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7-Figure Mindsets, Scaling your Messaging, and Hiring a Team with Molly Keyser Mar 08, 2021

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A conversation with my long-time friend Molly who also started a new biz after a big Covid Pivot. You can find Molly Keyser on Clubhouse @MollyKeyser and you can find Jamie Bright on Clubhouse @JamieBright Check out Molly's free 5-Day Course Kickstart Challenge here: https://bit.ly/3uRKolS Connect with Jamie Bright on Instagram at @JamieBrightAdventures Transcript: Today I get to introduce you to one of my longest friends in the online space. Her name is Molly Keyser. She was in the photography industry with me and also made a big pivot in her business last year after COVID hit. And we had the most wonderful conversation that went. All over the place. We talked about the biggest mindset shifts that we've made since we started our businesses and how we are growing our businesses differently. Now, we talk about the importance of messaging and how that shapes everything. We talk about focus. We talk about hiring. We get into all sorts of wonderful topics. I know you're going to enjoy it. So let's dive in to this phenomenal ð podcast Molly has been a dear friend of mine for gosh, how long Molly ages? Like seven, eight, nine years. Yeah, like probably eight, I think. Forever. Very long time. And, um, we have both grown businesses starting in the photography industry and then pivoting away. And she is just one of my dearest colleagues and I'm so excited to, excuse me. I am so excited to have her here today and to introduce her to you. So Molly, would you take a quick moment and share, um, Like super brief, like a little bit of your journey and where you are now and what you're doing now. Just so people kind of have context of who you are. Sure. So hello guys. So yeah, I started out, let's see here many years ago, I ended up, I dropped out of college, started a photography business. With 81 cents to my name was living with my grandma low times, low times. And I grew that photography business to multiple six figures. So other people started asking me how I was able to do that. And so I started doing a little bit of coaching and if you're doing coaching right now, you might relate to this. I felt like I kept repeating myself over and over. Um, so I thought, you know, what, if I take this same information and put it into an online course, So I put it into an online course. And for the last six years I had an online course for photographers. Um, one of which we grew to $2 million a year. And then when the pandemic hit, um, I actually made the decision to pivot and I can maybe share more on that later out in the episode. But, um, now my, my one and sole focused business is called profitable courses. So I am a course expert and I help people just like you turn their passion into an online course. Yes. And you do such a good job of making things so clear and simple. You're such a good teacher, so all right, Molly. Um, what I really want to dive into right away in our conversation and just see where it takes us is talking about now that you've pivoted about a year ago. Gosh, it's almost. Exactly a year. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. What month is it? March one month short of a year. March 12th is the day that it hit me. Oh my God. What month is it? That's so like, can I think like April I started to pivot and I think may was like the official start of the new year, like right away, you knew. But, um, since you've been through this pivot, I would love Tish. Um, Just basically have a conversation about how you're building your business differently now and like how I've been building my differently now than back when we started and how that mindset has changed for, for you. So like you wanna, you want to start like, how is your mindset different today than it was way back when you started? Wow, it's crazy. I would say the first thing that comes to mind is just. Almost like a calmness, assuredness and focus. Um, and I will say, you know, when you're starting your first business ever, I feel like you are going to go through a little bit of chaos just because you're trying to figure out what works and what doesn't work. And I feel like that was sort of, my last business was just like Jamie actually. And I were talking about this a different day and she said, it's almost like you've got your. Um, masters in business with your last company, like you got paid to grow that company, you know, because it was profitable and that is how I feel about it. Um, now with the new company, it's so clear to me. Like what we need to do to have success and to help our students. And it's just such a clear path. And so I don't feel that chaos in this business, but I do think that that is because of the journey I had before and what I learned in terms of trying all the things like we tried, all the things it absolutely did. And I think some of them we did together even sometimes. I feel like, yeah, we did. Yeah. Like one of us would have an idea. We would try it. Oh, this works. That works. Yeah. I feel like you tried a lot of different things as well. I think I tried everything. I've done. Quiz funnels and evergreen and LA immersion trips, challenges like a tiny offer, you know, mini everything yet. Yeah. I haven't done teleseminars. I think I came in just late enough to skip that, that I've been involved in many telesummits. We're getting old here. I was reflecting on this cause, um, two days ago as we're recording, this was my ten-year anniversary of starting my online business. So, um, like bef you know, it was so different having a blog before Facebook lives and like you had to have a blog and know how to code like HTML. I mean, it was just, there was no blogging, honestly feels like a different lifetime and. Well, yeah, like you'd have to code on the sidebar, your opt-in and be like, you know, open all the CSS. Yeah, exactly. A place to host video and like, yeah. Oh, it's image or I M G space source. Oh, I know all this stuff. It was, it's just crazy to think about business before, um, before it was so easy and at least in terms of technology, um, which. It kept the barrier to entry higher than, and it was easier because there was less competition, but I think there's never been an easier time to start a business. So anyways, I'm getting off on a tangent, which is fun. These are conversations, but, um, so what is one thing I would love? Um, so you talked a little bit about the mindset. You have this assurance and this confidence, because you've done it, you've proved to yourself that you can do this. And so, you know, you can repeat it. And so as you're coming into like your gosh, you're not quite a year into the new business yet. Um, what would you say is the biggest difference now? With how you're growing your business versus back then when we were just throwing spaghetti against the wall and seeing what was sticking. Yeah. That really does describe what I did last time for sure. I'm going to say we a lot because my husband actually called owns this new business with me, my last business. I started on my own and then he eventually joined it. Um, I'm super jealous that you call, you know, doing your ads and all the things employing my husband, but no now we're co-owners, um, which I would highly recommend. It's better to have your husband as a co-owner than an employee, but anyway. Yeah. And there was that dynamic too. I agree. Um, yes, I would say the biggest thing is going into the new business with a strategy. So I know a lot of people think they need like a business plan. I don't necessarily think you need a business plan because I think that can sometimes be something where you're trying to fit a lot of things into a document to say, like, I have a business plan, but rather you should have a clear plan. That's just simple. So for me, for example, With my last business, it was like, okay, I have this successful photography business. People want to learn it. I'm going to start a blog and then, Oh, okay. Now people want to buy things from me. What do they want to buy for me? Okay. They wanna buy a posing guide? Well, I should ask them what they want to buy next. Okay. What do you guys want to buy? Oh, you want to buy this thing? Okay, cool. I'm going to make that next. Whereas with this company, it's very clear. Like I came, you know, I just sat down and thought about who do I want to help? What's the one thing that's going to get them X result. And then. You know, I'm only going to have one product, one business, and what are the vehicles we're going to sell that product? So I would say the biggest shift is my last business was what products am I going to create for people to buy? And I would just keep creating new products and new ways to sell them and all the things. Um, whereas now I understand that one product is really a business, uh, just one product in itself. So with the new company, it's like, okay, how can we take this one product and sell it in all of these different ways to reach even more people and impact even more people while remaining. Calm cool collected enjoying life and not, you know, having a million different products, which is like running a million different businesses. Basically. It is. And I think that's, I mean, this is why I was so excited to have you come because we both have made this shift as we've been restarting. Like I don't want. To have like a bajillion products and 150 blog posts and like all the stuff, just for the sake of having the stuff it's like, what is the one thing that's most aligned with who I am that I can just go deep and focus on and say no to everything else and just sell the one thing. Just sell the one thing, just sell the one thing and make it as easy as possible. And it's such a huge mindset shift from what I used to do before. I think, um, I don't know. I think I felt. Like I needed to be busier, so it makes sense. Yeah. And you know what I'm so I proudly go to weekly therapy now and I actually wrote down yesterday, wait, what was it that you just said, Jamie, I need to be busy. Yeah. Yeah. I wrote down that I was like, I was really burying myself in my work. It's really no different than any other addiction in my opinion, but that could be like a whole podcast topic in itself. But. I was going to say in terms of the one product thing that you and I were just talking about, I also think that we could share about how, like you, for example, you've picked podcasting to be like your one focus for. Um, you know, I guess traffic or whatever you want to call it, would you say that that's accurate? Yeah, this is my only free content platform and everything else feeds this. So like I have emails, but they feed the pod. They send people to the podcast. It's not separate content, so yeah, totally podcasting. And to point that out that it's like one business, one product, but also. You know, be, be strategic with the one thing that you're focusing on because I see a lot of people trying to be on all the social platforms before they've even sold like one, one customer. And it's just like a cycle that'll never end because you can't do all the channels. Perfectly by her, by yourself. Yeah. I call it FOMO marketing because like they have this fear that they're missing out on these amazing clients that are on Instagram or Facebook, or like podcasting people there. And what if that's the place where everything blows up. And so people feel like they need to be everywhere because they've got this massive fear of missing out. Right. And that they're not going to find like, they're just, you know, they just got to try and find the one thing that's going to work platform that will explode is the one that you focus on. Yeah. Because here's why, because most people do that. Like shallow little bit of everything, you know, they're like, well, I gotta do just enough Instagram and just enough this. And then they do like the five or 10% that everyone does. And they don't have the capacity to go deep in one of them and really learn it inside and out. And if you would take all of that effort and go deep into one platform and it doesn't even really matter which one it is, as long as your customers. Right. It really doesn't. Exactly. I agree. Yeah. So like as long as they do that and they go deep, they're going to beat out like 90% of the people on the platform who are just doing like the bare minimum, and then they're going to get way better results. It doesn't, it really doesn't matter which one it is. I totally agree with you. So with my last business, I totally tried to do all the things at once. And with this business, I started with one thing I would say the one I started with was Facebook groups. That's the one that I just chose to start with. And then once I had mastered and automated that, um, then we went to Facebook ads. Uh, then we, you know, we have that outsourced and running and. To be fair. We have quite a bit of experience with Facebook ads. So it was, it's something that probably the first time you do it will take you years to get, but now that we've done it, you know, and then I hired a Pinterest agency, then I hired an employee to do Instagram and other things. So it's like, I did it. I wasn't doing them myself. I like mastered one. And then I would outsource or hire. Uh, to do the next thing. Can I, can I, can I, how, why you can do that? Can I share you have like the most brilliant, beautiful, tight messaging of anyone? I know. Oh, thank you. Well, no, but think about it. So can you tell people, like, why it's so easy for you to hand this off to other people? Like, you know, because I think a lot of people think, well, what are they going to write? Or what's the voice or whatever. Like how do you, so I know your systems because you've shared them with, you want to talk a little bit about how you approach messaging so that you can do that. Yeah, actually, I'm so glad you brought this up because to be honest with you, So I actually kept a notebook while I was starting my new business, because just like what just happened? I almost forgot that I went through so many months of perfecting the messaging. You're right. Um, so it's like, yeah, I started with Facebook groups, but I also spent probably three or four months just perfecting the messaging and building like systems around the messaging. So, so yeah, one thing that I did was I created a document. I think it's just called like profitable courses. Master messaging or something like that. Um, And it, it has in there, you know, it explains who is our ideal client. It explains what's our mission in one sentence. Um, so we help people turn their passion into an online course. Like that's our mission, super simple. And then I wrote down, like, what are all of our customer's false beliefs? I think I have like over a hundred false beliefs, which is, you know, they, they would say something like, Oh, I don't think I can do a course because I'm too old. I'm too young. I don't have money. I don't have an idea. Like all those things are false beliefs. Also thought I, I wrote down, um, all the other things that we would need for messaging. And then I also created a Trello board called I think I called it my story volt or something like that. And I think this is the thing Jamie's remembering. I had a while since I made it, but we still use it. Of course. So, yeah, I came up with what are all of my different personal stories? What are the false beliefs and how can I tie those stories and false beliefs? To crea…

Full show notes at the publisher

Hiring & Managing a Team and the 5-A Framework with "The Queen of Ops" Megan Kuethen Feb 27, 2021

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Connect with Megan Kuethen, the "Queen of Ops" at @thequeenofops on Instagram.

