deep work sessions are included. It is going to be so good. I'll be sharing more in the coming weeks. So stay tuned and make sure you're following me over on Instagram at @LaurenTilden for all of the inside details as I share them. In fact, for a sneak peek of the details now just DM me the word Pro and I will share you some of the inside scoop.

Okay, so let's get into today's episode, which is such a great one. My guest is Charmaine Charmant, and I have known Charmaine for years and it was such a blast to have her on the podcast. Charmaine is actually one of my youngest sister's best friends from college, and they went to the same college that I did Wellesley College outside of Boston. Charmaine is a New York City native of Caribbean descent with a passion for business, fashion and women's empowerment. She currently has a full time position at Deloitte Consulting, where she works with government and public service clients. She's also a fashion influencer, and that's what we're talking about today. Her work is backed by high quality content and a cheerful voice that energizes her audience to feel comfortable in their own skin.

She has appeared on ABC seven, Who What Where and XO Necole, and has worked on campaigns with brands like Facebook, Good American, Fabletics and Spanx. She's also a published author. In this episode, we discussed what is influencer marketing? Why now is a good opportunity to work with influencers even if you are a very small business. Why in influencers, number of followers matters less than the engagement that they get, how to find the right influencers, what it looks like to work with an influencer? How to become a content creator or influencer yourself, how to build community with your audience and more. I loved this episode, I think that you will too. Here it is. Charmaine, welcome to the Making Good.

Charmaine Charmant

Thank you so much, Lauren, thank you for having me.

Lauren Tilden

I am super excited about this. I haven't had many people on the podcast who I know from like, outside of my small business journey, small business life. Charmaine is one of my sister's really good friends from college, we actually went to the same college, but years apart. So this is it's just really fun that like life has led us both into, I don't know how to pass in a similar arena, like after going in very different directions. So I'm really glad to get to chat with you today.

Charmaine Charmant

I know I always love connecting with Wellesley alum, so I'm really excited to be here.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, influencer marketing is gonna be kind of the focus of our conversation. But I would love for you to first introduce yourself and share a little bit about your path because you have done a bunch of different things. So what what are you doing now? And kind of what is the road that got you there?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, well, nine to five, I actually work in consulting. I do federal consulting. So for any government agencies, if they have any issues that they can't solve with their own resources and house, they will contract out different firms to help them. And so that's basically what I do in the change management space, nine to five. And outside of that I actually am a content creator. So I do fashion and lifestyle and confidence building for women across all different ages, really, with the primary focus of you know, fashion, helping to boost your confidence. And so that is what I do outside of my 9 to 5.

Lauren Tilden

You have also written a book and have another one coming, right?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, that's correct. So yeah, so I wrote a book for teens girls, I have a gratitude journal. So it's just like daily prompts that teen girls can use just to feel a little bit more happier on their day to day lives. And I also have an empowerment journal. So it's kind of like the same deal, but dealing with self confidence, and empowerment and just learning to kind of come into their own skin as young women.

Lauren Tilden

I love this. I love this so much. And we'll definitely make sure those are links in the show notes. For anyone listening who has a young woman in their life that could benefit from those books, definitely check those out. Let's start really broad, you know that most of the listeners of this podcast are small business owners or aspiring small business owners. So a lot of makers, a lot of product based businesses, and then some kind of creative, let's say creative small businesses, things like photographers, graphic designers, things like that. We're going to be talking about how influencer marketing relates to these kinds of businesses. And I'm not, we're not going to talk so much about like, how do you become an influencer? Although, maybe I will pick your brain a little bit about that, too. But mostly, I'm interested in exploring, how can small brands work with influencers to you know, tackle whatever business objectives they have, whether it's growing their reach, generating sales, whatever. So overall, could you just define for us what influencer marketing is?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, I think influencer marketing, if I had to put it into words, well, an influencer is someone who has influence, right. So you know, whether it be someone who is like a tech expert, or a fashion expert, or, you know, a small business expert, we're really thinking about regular people who are experts in some way, shape, or form, and who have accumulated a following, you know, over the course of, you know, however long they've been on whichever social media platform they're on. So influencer marketing is really the future of marketing, in my opinion. As a fashion influencer, I work with lots of small brands, but also big brands, on various different campaigns. And, you know, influencer marketing is only growing, I think there's huge potential for small businesses to really work with influencers, to grow their brand and to grow their reach. So I think this is a really cool topic that we're talking about today. And yeah, I mean, that's really how I would describe it.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah. And you said that you work with both small brands and bigger brands, and I think this is one of the kind of myths I want to dispel together is, you don't have to be like a big huge corporation to be able to work with influencers, who, even influencers who have really big reach. So what would you say to like a small business owner who's like, oh, like, I can't work with Charmaine, because, you know, I don't have an enormous budget, or I'm just a small jewelry business. And she's I see her working with these bigger brands, like, what would you say to someone with that mentality?

Charmaine Charmant

I would say that that is definitely a limiting belief. And I think, as a small business, as a small business owner, and also as an influencer, as anyone, in any professional role, I think limiting beliefs are the death of you. And so I feel like you just got to get over that hump. Anyone can work with anyone, it's you always got to think about things in terms of, you know, what would entice this person to work with me? What incentives could I give to them to want to work with me? And vice versa, right. I think small businesses are in a really unique position right now, because influencer marketing is still at, I think, the beginning of, you know, regulation of funds like funding as we know it traditional funding it I know that it's even now just recently become a course in business schools.

So it's so it's such a young industry, I feel like, and so a lot of the rules haven't been set. And so you really have the opportunity to kind of set the tone, set your own rules. And as a small business, I think that there's more of an opportunity to kind of develop a relationship with an influencer to grow as an influencer grows, and to really just identify, you know, who it is that you see, you know, as your brand ambassador like. So for instance, for fashion, right, I will talk about fashion because I'm a fashion influencer. If I was opening up a small boutique, I would think about or if I wanted to market, my small boutique, I would think about, okay, who is my ideal customer? And, you know, where does she already shop, who are her, her favorite influencers, and kind of go from there kind of like reverse engineering, the collaboration in your head, I think that a lot of folks think they need to have someone with huge reach, or lots of followers in order to, you know, get a collaboration that will have a good return on investment. But from what I've been seeing, it's actually quite the opposite. You want to look at like smaller influencers, who have great engagement and whose audience is in line with your target demographic, I feel like those are really the sweet spots for coming out with, you know, an influencer marketing collaboration that will work for your small brand.

Lauren Tilden

And when you say like, maybe you're looking at influencers who might not have, like millions of followers, but have good engagement, what general range are we talking about? Like, I know, I've heard terms like nano influencer micro influencer? Yeah.

Charmaine Charmant

There's lots of terms. Yeah. But yeah, there's lots of terms for the different, you know, I guess, size, the different groups of influencers in terms of like, their sizes. And honestly, you just want to look at, okay, like, for instance, like, you know, if someone is posting who has like, 5k, or 10k, you want to see like, okay, look into their comments, if you're on Instagram and see, are people really like, you know, having conversations under their posts? Like, does it seem like their audience is truly engaged, like, you know, does this influencer create high quality content that you could use on your page, you know, there might be, you might want to work with a different influencer for different things.

So, you know, while someone might be really good at coming up with like, editorial, beautiful photos, another person might be really good at, you know, creating interactive content on like, say, TikTok, or something like that, that's a little bit more informal, but will really like spread the word about your product, right. So you know, having that person, right, who creates editorial content that you could, you know, use their images on your website, because there's so high quality, like that person is as equally important as like the person if you're a small business, and you're, you're looking at influencer marketing to kind of like outsource some work, then you know, that person is just as important as the person who can make, you know, a five second video on TikTok go viral to like, spread the word about your product.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, yeah, that's really helpful. And you talked a little bit about this already, the best way to find the right influencer for your brand, but I just want to reiterate what you said, which is to look at your ideal customer. We talked about that a lot on this podcast, and who are they following? And, you know, you want to you want to be working with an influencer, whose audience is similar to yours? So great points. Yeah.

Charmaine Charmant

And they're, you know, they're great influencers all over the place, like, you know, you could leverage someone who has, you know, a really great YouTube following, TikTok, Instagram, even Pinterest, I think the world is really your oyster in terms of finding influencers. And, you know, there are tons of influencers out there. But, you know, always searching hashtags, really helps any hashtags that are, like, relevant to your niche. That's a great way to kind of find an influencer, who might be in line with, you know, your brand, even looking at your competitors, and seeing, you know, who your competitors work with. That's great, you know, research as well to kind of understand what works and what doesn't work. And then there are also other platforms that connect brands with influencers, so it might be worth getting onto those platforms. One is Fohr. And you know, there are tons of platforms like that one that connects brands with influencers to kind of make that process a little bit easier.

Lauren Tilden

Great tip I have not, I didn't know that those platforms even existed.

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, yeah, they do.

Lauren Tilden

Awesome. Cool. Do you use those?

Charmaine Charmant

Um, yes and no, I think because I do have a full time job. I don't do as much outreach to brands as I would like. That's another thing. That's another thing to know is that, you know, influencers, who do this full time, like, they will reach out to brands, and they will pitch brands. So, you know, it's really good to let it be known that you work with influencers by you know, having your social media up to date or, and things like that, because you never know, you might, you know, join one of these platforms and an influencer might reach out to you directly, when you might see you there and follow up. So yeah, that's another important tip.

Lauren Tilden

How would you make it clear that you work with influencers? Like, make sure your social media is up to date?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, I mean, you know, one, you want to make sure your social media is up to date. So you wherever your presence is, whether it's on YouTube, or Instagram, or you know, wherever Pinterest, or even if you just have a website. You know, if you're working with influencers, you want to make sure you're like reposting their work. You also want to engage with people on social media. So you want to engage with accounts within your niche, you want to engage with influencers within your niche. If an influencer sees that you, as a brand have been liking their posts or stuff, they might, you know, start to follow you. Or they might have you in the top of their mind, like, oh, I should probably pitch them one day. That's what I think whenever a brand, you know, likes my picture or anything like that.

Lauren Tilden

Nice. What would like a fee structure normally look like? So I know, you hear about people being like, you know, sending product and exchange for promotion, I know that influencers probably also prefer to get paid, not just getting free stuff. So how does that generally work?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, I think it depends on an influencer, to influence their case basis. But I would say, you know, a lot of influencers do collaborate, especially influencers, who are just starting out, those nano influencers, they will definitely be open to gifting. Even big influencers, like huge influencers are still open to gifting. So I think don't, don't let that discourage you, I think gifting is great. Just make sure that your product is awesome. And that you really believe in it. And don't require, I mean, you know, in the conversation in the negotiation stage, like, you know, you guys can come to an agreement, you and the influencer. But if you are gifting, you know, don't be pushy about, you know, setting deliverable structures and things like that, because it's just like, you know, the same way that you're a small business and influencer also is kind of running their own small business as well. And so you want to make sure that there's a level of respect there, you know, right.

Yeah, but I mean, in general, I think for influencers, if you do want to approach an influencer, and you do want to pay them, I think a great way, a great baseline, a great baseline structure that you could follow would be, you can charge 4% of their following for a post and 2% of their following the you know, if you did the math for like a story for Instagram, for TikTok, I don't know if those numbers will, will would slide or scale or whatever. But, you know, thinking of just having a percentage of the following or if it's like a nano influencer, you know, of the engagement or whatever the case may be.

Lauren Tilden

Okay. Just while you mentioned TikTok, so I know that you're kind of bread and butter, at least originally is Instagram but you are expanding to TikTok. It sounds like how are you kind of viewing? The difference between those platforms? Like are you putting equal energy into each? How are you viewing that?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, I'm definitely not putting equal energy into it. But I would say if I were starting out as an influencer right now, TikTok would be my go to app. Probably. Growth. Yes, yes, definitely. Tick tock is an app that provides explosive growth. The algorithm is pretty awesome. It's just like super quick, short content, video content. It's great for like, getting your personality across. And it's just like a quick app and people can't it's like an app that kind of like, you can't put it down once you open it up. There's just a lot more that I feel like for Instagram, there's a lot more that goes into it. Because it is a video sharing app and a photo sharing app, although they are primarily focusing on video content right now, I don't know, I just feel like there's a little bit more production that goes behind Instagram that TikTok, you could really just, I mean, of course you could, depending on what you'd like to do, it could be a whole production for TikTok as well. But it's an app that's really meant to just like, I feel like seamlessly fit into your everyday life.

Lauren Tilden

Just in terms of, you know, with the emergence of reels, like, as an influencer, are you, like in your client work, like with the brands that you work with, are you are reels being sponsored now?, I don't know if I really noticed this, or is it still exceed posts and stories? Generally.

Charmaine Charmant

Yes, everything, anything that a brand or a social media platform offers a brand, like will pay for. So I mean, I have been asked to create reels, TikToks, posts, stories, even going live anything within a platform that, you know can be utilized, I think brands have definitely asked for sure. Okay, even blog posts are still something that I'm still approached for, which is like, pretty rare these days, because I don't think people read blogs that much. But that is also something that brands are still sponsoring and paying for. So yeah, definitely. I think there's definitely a benefit to, you know, each, what is it like offering that social media platform has and so just thinking strategically about the ways that you can leverage a post versus a video, versus a reel, versus IG TV Live, knowing the difference between those things, is super important when thinking about a campaign and how to best get your product or you know, your business idea across.

Lauren Tilden

Right, right. Let's say that so we know you're a fashion influencer, let's say we are a small jewelry business. What would make it and we like, we follow you, we've gotten to know what kind of content you create. And we are pretty confident that your audience would be a great fit for us. What would make it like a no brainer? Absolutely yes decision for you to decide to work with a small brand.

Charmaine Charmant

For me, I always love it when I can have a phone call with the brand or a video chat with the brand just to get to know the team. I love it when a creative brief is provided for me. And space, there's space for me to kind of give my input and share my ideas as well. And, you know, just having, you know, some realistic turnaround times. Some brands want content super quickly. And I think it's nice when you kind of have a little bit of, you know, notice, like realistic timelines basically. And of course being paid.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, yeah, of course. What would be okay, you said a couple of things. I want to dig into more. What would be a realistic timeline?

Charmaine Charmant

It depends. It depends on, it really does depend, I think when I say realistic timeline, I think okay, here's the timeline we were hoping for, does that work for your schedule? Or, you know, given the scope of the deliverables, what would be a feasible timeline for you so that it's more of like a conversation and less of this is demand on Friday and you sent me the email on like, Monday it's like that's a bit much.

Lauren Tilden

yeah. And creative brief. What is that in in the case of influencers?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, so that's like just like, like a branding like you know, it kind of gives an overview of the campaign, the brand, what the goal is, what the objective is, it has some styling inspiration if it's for you know, fashion influencer or even if it's for like a stay at home mom influencer or like a cooking influencer, it just has like a guide of what you're looking for. The best creative briefs I've received are the ones where they have pulled my own images from my feed and said, we want something similar to this, this is the lighting we want, this Is the hairstyle we want, so that I could literally it's like, quick and easy, like I know exactly what they want. And if it's not images of me from my timeline, that's fine. But you know, images from somewhere, or someone, or something that kind of just lays out exactly what the vision is. So that, you know, it's executed as seamlessly as possible.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, great point. And when people are, like, when you sign a conctract, I'm assuming you sign contracts. When you sign a contract with a brand, what is like? I'm sure this is a it depends question. But what would be the general scope? Is it like, okay, two feed posts and like three stories, or is it one at a time? Or like, how does that generally work?

Charmaine Charmant

It totally depends, like some brands will approach you for a one time campaign, you know, they might, whatever they could ask for, like, anywhere from like one feed post to like, three feed posts for the month, then five images? And, you know, it really depends. Some people have ongoing partnerships, a lot of larger influencers, have ongoing partnerships with alcohol brands, or, you know, home goods brands, or things like that. So it 100% depends on your marketing needs for the year, your budget, and you know, your needs.

Lauren Tilden

Right. Yeah. I had a feeling that was the answer. Yeah. And generally, when you're signing these contracts, are you bringing the contract template to them? Or are they approaching you with like, a proposal that you sign?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, they're definitely approaching you with a proposal. And then, you know, based on their proposal, I could go back and say, okay, like, I don't, you know, this is not going to work for me, these terms aren't going to work. We need to adjust this. And then you kind of work together to reach a middle ground, and then you sign, both parties sign.

Lauren Tilden

Oh, my gosh, a whole new world is it's so interesting. You said like, this is starting to be taught in business school. I know you went to business school, right?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, I did.

Lauren Tilden

Did you learn anything about this? There?

Charmaine Charmant

Not at all? Not at all. I know, my friend goes to Columbia Business School. And she's like, Oh, my gosh, I'm taking an influencer marketing class. And I was like, what?

