Business Development

Do you cringe and want to hide every time you send an invoice? Your brain gets so overwhelmed and you can’t see the big picture. 

Today I’m sharing my favorite secret in business growth that I wish more people had told me about when I first got started – money mindset & manifestation! 

And yes, I’m listing them in that order for a reason; before we get to manifesting money, we have to first focus on our money mindset. 

All of us have a mindset around money that was formed in both our childhood and adult experiences, and that’s where we have to start when it comes to reshaping those beliefs. I had to write out all of my money stories (both good and bad) that have impacted my life to determine where my money mindset and the issues with it originated. This is a great exercise to try because it becomes so obvious! Of COURSE you believe these things, you’ve never seen another way! Look for themes and how those translated or overcorrected in your adult life. 

Once you have an awareness and understanding of what’s going on, that’s where you can move forward and THAT’S where money manifestation comes in. 

Any time you’re manifesting something, you have to think of it as a relationship; I think of money as my best friend (and yes, I realize that might sound weird at first but hear me out!). How do you treat your best friend? You spend time with them, you invest in them, and you have a mutual trust that you don’t have to fear they’ll just disappear. 

What is your relationship with money like? Is it flourishing? Is it full of turmoil? Personally, if I don’t pay attention, I can treat it like a dark secret that I don’t want to think about or acknowledge; and that’s what I’m working on changing! 

Write out what you want that relationship to look like. What words do you find yourself saying about money? 

Where you are focusing your time, attention, and thoughts, that’s where your energy shifts. 

When embarking on your money manifesting journey, goal setting is a must. Big, audacious goals are lovely and necessary; but also make some bite-sized goals that you can tackle along the way. Based on that goal, how are you treating your relationship with money to get there? How does that break down into small steps you take with money each week? 

And finally, what does it look like when you DO hit those goals? What do you do? Who do you tell? Because the celebration is just as much a part of the journey! 

Listen in for examples, details, and tips on how to start your own money mindset & manifestation journey!

As a service-based business, scaling up from remote work to an office space or adding team members and learning how to budget for it all can feel daunting, to say the least!

I’ve learned so many lessons along the way in entrepreneurship and made some mistakes that I want to help YOU avoid! Today, we’re diving into why financials matter and discussing some practical tips on how to take charge of your finances and feel confident in growing your business. 

Tip 1: How you price yourself is dependent on your mindset, so there are some big questions you need to ask yourself; What’s the big vision for your business? Do you still see it being around in 10 years? It’s tough to do, but you have to price yourself now to prepare for your big dreams. When you have an idea of where you’re going, it gives you a much better roadmap of how to get there. 

Tip 2: You have to understand your finances; sticking your head in the sand won’t help you (in fact, it’ll most likely hurt you in the long run!). Stop guessing whether you can afford something and start writing checks for your growth in confidence. How do you get started in this? Seek out professional help! Find people who can help you get ahold of your finances and create budgets & financial forecasts. 

Tip 3: Make a list of all of the expenses in your business – subscriptions, marketing materials, ad spend, etc. to determine what your overhead is at different rates.

Next, create a list of what it costs to have clients – proposal softwares, email systems, etc. that you only have because you have clients. 

The overall cost of these expenses should be 30% of your pricing apiece; this is what we call the “Rule of Thirds:” overhead, COGS, & income (including taxes & savings) should each get ⅓ of your total revenue. 

None of us are taught this, which can make it tricky to figure out! But you’re not in this alone; listen in, reach out for help, and watch your business soar. 

When was the last time you truly, intentionally rested? 

As entrepreneurs, we easily get caught up in hustle mode (in fact, many of us feel like we THRIVE in it!), but we struggle when it comes to slowing down and getting quiet with ourselves. 

This summer, I entered into a season of choosing fun over work, and let me tell you, it re-energized me and gave me SUCH greater vision and room to dream.

As a business owner, giving yourself space and peace is what allows you to envision what the next stage of your business looks like and how you can grow. When you’re caught up in anxiety and the stress of the day-to-day, it’s easy to stay there and let your business just coast without intentional growth. 

Here’s my challenge to you: carve out time to find real rest! And once you’ve had time to rest, figure out how you can take that energy into your business without launching too hard and fast into busyness. 

So here’s my take, the #1 secret in business isn’t an action item. It isn’t a magical formula or an online program. Heck, I can’t even turn it into a course. 

Guys, it’s REST. No acronyms here, just plain and simple. 

As an entrepreneur, you have to wear all of the hats. From sales, marketing, execution, product development, invoicing, accounting, shipping…on and on…we can all agree, it’s A LOT. Coaches all over the world want to tell you all their secrets for growth and success but I am here to say that if you don’t let yourself rest, you are going to burn out or even beyond. Yes, there’s a phase beyond burnout, it’s that mode where you stop caring about everything that used to be important. You go to work, push hard, pick up your kids, and you just sit on the couch and scroll your phone until bedtime. It’s not that you don’t care, it’s that you can’t take in anymore. You haven’t done anything that fills your cup, you’ve only chosen to give out your energy.