Like this episode? Would you take a moment right now to please leave a review? That'd be amazing, thank you!

Send a DM to Jamie Bright @JamieBrightAdventures on Instagram and let her know what you thought of the episode!

What's Your Owner's Intent & Why is it Important? Feb 24, 2021

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Apply to join the Brighter Together Mastermind and get all the details by clicking here.

>>> http://wearebrightertogether.com

Have questions about it? Contact Jamie directly on Instagram @JamieBrightAdventures

Transcript:

Hey friend today instead of our regular podcast opener, I thought I'd play a little guitar for you. I'm out of practice, but why not? Right.

just kidding. Not going to do that. I don't know why I thought that would be a fun opening, but here I am. Let me put my guitar away. Oh, my gosh, I'm sitting in my closet recording. Cause the sound is better here. And my guitar happened to be here and I haven't picked it up in ages. So I thought I would. But today, what I really want to talk to you about is the intention behind what you're doing. Why are you growing your business? And I want to talk about why it's so important to answer that question and what got me thinking about it in the first place.

So it's going to be an awesome episode and I cannot wait to share with you ð so a couple of weeks ago I got mail, like a piece of paper, actually. It was several pieces of paper from Casey Graham, who is the founder of gravy. They're a payment recovery company and he sent out this thing called the outsider and it's a paper newsletter. And it's fantastic. I was really surprised to get it.

I've been a client of gravies for several years, although, with closing down the photography stuff, I'm not using them at the moment cause I don't have that membership going anymore, but they were great. And I got this outsider newsletter and it was all about defining your owner's intent, which is.

Basically the reason why you are growing your business and what your goal is for your business. Now that might seem really basic, but it's a lot deeper than you might realize. And it got me thinking in a big way. So when I was first starting out my business At that point, my entire goal was just to replace my household income so that I could have more freedom over my time and more autonomy. Be able to see more of my kids' milestones and be around more frankly, I was tired of commuting an hour and a half each day, and then working in a job that sucked the life out of my soul.

So my complete purpose in starting my business. Was simply to replace my income so that I could get out of a job that sucked the life out of my soul. I didn't want to be an actuary anymore. Because of that. And because that was my intention with the business, I basically created another job for myself.

The business was fully dependent on me. I was the face of the company. I was one doing the delivery. Yes. There are times when I had a team, but it was all based upon me. And I was constantly busy. Constantly busy. I did all the copywriting. I did all the sales pages. I did all the marketing. I did all the customer support until I got really wise and finally hired somebody best investment I ever made by the way.

And yes, it was amazing. And yes, it was very profitable. But I was very busy and it took me until several years later to really learn how to grow a team and to pass some things off so that I could get the freedom and autonomy that I was really searching for. And it was a really hard transition and I was still working on it even before COVID came.

I was literally in the middle of evergreening, everything so that I could step away a little bit, but it was still push, push, push, and very much so dependent on me, even though it was less dependent on me than it had been in quite a long time. And so when COVID came and I went through the whole massive business transition, it was kind of like giving myself a clean slate and.

I was able to think about how I would do things differently. Now with the 10 years of experience that I have doing this. Full-time. And at first I wasn't thinking about that at first I was thinking, okay, how do I get some more money into the business? Because my income dropped 85% like overnight.

It was awful. It was stressful. You can hear all about it. And season two, and it was a very much so income focused again. And by the way, there's nothing wrong. If that's where you're at right now. But as I began to move forward and as I began to get really clear about what I loved and didn't love, and as I remembered, and I thought about the fact that this was.

An opportunity to really build a business that just made me come alive in a way that I hadn't felt alive in a long time. I mean, I love photographers, but I haven't been passionate about photography in several years. And I was when I started that business. But today I would never start a business in the photography industry because that's not where my passions lie.

Can I help them? Absolutely. But I wanted something that was more aligned with me. I wanted to run. Masterminds and work with entrepreneurs. And I thought I would have to wait on the masterminds until later. Anyways, you've heard the story. If you've been listening to the podcast for any length of time, you've kind of walked through that journey with me and gotten to see where I've come from. But when I got this thing from Casey, this outsider. Pamphlet, I would know what to call it. paper newsletter. It really made me stop and think about why am I doing what I'm doing now? I had already been very committed to lifestyle design.

I know from experience that it doesn't get easier to step away from the business once it starts making more money. And that if you set it up from the beginning to be fully dependent on you and super busy, then later on. It's still going to be fully dependent on you, maybe even more so, and even harder to step away.

So with this one, I've been committed to creating a business that I really only had to do about 20 hours a week of work with, because I do homeschool my kids and. Uh, he ran a crazy long ultra marathons, which means spending miles and miles and hours and hours and hours on the trail each week training.

And so I need to have that flexibility if I want to have, well, one, if I want to have the presence that I want to have with my children, when I'm homeschooling and really do that well, but also have the time to do the training without it affecting my business. So, as I was thinking about the owner's intent, I realized more than ever that I don't.

Just want to run a mastermind or build a mastermind business that can scale where I'm running. All of these masterminds. I want to build a business that can truly have a massive impact beyond what I can do alone. I want to see entrepreneurs come alive and have the lives they actually want instead of getting stuck in the weeds and the to-do lists.

And actually not having, like most people don't even realize how trapped they are by the business that they themselves have created. And I know masterminds are a great way to help them out of that. I want to help them shine bright and make an impact in the world as well as an income. And honestly, I just want to empower you to know how to empower your people so that we can make massive impact in the world.

If I can help you change the lives of the people in your audience, even a one tiny way, then my impact has just been multiplied several times over. That's what makes me come alive, empowering people like you to empower your people so that my impact can scale so much greater than what I can do. I really started thinking about that deeply and about how I was doing that.

But I realized that. I actually want to be the architect this time and not an employee. I don't want to create a job. I genuinely want to create a business that yes, I'm going to do a little bit with, and yes, I'm going to be the face of it.

And it's going to reflect my heart and the impact that I can have in the world. But. I want to create something that can grow so much bigger than me. I want to empower people who have that same mission as me, who genuinely want to see entrepreneurs succeed, come alive and reach their goals and have a greater impact in the world.

I want to do that with other people. I want to bring them along. I want to empower them in the same mission with me, so that we can do it together. And that just lights me up and I genuinely want to be an architect and not an employee. In fact, my dream is to empower at least a thousand entrepreneurs through brighter together masterminds by the end of 2023.

And I can't do that alone. In fact, I actually wanted to have a much bigger goal than that, but we're going to start with that one as the stepping stone stone goal. And I honestly believe that it's possible, but it isn't possible if I'm simply creating a business. That's. Where everything is done by me, where I am the employee, where it's all based on me.

Yes, I am the architect. Yes, I have the vision, but. This time, this time is different from when I first started, because I can see that I can have the influence on an even greater scale. I can leave a greater legacy. I can impact more people by building a team of people to do this with me, by finding the right people, to be a part of this business.

And by structuring it in a way that's a legitimate business and not just. A side hustle. Not that there's anything wrong with a side hustle, but it's a totally different mindset shift. So my question to you is. Why are you building your business? I mean, yes. You want to help people. I assume, since you're listening to this podcast, but you could be working for somebody else doing that. You could be an employee. Why do you feel so deeply called to run a business? And why have you structured it?

And the way that you've structured it is this really how you want it to be.

And if you've enjoyed these podcasts and are getting a lot of knowledge from it, and you just feel like you resonate in a big way with the idea of not just making an income, but truly making an impact in the world with your business. And you would love to be surrounded by a community of like-minded entrepreneurs who are working to get out of the messy middle.

And scale their business and impact in a big way. I would love for you to consider becoming a part of the brighter together mastermind. Now at the time of recording this, I only have six spots available in the current group that I'm running and I'm not quite ready to start a second group yet. So if you are interested in having one of those spots and being one of the thousand entrepreneurs that. I am helping to reach, to empower and to grow their businesses in a real way.

And you would love to be a part of this. What I'd love for you to do is go to, we are brighter together.com and fill out the application. It's got all the details there. It's got all the pricing info and what we do and how often we meet and all the things about it.

And in the meantime, it just remember my friend, we are brighter together and the world needs us. So let's go out and make it ð brighter.

3 Mindset Shifts to Make to Grow Beyond the Messy Middle Feb 22, 2021

Show notes

Apply to join the Brighter Together Mastermind and get all the details by clicking here.

>>> http://wearebrightertogether.com

Have questions about it? Contact Jamie directly on Instagram @JamieBrightAdventures

Transcript:

In the last episode I talked about how important it was to shift your mindset, if you want to get out of the messy middle and really scale. So in today's episode, I thought I would share three of the biggest mindset shifts that I believe need to happen in order for you to get out of the messy middle, because these three things will keep you stuck.

Long-term and until you recognize them, it's going to be really hard to move beyond them. And that's genuinely what I want for you It's going to be a good one. So let's dive in real fast ð you should probably know that the reason. I know these mindset shifts are so prevalent are because I have struggled with each and every one of them at some point in my entrepreneurial life. And when I overcame these three mindsets or shifted them into whatever they needed to be, that's when things really started to take off.

And kept me from being held back in that messy middle and started to grow much easier. So it's, it feels a little vulnerable sharing these with you, honestly, because I've had to work through them myself so much, but here they are because I want you to. Basically benefit from the stuff I've been through.

And if these are things that are keeping you stuck, the sooner you can recognize them the faster you're going to be able to move beyond them. So, number one, the reason that we are stuck in the messy middle. Is that we feel really insecure about our worth and our authority and feel the need to prove ourselves.

what I mean by that is we're putting out way too much free content, or we are over-delivering in our courses and our memberships where we might even been giving them. All of this information, that's really, really great information, but it's overwhelming them. They don't need to know all of it because they just want results.

They want to implement what they're learning and get results as fast as possible. But we feel this need to give them more and more and more information or to do more one-on-ones or. Basically, we take on this responsibility for getting them results. So sometimes, and I've seen this and I've done this, so not just seen it, but done it.

We even jump in and do the work for our people. So for example, let's say that you're a copywriter and you're teaching people how to write copy, and you give them all these templates and you. Teach them all the different things they need to be thinking about as they're creating sales pages and all these other things, but then you have somebody who reaches out and they're struggling and they're like, Oh, you know, I just I'm struggling with this or that.

Or could you critique this? And so even though you didn't charge them for it, and you've got a lot of people and it's not scalable, You feel like you need to prove that what you're doing is good and you feel like you must get them results. And so not only you do, you critique it, but then you give them all of this copy and you kind of do some of the work for them, which honestly.

Sorry to say it. It's kind of, co-dependence when we take on the responsibility for them getting results, we need to guide and help them learn how to do things on their own and focus on results more than on giving more information or just doing the work for people.

So that. They can truly learn how to do it themselves and be able to replicate it in the future, but also teach them how to trust themselves. The reason we do this, it's not bad to help our people. I mean, love on your people, help them get results for sure. But keep your boundaries in place because what happens is.

If we're doing this because we feel insecure about our worth or we really feel like we need to prove that we're good enough. And that we know enough that we really can do this. What's going to happen is that we are going to fill our calendars with time. We're going to put other people's needs above our own.

We're going to do way too much free content because. We don't really feel like we're good enough to sell, or we feel like we need to prove it to more people. And we basically fill our time with stuff that isn't actually going to move the needle in the end. So, number one, you need to know that you are enough, you can do this and that the goal is to help your people get the results that thereafter and do it in such a way that still gives you the freedom.