Lauren Tilden

Oh, my gosh, amazing. Yeah, so cool. The wild, wild west. Let's talk a little bit about becoming an influencer. For anyone who might be interested in doing that. I, I feel like we there's a perception at least that like these days, it's harder to grow following on Instagram. I don't know if you're experiencing that. Or if that's like the narrative that you've heard or that you subscribe to, but like, is this, is there a sense that like, the ship has sailed if you haven't already started or?

Charmaine Charmant

People think this ship has sailed. And you can't think that way. I think that there's so much room, if you are someone who, you know, thinks that you want to do influencing. I also think if you're a small business owner, and you know, you can wear your product, or you're like a great ambassador for your products, I think it's probably a really good idea. If you if you really do have the drive to look into getting started, you know, I never think I never think I don't believe in like, oh, it's oversaturated I just don't believe in that. Because, you know, in my thought that I wouldn't have started blog. I you know, I started blogging when I was in college, but I took a break a couple years. And like, you know, by then, you know, bloggers that had started out where I started out, they were like, huge, had huge followings. And if I had said, oh, you know, it's getting oversaturated there's so many people now doing it, like, I miss my chance. You know, I wouldn't be here where I am today, like, you know, doing really great things with influencing.

So yeah, I definitely don't, I just think people say that just to scare people. I don't know, I don't believe in that. And that's for all platforms. Like, there's so many platforms that you can leverage. It's not just like, Instagram, you know, and in the next couple years, it'll be a new platform. It's about just like, keeping up with the times. Making sure that your audience trust you. You have to really build that following be consistent. And be true to yourself. And your people will find you and you know, as long as you continue to be true to yourself and you're a good person. They'll never leave you. They will people you like you're growing together. with your friends really? Just online.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah. So how what has been your process for kind of building your audience and your following? I mean, you said you started a blog in college, took a break from it. When did you like kind of start in earnest? And how has it gone for you?

Charmaine Charmant

Well, when I started, I was in high school, and I'd always been a curvy girl. And it was always like, very hard for me to find clothing, especially back then when like, brands were just not as inclusive. I was like in high school, going back and forth from New York City, to Western Mass when I went to boarding school, and just like, you know, trying to find the best deals with my mom while shopping. And I would always get questions from my friends who were like me, they would ask, where do you get this? Where'd you find this? And I just thought one day, I was like, I should make a blog. But I didn't really, I thought about it. And then I just kept thinking about it. And then when I was in college, I got this internship at J Crew corporate doing Merchandising, and I remember all of these buyers, they were sitting around a computer, and they were laughing at this blogger, the Man Repeller, who was like a huge, she's like, the OG bloggers, huge blogger, lots, you know, big business now. And they were laughing at her. And I remember thinking like, Oh, it's so weird, cuz she was like walking around in a flamingo suit. But I was like, it's so weird that they're laughing at her because she's like, you know, she's posting and you're watching her content. And like, this is pretty cool. So in the back of my mind, I was like, I'm gonna do this.

And so it was a really safe space to start at Wellesley. Just like taking pictures of my outfits. I didn't think anything of it. Like, I thought maybe I could work with brands like in the future, but I never thought it would look like what it looks like today. And then I started working in fashion full time after graduating from Wellesley. And working on the business side of fashion, really just crushed my spirit as like a woman of color as a plus size woman. It and I was so funny to say like that, because I was probably like a size 14-16 back then. And now I'm definitely not I'm definitely like a size 18-20, 22. But, um, but yeah, it crushed my spirit, like, everyone, like on the back end looked the same. And they didn't look like me. It was like a very tough environment. It was the total opposite of Wellesley, I felt like my experience at Wellesley was, like amazing and so empowering. And I felt like the energy at Bloomingdale's corporate was just in my buying department was like very, they just kind of felt like Devil Wears Prada, but like worse, because it was like my real life. And I just couldn't take it anymore. And so that kind of discouraged me from blogging as well, because I was like, the fashion industry, isn't it for me, like there's no place for me. And so I kind of hung it up.

And I went back to business school, and I was recruited to work for my current consulting firm. And I've been working there ever since. And while I was living in DC, I moved back to New York recently. But while I was living in DC, I kind of missed it. And I decided, Oh, I really like miss fashion and sharing my fashion sense. And, you know, I just got back to it really, when I was out there in DC. And in DC, there were so many creatives, there were so many brands, small brands, midsize brands, and we're working with influencers. And it just made me realize that Whoa, this is like bigger than I thought it was. Even as a micro influencer living in DC, I was like, going to events getting invited to different events, meeting all kinds of creatives, all kinds of small business owners working with like a small Hair Studio, it was like the coolest experience ever.

We shot like a promo video at the wing. And like, you know, they had like a whole expo where they invited influencers to like, cover the content, like cover their whole day and create content for it. And I remember feeling like whoa, this is like, what I want to do, and like there's a space for me, and people want to hear my voice and they want to hear my opinions. And they want me to like, you know, sell their products online like whoa. And it was really just about remembering that there was a space for me and like, you know, I do have a voice and there are people just like me out there looking for inspiration, who might not have had a mom who you know, knew how to dress them, help them dress for their bodies or things like that, and they're looking for that. And you know, traditional marketing isn't giving that to them. So they're looking for it in people like us, who are normal people but just have like a knack for something that's interesting to them.

So, and it's so funny, you know, I started this by sharing my outfits and stuff, but the work that I do and like even sharing things that, you know, I think I look cute and it gives people inspiration to like, who have given up on themselves, right, so many women, a lot of older women actually like in their 30s and 40s, 50s telling me that they have like, given up on going out because they don't like how they look in their clothes, or, you know, whatever the case may be. And it's so much more than just like sharing a beautiful outfit. It's about empowerment. And it's so cool to just see how many brands, you know, that message can align with. It's not always clothing, right? Sometimes it's, um, you know, I've worked with like, a, I've worked with, like, beauty products, beauty, beauty brands, and like, you know, Home Brands and things like that. And it's just about, like, you know, bringing people into your everyday life, you know, because at the end of the day, it's kind of like, I think following an influencer, for me, and my favorite influencers. It's really about like growing with that person seeing their growth over time. And, you know, gathering inspiration from them, it's kind of like having a friend through the internet. And that sounds a little weird, but that's how I think about it.

Lauren Tilden

I love just listening to you talk about like, I don't know, I'm hearing I maybe I'm putting words in your mouth, but I feel like I'm kind of hearing your why, like, why, what keeps you going, which is like these messages you get from people that kind of articulate how you've inspired them and how you know, they've given up but just seeing examples of people who walk like them, or, you know, have found clothing that like looks amazing. And it's just such a great example of doing something that's so aligned with, with your values and finding a way to, like make that a business. And yeah, I'm, I'm inspired by that big time.

Charmaine Charmant

Oh, thank you.

Lauren Tilden

You've talked a bit about, you know, developing this relationship with your followers. And, you know, you're kind of like their friend that they're gonna grow with over time. You have a full time job, too. And you have like throughout this, as we've discussed, so, how do you do that? I mean, like, it's so much time and effort. How do you? How do you put the I guess, aside from creating content, how do you invest the time and like the energy into building and maintaining these relationships?

Charmaine Charmant

I think the key to social media, and the key to anything in life really is not to like overthink it. I like to take things step by step. And so if I have 30 minutes, well, one thing I always do is I always respond to my comments. And I try my hardest to respond to all of my DMs, because at the end of the day, I think, you know, those pieces of engagement, comments and DMS, they matter the most. Because that's like direct, you know, engagement with your followers. So like, I especially in the first hour of my post, I answer all my comments, and I interact with all my comments. And even the next day, I'll go back and make sure that I, you know, got to everyone at that point. So I think that's very important. And also DMS, like if people have questions, making sure that if someone asked me for a link that I can send them something, you know, that's an exact match or similar. Just being there for those questions is really important. And you know, also those messages where people are sharing, you know, their stories, just like interacting with them. Because it's important, like that's your community, right? Right.

Other than that, like, I think if you're someone who's super busy, just set aside, if you have 20 minutes a day, like of downtime or 30 minutes a day, sometimes people do an hour of just like engaging with the people that you follow as well. Because you just want to make sure that you're staying kind of like in the top of everyone's algorithm. So that is also very important and I've been really bad about that recently. But it's important no matter how many, you know, followers you have.

Lauren Tilden

If you could look at kind of your journey as a content creator and an influencer and looking back at like the different strategies that you used or things that you've tried, what have been the things that have helped you grow your following the quickest or the most.

I would say consistency, because if I wasn't consistent, I'm like, Okay, so like I wasn't super consistent in DC during my two years there, the return on on being consistent was not immediate at all whatsoever. But because I was consistent, you know, during that time, and then when I moved to New York City I was, you know, consistent then it really even on the, even in the months where I blogged. After that, it just sets the stage right, like, the growth doesn't happen overnight. For some people it does on TikTok it might. On most of these platforms, growth doesn't happen overnight. It's about being consistent. It's about remembering, you know, that even if you have 20 people watching your stories, that's, you know, a classroom full of people. It's about remembering your why, and showing up right, for a little for the, you know, for the first couple, I don't know, months, years, whatever the case may be, you might not, you might feel like Oh, I'm just speaking to no one. And then when they will wake up and realize, oh, my gosh, I've grown so much. So I think consistency is the key to growth is definitely consistency. For sure.

Not the answer anyone wants but yeah. Oh my gosh. So good. Thank you for letting me just like ask all of these really pointed questions. Obviously, I know very little about influencers and working with influencers. You know, we're coming into the busiest time of the year for most small product based businesses, at least, which is the kind of Black Friday through the end of the year, when, like, when are brands are typically reaching out to influencers about working with them for campaigns over Black Friday, or the December holidays. Is that happened already? Is that happening? Now? What do you suggest there?

Charmaine Charmant

I say just as when you hear this, I think it'd be the best time to reach out. I think around, you know, around this time, like late October, early November, you want to start getting your ducks in a row around getting those collaborations, those collaboration ideas together and who you might want to work with and starting to reach out.

Lauren Tilden

Cool. And just a fun question, which is, are there any types of businesses that you are currently looking to work with? Just in case someone listening? It's like, oh, that's me.

Charmaine Charmant

Oh, whoa, so interesting. Oh, my gosh, I should have thought about this before. Honestly. Not really, not really. I am...I've been really into jewelry actually lately. And my followers know that. So and also I that's just like naturally like what I am interested in right now. So if you are a jewelry brand, and you are looking for someone to collaborate with, please feel free to reach out to me.

Lauren Tilden

Cool. Definitely. A lot of jewelry brands. I will I will. I will keep this matchmaking opportunity in mind. I want to transition into some of the questions that I ask all the guests, the first one I think you have, you've spoken to us a little bit already. But how do you approach doing good through your small business or through your work as a content creator?

Charmaine Charmant

I think as a content creator, being true to yourself is the most important thing I think that you can do. Especially for someone who is in fashion or body confidence or just instilling confidence in other people. If you're seeing that you're an expert in those things, I think being truthful, honest, and being yourself is the best way to show up because you can really just attract people who need to hear your voice. So I think that's really in, in terms of influencing and just using your influence to you know, encourage people to buy products or, you know, make big life decisions. I think that's the best thing that you can do.

Lauren Tilden

Mm hmm. What is one small business that you admire?

Charmaine Charmant

Oh, okay. I have a small business that I admire. I admire hairapy by j. So this is a business by a woman named Jilani. She is a loctitian and she actually has this like whole line of these different types of like oils for people who have a lock their hair, and I recently started my lock journey last year. And so I've been using her products ever since I started and they have really helped my hair to thrive. And she makes the best like she makes the best products. I Have seen in a long time um, that worked for my hair and so she's her businesses definitely a small business that I admire.

Lauren Tilden

Awesome. We will link to her in the show notes. What is a business book that you would recommend.

Charmaine Charmant

I really liked you the owner of Nasty Gal had that book is it Girl Boss, Girl Boss. Yeah, I really liked that book. I read that book quite some time ago, but I loved her journey. I love seeing how she started her business in her garage. And just taking it into like a full fledged company. I know she's sold it since but that book really inspired me because it was kind of like related to my wheelhouse, which is like fashion, women's fashion.

Lauren Tilden

Awesome. I haven't read that actually. So great recommendation. Okay, where can everyone connect with you online, share like website I know that the names of your books I'll link those but just in case people want to find them to buy and social accounts, all the things?

Charmaine Charmant

Yeah, so I am @Charmaine.Charmant on Instagram and TikTok and if you want to buy my books, you can just type in Charmaine Charmant into Amazon and I think my titles will show up. And yeah, on YouTube I am Charmaine Charmant.

Lauren Tilden

Didn't know you're on YouTube, amazing. Wow, all the things. Charmaine, thank you so much. This is like brand new territory for me as you can probably tell, so I've learned so much from this conversation. And I just like I personally, as someone who's really interested in body positivity and you know inclusive fashion, I am just so all about what you do. I really admire you, so thank you so much for being here and for the work that you do. Overall.

Charmaine Charmant

Thank you so much for having me Lauren, this was so much fun.

Lauren Tilden

As someone who is all about inclusive fashion and body positivity. I love love, love what Charmaine is all about. Friends make sure to follow along with her and if you would be interested in collaborating with her, get in touch. Did you enjoy this episode? I know Charmaine and I would both love to connect with you on Instagram. You can tag Charmaine at @Charmaine.Charmant, and me at @LaurenTilden.

If you enjoyed this episode, I would so so so love for you to leave a rating and review on Apple podcast, Stitcher or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can find all of the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/86 If you're interested in learning more about my small businesses Good Sheila and Station Seven, the links are in the show notes. And I would love to have you in the Facebook community for this podcast head over to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to join. Finally, make sure you're following me on Instagram at @LaurenTilden to make sure that you get all of the inside details on the pro version of this podcast coming soon. It's called Making Good Happen. And if you want a sneak peek on the details, just DM me the word Pro and I will send you some of the fun inside scoop. Thank you for being here and for focusing on making a difference with your small business. Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 4/20/22 Lauren Tilden 4/20/22

87: Introducing Making Good Book Club (+ Meet My Co-Host, Charelle Griffith)

87: Introducing Making Good Book Club (+ Meet My Co-Host, Charelle Griffith)

Lauren Tilden

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact. I'm your host, Lauren Tilden. And this is episode 87.

Today's episode is a super special one because I get to tell you about something brand new that I am just giddy with excitement about. If you've listened to any of the interviews I've done on this podcast before you know that one of the questions I ask every single guest who comes on the podcast is for a book recommendation. I am a pretty voracious reader. And I know that so many listeners of this podcast are really big book people too. And so I am beyond excited to be launching the Making Good Book Club, and I am so thrilled to introduce you to the amazing woman who has agreed to co host the book club with me marketing expert Charelle Griffith as part of the book club each month on the podcast we will announce the next month's book club book. And we'll read it together during the month. And then a month after we announce each book we will release an episode where Charelle and I will sit down to discuss the book highlight key takeaways and explore how to apply it to small businesses.

In this book club, we'll be covering both traditional quote unquote business books as well as general self improvement and wellness books that we think are relevant to how we run our businesses. We'll be making a concerted effort to not just read books written by white men, and we'll have some fantastic books on our list that I'm so excited about. We'll also be taking some questions you have about the book in advanced and we'll discuss those in the episode as well. So stay tuned. If you want to stay in the loop for the Making Good Book Club head to makinggoodpodcast.com/bookclub to sign up to hear about all of the juicy good stuff. And stay tuned till the end of this episode to find out what book we've chosen as the first ever book for the Making Good Book Club.

So today's episode is about two things. One is announcing the arrival of the Making Good Book Club. Yay, we did that. And the second is to introduce you to my amazing co host marketing strategists Charelle Griffith. Charelle is a business and marketing strategist for coaches, consultants and online service providers with a passion for supporting solopreneurs and small business owners. Charelle focuses on taking the overwhelm out of marketing and instead creates marketing strategies that help her client to shine online, consistently create content that converts and ultimately build a thriving business that supports the lifestyle they desire. In this episode, you'll get to know a little more about Charelle and what she does in her business as a marketing strategist. We also discuss Charelle's love for nonfiction books and where that comes from. And she shares her advice for making sure that we not only read awesome books, but actually implement what we learn into our lives and businesses. Finally, we're both marketing merits so we talk a little bit of marketing as well. Charelle is truly the perfect person to co host the Making Good Book Club, and I am so excited for you to get to know her in this episode. Here it is Charelle Welcome to Making Good.

Charelle Griffith

Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be here.

Lauren Tilden

I'm so excited about this. As I mentioned in the intro Charelle is the new co host of The Making Good Book Club, which, honestly, when I started thinking about doing a book club, Charelle was literally the first person who came to mind because I know she's just such a wizard with all of this. So this is going to be such a fun adventure for the podcast and so glad to have a part time co host, so thank you for agreeing to join me for this.