I’ve been there. As a high-achieving entrepreneur, I thought for years that I could keep pushing and pushing. Until I started seeing success, what I had always dreamed of unfolded in front of my eyes but I was so tired I couldn’t really enjoy it. It just felt like another thing, another moment…nothing special. That was my wake-up call. I thought to myself, “Why on earth did I spend these years working so hard? To get to that point I had always dreamt of and not feel a damn thing?” So I booked a trip. 

I spent 8 days resting, playing with my girls, and letting them choose what our daily activity looked like. We spent the days laughing, napping, staying up too late drinking wine, chasing fireflies, and sitting around fires eating smores. I didn’t post a thing to social media – it was magic! Looking back it was just rest and fun – no agenda, no to-do list. Needless to say, I came back changed. 

There are so many entrepreneurs that are spiraling, they are worried about revenue or achieving their next goal their bodies almost resort to fight or flight – and boy are they fighting. Abundance doesn’t come from fight or flight, the universe can’t show up for you when you are focusing so much on what you lack. So rest. Choose fun, choose to be light-hearted. It takes a leap of faith but choose it for yourself, your people, and your business.

What’s the common thread between successful CEOs? They have the ability to daydream. 

I’m not talking about dreaming of what’s for dinner that night or about what happened on “The Bachelor” yesterday, but dreaming about what the future looks like for their business, their family, their employees, their community…

Visualization & manifestation has been an absolute game-changer in my own business. The goal is to see your vision of the future so clearly in your mind that you’re convinced of where you’re going – it doesn’t matter if others don’t see it as long as you do (it doesn’t even matter if that little voice inside your head is telling you it’s not possible).

My own vision is of what happens when my business hits that half-a-million mark; it’s not me rolling in a pile of money. I visualize all the women our business has impacted at that point and the trickle effect that it has within their own families and communities. You have to find a vision that brings you PURPOSE and chase after it. 

If you’re new to visualization & manifestation, here are some quick tips to get started:

-Start a timer, even just 5 or 10 minutes, to start dreaming about your future that makes you incredibly proud.

-Make a detailed list of what you see in your vision – what clothes are you wearing? Where are you?

-Based on that dream, what can you do right now to get a little closer to it being real? 

-Start making plans of what you need for that dream to be possible; financial needs, free time, lifestyle…

-Visualize who you want in your life – business connections, friends…who is standing next to you?

Tune in for more tips on how to manifest your way to being the CEO you’ve always wanted to be. 

When I started my marketing agency, there was one big lesson the universe taught me: you have to put yourself out there if you want to add clients. You can’t start a business in the dark and expect it to flourish. 

Nothing is going to be perfect when you first start (or ever!!), and those of us in the marketing world can easily get caught up in the perfectionism of it all. It’s less about those details and much more about having the confidence to go out there and ask for what you want. 

In this episode, I’m going into the nitty gritty details of how I created relationships, added clients, and ultimately grew my business! 

1. Kill the perfectionism voice in your head – she’s not helping you, she’s only holding you back! 
2. Be vulnerable & tell your story – connecting with people personally is a beautiful basis to start a healthy working relationship.
3. Everyone in your life needs to know what you’re doing – don’t hide it! Tell your aunt, the guy at the smoothie shop, anyone and anywhere that it naturally comes up in conversation (and no, we don’t mean jumping into the DM’s of your old high school acquaintances and “selling” yourself) 
4. Volunteer for what you’re passionate about – the relationships you’ll create through volunteering are with the most well-connected, giving people in the world that you want to have in your back pocket
5. Network & attend events that you feel natural going to – and only during the phases of your cycle when you have the energy to do so.
6. Ask for referrals – the clients you enjoy working with are connected to others like them, so it’s an excellent way to expand your business with clients you actually like!

Tune in to hear more about how I added clients and the lessons I learned along the way. 

Today we’re talking about something I’m sure you’ve seen in quotes all over Instagram, heard in motivational speeches, heck, maybe it’s even on your coffee mug: Doing the next big thing before you’re ready. 

Even though we’ve all heard it before, have you ever stopped to think: what would this look like in my life right now? What have I been holding off on because I’m scared? 

We can tend to sabotage ourselves by asking the dreaded question: “What if?”

And if you ask me, there are two types of people in this crazy business world: people who set the “what if” aside and do it anyway and others who let the “what if” eat them up.