And. Protects your boundaries and allows you to live the life that you want to have. because when you don't, it's so easy to get sucked into doing way too much and not actually move forward. It's more like spinning your wheels and almost all of the time. And I know this myself it's because you're insecure about if you're good enough, or if you really can help people.

Number two, sometimes we get stuck in the messy middle. Because we're afraid of what other people are going to think. This usually shows up in the form of perfectionism. we want everything to be absolutely perfect. And it shows up in the form of shifts. Well, I should have this massive audience before I do this, or I should have this whole funnel in place before I ever sell, or I should have all of these things that I need to have, because that's what this course I take told me.

I need to do. Before I can legitimately move forward in my business and start selling to people. I should have the course done or the product finished, you know, I should have the sales page written. None of that matters. It only matters if you care about. What other people are going to think, or if they're going to judge you, we think we have to be perfect.

We think we need to have it all right. And we worry so much. Well, what are they going to think if I sell something to them and we created together and it's not perfect. What if I sell it before it's done? Well, as long as you're framing it. Okay. And saying, Hey, we're going to co-create this it's fine. as long as you're not lying about what's there it's okay.

But. Getting stuck in the sheds. Like I should be doing this. I should be running ads. I should any sheds don't should on yourself. Anytime the word should comes up, it should trigger up. I probably don't need to be doing this or there's maybe a different way or. Do I really have to do this, or is this me worried about judgment or not being good enough or any of the other things?

So fear of judgment will keep you stuck in the messy middle, because you will do all of this stuff that you don't need to be doing. You'll put so much time and energy on something being perfect. When spoiler alert. It's never going to be perfect. It won't, it's always a work in progress. This is like art.

It's not necessarily ever done. You don't perfectly right. a best-selling book the very first time there's multiple drafts, there's edits. There's all of these things that happen. It is a dynamic growing, changing, shifting thing. If you're truly going to have an amazing business and testing is a natural part of it, it shouldn't be perfect.

C plus work. It's enough now I know that's really hard to hear or do, if you are an Enneagram three, like I am a perfectionist. Somebody who wants to be the best at all, they do. But that's more a reflection of my own insecurities and my own fear of judgment then of what actually works to grow your business.

And so much of the energy that you're putting into your business. When you're afraid of judgment, isn't going to get you results. It's a waste. And it's keeping you from doing the things that actually matter. It's keeping you from reaching out and asking people to. Be a party of our business. It's keeping you from doing the things that really matter, and that really will move you forward faster.

They'll keep you stuck in the messy middle. The third thing that we need to recognize and overcome is that sometimes. We actually benefit from the busy work that we're doing, because it makes us feel good that we're busy. It feeds our ego straight up. It feels good to be wanted. It feels good to Mark things off the to-do list.

We gain our worth from achieving, even if it isn't the best use of our time, just, it feels good to make that little graphic in Canva instead of hiring a VA to do it for you. And. Sometimes the things we're doing are being done. Not because we really want to move forward, but because

maybe something in us feels like we need to earn our love or achieve in order to feel like we are worthy of love. That's something that I've dealt with. That's my not everyone's, but it's definitely mine. Or that if I give to my clients more, they will spread the word more for me and we try and earn it that way or whatever it is.

So often we're afraid to let go of doing all of the things and we make excuses about, Oh no, we really love doing all the things. We love them because they feed our ego and make us feel like we're doing something worthwhile. But they aren't growing our businesses. And so you really have to ask yourself, what's your goal here is your goal here just to feel smart, like, do you just want to go up on clubhouse and go up on stage and share some knowledge so that people think of you as somebody who's really bright and feel great.

Which that's okay, but recognize it for what it is or do you, I want to do it with intention behind it and not care so much about your ego and about getting credit or, being known for something because you want to be the best of the best of the best of the best. And so you focus on all this stuff that.

Helps you be known, but doesn't actually make you money because the backend stuff isn't as fun or whatever it is. Right. I've always wanted to be the smartest. I always want to be the most helpful. That's just kinda my own thing. I want to be perfect the best. And so, so much of what I did was motivated by my ego and it wasn't until I set my ego aside and said, Hey, you know, I don't need to prove all the things that I know.

I just need to help people get results quickly. What's the fastest, easiest way I can help them get results. What's the least amount of work they have to do in order to get the clients that they're looking for or to grow in their business or whatever it is. Right. And when I took that mindset shift and I went from having to show them how smart I was too.

Really focusing on them and how little could I do and starting to evaluate everything I was doing through this lens of ego, It feels so good to check all these things off the to-do list. But it feels even better to spend that time with my family or to be out on the trail.

And so I had to ask myself, am I willing to not help everybody with everything and to let go of these things that are feeding my ego in order to get the things that I say I truly want, do I really want them? And so here's what I want to ask you to ponder. Do you really want to move out of the messy middle?

Because if you do the first step is to admit that you want it and say, I want this more than I want to feed my ego. I want this more than I care about what other people are going to think. And I know that I can help people. I don't have to prove that to anybody, not even myself.

Because when you do this, It will change the way you spend your time. It will change the way you develop your products and it should change the way you do your business and allow you to let go of so many of the things that you're doing in your business that really are only there to serve your insecurities or your ego.

And aren't actually serving your prospective clients or your customers. And what I want for you is to let go of all that garbage and focus in on the stuff that really works, that really helps them. And that really moves your business forward because that. Is where you are going to start to move forward out of the messy middle it's through saying no.

And not saying yes to everything that will get you, that momentum to move forward.

because the more you can say no to, and the more you can focus on the things that remain, the more you're going to grow. Do more of what's working really, really well. Just go deep into it. And you are going to grow so much faster and have so much more space in your business, in your life.

And you're going to have more of all those things that you say you really want to have without it sacrificing. Your life without your business running you. And that is how you scale out of the messy metal. Now, if you want help with this and support as you go, I would love for you to consider becoming part of the brighter together mastermind, where you will be surrounded by like-minded entrepreneurs who are moving out of the messy middle, who are committing to focusing.

To supporting each other to learning how to be a mirror for each other. They can point out those limiting beliefs or those mindset shifts that need to happen and support you through it.

Do it and remind you of who you are. You can be seen and understood. And celebrated and supported. It's just magical. I would love to have you in it. If you're interested, you can get all the details@wearebrightertogether.com. Right now, as I'm recording this episode, I currently have six spots available, but once they're full, I'll be opening up a waitlist.

And if you'd like one of them just go to, we are brighter together.com. You're not going to see this perfect, beautiful, huge thing. It's a Google form, at least right now, as I'm recording this and it's got all the information there and what you need.

But I didn't let my perfectionist tendencies take over. Eventually I will make a bigger, more detailed page, but check it out. If you have any questions, just reach out to me personally, on Instagram at Jamie bright adventures. The link by the way to that is in the show notes. And I will be happy to answer any questions in the meantime, just remember we are brighter together.

My friends, the world needs us, so let's go out and make a ð brighter.

How Your Focus Shifts As You Grow Your Business Feb 11, 2021

Show notes

Apply to join the Brighter Together Mastermind and get all the details by clicking here.

>>> http://wearebrightertogether.com

Have questions about it? Contact Jamie directly on Instagram @JamieBrightAdventures

Transcript:

Confession. I don't do email. I just don't. I hate it. I hired somebody to start doing it for me in 2013. And I have not looked back since in fact, I don't even have email on my phone and. Yes, I have an email address, but it's fully managed by my customer service gal. And she is my favorite person in the entire world most days, because she can do everything I need in very little time and respond to stuff that needs responses from me by asking me a quick question, and then I'm not distracted by email all the time.

Now that being said, I do have one personal email address that I use for like my kids, teachers, and you know, all the things that require it, that aren't business-related that I have to deal with on my own. And somehow somewhere I ended up signing up for a newsletter with James clear. And I, I've gotta be honest.

I haven't read email newsletters in years because that's why I wanted somebody else to do my email because I will read them and I get sucked into them and I get pulled into all the hype and I need to focus. Like I don't need more stuff. I don't need more education. You probably don't either. I need focus.

I need to just do what I know I need to do and move forward. But I saw this newsletter come through from James and he's amazing, he wrote atomic habits. One of the most brilliant people. I follow a note. And when I do go into that inbox, which is like once a month or whatever, I never check it.

But when I have to, because I know there's something there from a teacher or something, and I see his stuff, I'll read it because. It's some of the best content in an email I've ever seen. And so today I want to share with you a nugget that I took from his email and talk a little bit about how that can help you grow in your business and help you identify what you should be focusing on right now. ð

So here's a quote that hit me really hard that I wanted to share with you. Now, this is James clear. He said where to focus for the beginner execution for the intermediate strategy for the expert.

Can you guess what it is? That wasn't his quote. That's my little side it's mindset. Okay. That's James clear from his email newsletter. I just thought this was so brilliant because it makes so much sense to me when you're first starting out, you need to know like what the softwares are to use, what the tools are, how do you actually do the things and what does it look like and how do you get people onto an email list?

And what do you say. And the focus is all on getting it set up, it's figuring out what to do and how do you actually make that happen? And that's the bulk of your questions when you're just starting out. Then once you start to get some progress, you start to make some money. That's one strategy is so important.

That's when you get super intentional about your messaging, about your offer, about your conversion mechanism, about your traffic and about your nurture. When you get those things into place, then things can really start rocking. And rolling, this is where courses on marketing and sales and all of those things are super helpful and they can really start helping you to accelerate the results that you are getting in your business, which is fantastic.

However, and this is the biggest mistake I think I see that keeps people stuck in the messy middle is that we don't give our strategies enough time. We do this thing that I call FOMO marketing. We try a strategy and maybe it kind of works. Maybe it doesn't. And then we read all those email newsletters, which is such.

Oh, such a black hole and we get all hyped up and we're excited about so-and-so's new free challenge. And we get excited about this and that and somebody else's course, and then there's this course and there's that course. And we know intuitively that we need some sort of strategy to move forward, but instead of sticking with one and going deep with it, because I can tell you they all work.

They almost all work. I shouldn't say everyone cause haven't tried everything, but I feel like I have tried all of them in multitudes of different ways and you can get results from any of them. So I'm speaking from experience here, but the way you get from that messy middle to truly scaling into seven figures and beyond.

Is by focusing by not doing all the things, but instead saying no to as many things as you can, and focusing on the one strategy that aligns with you and a massive way, and that's going to help you move forward. Just go deep with the one thing and not give up too early. keep whipping the cream until it turns into whipped cream.

And if you miss that episode, go look back a few episodes ago where I talked about with cream. Basically at this point to move from that intermediate stage to that expert stage, you need that mindset shift.

You need to be able to focus. You need to trust yourself to implement one thing really deep, and a lot of times the easiest way to get that mindset. Is to be surrounded by other entrepreneurs who are doing the same thing as you, who can support you along the way, they can encourage you and remind you that you do have what it takes.

They can be a mirror to you and point out the limiting beliefs that you have. Sometimes we can't even see those things that are so close to us and so much. So a part of us that they're holding us back because we're too close and we. May need somebody else to say, Hey, you realize that's just a limiting belief.

Like this is really what's going on. It's not that your offer. Isn't good enough. It's that you've got fear holding you back from putting yourself out there. It's a fear thing. Perfectionism is just fear or whatever it is, right. That's just one example. And that is why I believe masterminds are absolutely essential.