Charelle Griffith

No, thank you for inviting me. It was one of those emails where I was like, at first I thought, oh my gosh, is this some like weirdo contacted me and I get a lot of weird emails in the inbox. And then when I read it and I realized it was you from Clubhouse I was like, yes, I was like this is so my street and I'm so excited to take part.

Lauren Tilden

I'm so excited also. So for the listeners who don't know you, I would love for you to just introduce yourself and your business. Just tell us a little bit about what you do and maybe some of the paths that got you to do what you do now.

Charelle Griffith

Okay, cool. So my name is Charelle Griffith. I am based in the UK. So I'm from Nottingham, which is a place right in the middle, people in America nominated Robin Hood. So that is where I'm from. And I am a marketing and business strategist that specializes in supporting solopreneurs and super, super small service based business owners. So my background was that I actually had worked in marketing mainly in the live entertainment and the performing arts. So I've spent like the last five years working in London on like West End shows, all the glitz, all the glamour.

But I had started a business six years ago called Propel Her which you'll find out more because that's the bit that where the books kicked in. And through that I basically realized there were so many people that had great skill, but they just weren't able to market themselves very well. And that was frustrating for me. And as someone who was working in marketing day in and day out, I was like, actually, I shouldn't be just, it shouldn't be just the big boys, they get all the help. And actually, I could do some good. Now, yeah, so now I really focused on like solopreneurs, super small. And my mission is really just to help people to shine online, consistently create content that converts and ultimately build a business that they love, and allows them to live the life they dream of. So I'm really about a business that supports your life and making sure the two of them work really well together.

Lauren Tilden

I love this, and I'm so glad you said like good marketing shouldn't just be for the big boy. Companies, because it is true, like marketing can, in my opinion, as a marketer, it's sort of the make or break between the businesses that make it and the ones that struggle a little more is just your ability to communicate what you have to the world. So I think in that way, like marketing experts who work with small businesses, it's such a way of doing good in the world, because it helps kind of even the playing field a little bit. So I love that you do this. Tell me a little bit more about the clients that you work with, exactly like the kind of work that, the projects that you work on with them.

Charelle Griffith

Okay, so mainly, it's like coaches, consultants, online service providers, people who, predominantly are delivering a service online, but not, it doesn't have to be solely so I think actually be because of my background, I'm quite open to people that still want to do in person things. I'm a massive extrovert. So people that want to do like events, retreats, all that sort of stuff. Actually quite, I quite like that blend. So I do quite, I get people who sort of blend that online offline, I'm not like you have to be totally online. And mainly people who are like I said, they've got a skill, they've got a knowledge. So I've got quite a few like financial coaches and accountants, life coaches, people who have got a skill. But now, very often, they were doing it in a working situation as an employee, and they've come out and now they're by themselves. And like, I know, I'm really good at what I do. But just like what you were saying, Lauren, and it's like, actually, if you can't communicate it, is pointless, you can be amazing, but all of a sudden, you don't have this business above you, you don't have someone else doing marketing, you don't have the clients just falling on your lap. And it's just about delivery, you've got to bring people in.

So people who are actually open to learning how to do their marketing themselves, rather than wanting to be someone who's going to outsource. So my services range from like, some I have a program where I work with people for like six months, and I will do everything with them so that they get their marketing strategies done, we'll talk about all their content, look at basically anything and everything that comes up. And then like the other end of the scale is people like I have like a pricing power hour. Our pricing is definitely one of my superpowers when it comes to marketing. So sometimes people just come in, they're like, Well, I've like got fully booked my money, this isn't making enough money. I'm like, because your pricing was wrong. And so we'll go through all of their different services and offerings and try and make sure their pricing is right. So depending on what the business is and what stage it's at, I like have different services for that.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, awesome. So you, you kind of see businesses from the point of they have the skill, and they are not quite sure how to market it. And then you work with them to do that more effectively. What would you say is one of the big shifts, that makes a big difference when it comes to going from I have a small business, and I don't know how to market it or communicate it, like what is? Do you know what I'm saying?

Charelle Griffith

Yeah, I mean, I think the, for me, the most common things that come up that are really stopping people from like really doing as well as they should be, is one is around messaging. I think, obviously there was a big part of are you actually talking about language, can you communicate what you want to do? But secondly, understanding like, really, like, what where to be. And I think particularly now there's like so much emphasis on social media, and I'm like rolling my eyes. And three, and so that's why it makes people start there, but it's a very time consuming place to be. And it also forgets just like all the rest of the marketing channels that there are.

And I'm like really honest that I'm like most people do probably find me from social media. And they think that's like all I do. I'm like, no, like, I do other things. I get things from like in person. I do like what am recommendations, I've done go to networking events, I do other things, I have a really good email list. And actually, what I find with people is they've just done social media. And so they've probably done a course. And they've got no strategy behind it. They've got no real understanding of the journey they're meant to be taking people on. So I think literally probably every single person I've ever worked with, is actually this taken a step back and be like, how are you taking people on a journey? How are you actually expecting to make sure that new people are coming across you and then once they're in your world, how you bring them in? And then like showing all the goodies and making it very clear how you can like help them and then make the sale.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I am nodding my head as I'm listening to you talk, because I think the strategy part gets lost. Sometimes. People who listen to this podcast, a lot have heard me say this, but I, it's so easy when you start a business or like, Okay, I'm gonna do my marketing to just look around, what you see is people on social media, and they seem to be like posting every day or doing all like putting all this effort into it. So you're like, Okay, that's marketing, I'm going to do marketing, and you just try to, like, throw things out there. And the missing element to that strategy, like, why are you doing what you're doing? What are you hoping to get out of it? What role is social media playing in your marketing strategy? What role is playing like, thinking through all of these things is so impactful? So I'm really glad that you brought that up.

Charelle Griffith

No, I'm definitely a thinker. So I like all that side of it.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, it's the hard part, right. It's like, you know, having to put some effort into the strategy is not easy, but it is the most powerful thing that you can do. So we talk a lot here about intention. I think strategy is kind of just, I don't know, strategies like intention with actions are tied to it. So, so good. So tell me a little bit. I know that marketing is like, like me, you just love marketing. Like, it's your thing. What do you love about marketing?

Charelle Griffith

So for me, it's the perfect blend of an art and a science. So I was one of those kids that was really good at math and science, super geeky, but was also really creative. So actually, the reason why I used to do work in the live entertainment and finance industry was because I performed when I was younger, and my degree is actually in dance. So yeah.

Lauren Tilden

Oh my gosh.

Charelle Griffith

So yeah, so it's a very different, like route to my people. Like I didn't, it wasn't as if I knew from day one, it was to do marketing, like I actually did. I started a business, like when I was at college. And then but I knew, I was like, you can come back to this, your brain always exists, but your body only gets one shot. So that's why I did it at this degree. But pretty much I knew I wasn't going to perform by the time I even finished that degree. And so, but I was like, okay, what can I do around this that I'm really good at. And actually, in my third year, at uni, I, there was a program where the third years were made a dance company, and then we had people behind stage that were like, booking the tour, like, doing the pricing for it, doing the marketing for the shows. And I did that role. And it was the first year in 10 years that they'd ever made a profit and they sold their performances. Now, so Oh, clearly, I'm really quite, this is like clearly what I was meant to do. Yeah. So after I moved to London, very much like I'm going to work in marketing in dance, like, that's what I'm going to do, and ended up getting to the point where I was the Marketing Manager for English National Ballet. And even though I was like selling millions of pounds worth of tickets, now I look back and realize I had really bad impostor syndrome, because I hadn't done marketing, like, formally.

So I was like, fine, I need to do some training. So I did my professional diploma in marketing with the Chartered Institute of Marketing. And that just really opened me. That's where my strategy brain went to another level. So I think before that, it was just very practical. I knew how to do stuff. But doing that level of study, it just made me realize, oh, my gosh, there's so many factors that you need to be thinking about before. And so then I continued, and I was like, Oh, this is gonna be my life, like, I think, I do think it is. If people have an imagination, and they're really creative, and they have something they want to bring to the world, there's nothing more frustrating than not being able to do that. And for me, I just see marketing as being able to actually get what you want out there to actually make people aware of it to make that impact to make a difference. And yeah, it's great. Like, I got to do amazing campaigns, you get to do creative things, you do photo shoots, and you can do video, like, there's so many creative things. But then also my things like you have to plan and I love all the planning, and then all the analytics of the side. I'm like, oh, yeah, like, let me get into Muskego lakes. Let me do like all the ratios, let me get the percentages. I'm like, oh, so for me, it's just like this perfect world of harmony between creative and art. And that's what it all comes back to.

Lauren Tilden

I love this. And you I'm just latching on to something you just said, which is you have to plan. You do have to plan but you also have to execute, which I know is part of what you said that you work with your clients on. But I think sometimes this is a sticking point for people, like they make a plan and then maybe they bite that off more than they could chew. Maybe it's not realistic. Maybe they just have shiny object syndrome. But how do you advise your clients when it comes to like, okay, we've done the strategy part, we've made a plan, how do we make sure that we actually consistently execute them.

Charelle Griffith

So In terms of making sure like what you said about, you've bitten off more than you chew, I think I'm very realistic when I'm doing plans. So like, actually, for quite a long time, my whole thing had been my strat plan was making a strategy that one person can deliver. And I really talked to my clients, and I'm like, what resources you got? How much money have you got to be doing marketing? And how much time have you got per week to be putting into this. And I make a strategy based around those two things about actually how much time and how much money you've got, because there was no point committing into something that's like, gonna take you 20 hours a week, when really, you're like, I've got five hours. It's just pointless. And I think it's always because like, consistency is like one of my biggest points I'm always talking about, I say to people, start off with less and build it up. That's the best way to do it, rather than trying to like, do everything in one go.

So I think that's like, one way is me really trying to be like, Okay, let's keep it simple. In the beginning, let's get this in, like I talked about, like getting into your marketing with them or your groove, and then you can add more layers on as you go. And then also, the other thing I'll challenge is that quite often why people don't execute, which was a reason you didn't mentioned is, because it's scary. But actually, we're putting ourselves out there, particularly, if you'd like you're the face of the business. And that can be quite worrying, and like scary and frightening. And so that is why I work one on one with people is actually that sort of accountability to be like, it's going to be okay, like a bit of hand holding, like, particularly like the video ever said, like, the driving video is like, made my job sometimes just feel like I'm literally like that cheerleader that's just like, come on, like you can do it, it's fine. It's gonna be okay. And when people get off, it's fine. But it can be scary to take that leap in the first place and put yourself out there.

Lauren Tilden

Totally, totally. Oh, yes, mindset is just, I think it's so under estimated when we go into being our own boss and being small business owners. We I mean, maybe I'm, I'm not speaking for everyone, maybe. But I know a lot of people, myself and many other small business owners, you don't expect how big the mental piece of it is, right? And then you have these things that you run into, like I made this plan, but I'm too scared to do the things to execute the plan. And I'm not surprised to hear that's a big part of the work that you do with your clients. Because because it matters, it makes a difference.

Charelle Griffith

Yeah, and I always say to people, like none of us are born doing this, like no one woke up like, yeah, you if you decided you didn't want to be a TV presenter, then you probably didn't think you're gonna have to start a YouTube channel in your life. You know, I mean, like this, actually, it's just become a bit of an add on. It's the same way like, you know, it wasn't in podcast. But if people, if you thought to yourself, I wanted to be a radio host and fine. But actually, quite often, in order to deliver what you actually want to do, until you can get that team, you have to do other things. It's part of it.

Lauren Tilden

Absolutely. Let's Let's wrap up the marketing component of this conversation a little bit with one final question, which is, what is something that you're doing right now in your marketing that is working really well for you?

Charelle Griffith

So after my whole rant about like, social media was not the one, I have to really want to say Clubhouse has been working really well. For me, it's still been the biggest thing in the last like four or five months, I would say in terms of getting my long term, ongoing clients, the majority of them are coming through Clubhouse. And I know it's for a very specific reason, which is, it's a space where I've been able to really grow the know, like and trust factor unlike anywhere else. And people feel like they know me. Like literally people want a discovery call and they're just like, I'm like getting questions or like, I want to work with you. I just already know it. So yeah, for me, Clubhouse is definitely the one right now.

Lauren Tilden

Awesome. Let's dig into books, which is I know it's not your business, but it's something that you do have a bit of a a knack for and an expertise and so why don't you just share a little bit about your love for and journey with nonfiction books.

Charelle Griffith

Cool. So I was always a reader. So I was that child that I have like vivid memories of on a Saturday go into the library, and I'd get six books and I would like stem and had like a stamp on the date of like, you've got to come back with the next three weeks and return these and change them. And I was always really, really into reading. But actually after studying for my professional diploma marketing, I was just done. I think I was so burnt out after trying to study alongside a full time job that I just did not want to pick up a book ever again. And then for an unknown reason, and literally the only reason I know like when it was because I have a photo on my Instagram. It was like March 2015. I went online and I bought Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg and Strong Woman by Karren Brady.

Now Karren Brady is like a female business owner who is on the UK version of The Apprentice. So I released two books. As I said, I can't remember why. But basically, it was like, I open that. And then it was like, my whole, like love of reading all came back. And I had like a marketing manager job. At the time, I was happy. But I think I always knew, I was ambitious. I was living in London, I went there for a reason, I was like, this city's full of opportunities, I just knew there was more. And I think I started to read those books to help me, like, think about how to be more. And as part of that journey, I then realized, actually, there's got to be other women that are like me in the sea, that reading these books, and it's really helpful to have someone else to talk to. So by then that year, I set up Propel Her book club. And the whole ethos around this was to just make a safe space for women to like I said, to acknowledge and achieve their goals. And so all the books we've read over the last six years, so it's still running, have all been once a month for me on the first Monday of the month, has been around personal development, self improvement.

So actually, you don't have to be an employee or an entrepreneur, like my whole point was, it could be any woman with any type of ambition. So I kept it really open. So it's because of that sense. I don't really delve into business books, hence why this was really exciting for me. So it's more like the traditional, like personal development, self improvement. And then it always makes sure we have one personal finance book every single year, because I'm really passionate, particularly about women getting to grips with their money situations. So yes, I've been running a meet in person. And I just loved it absolutely just open this whole world of like publishing and reading to me. But actually, what I realized while doing that was I couldn't talk about other business books. And actually, nonfiction is read by much more men than women. So when I was trying to throw myself into communities and find them, I was like, actually, I'm sort of missing out on some of the conversations. So I started my book blog called Charelle Reads, so that I could then blog about all the nonfiction books that I was reading. So I've been doing that since 2016. So in the second half of the year, I basically decided I was going to read and review one book every single week.

Lauren Tilden

Oh my gosh, yeah.

Charelle Griffith

And that just like to say, this was like, I had a full time job. Like I live in London, I had like, a two hour probably commute every day, like I was so much crazy. When I think back to it now, like what was I doing, but I just thought, Okay, this would be great. And so I started, and it was amazing. And I loved all the people, I got to meet through it. And I just thought I was learning so much, but it just like really opened my eyes to a real great community online at the same time. So I still do have the book blog. I have been a little bit quieter this year. But I actually am like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna get back on it and be a good girl again. But yeah, so I have the book club, and I have the book blog. And now I'm gonna do the podcast. Yeah!

Lauren Tilden

Yes. So exciting. And yeah, one of the, I think, so Charelle and I met on Clubhouse. And we did, I think we maybe were in a couple of rooms about books. But one of the reasons that I thought of her immediately is because of the book blog, I think I was researching Profit First for some reason. And like one of the first things that came up was her book blog, which was just like so thorough and so awesome. So I will make sure that we link in the show notes, the blog so that all the listeners can go check it out and see all of the amazing content that she's put together there. But we are going, so I've mentioned this in the intro a little bit. So for this Making Good book club, we're gonna be talking about one book per month. And what our goal is really to dig into the book content, talk about maybe some of our main takeaways and then really focus on what can we all as small business owners implement, like how can we actually take it from we're reading, we are absorbing information to executing like we were just talking about earlier like doing the work that is what actually makes the difference it's not the reading that will change our businesses, it's the doing something about it. So how do you make sure that you're not just reading them but you're also doing something about what you learn.

Charelle Griffith

So my biggest piece of advice is always once you finish the book like before you open another one is actually try and write down what your top learnings are. And I try and keep it pretty slim. So I'll be like one or three to three things because books can particularly some books, where there's like 75 chapters or like I think there's a few books I've been reading this year that's like 100 Ways To Be A Millionaire like well, I can't remember all 100 is actually sort of accept the fact you're gonna forget some of it but like be like okay, what was really important what do I want to make sure I remember and what do I want to make sure I action? And so even like have a notebook like have a like an online doc where you can put all of the things So like get index cards like whatever makes the most sense to you that you can refer back to. But I think really focusing on just having less things and be like, but I actually want to implement this and in reality like Is this something I can do? Like is it something I can do this week? Or is it gonna be something that takes a month a year etc.