In my experience with my own business, every time we’ve experienced growth it was the result of taking one big, uncomfortable leap. Our business is growing a lot right now, but every time we take on another contractor it still feels really uncomfortable. It never gets easier, but I can look back at my track record and see that these big leaps are what let us grow even more. 

So, how do you push past the fear and dive in anyway? It’s not by just throwing caution to the wind and jumping in blindly; the best way to move forward with confidence is by strategically making educated decisions on how to get to your next step.

Tune into the episode to hear how I grew my agency one scary step at a time and how I had to grow accustomed to the idea of failure. Part of trying is failing, but I don’t let my brain get stuck there; they’re lessons that guide me on what to do differently next time. 

Resources: 

The Ed Mylett Show

The Power of One More by Ed Mylett

Have you ever gotten a new client and you just got a weird vibe right from the beginning? Or as you start working with them, there’s just a feeling that they are making decisions that don’t seem logical to you? As business owners, we can tend to ignore the red flags and just take on the client anyway – clients are clients, right? 

We have made these mistakes and always ended up with regrets – a project went over schedule, over budget, or just ended poorly. Once we were introduced to the world of personality evaluations, it was like a lightbulb went off in our heads: we could pre-screen our potential clients (as well as our prospective hires!) to make sure it will be a good working relationship for everyone involved! 

We use a series of three personality evaluations to determine who we hire, who we take on as clients, and how we design our workflows to ensure that we are creating the most balanced & well-rounded work environment possible. 

In today’s episode, we’re going to give an overview of the evaluations we use, what they mean, and how they play out in our business. The amount of information you get out of these tests allows you to make informed decisions quickly without having to learn by trial and error and truly optimizes the efficiency (and enjoyment!) of your business tenfold. 

Assessments:

Personality Plus:

We use this test we use most when hiring, as it evaluates a person’s core personality

• Sanguine: extroverted, talkers, optimists, appealing personality, naturally attract relationships, normally go with their gut rather than needing data, naturally curious, volunteers for jobs, enthusiastic, creative, inspires others to join
• Melancholy: introverted, thinker, pessimist, deep & thoughtful, analytics, artistic, self-sacrificing, love charts & graphs, perfectionist, schedule-oriented 
• Choleric: extroverted, the doers, optimistic, question everything, unemotional, independent, confident, organized, delegator, love to research and debate 
• Phlegmatic: introvert, watcher, pessimist, peaceful, easy-going, collected, patient, consistent, quiet but witty, sympathetic, kind, all-purpose person, competent, mediates problems

Predictable Success:

This evaluation is all about getting your organization on the growth track & keeping it there – it’s like a blueprint for leaders who are looking for sustainable growth.

• Visionary: see big picture, big thinkers, charismatic, deeply loyal, passionate, hate routine, love conversation, comfortable with ambiguity, really high visionaries can get stuck in the clouds
• Synergist: learned skill that people have actively worked on themselves, comfortable in group environments, high emotional intelligence, managing group dynamics, read individuals & groups well, persuasive without being manipulative
• Operator: doers, task-oriented, easily bored by meetings, action-oriented, work a lot and like to work alone, don’t like to be micro-managed, not naturally inclined to play well in meetings/groups
• Processor: focus on underlying systems/processes, rational, analytical, logical, objective, trust data over emotion, love routine, dislike risk, prefer not to be rushed

Positive Intelligence:

The Positive Intelligence test is all about how you sabotage yourself and how it translates into your work & personal life; how you protected yourself as a child turns into how you sabotage yourself as an adult.

• Avoider: focus on the positive and pleasant in an extreme way; avoid difficult and unpleasant tasks and conflicts.
• Controller: anxiety-based need to take charge and control situations and people’s actions to one’s own will; high anxiety and impatience when that is not possible.
• Hyper-Achiever: dependent on constant performance & achievement for self-respect and self-validation; can have unsustainable workaholic tendencies and loss of touch with deeper emotional & relational needs
• Hyper-Rational: Intense and exclusive focus on the rational processing of everything, including relationships; can be perceived as uncaring, unfeeling, or intellectually arrogant.
• Hyper-Vigilant: Continuous intense anxiety about all the dangers and what could go wrong; vigilance that can never rest.
• Pleaser: try to gain affection & acceptance, can lose sight of one’s own needs & become resentful
• Restless: constantly in search of greater excitement in the next activity or constant busyness; rarely at peace or content with the current activity.
• Stickler: perfectionism, a need for order & organization taken too far, punctual, methodological, can be irritable, tense, and highly critical
• Victim: emotional and temperamental as a way to gain attention and affection; an extreme focus on internal feelings, particularly painful ones.

Resources:

Personality Plus by Florence Littauer

Personality Plus test

Predictable Success by Les McKeown 

Predictable Success test

The Synergist by Les McKeown

Positive Intelligence by Shirzad Chamine

Positive Intelligence test