If you want to go from that intermediate, messy middle level to getting to that expert level, because what I know to be true is that right now, If you've found some strategies that work, you probably know everything you need to know to really go deep and do this well, but you need to trust yourselves and you need to overcome any of those limiting beliefs and adopt some new mindsets to help you get there.

Honestly, that's what I focus on in my mastermind is helping people believe that more is possible and then helping them see how to get from where they are to where they want to be. Because when you believe that it's possible and you know that you have what it takes to get there, then it's only a matter of time until that becomes your reality and having the support along the way.

Is invaluable. It's absolutely invaluable. Especially if your friends and family don't understand what you do. Non entrepreneurs do not get it. I love my entrepreneur friends. I love being surrounded by them because they get it.

They know what I'm going through. They can call me on my BS and they, they can help me see the things that I can't even see myself. In fact when I was pivoting and starting over and I had to go in and cut all sorts of expenses, including team members and all sorts of things because COVID destroyed my business.

One of the things that I refused to cut from my business was a mastermind that I'm a part of and it's expensive. It's a 25 grand a year mastermind. I literally would have sold my house and moved to a new place before I would have left the mastermind. And that says a lot because I love my house. I love where I live, but I know the value of the mastermind.

It's just one person. Saying one thing throughout a year. And I make that money back in an instant when they can show me where my mental blocks are, then I can learn to move beyond them and get the momentum that I need to have the success that I want. I will never run my business again without being a part of a mastermind because I don't need more strategy.

I'm not there to learn more tactics. I'm there for the support. I'm there to be surrounded by people who know me, who know my business and who can call me on my crap so that I'm not held back by it. And who can. Leverage their own experience to help me see maybe where I might be making little mistakes and need tiny course corrections.

It's absolutely amazing. Plus they're just way fun. They're my favorite people in the whole wide world. They will literally become your friends because when the people that you're surrounded by don't understand what you do. You can only be so close to them, but when somebody truly understands what it's like to be an entrepreneur and they understand the vulnerability and the fears and.

How hard it is and the motivation and just all of the struggles that go into it. It's really bonding. It's really validating as well. I mean, to be seen and understood and valued for who you are. Is so incredibly valuable and will help you move your business forward as well. So if you're interested in being a part of the brighter together, masterminds, you can go to, wearebrightertogether.com and apply at the time of this recording.

I currently only have. Six openings for the mastermind. After those six are full of that, you will go on a wait list until I'm ready to open another group. But I would love to consider you as a member and the brighter together masterminds. If you have any questions, there's a link below in the show notes where you can ask me questions directly. You can send a little video to me, or you can reach out to me via Instagram, DM at @JamieBrightAdventures, which is also below in the show notes. because here's what I know to be true. It's so easy to just. Keep buying more courses and hope that one of them is finally going to work for you and waste a whole lot of money in a year. I mean, think about how much money you've spent on courses. if you're like most people, You spend a lot more money, maybe a little bits and pieces at a time, then you probably want to admit.

And many of those, either aren't fully done or maybe not done at all. Or you've done them and now you've moved on to the other next tactic and the next, next tactic, and you keep moving around and moving around and moving around and you're just not getting the results that you really need to, because it's not about more education.

It's not about more strategy. It's about the mindset, the community, the focus and everything that you need to support you moving forward, which is why a mastermind is so valuable. So we'd love to have you in there. wearebrightertogether.com and would that my friends remember, I mean, funny that this comes right after the website link, but we truly are brighter together and the world needs us.

So let's go out and make it brighter.

Are You Thinking Too Small in Your Business Jan 26, 2021

Show notes

Mastermind Promo Show Notes Links:

Apply to join the Brighter Together Mastermind and get all the details by clicking here.

>>> http://wearebrightertogether.com

Have questions about it? Contact Jamie directly on Instagram @JamieBrightAdventures

Transcript:

A few weeks ago, I had an incredible conversation with my friend, Jay Wong. Now I've known Jay for years. I think it's years now. Wow. And we don't connect super often, but when we do connect, we go deep and he's always somebody whose advice I value immensely. And over the last few years I have watched Jay go from struggling to sell a course on how to start a podcast to running this incredible multi, multi figure agency, helping people deliver podcasts.

And he's grown this massive team and he's just crushing. It he's even made some big pivots. And he said something to me in our conversation that I've heard before, but he said it at just the right time to really shape how I'm thinking about 20, 21 and subtly shift the direction I'm going in this year. And I cannot wait to share it with you in today's episode ð So Jay and I connected again because we ran into each other on clubhouse and we had this really phenomenal conversation about how we were using it and how we were planning to use it this year. And so we did this whole little clubhouse room on it, and afterwards we hung out together and talked for at least another two hours and.

Caught up because I don't know. I think we hadn't talked in about a year and a half since we were at tribe live together in Toronto a year and a half ago back when people could still meet with each other. Oh, I miss in-person events so bad. Don't you? Anyways, we were catching up and he was telling me about the incredible.

Progress that he had made in his business and how he had shifted into this agency model and had to grow as a leader and really build this incredible team because he was so beyond the point of being able to do it all himself. And in order to scale his agency, he knew that he had to bring other people on to help him do the work.

I was just so impressed by his progress, but even more so by the personal transformation. But he had to make in order to become the kind of person who can let go of control and really allow other people to do the work for his clients, for him on his behalf, which is, it's just a big shift.

Anytime you have a team, you know that they're never going to do it exactly like you would. And even if their quality is good, it's really hard to find people who can consistently meet the quality that you meet and hard to find people who care as much as you do. And all the things, it just requires a massive leadership shift, and you really need to change your mindset and learn to let go of a lot of control.

And honestly, a lot of fear of being judged because that's kind of where this all stems that comes from building a team and hiring other people to help you do the work. And it was just a beautiful thing to see how he had done this. And so I told him that and he said something really profound that helped shape the, the entirety of my thoughts over the next few weeks.

He said, you know, I've really. Built a business for where I want to go and not for where I am now or something along those lines. I'm terrible about remembering verbatim. And he talked about Wayne Gretzky, who was asked why he was such a good hockey player. And he said, well, I skate to where the puck is going.

Not to where the puck is right now. And I started thinking about my own business. I've been growing this mastermind, which I love so much. And my original goal with all of this is to get back to a seven figure business, which I could totally do on my own.

With just running, you know, several small groups of no more than 12 people and getting to that point. And that's been my goal. I'm like, okay, I'll start these groups. I just need eight of them to hit seven figures. But I realized that to grow beyond that, I'm going to have to hire facilitators.

I'm going to have to hire other people to come in and help lead the masterminds as well. So as I've been leading my mastermind, I've also been developing a handbook, Something that I can use with the facilitators and give it to them so that they can follow the same process and they can use the same frameworks that I'm creating and give people an experience.

That's basically the same as if they were in a mastermind with me personally, and then they will have access to me, in the larger group. But I want to really be able to equip these facilitators. To run a mastermind in the exact same way I would and help people get the exact same results that I'm getting with the groups that I'm running.

That's always kind of been the plan. It's always been in the back of my mind that I would run the first several. I would figure out this process and then I would scale it by bringing other people on to help. Well, what Jay's comment made me realize is that I'm skating to where the puck is right now that if I.

Spend all of my time and fill it with running eight different groups, which I know I can do sustainably. Like I know how much time it's going to take me. I know that I can totally sustain eight groups, but I can't sustain running eight groups. And. Have the time that I really need to invest and it growing and empowering the facilitators to be true leaders in the mastermind.

And it hit me really hard that once I get to that seven figure point, it's going to be really hard to scale because my time will be the bottleneck again. And so I was skating to where I thought the puck was going to be in a year, but really I need to skate to where the puck is going to be in two years or where I want to be beyond that.

And it shifted a lot for me because. Instead of me. Doing eight masterminds all myself, eight groups within the mastermind. It's one mastermind, but with lots of small groups, because I really believe that you need to have that connection with a set of peers. And it gives me the freedom to make sure that people are in a group that's perfect for them.

But. If I do eight of them, I'm going to get to that point. And I won't have the capacity that I need without either handing off one of the groups to one of the facilitators or something else. And it just getting out of that point and scaling seems so messy. And so instead, what I've decided to do is I'm going to start bringing on facilitators earlier.

Now, I don't know how many groups I'm personally going to run, but I'm probably going to start either the second or third one. With a facilitator and be co-running it at first with the full intention of handing that mastermind off to the facilitator. and then I would just still be in the main group with everybody, but they would be running that specific smaller group within the mastermind.

And if I start that now, Not only is it going to help me avoid having a bottleneck later on, but I'm going to have a better sense of what I really need to do in order to bring on multiple facilitators in order to have a bigger team. And what really excites me is. Well, honestly, what really excites me is empowering people to empower others.

So I love helping people become leaders who can empower their audiences. And so instead of me running masterminds, I'm even more excited about me. Helping develop leaders who can empower people within my mastermind and go out and take those same skills and use them in their own businesses. So it, it seems subtle.

It seems small, but it really is a massive shift in my mind. And it changes some of the strategy that I'm going to be using this year as I move forward, because I'm going to Bri bringing in facilitators sooner than later, which is exciting for me because. Really my role as the leader and the visionary is going to be.

To develop the leaders who can then develop the members of the mastermind because masterminds, generally, it's not me teaching it's me facilitating and everyone in the group who is very carefully curated to be in there supporting each other and growing together. And you know, you get to see behind the scenes of everybody's businesses over a long period of time.

You don't just see the Instagram highlights. You actually see what works, what doesn't, you can't get that kind of knowledge and experience. Anywhere else outside of a mastermind, it's really a beautiful, valuable thing that you get. And so it's not about me coming in and teaching this big curriculum. I don't do a ton of teaching.

It's me helping facilitate these masterminds and curate the right people in them so that you can learn from each other and support each other. There's a lot more to it. You can go back and listen to some of the episodes I did in October of 2020 to hear more about why masterminds are so valuable, but I am really excited about this because my heart is in leadership development and yes, that happens in a mastermind, but.

I really get excited about bringing on people to help lead within the context of my business. I really spent a lot of time learning how to do leadership, how to manage a team, how to it's kind of like a mentorship almost. And it just, it excites me in a big way. It also raises a bunch of new questions for me that I don't really necessarily have answers to yet.

Like. Where do I find these people? are they already people in my mastermind? Are they other entrepreneurs? What are the qualifications they need to have? Because obviously if you're facilitating a group Of entrepreneurs. You need to understand what they're doing and be able to point them to the right resources and all of those things.

And yet, if they're running their own businesses, how much time did they have to do this? How many should a person be running? all sorts of different things that. I haven't got answers to yet. how do I pay them? How much do I pay them? All of these things, lots of it. And I'm really excited about that.

But those questions weren't even on the radar before this conversation that I had with Jay and that one little comment he made has really helped me shift my thoughts to, how could I create a business that supports a thousand entrepreneurs in my masterminds, And what would I need to do differently.

In order to go there now. Like how could I start that now? Why should I wait? And if I wait, how am I going to pivot? And that was, that was huge. So I'm really excited about where I'm going this year with this still love masterminds. I think they're incredible. I, haven't done a public opening of my mastermind since October, but I am going to be opening it again soon.

And like I said, I'm not sure exactly how many. Mastermind groups I'm personally going to be running. I've got one that I've committed to running for sure. And I might run a second one, or just start a second one in hand that went off. So if you have been around here for a while and been thinking about joining my mastermind, when it opens up again, Highly recommend reaching out to me on Instagram @JamieBrightAdventures.