Lauren Tilden

Hmm. What have been the books that you are like, what has been a book or two that you've read that you have most implemented in your business? And I think I know what you're gonna say here but...

Charelle Griffith

No, I think I might surprise you. Are you gonna think I'm gonna say Profit First?

Lauren Tilden

Yes.

Charelle Griffith

No!

Lauren Tilden

Okay, okay, I'm wrong.

Charelle Griffith

Yeah, you are. So that I just the reason why Profit First, I didn't implement it as much my business as I think most people do, is because I think I'm in quite a different financial situation in my business and my financial process and knowledge and interest and how much on top of it I am the most people so actually Profit First mirrors pretty much what I do my personal finances anyway, so I've always been really good on that. However, I'm struggling to think what a business but that ever really. So probably, if anything, it will be like some of the Russell Brunson books. So like a .com secret or the expert secrets or traffic secrets. I pretty much went for a phrase where I really went in deep relevance in and I actually have a blog post called like, I got sucked in. But I do believe that the books are amazing in terms of because he makes them money through Click Funnels, he can give away a lot whereas actually what there's a bit of a trend now a business books, if people sort of give you half of it, because then they want you to buy their course their program etc. Whereas Clozaril saunas want you to buy the software, he can be a bit more like, give you everything. And I think there's so much great advice and all three of the secret books.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, awesome. I will link those up in the show notes. So why I know like just listening to you talk about what you do, your work, the blog, you'll have a book club, like you've got a lot going on, why did you agree to join me for this Making Good book club?

Charelle Griffith

So I do have a lot going on. But don't they always say if you want something, give it to a busy person is that? Yeah. What is funny is because actually, I've this year, part of my mission is like I'm a proper, multi passionate person. And on top of the book club and the business, I also had been co hosting a podcast called Free and Figuring it out. And we had decided to close that after 142 episodes. We closed that in September this year. And part of that was meant to be for me to try and make my multi passionate self focus a bit more. So obviously, that you're, you had an email for me that was like let's just do another project and my brain like ding ding ding

Lauren Tilden

I relate to this so much.

Charelle Griffith

But actually, to me, whilst it was like a different project, and clearly, that's not quite as excited about it. The fact is, I have absolutely loved podcasting. So I don't have nearly three years. But it was very much like a personal focus podcast. And so that opportunity to do something that was more for helping business owners at least is in line with actually what my passion is, in terms of, I want to help people to do better with their business. And I am a big, big believer that books can help you to change your business. And even though I do one to one work with people, I'm not really honest, which is like, that's not how I started, I learned from books. So I think being able to really share the best books is something I'm passionate about because I do believe if you are good, and you read the books, and you actually follow through that it can make a difference in your business. So I think there was like it really is aligned to basically exactly what I want to do. But it was perfect time in terms of that podcast to just finish so I had a bit of a podcast hole in my life. And also it's a content form I've not done so for Propel Her for a few years. I used to make YouTube videos. And obviously I've been blogging, but I've never really spoken about books and podcasts. And I love to chat. And so I thought, well, let's go for it.

Lauren Tilden

Yay, I'm so excited. You agreed because I know like for me, I'm interested in books, I've read a lot of books, but I don't have this sort of background of just analyzing them and really thinking about books from the standpoint of like a book club lens, like what are the main takeaways and really processing it, so I think you are going to complement and add to what I'm able to contribute when it comes to the takeaways and lessons that we can all learn from these books that you know do have the power to change things for us but again, it's all about, it's about understanding the book, and then more importantly about doing something about it. So I'm super, super excited to have you joining me for this journey.

Charelle Griffith

Now, well, it's gonna be interesting. I think we'll both bring different perspectives, and a book, which also is something that I'm really passionate about, like I used to co host podcasts, I think there's, there is a beauty in having more than one opinion. So I think it'll be good.

Lauren Tilden

For sure. And I know both of us have our opinions. So we won't hold back. Okay, so we're gonna transition into the questions that I asked all the guests I am lucky enough to have on this podcast. And I do hope to have you as a guest again, Charelle. But for most of the time, Charelle is going to join us as a co host. So I am excited to get the chance to ask her these pointed questions before she kind of slips into co host mode. The first question is, how do you approach doing good through your small business?

Charelle Griffith

So my, I suppose biggest way that I focus on doing good is trying to make sure I just deliver a really high quality service and ensuring that all my clients leave, having fulfilled what they came for, that if particularly difficult, with like such a personalized service, it's really easy to like, go off on a tangent. And so I'm really conscious about being like, what did someone come for? And how do I make sure that they get that, but also in terms of doing good through my business in a wider sense. I'm very conscious, particularly with the people I work with on an ongoing basis, about the clients I work with, because there is lots of questionable practices out there and lots of questionable business owners. And so I think if I'm going to help someone to create more impact in, like having more visibility in their business, I need to make sure it's actually a good business so that people aren't seeing, like things that I wouldn't actually believe or support.

Lauren Tilden

Hmm, yeah. 100%. Um, what is one small business that you admire?

Charelle Griffith

So this is a business and also this person has a book, which is, yeah, so when chat so they are like PR agency based in the UK, and one of the co founders, or it's, I think she's the founder, but now her husband come alongside is Lucy Verna. And so her background was in PR. And I think for me, she's like, she's, I sort of see her as like exactly what I would want to be in terms of like the other side. So like how PR marketing works together. Like she came from a very strong agency background and working with big businesses and was like, now on a real mission to help small businesses be better with their PR. But she got like a great strategy head. Everything I ever read, I think is so like, correct, but so made that small businesses owners can implement it. So that's my big master one I admire.

Lauren Tilden

Yes. And her book, is she the one who wrote Hype Yourself?

Charelle Griffith

Yep. So she wrote Hype Yourself. And then recently, she's got Brand Yourself.

Lauren Tilden

Okay. Amazing. I will link to all of this in the show notes. I think sneak peek, we will be tackling Hype Yourself later in the book club. But if anyone wants to get a head start we will talk about for sure. What is one or more if you want book recommendation that you have.

Charelle Griffith

So I decided that this is not like this is the hardest question in the world for me anyway. And given the fact that we're gonna go through so many books on like, we're gonna skip this one today.

Lauren Tilden

Oh, she's like not responding. Okay. All right, moving on. Where can everyone connect with you online and get to know you and your work a little bit more, figure out what you offer all the things.

Charelle Griffith

Cool. So the best place to find out all about me, including all the blogs, so actually like my business, or my business blog posts, and all of the book blog posts are all in the same home. So that's all charellegriffith.com. I'm sure Lauren will put my name the correct spelling in the show notes so you can find it. And then in terms of social I've already mentioned Clubhouse is somewhere where I'm at so if you are one of the weird people that still is in Clubhouse, come and join me it's Charelle Griffith. And then as probably virtually everyone on here, I spent way too much time on Instagram, but I am on all the socials. Even it's mostly CharelleGriffith, but sometimes only Charelle Griff because like Twitter and Pinterest, don't let you have a name as long as me.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, perfect. I will make sure that all of those are linked in the show notes. Charelle, thank you so much for coming on here and to introduce yourself and let the listeners get a bit of a sneak peek of you know, my new co host for Making Good book club. I'm so excited to do this together. And yeah, very soon we'll come out with our first edition of Making Good book club.

Charelle Griffith

Yeah, well, I'm super excited to get started and I can't wait for everyone to hear about all the fabulous books.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, isn't Charelle amazing? I am so so honored. She has agreed to co host this book club with me. And it is now my absolute pleasure to announce the first book that we're reading as part of the Making Good Book Club and that is Mindset by Carol Dweck. Mindset is not necessarily just a business book, but it's a book that deals with how our minds affects the results that we see in every part of our lives. I've come to see mindset as the most important piece of the puzzle when it comes to your business.

So starting with this book feels like the perfect way to lay the foundation for all the future books to come. I wanted to just read you the description from the books publisher Random House: ''After decades of research world renowned Stanford University psychologist, Carol S Dweck PhD, discovered a simple but groundbreaking idea, the power of mindset. In this brilliant book, she shows how success in school, work sports, the arts, and almost every area of human endeavor can be dramatically influenced by how we think about our talents and abilities. People with a fixed mindset, those who believe that our abilities are fixed, are less likely to flourish than those with a growth mindset. Those who believe that abilities can be developed. Mindset reveals how great parents, teachers, managers and athletes can put this idea to use to foster outstanding accomplishment''.

I'm super excited about this one. So I would love for you to go connect with Charelle on social media, she's @CharelleGriffith on Instagram. And I'll link her other social accounts in the show notes which you can find at makinggoodpodcast.com/87. In fact, if you are as excited about the Making Good book club as we are, take a screenshot as you're listening to this episode and tag both Charelle and I on Instagram so we can cheer you on. Again. Charelle is @CharelleGriffith, and I'm @LaurenTilden.

Before we wrap up today's episode, I wanted to share one more super exciting piece of news with you. As you might have heard me talking about I'm about to launch a new Pro version of Making Good. Making Good Happen is a new monthly membership for those of you who want to take everything you learn here on Making Good to the next level. Making Good Happen is designed to make sure that we're taking the actions we need to take to move the needle in our businesses. In this monthly membership, we'll work together on creating and implementing a marketing plan that will take your business where you want it to go. A private podcast accountability and focus to deep work sessions are all included. It is going to be so good. I'll be sharing more in the coming weeks. So stay tuned and make sure you're following me over on Instagram at @LaurenTilden for all the insight details as I share them. In fact for a sneak peek at the details now, just DM me the word PRO on Instagram and I will share some of the scoop. I would also love to have you in the Facebook community for this podcast where I might be dropping in some nuggets from these books along the way. Head to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to join. Thank you for being here and for focusing on making a difference with your small business. Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 4/18/22 Lauren Tilden 4/18/22

88: How to Face Your Inner Critic, Creative Blocks + Impostor Syndrome with Cynthia Hauk

88: How to Face Your Inner Critic, Creative Blocks + Impostor Syndrome with Cynthia Hauk

Lauren Tilden

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact. I'm your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 88.

Today's episode is like chicken noodle soup for the creative soul. I felt so calmed by this conversation with creative coach Cynthia Hawk, and I cannot wait to share it with you. We talked all about the inner critic self care, tackling creative blocks and much much more. One big update before we get into the episode though, and that is this Making Good is going pro. This new monthly membership is called Making Good Happen and it's for those of you who want to take everything you learn here on Making Good to the next level. Making Good Happen is designed to make sure that we're all taking the actions we need to take to move the needle in our businesses.

In this monthly membership. We'll work together on creating and implementing a marketing plan that will take your business where you want it to go. A private podcast accountability and focused deep work sessions are included. It's going to be so good. For a sneak peek of the details, just DM me the word Pro on Instagram that's @LaurenTilden, and I'll share some of the inside scoop.

Okay, so let's talk about today's episode, which is already one of my favorites. My guest today is Cynthia Hauk. Cynthia coaches heart centered and creative solopreneurs how to move through imposter syndrome so they can share their unique voice and offerings in the world. She shares simple and calming mindful art activities that can help people struggling with anxiety, stress, self sabotage and burnout. Her online classes, teacher trainings and group coaching program have supported people in 49 countries and growing. In our chat, we discussed what the inner critic is, how it shows up and how to face it, the concept of incremental improvement, activities and exercises that help us get in touch with our creative process and move through blocks. How to tackle creative blocks in your business, impostor syndrome and the best way to approach it, the power of rituals to spark creativity and momentum, the critical importance of self care, authentic marketing and much more. This episode is gold. Here it is.

Cynthia, welcome to Making Good.

Cynthia Hauk

Thanks so much for having me, Lauren.

Lauren Tilden

I am very excited for this conversation. As we kind of get ready to get into a really juicy conversation, I think all about a lot of really important topics like self care and mindset and creativity. I would love first to hear a little bit about you, if you could share what you do in your business and a little bit about the path that brought you there.

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, absolutely. So I coach creative, small business owners, largely on how to move through creative blocks, so they can share their unique voice and offerings out into the world. And I also share really simple and calming mindful art activities. They're largely my practice, and I share them to help others with anxiety or stress, especially with self sabotage, and with creative burnout. And I do all of that through online classes and teacher trainings and group coaching programs. I would say for myself, this process and journey for me has been a long time coming. But I think probably like a lot of your listeners who are creatives. I can be a perfectionist, I can procrastinate, I can self sabotage. And because of those things over the years, I've just adopted different mindfulness and art activities to help me be with a lot of those things and to help me move through them. So a lot of what I share has been through my own personal journey.

Lauren Tilden

I love how you said that you didn't say I've picked up activities and processes to help me like get rid of all these feelings of perfectionism or procrastination to like, live with them and move past or maybe not move past them, but go on anyway. I'm really interested in digging into that specific difference. Like could you just talk about that a little bit?

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, absolutely. I'm super passionate about that topic. So I hear a lot of times people say like if we talk about our inner critic or feelings of impostor syndrome, I've heard other people talk about eradicating our inner critic or banishing or getting rid of, and instead, I really like the approach of embracing our inner critic. And, and I love although it can sound cliche, I love the adage of feel the fear and do it anyway. Because there's been so much research and books and studies and interviews that have shown that people who have been creating successfully for years and years it's not that they no longer have fear, it's just that they've learned how to recognize that fear and not allow it to stop them from creating and showing up in the world. So I like that softer approach of embracing our inner critic.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I once saw Elizabeth Gilbert speak in Seattle, and she said something similar. She was talking about fear as like a kind of presence in any creative work. And she said that she, she didn't try to get rid of it or not have it be part of her process, she just tried to make sure it was sitting in the passenger seat, and not the driver's seat. So like being willing to sit with these things that maybe we wish weren't there, like letting them still be there, though, like tough feelings that kind of inhibit us creatively, or stop us from doing what we really want to do, letting them still be there, but just not letting them run the show entirely. So I really like that distinction. One thing that I know we're going to talk about is the inner critic, you just mentioned it. So could we dive into this topic a little bit? What is the inner critic? You talked about embracing the inner critic, which I feel like a lot of people are gonna be like, Oh, how? Why would I do that? How can I do that? Why is the inner critic so common? Like, why is this such a thing that we all face?

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, definitely the inner critic, I largely see it as a part of ourselves, that's just trying to keep us safe. And that's largely why I like to focus on trying to embrace the inner critic, because it is an internalized voice that is a part of me now. And many times the messaging that's on repeat, I don't believe is messaging that comes from me, right? A lot of times, we have external criticisms, perhaps from when we're younger, or over the years. And then it's like old tape record, we just started to replay it internally instead. But once that inner critic and that voice is there it is, at that point, I believe a part of me that's just trying to protect me, it's trying to make sure I don't have another moment of rejection, or I don't have something else that happens, that's hurtful to me. And so instead, I like to see if there's a way that I can be with it. And also to even use, I know, I love that you brought up the idea and notion of fear. And I like to even see when fear comes up in the creative process, that that can potentially be a wonderful signal, because maybe that means I'm on the edge of something outside of my comfort zone. And so that's really exciting that I'm starting to kind of test the waters, and consider something new and different.

So there's so many different ways that I think, we can reframe it in our own mind, to be more comfortable when those voices start to come up that don't feel good, because I know my inner critic is really mean, most people's inner critics can say things to themselves much harsher than you would ever say to anyone else. And I like to just think of it as like a young, Wounded Child, you know, that's kind of throwing a fit, so they can get their way and feel better. And instead, I like, I like the example you mentioned around the passenger. But also I've sort of see it as I have a nephew, and if he starts to have a tantrum, I'll make sure that I'm with him first that we can regulate together and have kind of a moment to calm down and be with each other. And then maybe I'll focus on what are the other options. And I do the same thing with my inner critic. So I be with it, I noticed that I helped kind of calm some of those thoughts and fears that are bubbling up, and then I can start to move forward into some other creative practices.

Lauren Tilden

I would love to talk about maybe some specific examples. So a lot of my listeners, as we were just talking about our product based business owners, or makers of some kind, others are, I think probably most listeners would identify as creative in some capacity. But maybe even those who don't like small business owners who sell something, offer something and are just, you know, kind of trying to take things to the next level continuously. What are some of the ways that like inner critic might be showing up maybe just some specific examples?

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, definitely. I'd love to share a brief story if I can, because they think I can share some examples with it. So before I did my MFA in the arts, I did a one year program in Italy and I was painting and we had deadlines at the end like halfway through the year where we had to get ready for an exhibit. And at the time, I was doing these really large paintings and murals with spray paint and oil painting. And I had a really what I felt to be a successful initial start where I created a lot of work, we came up to like right around holiday break. And when I came back, I was completely stumped. Totally frozen stuck. I felt like that project I had worked on, I kind of ran to the end of that particular course for that project. And my well, my creative route, well just felt completely empty.

And I remember my professor at the time had made the comment to me, she said, strike while the iron is hot. And, and I understand what she meant by that of, you know, if you're on a good roll with work to keep rolling with it, but I don't think at the time, she realized I felt like I had already drained that. And so instead, what was coming up for me, were a lot of thoughts around, you have no more good ideas, you're not going to get this done in time, the work you create is going to be crap, right? These are like voices that our inner critic can say to us. And so I sat with that on and off for a while her comment of strike while the iron is hot. And instead my my inner critic, twisted that again and said, See, you're not producing anything you're in the studio, you're not creating, right. And that inner critic can be a barrage of internal dialogue that cannot be helpful.

And so instead, what I started to explore then, but what I've done much more so in the last 15 years really since then, is I started to adopt small ways that I could just have some sort of what I like to call momentum, or to move through some of those creative blocks. So I like to use the Kaizen Muse method, which really just means incremental improvement. And I also like to use five minute activities to spark momentum in my creative practice. So some examples would be five minute mindful art activities, where I focus on my breathing first. So I'll notice that internal dialogue that's not helpful in any way, shape, or form in this moment, for me, I'll just recognize that thought, I'll notice where I'm holding tension in my body. So maybe that's in my chest area, in my upper shoulders, I might feel really warm, I might feel tightness in my jaw. So I just noticed those things and even name them or write them down. And then I'll give myself, I'll set a timer. And I'll give myself five minutes to make, to create anything. And that would be whatever your creative practice is. So if you're a sculptor, you make jewelry or you like to draw or paint, you can just give yourself five minutes of play time, where you don't have a deadline, you're not trying to get anything done, you're not trying to accomplish anything. And that five minutes I find is a good barometer, because my mind knows I'm not going to create a masterpiece in five minutes, that sort of removes some of the pressure that I can automatically place on myself.

And so what it does, what I've noticed for me and for my students is that it can just help to shift the needle, a hair, even just that little bit of getting back into creative practice, or a material that we really enjoy working with. Or especially for people who create as a creative and product, sometimes we can also get into a rut of creating for other people, creating to then produce and sell. And so it's just a way to give ourselves a bit of breathing space, literally noticing our breath, and then also breathing space to play without any expectation. And so that's one thing that I like to do. And that might be a daily practice. I've done five minute mindful art activities multiple times throughout the day when I need it as sort of a reset. And so that's kind of a easy way of dipping your toes in.

Lauren Tilden

Hmm, you mentioned something I think you said, Kaizen muse. Could you talk a little bit more about that? I just I'm not familiar with that.

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, so Kaizen Muse. So it was originally created in Japan. And it translates and just means incremental improvement. And largely, my understanding is, it came about through car manufacturers and they had a Japanese car manufacturer that had different stations where they were having people just focus on one like smaller task and they were much more efficient and were able to move through things much better. And then it transformed and people started using that with other forms of habits and mindset and then creative habits. So another example that's often talked about is if a runner wants to be consistent They might just set their sneakers out by the front door, or they might just put their sneakers on for five minutes. And so it's a way of having a task, or a habit or ritual or creative goal, feel so small that you can't fail. Like, you remove the barrier. And so what I mentioned to my students a lot of times, is if you're breaking down steps, let's say towards a creative project you're doing, if you look at that next step, what's that one next step, and it feels too overwhelming or daunting, and you kind of have that response where you just feel like, you know, like, we're, that feels like a barrier to even do that one next step, then I would say maybe that one next step really is 10 smaller steps.

And so I like to just refer to it as a way of how can I make my next step be as manageable and bite size as possible. So I can feel like I have some sort of momentum. And then I feel like often it's like a snowball that rolls downhill, you know, or once you get into a flow state, then you can start to kind of create more freely, but it's just a matter of getting that ball moving initially.

Lauren Tilden

Huh, oh my gosh, so many things you said that I love. I totally agree with that. I don't know for me, I usually think of it as like a as an overwhelmed thing. But a lot of times when I'm I feel stuck, maybe it's creatively stuck or overwhelmed with the amount of things I have to get done. The thing that actually does end up moving the needle for me and kind of getting me going is to whatever it is that I've been avoiding, like break it down into smaller steps. Because sometimes something can seem simple. Oh, but it's too broad, or it's too big somehow, to like, really understand what the immediate next thing to do is. So the smaller that you can break down your projects into like, you know, set up a login, like the put your name on the top of the paper, whatever it is, like, the smallest steps that you can possibly take, those often are what kind of get me going personally.

And also the idea of momentum. I really love that. Because for me, I find that in my business, it's all about momentum, it's like I'll go through these dips of like, where I'm not excited about things or I don't know, like things are going slower or make I'm not making as many sales and I'm not feeling as great about things. And then when things pick up, I have so much more energy, I'm doing more, which is like what creates more sales coming. So the question I often asked myself is like, how do you create that momentum? Like how do you not just wait for momentum to show up, but actually create it yourself? Because, yes, like you say, like, so much good stuff happens when the ball is rolling down the hill.

So do you have any other ideas for how to create that business momentum or creative momentum? You know, the five minute activities or one idea and I love that I'm kind of trying to play around in my head, as we talk about like, what those those activities might be for me. But what else would you suggest for people who are relating to this idea of like, yes, when I have the momentum, I'm doing things, everything's going great. I'm making results happen. But it's really hard to get that momentum going. What would you say to people who struggle with that?

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, I would first say that they're not alone. I think that that struggle that comes up around noticing our ebb and flow and our creativity is entirely natural and normal. And what I like to focus on is moving from resistance to rituals. And so I love that you named the fact that when you're, you know, when you're in a good flow, and you're creating lots of things, then you also feel better. And it's also good for your business that you notice that kind of positive spiraling that happens there. What I like to focus on is rituals. And that's not to say that it's guaranteed that I would automatically be back into that creative state. But what it does is it gives me a framework that I can step into where I know I can do certain steps and just be present and consistent and over time, eventually I'll get back into a good flow.

So what that looks like for me and what I mentioned for a lot of my students is one easy way that I like is if you are a creative where you have a creative space so let's say you're a painter or drawer so you have a desk or perhaps the easel you work at or if you're a sculptor or jewelry maker and you have your sections set up, whatever it is that you typically create, it can be helpful to make sure that your space is maintained in a way where you can just step in as quickly as possible to your practice.

And so, I know it sounds like something really small, but when my art desk as an example, gets really kind of out of control, and it would take me 30 minutes to 60 minutes just to clear a space, so I could even begin working that would, it stops me from being more creative consistently. So sometimes, that ritual is just having a practice where I can keep it so it doesn't kind of, you know, go off the sidelines. Or if it has done that, then I just give myself a bit of space to kind of bring my creative space back to a place where I can create more easily.

And the other thing that I like to do is I force as much as I can Creative Habits with a schedule. And I use the word enforce, again, very softly, like I do with embracing the inner critic. So I have as an example, on Mondays from one to three, I have a general idea of what I'll be working on with my creative teaching in business. And I know if I need to adjust that, for whatever reason I have the freedom to do that. But what it does is it frees up my mind. So when I come to my art desk as an example, at one o'clock on Monday, I know generally kind of what I'm working on. And I also like to leave some of the work that I've done in my creative practice unfinished the last time I'm working on it. So I can step back into it a bit more easily. So that's another kind of trick that I use that if you've never tried it, it can be really interesting to play around with some people I've noticed, creatives will do this just by working on multiple projects at the same time, which can be great as long as you don't feel too overwhelmed by too many projects.

But having what, I will often do similar to the five minute mindful art activities, by using that timer is I just don't allow it to come to full completion at the end of the day. So when I'm beginning the next day, I have something I can step back into right away, instead of sort of starting from scratch. So that can be something to play around with if you've never done that before.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, that's such an interesting idea to apply to like running a business or creating your product or whatever it is, I've heard of that strategy for writing, where you know, if you're writing a chapter, leave off one day, like right at the end of a chapter don't finish it. But like, so it's clear where you start, because oftentimes, starting like we're talking about momentum is the hardest part like getting that ball rolling. So if you leave off one day where it's like there's already momentum, all you have to do is like sit down and look at the last sentence and then keep going. That's such an interesting thing to apply to running a business or creating your product. So yeah, me I'm thinking about different ways this could apply to me. I've got a stationery business. So yeah, like, I design my stuff and watercolors before I scan it and digitize it and all that. So maybe it's like, don't quite finish the watercolor have it be like almost done. And then the next time you sit down, it's like not so, I don't know, you don't feel like you're starting from scratch. I love that idea.

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, I love that you have that other piece that you focus on. Also, one thing I like to play around with and mentioned with my students also is this idea of mindful art experiments or having multiple things that you can play around with. And so that's another piece that I focus on to move through creative blocks is, especially if I'm working on a bigger project in my creative business, I'll have something even if it's again, just that five to 10 minutes on the side that I do every day or a few times a week that I feel really excited about and inspired by or curious about. And I have absolutely no idea where it's going. Like that idea of being curious and experimenting and not having a set expectation of where that project is going, I think for me and what I've noticed with my students is it can just feel really freeing and oftentimes that is like a little mini playground that can spark ideas. Even if that mini project doesn't go anywhere. It might, you know, spark your next idea that you do in your business later.

Lauren Tilden

Huh I love that. One thing that's kind of going on in my head right now, as we're talking, is thinking about how some of these practices, you're talking about creative practices or sort of like mindset practices can be applied to the business side of business. A lot of what we talk about here on the podcast is marketing, a values based business. So I think a lot of people when they think about getting stuck, yes, it could be like designing new products or completing client work, whatever it is, but I think also it can be marketing a lot of times is another area where we have so much to create that's content, emails, social media, like, blogs, if you do that a podcast in my case, so I wonder, like, just do you have anything to say about applying some of these practices to business and in addition to like, the creative process and the way that we normally think about it?

Cynthia Hauk

Definitely, yeah, so I, what I've noticed is that a lot of creatives that I've connected with, there can be this tendency that we feel really comfortable with our craft and with creating. And sometimes people feel comfortable with the business side and marketing. But most creatives that I've met, find that to sometimes feel either really tedious or perhaps salesy, or there's this struggle for it to feel as expressive and authentic, as we show up in our creative practice. And so I find that a really interesting thing that comes up for a lot of creatives. And I'm really, it's something that I've focused on for years, and I thread into a lot of my group coaching programs and how I coach creatives, because I feel like it's so important otherwise, that's, we can't really be successful as a small business owner, if we're not able to have multiple hats on with that.

So the one thing I would say around that is that I've noticed that that similar resistance we can feel in our creative practice can also come up in the business side of things. And so that might be that we know that we need to be creating content, perhaps through a blog, or social media, or on YouTube or a podcast, but we're not doing it or at least not doing it consistently. It might be that, you know, there's there's so many different ways we can kind of self sabotage. But it might be that we have too many ideas, and we're not sure which ones to pick, so we don't do any of them.

It might be that we feel so overwhelmed by the process, because it's a new social media platform. And there's a lot to set up. And we're not comfortable with it, that instead we focus on busy work and do emails, or tinker in our studio, right? There's so many ways, I think that we can self sabotage our practice and our business. So similar to the five minute mind part activities I mentioned, a lot of what I tend to focus on with that to gain momentum is having really good systems in place, again, some sort of creative habit or schedule, if it's something that's entirely new to you, I think it can be helpful to have support. So that might be through a course or a coach or just an accountability group. But also to have this, I work really well under deadlines. So or, or visual accountability. So having, let's say, one social media platform that you're focusing on, and letting that community know that you're going to be posting, you know, once a week on Friday, so you have some of that accountability there.

But there's so many I think the main thing that comes up when I hear you ask that question, is that it's so different for so many different people, what I find to be really helpful is identifying for yourself, what are the resistances? Why are they there? And then what are some small steps that you can just start to gain momentum and move forward. So another practice that I do and teach, that I use to move through that I call it the inner critic and inner muse writing exercise. So it's a way to converse with yourself back and forth between this resistance and this desire that you have to give back in the world to do good in the world to show up consistently, and be seen and heard, but also that there's oftentimes fear around those things also. So I have a writing process where you can just kind of converse between the two and it just really helps with clarity, and then having those small steps in place. So you can start gaining momentum. And I like to just ask the question as well like what could be my next step? What's the next thing I could do that would only take maybe five minutes. And I might spend a half hour just brainstorming those five minute tasks. And there's so many different ways to bridge it. But those are some some of the things I do.

Lauren Tilden

I love this idea of the inner critic and our muse reading exercise. If someone is interested in trying that, like, what would that look like practically?

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, so there's a few different ways that I approach it. One is using your non dominant hand. So I like to incorporate with a lot of the main activities, scribbling exercises, or your non dominant hand, because it's also a way of getting out of your own way and turning off that switch of perfectionism a bit. So, in that instance, I would have my inner critic, right with my dominant hand. So perhaps writing out what are some of those harsher things that my inner critic is saying to me? Or what are some of the resistances that are coming up? And then I might ask that question of what could be my next step, and using my non dominant hand allowing it to be, it's just an invitation that perhaps this is my inner muse. Or, if you have a mentor you really respect and admire, like, what would that mentor say, you could use your non dominant hand and write some responses.

And what I love about that, too, is that because it's your non dominant hand, it does a couple of things, it accesses another part of your brain, typically, more of your right brain hemisphere, that is our creative brain side. And then it also your responses have to be shorter. Because you're writing with your non dominant hand, it's so hard to write a big paragraph. So it tends to be these simpler, sustained kind of responses. And I don't know about you, Lauren, but I've found my inner guidance when that intuition or voice bubbles up, it's not usually a big huge monologue. You know, it's usually like five words or a sentence of wisdom that's like, maybe you should try this right now. You know, maybe this would feel good right now. So that's one way that I kind of approach it. But I I teach some different soul collage, and expressive arts practices and they all have writing prompts afterwards that go in depth. So it's hard to kind of express all of that over the podcast.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, that's a great example. I love that idea. I would love to talk a little bit about impostor syndrome. This is something that's on my mind a lot, because I think a lot of us experience imposter syndrome, when we're kind of pushing ourselves to do more and, like, do better or do something bigger than we've done before. And I'm always, especially thinking about it as sort of as I don't know, it's kind of like impostor syndrome, versus like making the impact that I want to make, right. And because impostor syndrome, if you listen to it, or if you let it run the show, can hold us back from doing things that we know would make a positive impact or would help make the kind of change or whatever it is that we're trying to do with through our art or our business. I know that imposter syndrome is something that you talk about a lot in your work, I would love to hear your thoughts on impostor syndrome and any guidance you have for people who are feeling it just to some extent as like, why should I be the one who is successful doing this? Or why should people listen to me or any of those kinds of those feelings that I'm sure a lot of listeners are familiar with?

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, what I find so fascinating about impostor syndrome, is that there's been so many studies done around it, that it's pervasive, it's so common, and I remember I read an interview from Maya Angelou, it was like at the peak of her career, I think she was winning some sort of like lifetime award or something amazing. And, she had named that she was quoted as saying, like, they're gonna find me out any day now that I'm not actually good at this, you know, which is so mind blowing. For me when I see that and hear that from someone else who is clearly so accomplished at their craft and has been working at it for years and years and years. And that's just so common.

So I approach the imposter syndrome the same way that I approached the inner critic in first just taking some time to normalize it, to name this is part of our human experience, I think the same way that I also teach meditation and in so oftentimes with meditation, there's this idea that we need to there's a myth that we need to completely clear are thoughts, that we're only meditating when we have no thoughts. And instead, largely what meditation is focused on is noticing when we have thoughts that are distracting us. And then just with non judgmental awareness returning back oftentimes to an anchor, like your breath or to your body. And so I use mine for art activities the same way that someone would use meditation in that type of practice.

So anytime I start to notice that I have thoughts of imposter syndrome or the inner critic, then I'll use it as an anchor to simply notice that judgemental thought, and then I like to have, you know, instead of focusing on just the breath, I focus on a mindful art activity. So I might do writing, or I might actually create a small drawing or painting around that struggle that I'm having. And as I noticed those thoughts of feeling like an imposter, of feeling like my work isn't good enough of feeling like I don't deserve any success that comes my way, or that people will find me out, you know, these common thoughts that come up with impostor syndrome, that I can perhaps doodle while I'm considering those thoughts for five to 10 minutes. And then as I'm doodling, and those thoughts come up, just simply notice it, even perhaps, sometimes smile and like have an internal smile of oh, okay, good. I'm human like, this is what happens, when we're, when we're pushing the edge of something that feels really uncomfortable, like, it might be also a really exciting thing, because that means I'm attempting to be brave to put my work out in the world, which is a beautiful thing.