You'll notice it's a new Instagram handle. There's all sorts of details about my name, change on Instagram. I'll share more about that in the future, but for now you can go there. It's also linked in the show notes and drop me a DM. I don't have a big fancy. Mastermind details page going. It's not open right now.

but if you really want to be in the mastermind that I am leading, for sure, I have a very small handful of spots left in the current group. And I would love to chat about potentially having you inside there. If you feel like that would be a good fit. And honestly, I truly believe that even with other people facilitating masterminds, that it's going to be amazing because they're going to use my foundation we are all going to have one big group. So all of the different mastermind groups that I'm going to be creating will have access to each other and me, but the groups that I lead obviously get more intimate access to me. So you can always reach out to me if you're interested in that. Or if you want to hear more about it, I'm happy to give you all the details on how often we meet and how much involvement I have, because I will absolutely be involved in this. I love doing these masterminds are on my heart.

You've known that since the very beginning of the podcast, if you've been listening from the beginning, but just wanted to throw this out there for my loyalist of podcast listeners, if that's you. And you've been thinking about this now now's the time to reach out because, like I said, I only have a couple of spots left in the current mastermind that I'm leading before I start a second group.

And I would love to consider you for it. If you would really like to be in that group with me. All right, my friend. So my question to you then is. Where are you going? Where is the puck going in your business? Are you building a business for what you're doing today and only focused on what you're doing right now?

Or have you taken the time to think about where you're going and what needs to shift in order for you to go where you really. Truly want to go for me? The shift from thinking about having a hundred people in my masterminds to a thousand is a pretty significant one. And I believe that by thinking about a thousand people, as opposed to a hundred, that I'm going to be able to create a structure that'll grow more easily and help me avoid future bottlenecks.

If I was just thinking about a hundred. So while you're thinking about where your puck is going. Think about if I was to 10 X, that number would there be bottlenecks? Where would I run into problems shifting from what I'm doing now to really truly scaling. And that is your assignment for this week, would love to hear how this might help you in your business and give you more clarity on where you're going and hear about any shifts you're making.

Reach out to me personally, Instagram @JamieBrightAdventures. I would be happy to have a little conversation with you, super fun. And would that my friend just remember that we are together and that the world needs us. So let's go out and make it brighter.

The Big Shift I See Happening in the Online Business Space Dec 11, 2020

Show notes

Join the Waitlist for the Launch Your First Mastermind Workshop here >>> https://www.launchyourfirstmastermind.com Have questions for Jamie or are you interested in the Brighter Together Mastermind? Contact Jamie directly on Instagram @JamieBrightAdventures Sign up for podcast email reminders here >>> http://brightentrepreneurpodcast.com/email Transcript: One of the most fun and admittedly, sometimes frustrating parts of running an online business is that things are always changing. This means you always have something new to learn and figure out which can be really fun if you get bored quickly with doing the same old thing over and over again, but it can also be incredibly frustrating. If it means that you're getting left behind and the market is shifting and you haven't kept up. Now, if you are at the forefront of this and you see where things are going and you can react quickly being the first in your market to make a massive shift that everyone kind of follows suit with, it can be a huge benefit. And so today what I want to share with you. Is the shift that I see happening in the online education space that I am watching very closely and I mean, I've been in this business for just about 10 years now. So I've been watching and I know when the shifts are happening and they happen every, I would say every 18 to 24 months. And we're right on the edge of another big one. So that's what I'm going to share with you today in this moment, ð cast Well, 2020 has been one of those years that many of us never want to go through again. One of the beautiful things that has happened is that many people have started online businesses. Now, this is really exciting for me because I know that when I realized I could have an online business that gave me the freedom and the life that I really wanted to have, I was all in. Like, I literally remember the day that I found the pro blogger site from Darren Rouse. And started reading it and was like, Oh my goodness, I could do this. I could totally make money helping people. And it blew my mind. Like I was completely consumed for the entire day. And for months thereafter, I just got really excited about it and I know how much it's changed my own life. And so I get excited to see all of the people who are realizing the opportunity that's there for them and the freedom that they can have even though 2020 has been a really hard year. And some of them are starting businesses because they have to, because they've been laid off from jobs or whatever it is, , which admittedly is very difficult. I really believe that many people are going to look back on this year, especially those who started online businesses and be really grateful for the transition that happened. Now, that being said, for those of us, who've been here for a while, it means that the market is. Becoming more flooded. There are more and more people starting online education businesses, and each niche everywhere, not just online education businesses, there's even box subscriptions and e-commerce and all sorts of stuff starting. So no matter what you're selling or what you're doing, if you're selling online primarily to an audience that's online and you don't have a brick and mortar store, your going to start to have a lot more competitors. This year, the people who have been selling how to start your own online course and how to start an online business type of resources have been flourishing. In fact, I have friends who do that exact thing, and it's been a really great year for them, but that means as people start implementing this. And selling their stuff. The market is going to become more and more saturated. Now this can be really hard and this can be really scary to go through and it absolutely can affect your bottom line. If you go back to season one of this podcast, back when I was called the personal brand journey podcast, you can all listen to what happened in my own business. When a few years after starting it. The market flooded with all sorts of people, teaching in the professional photography education space. It was hard. I actually lost half of my revenue over two years because I didn't realize what was happening and I didn't take measures to protect against it. And it took me quite a while to recover. You can hear the whole story and the very first episodes of season one, that being said. I don't think that you have to be afraid of the fact that the market is going. To be more flooded with people. You're going to have a lot more competitors. I think you just need to do three things to respond. Clearly. That's going to keep you ahead of the game and it's going to help you stand out from everyone else. That's just started their online business and is offering stuff to your clients. And really help elevate you as the expert in your field in a way that maybe you haven't stepped into yet. So I want to share these with you because these are hard earned lessons that I learned after. I went through this experience and struggled through it. the first one is one of already talked about a few times in the last couple of months is you need to get more personal and connect with your people. One of the things that got me out of my slump back when the photography market flooded was moving from a generic bank brand to a personal brand and really focusing on how I could build real connections with people in mass. My photography business has 120,000 email subscribers. So you can't connect with each of those people one-on-one. So I had to learn how I could build that connection, how I could build that familiarity, that personal connection, where people felt like they knew me. Even though I may never have even seen their name or had any idea that they were out there listening, watching, learning, et cetera. And the reason is that people buy from those, they know like, and trust as more and more people are offering the same types of products promising the same sorts of outcomes. The thing that's going to make them decide who to hire. Comes down to who they feel, understands them best. And the people we feel understand us best are those that we've connected with and that we trust when we can show them that we understand their deepest fears, their struggles, and we can show them solutions for getting out of that. Give them quick wins that help them gain momentum. They're gonna. Believe that we understand their problem more deeply and can help them with the bigger stuff as well. They're going to want to keep working with us. So you definitely need to focus on being personal, both in your own brand and being the face of your business as well as mixing in as much. Personal touches. You can. And I have a whole episode, like I said, a couple episodes back about how to be more personal in your business that will give you lots of ideas of how to do that. Whether you have 105 email subscribers, or you've got 120,000 email subscribers, that's definitely worth a listen. Number two, I believe there's going to be a massive desire for experiences instead of just. I believe that if you want to stand out from, what's been done for the last five or six years, which is mostly online courses, video courses with maybe a Q and a session or something. I think one of the biggest things you can do is to offer implementation experiences, a virtual retreats, some sort of opportunity to connect with other people to come and get stuff. Done and to have a whole experience. That's not just learning. It also incorporates doing in a very tangible way, where at the end of the experience, they're going to have something completely finished and they're going to feel that excitement and that big win. Now I. I have seen a number of people doing implementation days with their students, where they offer to say, Hey, if you want to come and we'll all just work together and I'll kind of be there to answer questions and guide you through it. Um, you know, it's a certain amount of money. We'll all hang out on zoom and we'll get her done. Another thing that works really well is masterminds, which is part of why I'm so excited to do this because I believe that, , having that connection. And that ongoing experience, not just one off is incredibly valuable. Now this kind of actually leads me into the third point. So I'm overlapping a little bit, but bear with me not only do we need to be personal. Not only do we need to create experiences instead of just education, but I really believe that we need to be offering something to the advanced people in our specific niches. Now, when people start their online businesses in a topic, like when I started teaching professional photographers, how to book clients. I focused on helping the beginners because I didn't feel that far along. I had a lot of insecurity about being seen as the expert, and I knew that there were always way more beginners than there were experts. And so my market was going to be bigger if I focused on beginners. That's great. But if you've been in this business for any amount of time, or if you really know your topic inside out, you're going to find that all of these new people, I would say the majority of them are going to be focusing on how to teach beginners, which is great because what's going to happen is that there's going to be more people who are beginners, who actually start to make some progress. And now. Are looking for that intermediate to advanced thing that can help them take what they just learned and implement it in a deeper way. And new people coming into the industry, rarely have anything set up that is going to help people beyond beginners to really advance in their fields. So if you can take your offerings and think about how you can serve that intermediate to advanced audience better, not only. Are you going to have more people who are ready for that because of all these people who are flooding your market. So that's one of the positives of it, but you're also going to be able to charge more, which allows you to make more money, which is fantastic. And. Oh, and this is so beautiful. You're going to be seen as an even greater expert because you're talking about the things that are more advanced and not just beginner stuff. And it's really easy to fall back into the trap to speaking to just beginners. But when you can shift that conversation, To a higher level conversation. You're naturally going to attract more advanced people into your business. It's all based on the conversations they're having. And my guess is if you're anything like me, you are so tired of having those same beginner conversations anyways, and it would be really exciting. To have deeper level conversations with people who are further along in your topic or your niche that you can help in a deeper way. And you know, personally on my side too, I love working with people who aren't beginners. I mean, I love my beginners. I have nothing against them. But I really love working with the people who are more intermediate or advanced in growing their businesses, because they're my people, they're there. They've done some of the work they've shown that they get progress. They're not the ones who are going to let limiting beliefs hold them back nearly as much because those people are weeded out at the beginning. Right. They never get past that beginner stage. And so it's easier to get them results and it's just more satisfying. My favorite kind of people to work with are those who are more advanced because we can have deeper conversations. It's more thought provoking for me. They have stuff I can learn from them. It's just one of these win-win wins all around and because it is more advanced knowledge, I can charge a lot more for it. So it brings me back to masterminds. I truly believe. That masterminds and running masterminds in a variety of different topics, not just in the entrepreneur space or how to build a business space, but having a mastermind structure, even if it's not called that is going to become more and more popular for people who want to stand out as experts. And honestly, People want this more than ever after having been stuck in their homes and being forced to cancel their travel plans and not see the people they want to see and live the lives that they've normally been living, which are full of people in connection, people are hungry. To be a part of a community. They need someone to believe in them more than ever, and they are ready to move beyond this beginner stage and really dive into something deeper with other people. They value that energy more than they ever have before. And that's why I'm so excited about masterminds, because I think that. Does this so well, not only does it provide that personal touch and the experience, that's not just once, but it's ongoing month after month after month, year after year after year. And it allows you to work with your best customers and clients and have those deeper conversations to really see them make massive growth and really just get to. Believe in them. It's so fun to be able to cheerlead them and guide them and not have to be providing all that basic how to content, because they already know it. It's not something they're joining because they want more information. It's something they're joining because they want more support. They want somebody who can help them see what's possible and then help them. Understand what that next step is. You know, masterminds are more about getting that one comment or that two comments a year that totally make your money back because they were the right thing in the right moment from somebody who knows you, trusts you and understands what you're going through in your business, that maybe you were just too close to see whatever it is. I get really excited about them because they're also a lot of fun. And I think that fun and friendship and connection has been lacking so much this past year. So I would love to challenge you to think about as you're going into 2021, what's happening in your marketplace. Do you see a lot of people starting to teach in your marketplace? And if you're still focusing on beginners, which is fine, I'm not saying you can't help them. I'd encourage you to think about how can you be more personal with them. How can you build more experiences into your business? Not just courses, but actual experiences where people get to connect with each other and implement something and come, even if it's virtually, which I assume it will be for a while yet, but come do something together and then have a tangible outcome by the end of the day or, you know, multiple days, whatever it is. And then three. Okay. I would have you consider if maybe serving the higher end market with a mastermind might be something that can help you elevate your expertise and serve those more advanced customers and clients better. So if you want help with that, I'm currently working on putting together a mini workshop. It's not going to be super long. It's not going to be super expensive. that's called launch your first mastermind. And basically it's how to launch that very first mastermind and what you need to know in order to price it appropriately. Find the right people, get them to sign up and get this rolling as quickly as possible as well as what mindset shifts do you need to overcome in order to do this? Because when you start doing a higher ticket offer, working with more advanced customers and clients, sometimes that can stir up some i…