So just noticing any of those thoughts, perhaps reframing it. And then just continuing with that, and, it sounds so simple, and it is simple, and it's very difficult at the same time. And similar to meditation being a practice, I find that is also a practice. And I think that's why I also named earlier around embracing our inner critic, because I don't believe our inner critic, thoughts are going away, I don't believe those feelings of impostor syndrome are going to right away, they might quiet you know, or they might shift or you might feel more confident or comfortable or reframe it over time with practice. And so these, these mindful art approaches, they really are just a practice to help us be with those things. And then after that time, perhaps 5-10 minutes of doing that awareness, meditation and drawing and scribbling, then I might shift gears and focus on you know, what I can do to move into action. And I think that's why I bring up the word momentum so much, because, you know, any of those things, the inner critic or imposter syndrome, the main root of that is feeling stuck, is being stagnant is not moving, is feeling frozen, right is holding back is being shut down. And so anything we can do, whether it's some of the practices I'm mentioning, or whether you have your own practice, it might just be getting out and walking in nature for 20 minutes, and then coming back to your creative work and seeing if that's something that has shifted. Anything we can do to help support ourselves, our self care, our mental and emotional well being, to continue to take those brave steps forward inch by inch, I think is beautiful.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, yeah, so much of for me, like sort of the personal growth side of running a business has been, or even just living, not even just running a business has been just learning how to be okay with negative or feelings that you wouldn't have wanted to have. And not letting them stop you like just sitting with uncomfortable things and maybe listening to what they have to say but not making that mean, anything about you and not making that really direct how you behave too much.

I have talked a lot about, maybe not a lot, I've talked about on the podcast how I have OCD. And a lot of OCD is around doing compulsions so that you don't have to be uncomfortable like, you know, flick the lights I don't particularly have like checking or like numbers and ritual based obsessions and compulsions. But people who do it might be about like, if you flip the light seven times, then you can feel comfortable that you know, whatever it is you think might happen if you don't, won't happen. And it's all about like preventing that discomfort. Or for me, like washing my hands for an especially long time. If I do it until I feel like okay, my hands are definitely clean. Then I don't have to sit with the discomfort of feeling like well, maybe they're in, I'm perfectly clean. And that has been, you know, just this practice, not that I've totally overcome it. But this practice of learning how to sit with things that are uncomfortable.

They've, I don't know, that's been such a test for me in my OCD journey, but also like in business, kind of these bigger topics of, you know, feeling like, things have to be perfect, or else I can't put them out into the world or, yeah, like, we've just been talking about impostor syndrome or inner critic, like, whatever it is, this, I think, like, the biggest thing I've learned, and that I'm still constantly learning is all of these things. And these feelings can still be there. And they don't have to stop you from moving. And I think kind of all of these mindset topics really come back to this feeling, or this same concept of just like letting yourself sit with hard things or uncomfortable things and still moving. So I love that that's come up so many times in this conversation already.

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, and I love also that you name specifically, that idea of perfectionism, because I do think that's a core route to what can drive a lot of those inner critic thoughts or feelings of impostor syndrome, is that we set a benchmark for ourself, that is not realistic, that we wouldn't hold other people to that same standard. And so finding a way, whatever that way is, for you to sit with some of that uncomfortableness, but also to perhaps soften so we can move forward a little bit, I think it's really lovely. And I often now, as a recovering perfectionist myself, I tend to focus on just shooting for 70%. And typically, my 70%, you know, is already probably above that anyways. But if I'm working on a project, instead of getting it to where my ideal in my mind might be, I shoot for 70%. And then we'll share and I know and trust that I can always experiment and make more changes. And, and then what that has done is it allowed me to create and release and create and release more often, which I think also does improve our work. So I think it can help with those feelings of perfectionism.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, yeah. And as makers or artists, or even business owners, like we really never know what's gonna resonate with people the most. So I always send the one, one specific greeting card that my brand Good Sheila has that I literally made in probably, I don't know, four minutes, like it is, it was the least thought out like the least intentional or like, perfect thing that I've probably created for the whole line of all my products. And it's one of the most popular and I put it out there. I think in a rush because I needed a birth, it's a birthday card. I needed a birthday card. I didn't have one a couple of years ago and then like it started selling immediately and sells, like it's one of the best sellers even though for me, if I had let myself be a perfectionist about I probably never would have put it out into the world. So I think that to me has just is just evidence that like what's perfect isn't always what means the most to people or impacts them the most or they even like or want the most so yeah, like I love the aiming for 70% goal.

Cynthia Hauk

I love that story. There's also a certain level of like rawness to that you know that. I don't think sometimes people want something polished and perfect. Like we connect. It's the same way we connect with people we connect to, you know, our stories of struggle and, and with it not being totally perfect. So I love that about your card.

Lauren Tilden

Yeah, I always laugh when it when it's like it orders for it. And I'm like, I'm not my favorite, but other people do like it. So I just try to learn from it. I've gone over time already of where I meant to be. But I do have a couple more things I want to chat with you about. One is self care. And this is a big topic for small business owners who oftentimes are contending with this like hustle culture of just, you know, and I am raising my hand as high as I can, like I fall into this trap to feeling like you have to work hard to succeed like really hard and put in a lot of hours and particularly in the beginning. What I know this is something I think you have some things to say about like what, why is self care important for artists and also small business owners? And what are some ways that we can practice that and kind of create a routine around it.

Cynthia Hauk

I love that question. I feel like it's so important. So I'll say that I think probably like many people have had moments where I've burned myself out and where I haven't been tending to myself care. And I've paid the price for that, you know, made in some instances that looked like I was sick for a bit afterwards, or then I couldn't work for a while afterwards, or I completely dropped the ball on a project, right? Like, all of these things that can happen. And so mainly, that was about 20 years ago, when I was in college, where I was just doing way too much and, didn't have the self care tools. So one thing that I like to do now, that I like to speak about is that I feel really strongly that we can give out to the world from a place of our well being really full. So it's an overflowing out, instead of I give to the world, and then I take care of myself, you know, on the back end. And so I do a few different things just as far as kind of a self assessment.

So I have what's called the life life wheel balance worksheet that I go through, where I can just check in with myself and see like, where do I feel overextended right now? And, and it looks at different factors like how am I tending to myself care with my health? How am I doing that with my connections and relationships? How am I doing that with my overall sleep, or with passion projects, or with my balance of work, or how I feel about finances, right, like all of these different categories in our life. And I like that it's a way of, instead of doing an overall assessment of like, do I feel completely rundown, which at that point, maybe it's too far. Instead, I can look at all of these different areas. And notice, like, Oh, I'm actually really missing connection with my friends and family right now, because I've been working on this project, and you know, I'm doing all of these things. And so maybe that's an indicator that I can start to spend a bit more time or carve out some space to do that. So that's something that I do. And I, when, I'm really stressed out, or when I really have a lot of things going, I use that wheel weekly. And when I don't, when I have more space, or when I feel like I'm kind of tending to my self care more naturally then I do check ins like once a month or once a quarter.

But I find that when I am busiest is when I need that space to check in a bit more. And I know we were talking earlier a bit about self sabotage, I also have a worksheet that talks about eight different ways we self sabotage, and then how we can move through creative blocks. So if that's helpful for listeners, both of those things, I can always share that in a link. But yeah, self care, I think is just so important. And anyone who's had moments of burning themselves out, I think that deeper appreciation for self care. I also want to say I think that self care looks really different for each person also, like, as an example, for my mom's self care would be going and getting a pedicure or gardening, you know, and for me, it might be taking a random excursion to a small old bookstore and looking through art books, or cloud gazing, right, there's so many different ways that we can kind of feed our well. And so it doesn't have to always look like certain pampering things that people don't talk about, it might be, your self care might be venturing out and watching your favorite show for an hour, because that's what you really need to do to de stress in that moment. So I think just giving ourselves permission, and as best we can, seeing if we can tend to that before we feel burned out. Because you know, it's just easier to attend to ourselves then.

Lauren Tilden

And I don't know if other people can relate to this, but for me, sometimes self care feels like more to put on my to do list like oh, I already have all these things I want to do like I don't know, like adding these extra tasks that maybe Im not inclined to do as someone who's kind of go go go work, work work. I don't know, it doesn't feel like fun or exciting to me. Is that just like yeah, it doesn't need to but you should still do it or what would you say to that?

Cynthia Hauk

I think that that would just be that your definition of self care in that moment looks and feels differently for you. So if I was feeling that way in that moment instead of you know, brainstorming some of the ideas I just mentioned around going to a bookstore or gardening. It might be that you clear your calendar for an evening and you do nothing, you have nothing on your calendar and you can just see how you're feeling in the moment, maybe it's you just resting on your couch and having a candle lit, I think it might just be, you know, having a friend come over and have tea with them, or I think there's so many different ways. And ultimately, I love what you just named, because I think it highlights that it shouldn't feel like a chore, it shouldn't feel like an extra thing that you have to do, even if it's for yourself and for your self care.

I think I believe good nurturing self care should feel restorative and supportive. And in some ways, even inspiring. And yeah, so I think that just is whatever, whatever is supporting you in that time. And if it's something that you're ever struggling with to, it might be that you journal about it or talk about it with a friend, and just give yourself a bit of space, you know that you don't have to decide, right this second, what would feel good as self care for you also?

Lauren Tilden

Mm hmm. That's great answer. Okay, the last thing I want to touch on, before we head into our wrap up questions, one of the things that we were chatting about talking about on this conversation on this interview is authentically marketing yourself. That is something that is such a huge topic for me, and, and for listeners of this podcast. It's something that they like, like, oh, whenever I do episodes about kind of like heart centered marketing, or these kinds of topics, they are always some of the most popular ones. So just I know, we don't have time to do a whole episode on it. But do you have any tips or practices or just, you know, one or two minutes? And how, how would you answer this question of how do you authentically market yourself or your creative business?

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, I think a lot of the work we talked about around the inner critic and impostor syndrome, naturally lends itself to then be able to market yourself more authentically to put yourself and your work in the world in a way where you're not holding back as much or where you're being more transparent and genuine. The main thing, main tip, I would say is that documentation, like documenting what you're doing, and just sharing that, I find to be one of the most lovely ways I've been able to authentically market. And so as an example, if I did a five minute modular art challenge, recently on my Instagram and YouTube, where I was just feeling like I needed to do small practices to help me de stress. And I ended up documenting that daily and sharing it with others. And then we had a conversation together about it. Versus I think it's a way we can share parts of our story. Like, as I was creating one of my mandalas and sharing it, I then would talk about what came up for me personally, that I did in my writing practice.

And so I think just giving ourselves permission to be more human. We're in what we're sharing. And that doesn't mean to unload or overshare. Right. But I like the idea of documentation. And I think that that's really what social media was created for initially, you know, that's as small business owners if we're using social media, like Instagram, or Facebook or YouTube, well, it's largely because we're sharing parts of our world. And it's sparking some sort of interesting conversation, and then we're connecting with other people. So I like that idea of documentation. And again, just keeping it really simple. It doesn't have to be perfect, it doesn't have to be polished, that you can, you can similar to having that five minute mindful art practice. So you could just have, you know, a five minute goal that each day, you're gonna spend some time on social media and or, you know, just documenting what it is like what's coming up in your day that you want to share with other people?

Lauren Tilden

Mm hmm. Yeah, that's great advice. And I think there's this tendency to just want to share the final result that's late and this probably has to do with perfectionism somehow, but like, a very polished, final done beautiful. Like, everything's ready result. And I have found that like, that's actually like you're saying that's not necessarily what people are most interested in. Like, people want to see the process, especially makers, like people want to see the behind the scenes of how you do things or what your office looks like, or, you know what your morning routine is, like the really kind of what feels like boring details to us are really interesting to people who are interested in our journey and our work.

So and then even as business owners, some of the content that I've posted that has been most interesting to people is like, here's the tools I use, or here's a time lapse of me editing a podcast episode. For me, this is like, could not be more boring, but other people are interested in it. So I think just, yeah, I like this reminder to share the process or the documentation, like you say, share the behind the scenes, and not just the final, like perfect end points. So what a great tip. Okay, so we are going to move into some other wrap up questions. One is, we've talked a lot about many answers to this question already, I think but just in, in one question, how would you answer how you approach doing good through your small business?

Cynthia Hauk

I love that question. So I see a lot of my small business and my teachings as my calling, I see it as how I can serve and give back in the world. And I'm really passionate about helping other people to destress and move through their own creative blocks. And I see it as like a ripple effect, you know, if you drop a pebble in a pond of water, how it ripples outward, that with each person that feels more at ease, are more able to be with uncomfortability. And to still create and share in the world. We're sharing more and more with each other. So I like that visual. And, and it helps uplift me in the work I'm doing and to stay consistent.

Lauren Tilden

I love that. Yes. And I'm such a big believer in the ripple effect, like, every one person you affect like they can go in effect, however many more people and then they will do it. So yeah, so especially in creative work, I feel like that's, that's such a powerful force. What is one small business that you admire?

Cynthia Hauk

I really love, so we were talking earlier about authentic marketing a little bit. And I worked with George Kao, who is an authentic marketing coach. And I just really like he's really down to earth. And he is different enough from me where I can get, you know, these really interesting systems and tools, but he's really heart based and, so I connect, I can connect with his style and approach to marketing much easier. And so yeah, I definitely have a lot of respect for him as my mentor.

Lauren Tilden

What is a business book that you would recommend, or more than one if you want.

Cynthia Hauk

I love any books by Seth Godin, especially his Purple Cow and The Dip, which are both marketing books. And then I also really love Atomic Habits by James Clear, which I think would be defined as a business book, I think in a lot of ways. It's also just about mindset and habits. But that one has been a go go to that I have returned back to so many times.

Lauren Tilden

Okay. That's been on my list for so long, and I've just been resisting it for some reason. So thank you.

Cynthia Hauk

So good.

Lauren Tilden

Okay, so where can listeners connect with you online, I know you have a YouTube channel, you mentioned a couple of resources already, the self care worksheet, the self sabotage, exercise, and then there's also mindful art exercises. So any of this, I will link also, but if you want to share where people can find it, in case they're not at the show notes page, and then just where they can connect with you if they want to learn more about your work and what you have to offer.

Cynthia Hauk

Yeah, the best place would be on my website at mindfulcreativemuse.com. And then if you scroll down on the bottom of my website, it has links to all of my social media platforms that you mentioned. And I have a free resources page as well on my website that will share more information about mindfulness and art activities.

Lauren Tilden

Amazing. Cynthia, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I I already just want to re listen to everything you had to say and try some of the exercises you mentioned, this has been so much fun, and I know that my listeners are gonna love it as much as I did. So thank you for taking the time and for sharing with us.

Cynthia Hauk

Thanks for having me, Lauren.

Lauren Tilden

Was anyone else as comforted and inspired by this conversation as I was? huge, huge thanks to Cynthia for such a refreshing conversation. I am so excited to get doodling. Seriously though this episode comes out November 16 2021. Just a week before Black Friday and the holiday rush that can get nearly all business owners feeling pushed beyond our limits. I hope you're as inspired as I am to find those moments to take care of yourself as a human and a creative, not just a business person, did you enjoy this episode? I know something I would both love to connect with you on Instagram. You can text Cynthia at @mindfulcreativemuse and me at @LaurenTilden.

I would so love for you to leave a rating and review on Apple podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can find all of the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/88 If you're interested in learning more about my small businesses, Good Sheila and Station Seven, the links are in the show notes. I would so love to have you in the Facebook community for the podcast head to makinggood podcast.com/community to join. And finally make sure you're following me on Instagram at @LaurenTilden to make sure you get all the details on the pro version of this podcast coming soon, Making Good Happen. If you want a sneak peek on the details just DM me the word Pro and I will send you some of the inside scoop. Thank you for being here and for focusing on making a difference with your small business. Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 4/12/22 Lauren Tilden 4/12/22

81: 8 Places to Meet Small Biz Friends

81: 8 Places to Meet Small Biz Friends

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 81.

In today’s episode, I’m going to talk about 8 places to find your small business PEOPLE -- the other small business owners that will have your back and cheer you on along the way.

BUT. Before we get started, a couple of things I wanted to chat about first..

OKAY! Let’s get started with today’s episode… on my 8 favorite places to find your small business friends.

Here in the U.S., summer has wrapped up and we are squarely into fall. I live in Seattle, so this means the days are getting shorter, the sky is getting grayer, and the rain is starting to do its thing.

And don’t get me wrong -- I love summer as much as the next person -- but there’s something really special for me about this time of year. It’s the time of year for cozying up inside, indoor hobbies, and for me -- doing a little bit of hustling to get prepared for the winter holidays, where, as a product-based business owner, my sales are by far, the highest they are all year.

So, this has got me thinking about what I was doing this time of year in all of my other jobs…

In high school, when I worked at a home decor and craft store, I would be setting up fake christmas tree after fake christmas tree, and selling all manner of holiday home goodies.
In college, when I spent many nights driving the van that took students around to the different stops on campus, I’d be filling up my mug with coffee and cranking up the heat in the van to keep warm.
After college, when I worked part time in an organic cafe, we’d be transitioning our menu from summer salads and iced drinks to hearty soups and warm teas.
And in my years in corporate marketing, we’d be gearing up our final marketing pushes to try to end the year on a high note.

At first glance, these different jobs don’t have much in common.

But, just a few short months into my journey as a full-time small business owner in 2017, I would have been able to tell you one critical thing that all of these jobs have in common.

And that is PEOPLE.

Until I began working for and by myself as a small business owner running my stationery brand, Good Sheila, I had always been surrounded by PEOPLE as I worked.

But I soon found that working for yourself, by yourself, all day long is lonely, and isolating. And it can be really, really hard to keep motivated.

For me, at least… I felt like there was no one around me who “got it”. No one to commiserate with. No one to give me a pep talk when I was feeling down. No one to bounce ideas off of.

But after several months of working in complete isolation, whether it was consciously or subconsciously, I started making friends with other small business people, and I started to feel SO. MUCH. BETTER.

All the sudden I had people to check in with, had friends who keep me accountable, had people to bounce ideas around with when I needed another set of eyes.

I want to say that I’m fortunate enough to have really supportive “REAL LIFE” friends and family who I have of course consulted along the way, and their support has been so important to me. But starting a small business is such a unique experience that you can really only understand if you’ve been there yourself.

And this pattern has continued throughout my small business journey. I have my ups and I have my downs -- and usually what makes me feel better when I’m feeling low is finding community with other small business people.

Some of the things that finding community has done for me:

Learning from people who have skills and experiences I don’t
Feedback when I need it
Collaborating with others which often leads to real business results
Introductions to other people
A general sense of belonging
Some really incredible friends

I’m sure you’d agree that these are really great things to have.

But how do you FIND these small business friends and community?

I know it can feel intimidating. As an introvert, it DEFINITELY did for me. And I know I’m not alone in this -- I hear this from small business owners ALL THE TIME that they don’t know where to start when it comes to building a small business community.

So, in this episode I want to talk about 8 different places you can find your small business communities. You don’t need to try to all of these things, but hopefully as you listen, a couple of ideas will stand out as good places for you to start.

1. Instagram and other social media platforms

When it comes to social media, I’ve come to believe that the magic word is INTENTION.

We all know that social media can be great for helping our businesses grow… but it can also suck away our time and leave us feeling things that aren’t always so helpful.

But, by applying some INTENTION, social media can be a really special place to make connections and make friends… particularly for small business owners.

First of all, get intentional about how you’re using social media. Before you open the app, let’s say Instagram, have a REASON for doing that.

Are you going to go leave some love for people you follow?

Are you going to go respond to your messages?

Are you going to go out and find new people and cheer them on?

Have a specific purpose for going on to social media, and then I would suggest you even set a timer so that you don’t just get lost there.

There’s a quote I’ve heard that says “Friendship isn’t a big thing, it’s a million little things.” -- and that is so so true when it comes to social media. Relationship building on social media happens over time. Every small gesture of support, kindness and appreciation stand out and add up, because not very many people do them.

If you follow someone who you relate to, engage with them on their posts! Share their posts. Mention them on Instagram stories. And, most powerfully, send them a thoughtful direct message to say what you appreciate or relate to.

Sometimes, these acts of kindness will simply make that person’s day.

But sometimes… they’ll go a lot further. The person will respond, follow you back, engage on your content, and a conversation and friendship will begin.

2. Clubhouse / social audio

I absolutely love social audio… and for me I specifically focus on Clubhouse. Clubhouse is a social media app where audio conversations are held. Think of it like a conversational version of podcasting.

So if I were talking to you right now on the app Clubhouse, it would be live. You could raise your hand, and I could bring you up to the “stage” where you could join the conversation, ask questions etc.

Generally these conversations aren’t recorded, but they are fantastic places to build community with other people who have businesses like yours. And this is because the voice is powerful.

We can write amazing marketing content for our Instagram or email list, but ultimately, there’s something so, so powerful and human about hearing someone’s voice.

I’ve met some incredible people on Clubhouse, who I am so happy to call my friends. Some of them you’ve heard on this podcast, and the reason we became friends so quickly is because having real conversations where you hear someone’s voice is an immediate way to connect.

3. Coworking / creative community space

First up, I take COVID-19 safety super seriously so I think I’m mostly recommending this particular suggestion for when it’s possible to do safely and for vaccinated people.

This isn’t a possibility for everyone, but if you’re in a situation where it might make sense, consider joining a coworking space or another creative space where you can physically do your work -- at least sometimes -- somewhere other than your own house.

This could be a coworking space, or a building with a lot of different artist studios, or some other community networking space.

It’s hard not to make connections when you’re physically in a space with other people. Plus, many of these spaces have a calendar of events for networking and learning over breakfast, lunch, or after work, that can also be great opportunities to build connections.

4. Content creation

I create a lot of content with and about other people.

For this podcast, I interview guests, and we all promote the episode!

For my product businesses, I feature a lot of other businesses that I love.

I’ve done giveaways, joint Facebook Lives, guest lectures, etc.

Every time that you create content with or about another small business owner, you’re supporting them in a very real way, but you’re also -- essentially -- collaborating.

Many of the people I didn’t know at all before interviewing them on this podcast, I’ve become friends with after getting to know them better through our conversations.

For most of us, we could come up with a way to jointly market our business and also support another business -- it could be something like a joint Facebook or Instagram Live, a blog post, a podcast interview, a giveaway…

These are great opportunities to build relationships that often turn into friendships.

5. Friends of friends

If you like to get scrappy, this one is for you. But one way to grow your creative community is to start with your existing network.

If you have a friend who has mentioned another friend they have who is a creative small business owner, ask for an introduction.

Or, send an email out to 10 or 20 of your friends and family saying something simple like this:

Hi friend! I’m looking to get connected with other makers/small business people. Do you know anyone you could connect me with?

It really can be that simple, and I think you’d be surprised with how this plays out for you. When you’re put in touch, set up a Zoom or phone call to get to know each other better, and then follow up!

6. Facebook groups

There’s a Facebook group for just about anything you can imagine. I’m personally in Facebook groups related to my neighborhood, progressive politics, watercolor and calligraphy, body positivity, podcasting, houseplants, even my local dog park.

You can look for a few different types of Facebook groups:

The first category is groups related to running a small business.
The second category is groups related to whatever field your business is in. For example, if you’re a jewelry designer, look for Facebook groups for jewelry makers.
The third category is Facebook groups for business people in your area.

I have a free Facebook group that I would LOVE for you to join if you’re looking to build community. Head to makinggoodpodcast.com/community.

So what do you do when you’re in these groups to actually make friends?

You need to participate! Interact, ask questions, answer questions, and then to take it to the next level, set up a conversation to go further. You could set up a quick Zoom or phone call to get to know each other a little better. At the end of this conversation, ask the person if there’s anything you can do to support their business. A little thoughtfulness goes a long way.

You can also just be super direct! Start a comment thread in a Facebook group saying something like, “hi! I’m a retail shop owner looking to expand my network! If you have a brick and mortar store and would be up for a chat, I’d love to connect with you”. Or if there are people in the group that you connect with, you can message them directly and simply ask.

There’s actually going to be an episode coming out soon on Facebook groups, so stay tuned for that :).

7. Paid programs

I’m a big fan of investing in yourself as a business owner. Whenever I’m looking to purchase a course or make another investment in myself, I always look to see if there is a community element.

These communities can be on Facebook, they can be on Slack, or another private membership area all-together… but the great thing about paid programs is that because everyone has had to invest some of their money to be part of the program, the overall level of participation tends to be higher. People have skin in the game, so they want to get the most out of it, and this tends to be an awesome place to make friends.

8. In-person events

This is one of my favorite ways to make small business friends, although it is a bit tricky right now with the COVID-19 pandemic. So, I just want to say, if you do any events right now, only do in-person events that are safe for you and allow you to protect yourself and others as best as you can.

But, since COVID-19 hopefully won’t last forever, I did want to include events in this round-up, because this has been a big one for me.

I’ve met some of my closest small business friends at events.

For me, this has often looked like craft shows! Sometimes the highlight of a craft show is the connections I make with other makers, not necessarily the sales I earn. When you spend a full day (or sometimes multiple days) with people, you get many chances to chat and get to know people.

I’ve also been to in-person events for developing myself as a business owner. I went to an in-person Retreat for a few days, all with people I’d never met before, and it was amazing how strong of connections you can make in just a few days.

Before we wrap up, I have two more things to say… about the mindset you approach making friends with.

First, there’s no “right” way to make friends… but one thing that I really believe will make it happen for you a lot faster is if you’re willing to put yourself out there a little bit.

This might mean… reaching out to someone you don’t know and asking if they’d be up for a quick Zoom call to get to know each other, actively engaging with people online, approaching people in person to start a conversation.

These kinds of social interactions might seem uncomfortable for many of us, but sometimes the best things happen outside of our comfort zones :).

I highly recommend that you channel your inner 1st grader, the kid who would go up to someone on the playground and say, I like your shirt. Do you want to be my friend?

Second, always remember the Golden Rule! Do for others what you would like them to do for you. If it makes your day to receive snail mail, write a thank you note to someone you just met! If showing some love and shouting your business out on social media feels good to you, go do that for someone else.

So! There are my 8 places to meet your small business BFFS! What did I miss? I would love to hear your suggestions to add to this list -- tag me on Instagram and let me know @laurentilden.

You can find all the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/81.

If you’re interested in learning more about my small businesses, Good Sheila and Station 7 -- the links are in the show notes!

And again, I would so love to have you in the Facebook community for this podcast: head to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to join.

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 4/12/22 Lauren Tilden 4/12/22

83: How to Find Your Calling

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 83.

Your calling, your why, your purpose, your reason for being and doing… whatever you want to call it… that’s what we’re talking about today. We’re going to talk about what I actually mean by calling, why it’s important to find your WHY, and then - most importantly HOW to actually find your calling. I’ll share what some of the world’s leading thinkers in productivity, motivation and business have to say on this topic, and then I’ll also share some of my own experiences. This is going to be a good one.

Before we jump into the episode, though. I have some super, super exciting news to share with you.

And that is THIS: Making Good is going PRO!

This new monthly membership is called Making Good Happen, and it’s for those of you who want to take everything you learn here on Making Good to the next level.

Making Good Happen is designed to make sure that we’re taking the actions we need to take to move the needle in our businesses…. In this monthly membership, we’ll work together on creating and IMPLEMENTING a marketing plan that will take your business where you want it to go. A private podcast, accountability, and focused work sessions are included…. It’s going to be so good.

I’ll be sharing more in the coming weeks, so STAY TUNED (and make sure you’re following me over @laurentilden for all the inside deets as I share them). In fact, for a sneak peek of the details, just DM me the word PRO and I’ll share some of the inside scoop!

OKAY! Let’s get started with today’s episode… on finding your WHY.

Let’s talk about Sundays, shall we?

For many, many, many years -- the 8 years I spent in corporate events and marketing after graduating from college and before starting my small business journey, Sundays were HARD.

I’d wake up Sunday mornings with a sense of unease that would get progressively worse throughout the day, until Sunday night, by which point it had morphed into full on dread.

Dread that Monday was just hours away, and it brought with it a full week of spending most of my waking, living hours going to work.

I even want to put a caveat in here. For the most part, I had great jobs working with great people. I learned a lot, and even fell in love with marketing. So I know I could have had it so much worse… but still. It wasn’t working for me.

But in August 2017 I left corporate marketing for good, and I have not experienced the Sunday Scaries one single time since then.

In fact, I genuinely LOVE what I do. Sure, there are always tasks that aren’t fun when you’re running your own business, and I do get stressed out. But there is always this underlying feeling that I can only describe as ALIGNMENT that just makes it all feel… right.

I wake up Mondays (and every morning, if I’m honest), with the incredible privilege of feeling EXCITED. Excited to jump into the world of Good Sheila and Making Good and Station 7. Worlds that I have created to align with who I am and what I care about.

Now. I’m not saying, AT ALL, that quitting your job and working for yourself is inherently better for everyone -- it’s definitely not.

In my case, the “quitting my job” part was incidental. The REAL before and after picture that I’m trying to paint for you is about listening to my intuition, getting clear on my WHY, and following my calling.

These days, I have this deep in my bones feeling that I am doing work that matters, that I love, and that I’m uniquely qualified to do.

So.

Let’s first start by talking about words. In this episode, I am going to use a bunch of words interchangeably. We’ll talk about finding your calling, your purpose, and your WHY -- but ultimately, regardless of the word I use, what we’re talking about is finding what is most right for you to do in this world.

Everything I’m sharing with you is based on my own experiences, and from research I’ve done. But I’m not a life coach, and if you find yourself getting stuck here, I would recommend that you work with a life coach! I personally worked with Jenna Starkey, I’ll link to her in the show notes -- you can hear my interview with her in episode 3, and the guided visualization she did for this podcast in episode 42.

Why this matters

Why is it important that we do this work?

Oprah said, “Everybody has a calling, and your real job in life is to figure out what that is -- who you were meant to be -- and begin to honor that.”

I have 3 reasons why I think everyone should do this work to find their calling:

1. Purpose-driven people are more fulfilled.

Martin Seligman is the founder of positive psychology, has a model for achieving happiness called PERMA -- this is an acronym with different components/elements of a happy life, and the M in the acronym stands for Meaning.

Having a meaning or purpose in life helps us focus on what’s really important and the world beyond just ourselves.

In a 2009 study by Kashdan, Mishra, Breen and Froh, people who report having purpose in their lives live longer, have greater life satisfaction and have fewer health problems.

2. When you’re doing something important to you, you are more likely to achieve.

An Inc article cites a University of Michigan study showing that working with a sense of purpose and meaning leads to greater engagement, motivation, and productivity.

A lot of times, when we’re working in alignment with our purpose, we’re doing something that we would do EVEN if we weren’t getting paid for it, because we care so deeply. We’re more actively engaged, and we’re more interested in putting the work in, because we are so clearly motivated and connected to WHY we’re doing it.

He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.” – Friedrich Nietzsche

Our why is what motivates us intrinsically when things are tough. And moving forward consistently, even when things are tough, is what leads us to achieve our goals.

3. Leading with our values/our WHY is compelling to others -- as a small business owner, having a clear vision of WHY you do what you do is a critical component of being a great leader and marketer.

Simon Sinek wrote a book called ‘Start with Why’, and it he shares how powerful it is to be able to clearly articulate WHY you do what you do in your business -- both in terms of inspiring your team and anyone who works with you, as well as customers.

The line he repeats over and over again in his TED Talk on this topic (which I’ll link in the show notes) is:

“People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.”

He has a model called The Golden Circle. It’s 3 concentric circles, and he suggests that we focus most in our messaging on the inner-most circle -- Why we do what we do. The next circle is How we do what we do, and the outer circle is What do we do?

Getting super crystal clear on on our PURPOSE/WHY helps live happier, healthier lives, achieve more, and do better business.

It doesn’t get much more compelling than that!

How to find your calling

So. How do we actually go about finding our calling? Well, this is where the rubber really meets the road.

Let me start by saying something I believe with all my heart:

You can’t simply WAIT for your calling to occur to you. It takes work to figure things like this out.

And this work comes in the form of introspection. It’s a matter of really really getting to know yourself and listening to the inner wisdom that you have.

There’s no RIGHT WAY to go through this process, but I believe that there are 4 main categories to do some deep thinking and writing on.

I’d suggest that you make one big list of questions and view them as journal prompts. Spend some time on this, answering questions, reflecting on your life, and seeing what you come up with.

TALENTS: What are your strengths?

What are you innately good at? What do people come to ask for your help with or your advice on? What are the things that come so naturally to you that you tend to undervalue them?

For this, it can also be helpful to ask those close to you this question -- sometimes the outside perspective is helpful.

Don’t limit yourself to what feel like “marketable” skills. They don’t have to relate to your work., and I’d write them down even if they seem insignificant?

For a lot of us, really getting clear on and owning our strengths is difficult. Here’s an example: I am a good writer. But I didn’t study writing in college, and haven’t specifically worked as a writer, so I have often felt hesitant to claim it as a skill. BUT when I go through a process like this, it’s clear for me to see that writing is a strength of mine -- it’s something people ask for my help with, it’s something that comes naturally to me, and it’s something that p[eople have told me I’m good at. So here’s my encouragement when you see some evidence that you’ve got a certain skill, accept it!