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What is Clubhouse and How do I get a Clubhouse Invitation? Dec 05, 2020

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Sign up for podcast email reminders here >>> http://brightentrepreneurpodcast.com/email Follow me on Clubhouse @jamiebright Transcript: A few days ago, I got an invitation to clubhouse, which is one of the newest, fastest growing apps that I have heard about in space in a long time. Now clubhouse is So you can't even get in. It's similar to how Pinterest and launched way back in the day. And so it's causing a lot of buzz and a lot of scarcity and people really wanting that exclusive invite so they can get inside and see what all the fuss is about. So today what I'd like to do is actually tell you a little bit about my first impressions of the platform and why I am so incredibly excited I really hope that this one makes it and sticks around it has a of potential, especially for people who love it. Audio, which I assume you do since you're listening to my podcast and for people who really want to connect with others in a meaningful way. So that's what I'm going to talk about in today's podcast. here's what I want to share with you. First and foremost, I want to talk about what clubhouse is, how it's run, what it looks like on the inside, why you might want to get an invitation to it that talk about. How do you actually get an So you can be a part of clubhouse. And then third, I'm talk to you today about some of the opportunities see clubhouse bringing to the table and how I personally am going to be approaching it in a strategic way. Hopefully both to grow this podcast as well as, you know, the rest of my business, because that's what I am. I'm an entrepreneur. I want to, you know, move forward. I want to grow my platform. I want to help as many people as possible. So I always want to be growing my audience. So when new apps like this come out, I love to think about how I can use a platform, both in an innovative way, but also an interesting way. That's going to make people who are checking it out, want to follow and watch what I'm doing and emulate it. I want to provide great value on the platform. And then two, I'm always thinking about different ways that I it creatively. To grow my audience as well. So I'm going to share you here and give you tips that I've gleaned in the couple of days I've been on it. So I will say I'm not a pro at clubhouse. I haven't been on it very long, but I do think that this is going to grow and I think it's going to grow quickly. And I'm very excited about the possibilities and want you to be one of the bright entrepreneurs in the know about it from the very beginning, even though it's not quite the very beginning. It feels that way because everyone started talking about it. Okay. So number one, what exactly app look like? Well, the app is actually quite simple, basically, having a list of zoom rooms that you into that have the inside listed. So right let up my app and see if I open up the clubhouse app. I have what's called the hallway. And there's, um, somebody talking about having a big impact in business and life by fostering outstanding relationships. Cool. Interesting. There's somebody talking about small business Saturday, we've got money to spend on your amazing products, which allows you to come in and pitch your product. How cool is that? Um, there's travel speed dating. Are you my future Bay? Okay, so I'm not into that one. That's fine. Somebody talking about sexual consent in the church, somebody talking about time travel, let's talk about it. Right? There's all sorts of random things in here. Some of them are going to be pop culture. Some of them are going to be business-related. so this is called the hallway. And if your friends and the people you're following start a room, then you will see this in your hallway so that you can also enter that room and join the conversation. So you click on a link to join a room. When you join a room, you're hearing people talk. Live now, there are no recordings that you can go back and listen to later. And I think that's part of the appeal is that if you're not there, you miss out on it, but that's also part of the beauty of it that these are conversations happening with real people. And it's voice only. There's no video and there's no. Chat function like you can't sit and chat in the comments. So that's how it's different from zoom. For zoom. You can go in, you can have a big zoom meeting and you can have your video on and off or your audio on and off. Or you can chat in the comments. It's not that way in that there's no video at all. There's only a profile picture and there's no chat. So the only way, if you want to talk, you actually have to raise your hand and go onto what they call the stage. And the person who starts the room gets to moderate that. So they can allow people to talk or not, and they can mute people. They can kick people out, they can do all the typical moderation stuff, but. It's a beautiful platform because you're actually hearing people have conversations live. What I've found is that these rooms generally stay open for quite a long time. People come and go and it's explicitly said on there that it's not rude to ghost within clubhouse. So if you come into a chat, you're not having it, or you've got to run or whatever, you don't have to say. Sorry, guys got to go. You just quietly leave. Actually the button even says leave quietly, which is just. Super beautiful and really graceful so that people don't have to feel bad breaking a social norm about communication that outside of the platform might be seen as rude. However, because the platform is made on conversations and it's meant to listen in and participate. They totally understand if you have to go and you don't want to interrupt the conversation that's happening, especially if you're in a room with a thousand people who want to talk or have a conversation. Now, most of the rooms are quite a bit smaller than that, that I've found, but there are some rooms that are quite a bit bigger. So it's a little bit like zoom in that you do have a room. But you don't have video. You just hear voices, but you can go back out into the hallway and you can see all the different rooms that are listed. And so it's just really addicting. It's really a beautiful platform for you to go in and have conversations about whatever it is you want to have a conversation about and really talk to real. People, I absolutely love that so much. And there's so much support in the platform that I've found. And people have been really gracious to people who are new coming in and learning the platform for the first time and engaging for the first time. So I love it because I feel like it's a very personal real app. You actually get to engage with people in a real way, because voice is really personal. It's part of why I love podcasting because podcasts that I listened to, I feel like I know them. I hope that you feel like, you know me in some weird little way. And so there's a big appeal in this app because it does feel so authentic. You can't, sit and type out a post for 20 minutes before posting it and make sure every word is right. You've got to talk. And when we talk things come out sometimes and we can talk over each other and be rude, or we can be polite or, you know, we have to learn to moderate when it's a big group like this. And it's really an interesting platform in that way. the other thing that they have not just rooms is they have something called clubs. Now you have to manually apply to have a club, which clubhouse is new. I mean, right now, as I'm recording this podcast, it is definitely in beta. There's definitely some bugs and. They are rolling things out pretty quickly, but it's still taking a little time. So clubs is something that they have to approve for your account manually. So the process is very slow. You fill out a form that's on air table at the moment. Like that's how old school get her done done is better than perfect that they are, which I really love about them. And you can request to have a club that's associated with your name. Now, if you have a club, people can actually follow the club. And if you want to, you can approve them as a member of the club. You can invite them to actually be a member. So there's kind of two tiers, and then you can start a room that's hosted by your club. And when you do that, it actually goes out to all the people who are following your club as a notification, which is super cool. And you can schedule things on a calendar. For upcoming conversations that you want to have on the platform. So people can go up to a calendar and if they're following your club and you've posted it from your club, they're going to see that you don't have to have a club to schedule your conversations. You can actually do that even without a club, but it's definitely neat to have a club because then you can do things that are members only, or that are open to the greater followers of your entire club. It's just another way for you to. kind of help set yourself apart as an expert in a specific kind of topic or niche, or like I'm doing. To build a community on clubhouse. So mine is called bright entrepreneurs. Guess what? That's because I'm trying to create a movement, a bright entrepreneurs and a community, a bright entrepreneurs. And I just really love that format. I want to be known as an entrepreneur who knows her stuff. I want to grow my own podcast right here. The one you're listening to. So, shamelessly, I'm just going to ask you to share it with friends. You think would like it, but. As I build my profile on clubhouse and I build a club for bright entrepreneurs, which I haven't even had approved yet. So I don't have it there. I'm kind of in that waiting period, which they said can take one to two weeks right now because of their backlog. But assuming that that gets approved, then I can grow this club on their, not just my own personal followers. But followers within that club who then get notified of anything we do there, which is just neat, because then they don't have to follow me as a person if they're not interested in some of the other topics that I'm hopping into and having discussions around. And I will use that club very intentionally to talk about business stuff, similar to, like I talk about here on the podcast, I can share my, things I'm thinking about in terms of growing my business or. Anything really the beautiful thing is because it's not recorded. I can share the same thing over and over and over again with new people, I can get a little bit more intimate and I don't have to worry so much about it being perfect because it's in real time. And once it's done, once it's said it's gone, it's like conversation. I love it. It's a little bit more like being in a conference, but virtually, and I just adore it. I mean, yes, there's some differences because not everyone can be in a room talking at the same time, like at a conference, but it's a really beautiful way. To find people who are interested in topics that you're also interested in, either by you posting them and starting rooms, and then letting other people who find the room, come in and start the conversation and naturally be attracted to you. But also by going on the platform and finding conversations that are already happening around your niche and joining in on them and really showing your expertise. It's great. All right. So how do you get an invite to this? Well, you have to know, but he was on the platform. When I joined clubhouse, I was given one invitation, which I passed on to a mastermind member. Who's in the brighter together. Mastermind. Yeah. And we have a little chain there. That's going. So once somebody gets in, they commit to inviting the next person in our mastermind who commits to inviting the next person in the mastermind until all of us will get in that way. But you only get one invitation when you join. So I don't have another invitation to give you right now, but apparently if you go in and use the app and the people that you invite go in and use the app, you. Somehow earned some sort of clout and you can get more invitations each week. If you're active in your people are active. So you only want to invite people who, you know, are really going to use the app and be active on it so that you can get more invitations and bring more of your friends. So you can try and find a chain of people who are doing an invite train, I did one on a. Facebook group that I was a part of somebody had their one invitation. They got that week. And so they said, okay, I'm going to give it to the first person who comments below as long as you absolutely promise to invite the person who's right below you. So that's how I got in is that I was able to get in through an invite, train that way now. you might have to find one of those on Facebook. You can put up a post, like I did on my profile that said, Hey, I would love to have an invitation to clubhouse. If anybody knows anybody with one, I would love to join. that's kinda how I got tipped off to the fact that there is a group with a big. Chain going on. So that's one way you can find an invitation. The other thing is that you can sign up on their app and apparently they have a waitlist and you may be sent an invitation via text message eventually. Now, I don't know anybody who got in this way because everybody I know, came through a chain and an invite process, but that is what they say they do. And so. You can go to the app store and download the clubhouse app. You can actually reserve your username, which is fantastic. Even if you don't have an invite, go reserve your name right now. And hopefully they will eventually send you an invitation. If you don't already get one from somebody else that you know, now there's a little bad news for my Android users. it's only available on iPhones or iPads. I don't know if they're going to be coming out with an Android version eventually or not, but honestly, if this is a platform that you want to get to know and access and build, especially if you have a podcast or you just love having conversations. I think it would honestly be worth going out and buying a cheap used iPad or iPhone that you can use just to run the clubhouse app. And maybe you're just like, heck no, no way. That's fine. That's totally cool. for me, if I could get something for one to $200, I really think there's a lot of opportunity to grow a big audience on clubhouse right now, pretty easily. Because so many people are looking for people to follow. They want to find their people. And it's very active right now, but so many people are new that they're afraid to start their own rooms and put themselves out there as a leader, because they're trying to learn the ropes that there's just tons of opportunity. It's just a beautiful playground right now. And I think you could grow very large, very quickly and become known within the community if you wanted to go there. And I don't know if this platform is going to stick around. I don't know if it's going to be bought up and sucked up and whatever. I mean, maybe it's going to be like Periscope where people came on and it was big for like six months. And then Facebook lives rolled out and it basically killed Periscope and, you know, whatever else. But even if that…