There’s an assessment you can use if it’s helpful, called the StrengthsFinder 2.0

PASSIONS: What do you love doing?

What are the things you’re most passionate about? As Simon Sinek says, what are the things you love doing SO MUCH you’d do them for free? What lights you up? What energizes you? What are the tasks that you get lost in… you start working on them first thing in the morning, and most of the day could pass without you really noticing?

In my research for this episode, I came across a clip of Jack Canfield (author of the Chicken Soup for the Soul books). He has an exercise he calls a “Joy Review”, where he essentially asks you to go through your life and make a list of all the times you felt great joy. Think back long into your past and spend some time on this.

Then, when you have your list, look for patterns. What do these moments in your life have in common? Jack Canfield says that whatever pattern you find -- there’s something here related to your passions.

I also want to add something here.

First, Simon Sinek says to think about the things you’re passionate about -- the things you love doing so much you’d do them for free? There’s an energy that comes with passion,

VALUES: What do you care about?

What are your values? What do you care about? What do you believe in? If you could share ONE message with the world, what would it be? If you could change one thing about the world, what would it be?

I have a *GREAT* if I do say so myself guide to getting clear on your values and figuring out how to write them into a Good Business Statement. To download it, head to makinggoodpodcast.com/goodbusiness.

EXPERTISE: What does the world need from you / can you be paid for?

Here’s the really practical side of this exercise. Make a list of things you could sell. Don’t think too hard about it at first, just start making a list.

For example, it could be: handmade jewelry, marketing consulting, copywriting, coaching, whatever it is. Don’t edit yourself at this point. Just make a big long list of different things that you could sell.

A few other questions to consider

The Inc article by Scott Mautz had a few other questions that I wanted to share, in case you’re looking for some more prompts.

What are your superpowers?
What have you learned from career misfires and triumphs?
What would your coworkers miss if you weren’t there?
What would OTHER people say you were meant to do?

After you’ve gone through these questions, spend some time with what you’ve come up with. We are looking for patterns that appear across all 4 categories of passions, strengths, values, and expertise.

Your calling should be something you care about, have an aptitude for, love doing AND something the world needs (something you can be paid for).

My Why?

In case it’s helpful, I thought I would share MY Why.

Put simply, my calling is to help small businesses make the world a better place. HOW I do this will vary over time, but right now it looks like….

-- being a small business that gives back (Good Sheila and Station 7)

-- buying from other small businesses as a way to support them (Station 7)

-- teaching other small business owners how to run strong small businesses, particularly when it comes to marketing (through this podcast!)

The writer Mark Twain said “The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.”

But there’s a pretty good chance that that second day won’t be today.

This kind of work plays out slowly sometimes. It probably isn’t an overnight process. There might be some thinking, some playing around, some trying new things involved in this. Don’t rush it.

My experience with finding my calling is not that I all the sudden figured it out… but it was a process of moving closer and closer to it by making the next right decision that felt aligned and intuitively right for me… and eventually I just felt like I’d finally gotten there.

So, here are the next steps I’d like to recommend:

Do the journaling I suggested here
Draft your WHY statement and put it somewhere visible in your life to keep you going
As the days pass and you reflect on your WHY, see if it still rings true, or if it feels like it needs tweaking
Tweak, rinse and repeat until you land on something that feels right in your bones. You’ll know.

So! There’s my take on finding what you’re meant to be doing in the world.

What does this look like for you? I would love to hear your suggestions to add to this list -- tag me on Instagram and let me know @laurentilden.

If you enjoyed this episode, I would so so love for you to leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

You can find all the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/83.

If you’re interested in learning more about my small businesses, Good Sheila and Station 7 -- the links are in the show notes!

I would so love to have you in the Facebook community for this podcast: head to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to join.

Finally, make sure you’re following me on Instagram @laurentilden to make sure you get allllll the details on the PRO version of this podcast coming soon, Making Good Happen. (If you want a sneak peek on the details, just DM me the word PRO and I’ll send ya some of the inside scoop).

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Lauren Tilden 4/12/22 Lauren Tilden 4/12/22

85: How I'm Approaching End-of-Year Marketing Planning

Welcome back to Making Good, the podcast for small businesses who want to make a big impact.

I’m your host, Lauren Tilden, and this is episode 85.

This episode comes out on October 26, 2021, which is EXACTLY one month before Black Friday. For many listeners, particularly those in the product-based business world, the period of time between Black Friday and the end of the year is the busiest and most important sales time of the year.

So, how can we make sure that we do all we can to have a successful, prosperous holiday season.. Without driving ourselves to complete and total burn out?

The answer to that question, my friends, is through making and executing a plan in advance.

In this episode, I’m sharing my process for making a workable plan for the end of the year rush.

Before we jump into the episode, though. I have some super, super exciting news to share with you.

---

And that is THIS: Making Good is going PRO!

This new monthly membership is called Making Good Happen, and it’s for those of you who want to take everything you learn here on Making Good to the next level.

OKAY! So let’s talk about planning for the end of the year.

In college, I had a routine every December. I went to school outside of Boston. During finals week, I would stay up most of the night drinking coffee and Diet Dr. Pepper (and eating Gardetto’s), and cram cram cram for all of my midterms and exams. I would get an hour or two of sleep, and wake up and repeat the day all over again for a week or two, before finally packing up to fly home to Seattle.

And just about every year, I would get SO SO SO sick in December. Run down, depleted, and so burned out that it took my body getting seriously sick to make me start taking better care of myself.

I’ve never gotten quite to my college-level burnout since then, but the last couple of seasons as a small business owner have definitely gotten me close.

So, this begs the question. How do have a super successful (whatever that means to you) November and December, WITHOUT burning out so badly that you need all of Q1 to recover?

The answer is PLANNING.

And while I plan to some extent all year long, I’m much more relaxed about it until this time of year comes around.

But I get pretty serious about my plan this time of year.

So, I thought I would share with you what I’m doing in case you’re looking for some ideas on how to get your next few months organized and working in a way that works for you and doesn’t ruin your holidays… or your health.

Step 1: Get out your calendar.

I like to actually print a physical calendar out, with separate pages for each month. I’ll later transfer everything to my project management system and/or calendar, but for the planning process, I think it’s super helpful to have a pencil and paper to get things organized.

You can find some blank calendar templates on Canva, or just go to the calendar app on your computer and print out a couple of blank months. If you’re following along with this process, let’s just print November and December calendars for now.

Step 2: Put your personal life in.

The next step is to put your big dates and commitments personally in this calendar.

For example, will you be traveling at all over November and December? Which days do you want to dedicate fully to preparing for the holidays… personally? Which days do you want to dedicate fully to spending time with your friends and family -- COVID-safe of course!? Which days do you want to lay on the couch watching a marathon of Murder She Wrote or the Great British Bake Off? Which days do you want to spend the day making sugar cookies for your neighbors?

Seriously. What are your favorite things to do over the holidays? It’s far too easy to let your business creep in and take over all of the time for these wonderful moments, and the way to prevent that from happening is by scheduling them and blocking that time out of your calendar.

Step 3: Put the big business dates and deadlines in.

Here’s where the planning starts to get serious. Now we’re going to add all of the major dates and deadlines that you will be communicating to your audience. This includes any sales, shipping deadlines, etc.

Some recommended things to think about:

Are you launching a new product? When?
Are you doing a promo for Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, or Cyber Monday? Or perhaps something that covers all of those dates, collectively sometimes called Small Business Weekend? Put the starting and ending dates in.
When is the last day you can reasonably guarantee delivery prior to Christmas. Please make sure to consult with whatever organization you use for shipping - there’s a lot of turmoil in the shipping industry these days, particularly with USPS, and shipping deadlines are generally EARLIER than they are most years.
- Also, consider what fulfilling orders looks like. If you’re really, really busy, maybe you need to make the order date a little earlier so that you get everything out in time.
- If you’re taking a week off at the end of December, maybe you want to include a note on your website that says, “all orders placed after December 20th will be fulfilled in January” -- or even put your shop on pause altogether.
Do you have any other kinds of campaigns going in the next couple of months?
Are you offering any kind of holiday “gift” or letter, whether personalized or by email? When is that going out?
Are you doing or saying anything relative to the New Year?
What holidays in November and December will you be acknowledging and celebrating through your business?
- A quick run-down to consider, as I think it’s important to be as inclusive as possible:
  - NOV 2: US General Election
  - NOV 4: Diwali
  - NOV 11: Veteran’s Day
  - NOV 25: Thanksgiving Day — I like to make sure to acknowledge the difficult history of Thanksgiving on this day
  - NOV 28 - DEC 6: Hanukkah
  - DEC 21: Winter Solstice
  - DEC 23: Festivus
  - DEC 25: Christmas
  - DEC 26 - JAN 1: Kwanzaa
  - DEC 31: New Year’s Eve

Step 4: Plan out your marketing.

Now it’s time to actually put your pencil to paper and start making the plan. I typically think through my marketing in terms of:

Website
Email marketing
Long-form content (blog, videos, podcast)
Social media
Other (print, PR, etc.)

For each of these dates, and deadlines, what are you planning to do and say about them in your different marketing platforms.

I’ll usually mark onto the calendar all of the days that are going to have an email, and I’ll number them. Email #1, Email #2, Email #3 = then on a separate sheet of paper or list, write down what the purpose of each of those emails is.

Same with Instagram. When are you posting a carousel? An image? A Reel? Label them with numbers and then go back later and decide what you’re going to say in each of them in advance.

For example:

For each of the holidays, I’ll plan a piece of social media content
For my product launch for Good Sheila,
- I’ll start an email waitlist for more details (since there’s a limited quantity of what I’m selling) a couple weeks before the launch
- I’ll communicate the date of the launch frequently to build excitement, by both email and social, as well as on my website
- During the launch, I’ll make it available to my email waitlist 24 hours in advance of my public launch
- During the launch, I’ll send an email about it every day, as well as promote on social
For my Black Friday/Small Business Weekend promotion, I’ll communicate the details in advance by email and on social media.
- During the sale, I’ll send an email every single day about it to stay top of mind and post about it on social
For the December shipping deadline, I’ll do quite a bit of promoting it:
- I’ll make a post about it on social media a couple weeks in advance, and mention it frequently. Right before the deadline I’ll post about it again.
- I’ll send a couple of emails about it, with a higher frequency of emails coming right before the deadline
- On my website I will have a banner at the top about the shipping deadline to set expectations
- After the shipping deadline has passed, I will promote digital gift cards.
For New Year’s Eve, I like to send a “State of the Union” type email. I’ll mention on social that it’s coming for a couple of days so people can be on the list if they want to receive it
- I’ll then send the email on Dec 31st, and post some of the highlights on social

When it comes to Instagram Stories, I have to admit I’m not always awesome at this, but I like to be as active as I possibly can during all of this time, posting both behind the scenes of life stuff, as well as details about the launch.

After we’ve gone through and created content around the main dates and deadlines on your calendar, we need to fill in marketing in the other dates and weeks that aren’t as busy with promos and deadlines. It’s important during these weeks to continue showing up with useful and engaging content, so it doesn’t feel like we’re only showing up for our marketing when we are directly promoting something we’re selling. In these weeks, think about creating content that is designed to grow your audience and nurture your existing audience. Think about Value Added Marketing (more on that a bit later).

One more thing before we move on to the next step. Remember how the FIRST thing we did in this planning process was to put in your personal non-negotiable dates?

We need to make sure that the marketing plan we create is something we can REALISTICALLY get done in advance, so that we’re not forced to cut into that personal time we are trying to protect.

Remember with marketing that it’s never perfect. You can *ALWAYS* do more. But don’t let that stop you from creating a plan and doing what you can reasonably do -- because it WILL make a difference.

Step 5: Schedule the creation of this content into your calendar.

Now, making a plan is one thing, but actually following through on it? That’s the hard part.

That’s why it’s important to build yourself out a LOT of time in advance to create this content.

And, importantly: actually physically put it in your calendar when you’re going to create this content. Maybe you can block off the better part of a week to put your head down and blow through this. Maybe you have an hour or two chunk every day that you can allocate.

If you look at your plan, and then look at your calendar, and it doesn’t look like it’s going to be possible to get everything created, you have two options:

You can scale back your plan. Send emails less frequently, post less frequently, and stick to the critical dates and messages.
You can enlist help. A team member or social media manager or assistant.

I like to work through this piece by piece. For example, I’ll record ALLL of my podcasts in a short time frame, get them edited, and then scheduled. Then I’ll move on to writing my marketing emails. Then I’ll create the social media graphics. And so on.

You could also think about working on your content a week at a time. So, for example, you might spend a full day creating ALL OF YOUR CONTENT for the week of November 1st. Then a few days later, creating ALL OF YOUR CONTENT For the week of November 8th. Whatever works best for you.

Step 6: Schedule content in advance.

Once you’ve created the content, it’s very important to schedule it out in advance using a tool that is designed to help you do just that.

So once we’ve designed our marketing emails, we want to put them into our email marketing tool, get them all designed, test and edit them, and then schedule them to be automatically sent out at the right time.

With our social media, we want to create as much as possible now, and then schedule it using a tool like Facebook Creator Studio, Later, Planoly, etc. to go out on the proper dates.

There are some things that are harder to schedule, and instead you’ll want to add those to your project management system or you calendar so you get reminded.

For example, changing details / dates / announcements on your website homepage is something that you’ll probably have to go in and manually do at the right times.

Behind the scenes Instagram stories, are another example of something that are a little bit harder to schedule in advance.

A couple of final thoughts

Something I’ve realized since starting this podcast is that I could probably host an entire podcast about the topic of perfectionism, because it’s something i continue to face and contend with pretty much every day.

So if you’re also prone to perfectionism, let me hopefully pre-empt yours a little bit…

Your plan will go off the rails. You’ll plan a lot of stuff, and it’s not all going to come out like you hope it will. You might not have time to create content for a few weeks, and then byt the time you sit down to do it feel like you’re way too late to start your holiday marketing and what’s the point. You might make mistakes somewhere in your launch. You might bump into some unexpected situation that throws a wrench in your plans.

But I want to encourage you that whatever effort you can put into your holiday marketing, as long as you’re doing it intentionally, will pay off. During November and December, people are receiving a LOT of messages from brands, and so every time you can pop up in an email or on social media is an important opportunity to remind your audience that you’re there and a good option to consider for their holiday shopping.

Let’s also talk about your marketing philosophy. For most of us, we are sending out a LOT more marketing than usual during November and December, so I want to encourage you keep in mind my favorite marketing philosophy: Added Value Marketing. The underlying principal behind Value Added Marketing is that the best business practice is treating our customers well -- viewing them as customers, and not just dollar signs.

We’ve talked quite a bit in this episode about when to send out your marketing messages, but when you actually sit down to think about WHAT to say, really do your best to put yourself in your ideal customer’s shoes. What are they experiencing at this time of year? Are they stressed? Overwhelmed? Lonely? Cash-strapped?

The better you know your ideal customer, the better you’ll know the answers to these questions.

And when you think about what they’re experiencing during this time of year, you can think about what VALUE you can add to their lives to make things better in some way.

What can you teach them?

How can you make them feel less alone?
How can you entertain them?
How can you inspire them?

What resource can you provide for them?

How can you make something easier for them?

These are just a few questions that might help get your wheels turning when you’re thinking about what to say during all of your holiday marketing.

Make sure that the content you create relating to these questions is also relevant to your product, and maybe you tag the product at the bottom somewhere, or mention it, or maybe there’s a photo of your product in the graphic. But the main point of most of these messages will be to serve in some way.

Now, of course we do need to occasionally say, “HI! DO YOU WANT TO BUY MY PRODUCT?” this is important. It should be very very obvious what you sell and who it’s for when someone comes across your brand. But I like to aim for the main focus being adding value 80-90% of the time, and directly asking for the sale about 10-20% of the time.

If you’re interested in hearing more about the topic of Value Added Marketing, check out episode 69 of Making Good which is all about this. I’ll link to that in the show notes.

So! That’s what I’m doing to plan for the end of this year. I hope this little peek behind the curtains into how I run my businesses is helpful and that you got some ideas for your own business!

Let’s connect on Instagram! Take a screenshot while you’re listening to this episode and tag me on Instagram @laurentilden. I would love to connect with you and cheer you on!

If you enjoyed this episode, I would so so love for you to leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

You can find all the notes from this episode at makinggoodpodcast.com/85.

If you’re interested in learning more about my small businesses, Good Sheila and Station 7 -- the links are in the show notes!

I would so love to have you in the Facebook community for this podcast: head to makinggoodpodcast.com/community to join.

Thank you for being here, and for focusing on making a difference with your small business!

Talk to you next time.

Give me 15 minutes, and I'll give you a smart, effective marketing strategy. 🔥