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How to Get Unstuck & Regain Momentum in your Business Dec 02, 2020

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Interested in a Clarity Coaching Day? Contact Jamie directly on Instagram @JamieMSwanson Sign up for podcast email reminders here >>> http://brightentrepreneurpodcast.com/email Transcript: I have a confession to make back in September, I ran a 52 mile trail race, which is crazy. I know it's, it's like a double marathon in an entire day on super remote rugged trails. And I talked a lot about it back in October during my launch series, which was a five-part bonus series that I use basically to launch my bright future method workshop. but here's what I want to confess to you today. I have hardly run it all since my race. And I am super out of shape and I was feeling really, really awful about it. I was feeling like, man, I am never going to be able to get out on the trails again. And I know that sometimes we get that way in our business as well. We feel like we're just not making any progress that we are just stuck. We've lost our desire to do anything. And we're approaching that burnout point pretty dang quickly. So today I want to talk about how we can get unstuck and start making momentum in our business. So I didn't mean to get out of momentum with my training and take such a long break, but back in August at the very height of my training where I was literally running a half marathon one day and a full marathon. The next out on the trails to train for this insanely long 52 mile race. I tripped. I fell. I fell in the woods and the sad part is it wasn't even on a super technical part, but I clipped my toe on a root or a rock or something. And I felt now I didn't fall particularly hard, but my left knee hit a rock and it must have hit in such a way that. It heard it kind of bad. Now it didn't like injure it where I couldn't run on it. In fact, I didn't think anything had really happened, but as I continued finishing my run and I think I still had another, I don't know, six to 10 miles left after that point. So it was on a long run. It wasn't a short run. Um, I got back to my car and my knee was really starting to hurt and it was starting to flare up. And so I took kind of an easy week and I didn't do a lot on it. I gave it some time to heal and I knew it wasn't like a massive deep injury, but I also knew that it needed a little bit of rest. And so I gave it some rest. And the next weekend I went out and I had had my longest week, or it was like 18 and 32. I did my 18 miler and I did it really gently if that's possible. I know this is insane. Just bear with me and. When I did that, I'm like, okay, it's, it's a little sore, but it's not bad. And so the next day I went out to do my 32, which was my longest, just one. And I got a mile and a half in and I'm like, Nope, turning around, going back because it was already starting to hurt and starting to hurt. More than it had the day before. Like I could tell that if I continued running on it and did a full 32 miles, it was not going to be happy. And it might actually keep me from being able to do the full race, which was September 12th. I took three and a half weeks and I barely ran it all. I did a couple of very short runs, but I was really wanting my knee to heal so I could go out and do my 50 mile race. And I talked about tapering. And a past episode during that bonus series. So you may want to go listen to that because it was really interesting experience where my brain also felt like, Oh my gosh, I'm losing all of this running, you know, this athletic base that I've built up. And it just, it was really hard for me to step away and be wise and wait. But then I got to the day of the race and it was amazing. I, my knees didn't hurt hardly at all. At the beginning, it was a touch sore, but not bad. And I was able to run the entire thing. And the last section was actually really hard on both of my knees at that point, just because it's a lot of miles. And, um, I knew I wasn't injuring it. I knew it was just sore, but it was still hurting. And so anyways, I took quite a bit of time off after the race, because I really did not want to have long-term injuries in my knees. And I wanted to let them heal. I just run literally six, 700 miles over a summer, and I love being out in the woods, but I had some work stuff that had to happen. I was going to be launching. And so it was a pretty busy time. It was actually kind of nice to have a lot of my time back to work in my business instead of being out in the woods, even though I love the woods, I was training for a good 15 to 20 hours per week, which is a pretty insane commitment. So I intentionally decided to take a few weeks off and see how my knee was doing well near the end of October, I started hiking and running on it again, and it was still a tiny bit sore, but it wasn't too bad. And so I was getting out there. I wasn't training long miles like I had been, but I kept finding excuses for staying in the weather was changing. It was icy. Now it was. Not fun. Um, there was a couple of weeks, like two separate weeks where the weather was gorgeous and I spent pretty much the entire week outside as much as I possibly could. And those were wonderful, but I still knew I had lost some of my base having not done a ton of running since the mid middle of August. And then hunting season hit and hunting season in Minnesota means I need to stay out of the woods. Because people are shooting guns and hunting season is very prevalent here because a lot of people actually rely on the meat that they get from deer to get through the year. And it helps their family in a massive way. So I have no problems with the deer hunting season itself, but you're not going to find me in the woods. With people hunting. I do not want the chance of a stray bullet hitting me, even if I'm in blaze orange, just because I want to go out and run. And many of the trails around here, I actually closed for a solid two weeks. So that came as well. And here I find myself this past week and it had been a couple of weeks, three weeks, almost, not quite since I had ran at all or hiked or anything. And I was just feeling so unmotivated And I know that I lost a ton of the athletic base that I had worked so hard to build, and I was really feeling discouraged and I knew that I just needed to get out there and start doing it again. And that it would come back eventually. But just the thought of going out one in the cold, because now it's full on winter here too on the ice, which is slippery, which means you can't really run it all and you have to be a lot more careful and it's just more miserable. And just three being out there knowing that my body couldn't do nearly as much as it could in this past summer, it was really just disheartening. Like it felt depressing. And I'm sure the fact that I haven't been exercising also made it feel worse because that really releases a lot of endorphins. And man, I come alive in the woods. I just forget. And part of me just wanted to hibernate. All winter long, eat all the delicious foods and just give up for a little bit, you know, like we all have those moments when we're just like, ah, screw it. Let's just eat all the things and sit around and whatever it is, right. We have our, we all have our things. And so here's what I did because I'm like, you know what? My ski season is coming. It's not here yet. I was hoping it would be here by now, but we don't have snow enough to ski, unfortunately. So until then I knew that if I just waited, I might just get super lazy and lackadaisical all winter long because maybe it's going to be a winter without a lot of snow. Maybe I won't be able to ski hardly at all. And I didn't want. To lose out, not just on the athletic base, but the energy that I get from exercise. I didn't want to lose out on the habit that I have when I exercise of just getting outside and more than anything, I didn't want to lose out on the stillness and that peace, joy, and love that comes from being in the woods and being quiet. I mean, I love to find places of solitude to just sit. And meditate or contemplate or whatever, or pray, whatever word you want to use. And just soak up the silence. There are so few places where you can get true silence and winter, especially as beautiful as for silence because the snow just dampens all the sound around you. And so I knew I needed to get it back out on the trails, and I knew that the first few times they're going to be. Pretty uncomfortable, but that it was worth it. And that if I wanted to get back up to where I was, or even part of the way back up, that I just needed to get out there. And I also knew that I probably hadn't lost as much as I thought it just feels that way, our brains just tell us these stupid things. And so. If you're in your business right now, and maybe you've just been exhausted, maybe getting kids figured out what their schooling options has been really frustrating and exhausting to you, or going back into lockdowns or the holidays. I mean, there's all sorts of stressors. All sorts of stressors around us that might be dragging you down that might be cutting into your energy level. That might make you feel kind of stuck. And maybe it's been harder than normal. Maybe the conditions haven't been, what you've needed them to be. Maybe you're having limitations placed on you because of COVID or whatever it is. This year has been especially difficult for many people, not everybody, but for a lot. And the ones who get through it are the ones who finally say, you know what, despite all of this stuff, I'm going to make a commitment to moving forward anyways. And that's what I did as well. I'm like, you know what? Yes. It's cold. Yes. It's IC. Yes. It's kind of miserable. And the sun rarely shines this time a year here. So it's going to feel really dark and dreary and yes, I've lost a lot of my base. And so it's going to be really a lot of extra work. And when you're hiking through snow, it's especially just all this stuff, right? Oh, this stuff, all the stuff. I had a hundred excuses. And what if my knee isn't good enough? Cause it's still feeling pain and whatever else. And I just said, Nope. I'm going to commit to going outside at least 10 minutes a day. And I'm going to say specifically outside at first I was thinking, Oh, I'll just do any exercise, but I know for me and my spirit, I need to go outside. I need to have that solitude, that quiet that I get from nature that I can't get anywhere else. And so. I did that. I decided, okay, I'm not going to commit to 10 mile runs. I'm just going to say 10 minutes now. I will absolutely stay out far longer than 10 minutes, but it's just committing to something tiny that starts me moving forward and gives me momentum that is going to help me get back into the pattern of getting up every single day. Doesn't matter if it's raining and it's disgusting or it's sleeting or whatever else. 10 minutes is all I have to put up with it. Right? And by the way, the rain can be really fun, right? If you embrace it and you come at it with an attitude of, Oh, this is different, what's lovely about this. And if you don't worry so much about getting dirty and you let yourself jump in the puddles and play and be a kid, it's actually one of my favorite things to do. It's very fun. So don't let the things that you're like, Oh, that sucks. Stop you from doing what you need to do. So the first thing I would say, if you're feeling stuck is one, make a commitment to doing one small thing. Every single day, that's going to start you moving again. And if you only do the 10 minutes or whatever it is, that's okay. That's okay. That is a win because you are taking action and getting back into momentum. Number two. Tell people about it. I don't know about you, but I am a woman of my word. And so if I tell somebody I'm going to do something, I do it. So I went to the people in my mastermind and I said, Hey friends. I need you to hold me accountable to getting outside at least 10 minutes per day, because I know that if I tell them I need to do it, then I'm going to do it. And I'm going to show up and say, okay, here's my pictures. I was out there, proved it today. And I know that it's going to help me continue building this habit of getting outside. That's going to help me reestablish this base that I've lost. That really is going to make my momentum grow because. This is the same in business, not just exercise. We will get far more from taking small, consistent action over time. Then we will, by doing one big, massive, crazy push and then crashing for a month or two and feeling burned out and then coming back and doing this crazy push where it all consumes everything we do. And maybe we get really great results from that, but it can really cause you to burn out fast when you do it that way. And if you can find a more sustainable habit, practice, whatever you want to call it, that you can do small amounts of every single day and move in the right direction. That's going to be far more valuable to you and sustainable to you than these massive pushes that then. Leave you burned out where you just want to abandon ship for a while because when you have momentum moving forward, just a little bit of an extra push every little day, or every Workday is going to be far more effective than, you know, think of pushing a rock. If you, once it's moving, it's easy to keep going, but if you let it stop, then you've got to put a lot of effort into getting it going again. So it's really important that we keep our momentum going. And even if it's just 10 minutes of something that you know is going to move your business forward every single day, put those 10 minutes into practice, there's probably something that if you did it every single day, you know that that's going to keep you moving forward and growing faster, maybe it's reaching out to somebody every single day and asking them personally, if they'd like to be a part of what you're offering, maybe it's reaching out to network with other people who have your same audience to see if you can be on their podcast, or if they want to connect or be a JV partner or whatever it is. I'm sure. Reaching out once a day to see if somebody wants to collaborate over a year is going to open up some incredible opportunities for you that you've never even dreamed of, or maybe it's doing Facebook lives or emails or blog posts or whatever it is. But if you take a moment right now and think about it, My guests, if you're truly a bright entrepreneur, is that, you know, that there's something you could be doing every single day that would move you forward. That really isn't a lot of time that you could commit to right now. And then you could find somebody to tell who can keep you accountable, which is the second part The third thing. Is to remember that there will always be something that could hold us back that we could use as an excuse. And when we do that, we're actually being a victim. We're actually playing that victim card and saying, Oh, these external things outside of my control are keeping me from doing it. Sure. I'm not going to be out in the woods during hunting season, but I absolutely could go to some of the parks around here that don't allow hunting and have done some sort of workout there or been out in nature there. I didn't, they're not my favorite. They require me to drive a little further, but I use…

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Are You Doing ALL the Right Things but your Business Still Isn't Scaling? Nov 29, 2020

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Interested in a Clarity Coaching Day or in joining the Brighter Together Mastermind? Contact Jamie directly on Instagram @JamieMSwanson Sign up for podcast email reminders here >>> http://brightentrepreneurpodcast.com/email Transcript: It can be incredibly frustrating when you know, you are doing all of the things that you're supposed to be doing, but it's still not getting you the results that you are waiting for. So what's going on? Why is this happening? Why aren't you getting the results as fast as you'd like? Well, we're going to talk about that in this episode. So we just celebrated Thanksgiving here in the United States. And my daughters were helping me make the meal because this year due to all the COVID restrictions, we just celebrated as a family and didn't invite anyone outside of our household, but there's still nine of us to feed. So it's a lot of work. And I remember dreaming of a day when I would have my oldest, daughter's able to help me cook and to do stuff in the kitchen and just celebrate holidays together with, so it was actually quite lovely. It was kind of the fulfillment of a personal little dream, but something happened with my second daughter. Her name is Britta and there was something that she did that just hit home really deep for me. And I wanted to share it with you today. So. Brita was tasked with the job of making whipped cream. Now, I don't know if you've ever made whipped cream before, but it is the easiest thing ever to make. If you have a mixing bowl with a whisk and it's very good, it's the best thing you're ever going to have. So if you haven't ever made whipped cream from scratch and you like with cream, all you have to do is go buy some heavy whipping cream. Grab some of your favorite sweetener. I like plain sugar. You could also use maple syrup, whatever it is you like to sweeten things and then use a little bit of vanilla. Now there's no like hard and fast recipe, but you put it all in the mixing bowl. And then you whisk it and you just have to let it run for as long as it takes for it to get stiff peaks. So what that means sounds super dirty, but it's not what that means is when you lift the whisk out of the cream, it'll be, it'll leave a little peak. Like you'll, you'll see where it came out. It'll kind of create like this little. Mountainous little thing. It won't just flatten out kind of like milk does. If you pull a whisk out of milk, it's just going to drip, but as it thickens, you'll get to that stiff peak. Now you have to be really careful and stop at that point because if you continue to whisk it beyond that, you're going to end up with a very sweet butter and it's going to start to separate. And so really that's the only thing you need to worry about is watching. The cream while you whisk it so that it doesn't over whisk now, depending on the speed of your mixer, this might only take a few minutes or it might take longer. And so it's not hard. You just have to pay attention. So my daughter, Brita put all the stuff in and I don't know how much sugar and vanilla to put in. I'm like just put it into taste, teaching her, you know, how to trust herself, which is a great lesson for all of us. And to go off what we think is best and, you know, dip your finger in and give it a little taste and see. So you can get a sense of what it's going to be like when it's done. So she put all this stuff in and she started whisking it and fuchsia standing there starting to get a little bit bored and she's like, it's not working. And I'm like, honey, you just put it in and turn it on. You got to give it some time. And so she stood there and she let it whisk and we were doing a double batch. And so our bowl was quite full. So we couldn't put it on very high at the time because it would have splashed out the bowl. We had to wait for it to thicken up before we could increase the speed of the whisk. So she's waiting and she's waiting and she's waiting and she's getting bored and she's like, mom, This is not working. Like, what am I doing wrong? Why isn't this working? And I said, don't stop. Just let it keep going. You're not doing anything wrong. You just have to keep the whisk moving. It will thicken up and it's time. So she did. So she waited and then all of a sudden she's like, mom, I think it worked now because we were doing it quite slow. I think it took us a good 10, 15 minutes, which is a little longer than normal, but because the whisk was going slower, it was going to take longer for it to bring air in to the cream and for it to do its magic. Now, I don't know exactly how it works. I just know that it does that as you whisk the air. Into the heavy whipping cream that eventually, if you do it long enough, it's going to turn into the most magical whipped cream you have ever eaten in your entire life. It's just lovely. I'm sure there's some beautiful science behind it. I don't know what it is. I'm sure a quick Google search will help you find it. But we got to that point and we turned it off. And then I explained how, if she hadn't turned it off, if she had walked away and just let it go forever, it was eventually going to separate and turn into butter and. We talked about how that's such a good lesson in life that sometimes we're actually doing all the right things and all we need to do to get what we're dreaming of. It's just keep doing them and be patient. And that is so stinking difficult. Right, because we think if we do all the right things, then magically, we're going to have the results that we want to have. But sometimes especially in our online businesses, and this is where I see people getting stuck in the messy middle all the time is that they're doing the right stuff. And they want to grow faster. So instead of just continuing to double down on the things that are working and keep it simple, they're like, Oh, well, I'm going to do this too. Maybe I need to do this. Maybe I'm going to do that. And they, they have this whole FOMO marketing thing, like this fear of missing out that if it's simple and it's easy, That they're not going to be able to grow fast enough and they're not going to have the results that they want. And so they've done all the things they're supposed to do. And so now they've got to do more, to get more money and to grow faster and get their audience bigger and whatever it is, they develop new products. They have more and more offers and more and more upsells, they do more and more marketing channels. And before you know it they're overwhelmed. They have lost focus on the things that really matter. And they either stagnate for a good period of time or burnout or start decreasing in income and revenue. I've seen this many a time or all have some mix of all of those things. So here's what I want you to take from this quick little example that came from Thanksgiving dinner. You might be doing all the things right. But you just haven't done it long enough. Some things take time before they really start to work. One of the things that I have learned that I know now as a bright entrepreneur, who's got almost 10 years of experience having done this online. Full-time what I have learned. It's that consistency and a regular frequency is one of the most powerful things we have for growth. And that small, consistent steps is far more powerful than going out and doing this new, big, massive launch or this new, big social media channel or whatever it is that when you can stay laser focused on what you know works when you've got messaging that attracts the right people, when you are. Really truly helping your people be transformed when they purchase your product or service or whatever your offer is. And when you know that you can sell, right, you can find your people, you can convert your people into your product and you can get them results. And if you know that that's working, then all you need to do to grow is continue to double down on that. You don't need to do a hundred million different things. In fact, that's going to draw your focus away from what you need to be focusing on. And so how do you know. If you actually are doing the things right, and you just need to wait or maybe your messaging is off, or maybe your conversions are off, or maybe you're not attracting the right people. That's a totally different problem. If you're not attracting the right people, you can do it all day long for years, you can grow a massive audience, but they're not going to buy your stuff. That's a different situation now, how do you know the difference? Well, one, you can look at your numbers. And I talked about that a few podcast episodes ago. So go back and listen to the episode on knowing what to focus Cassandra grow. But two. If you have people around you, whether it's a coach or other experienced entrepreneurs who have been there, who've done that. Who've grown successful businesses and who know you and your business, they can help be Amir for you to know if what you're doing is really right as you gain your experience. And as you've done it, like I have grown a seven figure business. I've been doing this full-time for almost 10 years. It'll be 10 years in March. And. I know what works and what doesn't. I know what's aligned with me and I can tell when it's just a matter of time, in fact, this whole mastermind thing that I'm doing. I feel so confident about that because of my prior experience. I know I have my messaging down. I know I have a funnel that converts. I know at this point, it's just a matter of showing up consistently finding more people, continuing to talk about the brighter together, mastermind to get people excited for it. So I know from my experience that that's going to work, I also know because people who are close to me who know my business really well, actually, people I'm in a mastermind with. Not that I was meaning to bring that in, but it's absolutely the case. These are the people who know me best the ones I've been masterminding with over the last three and a half years. And Stu McLaren's mastermind. They've told me, I see what you're doing. This is perfect for you. It's only a matter of time until your success is there. They know from their experience of building seven figure businesses that yes. This is right. This is simple. I'm known for masterminds, or I will become known for them the more I keep talking about them and that's going to help me move forward. And so I've got my self validation from my own personal experience, which if this is your first time building a business, you might not have that yet. And so I can understand why you might think you need to do all the other things. But if you are in a group of other experienced entrepreneurs who are like-minded, they have your values, they understand you and your business and your goals. They can be a mirror to reflect back. If this is actually a good idea, or if there's something you're missing that you can't see because you're too close to what's there. So at this point, if you've done all the things, you might not need more information, you might not need to do more new things. You might just need to double down and keep doing what you've been doing and have some patience. Keep reaching out, keep doing the stuff, just double down on the stuff that's working. Well, I can say this over and over and over again in a million different ways, but you need to know if that's the case or if it is a messaging issue or is it, if it is a conversion issue, so you can talk to people who know you and your business. Well, if you have a business coach, you can talk to them and get that validation that yes, you're doing all the right things. Just keep doing it, ask them for accountability and. It's that simple. I know. It's just like, what really is it really that simple? Yes. It can really be that simple when you know that your business is built with intention, with focus and has a very strategic plan for moving forward. You know, your messaging, you know, who you want to reach, you know how to get in front of them. You've got Supreme clarity about how to get them into your products and services and offers, whatever it is you're selling, you know how to convert them into your business. And then once they're there, you know how to transform their lives and give them the outcome that they are looking for, and then leverage them to help you get more. You're going to grow. You are going to grow. You are going to get so much momentum and you just have to keep showing up and keep doing what you're doing. Keep consistent and not give up. Because you're not having growth as fast as you were hoping, or because you think you need to be doing all these other things that you're gonna let yourself get distracted by a bajillion different new projects. If you're sitting here listening to this and you're like, man, I don't really know for sure. And I don't know anyone who can tell me if I'm on the right path or not. You have two options. Number one, I do have a couple of clarity coaching days left, where I would love to sit down with you. Look at your business and help you find the things that are really working and make sure that your strategy is both strategic and intentional to help make sure that you're attracting the right people, that you can convert them into customers. And that you're serving them really well. That's one of my gifts is helping you cut through the mess so that you can simplify down. Get Supreme clarity, and then just do the stuff you need to do to move forward. I have some of those. So if you're interested in that, you can go down to the show notes and reach out to me personally. And then number two, if you are interested in being a part of a larger group of entrepreneurs who can get to know you intimately, that you can mastermind with going forward, who can be mirrors for you so they can say, yes, this is right. Just keep doing this, or, huh. Maybe you need to look at your messaging or maybe this isn't resonating, or maybe you should try a funnel that's like this because it makes sense with X, Y, Z, right? When somebody knows your business, they can give you really clear and helpful feedback because it's specific to who you are and what your business is. And they can leverage the experience that they have gained through growing their own business. And help you with that because really, truly the difference between somebody who's successful and isn't is their experience level. They've got the experience, they know what works. They know what doesn't, they've had lots of failures too. And so they can use that to grow faster when they're starting over, which has definitely been the case for me in my own new business that I've started. So if you're interested in being a part of a mastermind, I do have mastermind groups available right now. They're on an invite only basis. They're not like open to the general public. So you'll have to reach out to me and talk to me about it, but there'll be no more than 12 people in a group so that you can really truly get to know the other entrepreneurs around you. Very intimately. if that sounds good to you and you want go ahead and reach out to me either for the coaching day or t…

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