Do Weekly Podcast

Welcome back dear listeners! Welcome back to the Do Weekly Podcast!! We talk about challenges and how a Blue Whale intros a podcast courtesy of resident co-host, Natalie Maclees!

Also, don’t mind the birds in this episode providing background vocals!

Our challenge from last week was to find a newsletter to advertise in. The idea here to find newsletters that have synergy with your business (newsletters that go out to people who would be a good customer fit). I tried using ad networks (which some of them have newsletters in addition to website ad zones). I placed inquiries at a couple other places and thus far it hasn’t turned into a positive result.

Natalie decided to advertise in a newsletter related to Natalie’s new accessibility-focused web development and consulting business.

Random observation for the week: Birds make the best backup singers when recording a podcast episode.

This week’s challenge is to find a business (possibly a competitor) that your business that has an affinity with yours, meaning your businesses offer complimentary services. The idea is to have a conversation with these business owners to see how you might each help one another. It’s not necessarily a partnership, per se, it’s really about finding business opportunities where you can help promote one another.

Natalie does accessibility work but I do not. Natalie doesn’t offer copywriting or SEO. Even though we both do the same type of work we can still help and promote one another.

SO find three businesses you can reach out to, engage, and have a conversation about how you can each help one another.

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes or Apple Podcasts or whatever the fuck and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash

Random fact for the week: Hello Kitty’s last name is not Kotaro or Rodriguez. It’s White.

The post Episode 046: Reach Out to Other Businesses appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

If you listened to our last challenge you completed a S.W.O.T. Analysis of your business. If you didn’t complete the challenge you owe me cookies (but not Natalie, just me).

A S.W.O.T. Analysis is a tool that one can use to analyze their business opportunities, strengths, weaknesses. This not-so-simple process provides business owners insight into their industry’s changes, challenges, and more. it helps biz owners focus their attention in the right place.

Both Natalie and I completed the challenge. Did you?

I worked with my Marketing Coordinator to tag team on what our points were from the S.W.O.T. Analysis. Having another perspective was a good idea because I know what I know and often, I have tunnel vision when it comes to my own business — the second opinion provided additional perspective which helped to round things out more firmly.

Random advice for the week: A hungry Tiger makes for a shitty roommate. Same goes for hungry Hippos…

This week’s challenge is to find an email newsletter related to your business/niche and see if there’s an advertising opportunity find it and then advertise on it.

The idea is that if you can place an add in a channel where there are potential customers then there’s a chance you can shake loose a few different leads. It’s worth a shot and may prove more effective than a blanket ad campaign on Google or FB..

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash

The post Episode 045: Find a Newsletter to Advertise in appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

Our last challenge was super simple. You had to give your time away. For free. Did you do it? We sure did! That’s the idea behind our podcast after all, folks!

Our challenge was to give away some time for free. Rather, leading with value when talking to a prospective customer/client. I have a form on my website that people, who are interested in working with me, can fill out. They are then sent an auto-reply (autoresponder) to book an appointment with me to discuss their needs further. I take about 30 minutes to learn about their business and what their needs are and figure out if I’m a good fit for them or not. If not I try helping them get to where they need to get the help they require.

Natalie also provides this sort of free consultation on her website. A couple of leads took her up on this free consultation, however.

However, you can always hit up your existing or former clients and encourage them to reach out and check in on them. It could lead to more work for you or just a meaningful conversation with the folks who help keep your business open.

Unrelated pro tip – Don’t let random employees or service providers register your business entity domains on your behalf. Register them yourself or you could find yourself locked out of your website!!!!

This week, we’re doing a new challenge (as if you were surprised). This week, we’re doing a SWOT analysis. What I learned was that SWOT is really S.W.O.T., like an acronym or something. Who knew? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

What is a S.W.O.T. Analysis anyway? To understand what it is we should figure out what those little letters mean.

Strengths
Weaknesses
Opportunities
Threats

It’s a good idea to perform a S.W.O.T. Analysis annually to keep on top of changing trends in the market, changes to the business — this will help you focus your business on the things that matter most and understand the business landscape you occupy.

You can do a S.W.O.T. Analysis yourself obviously. However, if you have people working for you or with you ask them to participate and give you their ideas from their analysis since their ideas and thoughts will not mirror yours.

If you want to get better of where you are the S.W.O.T. Analysis will be a useful tool and easy to put into action.

S.W.O.T. Analysis Resources for this challenge

• https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTMC_05.htm

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash

The post Episode 044: Do a S.W.O.T. Analysis appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

Our challenge last week was to make a choice. Either to take a Ferris Beuler’s Day Off OR to mediate each day of the week.

While the challenge seemed easy, I didn’t get the thing done. I didn’t do the challenge. I was stressed and I just had a really lousy week and I didn’t feel like I could get away from my work. I didn’t take the time for myself.

Natalie, the Queen that she is, did the challenge in epic fashion by meditating each day of the week. I realize no one ever says epic and meditation in the same sentence but I just did it! Twice, even!!

The truth is when you don’t take time to take care of yourself, relax, and tend to your mental health you’re going to wear yourself down and lose time. American business owners lose tens of thousands of dollars annually due to a loss of productivity from the every-day stresses of their work.

Time. You wish you had more of it but you don’t. While Nat and I argue over what sort of cookies she’s going to get (pickles and cheese with toasted oat cookies) we all have to move on to the next challenge!

Why should we give away time? It’s a way to share our expertise, establish trust, and overall demonstrate goodwill. As a general rule, it’s a good idea to lead with value. Of course, I had an issue with a lead who came to me and we spoke for about 40 minutes and I gave them a suggestion for their project. They loved the suggestion so much they went and hired someone else to build it! Womp womp!

However, if you’re trying to market a service or product that you have it makes sense to give away your time to refine your offering. Also, if you have customers or clients who aren’t aware of a specific type of service then giving away your time to consult with them about those services will help promote them to an audience more readily willing to buy from you!

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash

The post Episode 043: Give Away Some of Your Time appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

It’s been slog, folks. Time is a precious resource that we don’t have enough of. Tax time has been eating into our time as has keeping up with the books, which leads us to..

If you paid attention to our last episode then you would have known that you were supposed to review your bookkeeping solution and possibly move to a new provider. I’ve decided to move from Less Accounting to Bench.co for my bookkeeping. And then I’ve decided to move from Less Accounting over to Quickbooks Online. I’m basically going to two services rather than one service. But I’m paying a little less, which is great.

The average small business owner loses about forty-four minutes every day due to stress, according to a study of 1,000 small biz owners. That adds up to twenty four working days per year. Crazy right? The average business owner values their hourly rate at $50 per hour. So the stress and worry amounts to about $10,000 per year. That’s a lot of chalupas!

Our challenge this week, well, we had problems agreeing on a challenge for this week. So we’re going to give you a challenge choice this week since we couldn’t make a choice.

Let’s reduce stress for all y’all. Let’s turn off the lights and the TV and turn up for this advice.

Option 1: You need a break or break yourself off something fierce? What? What I mean for option 1 is to take a day off for yourself. If your name was Beuller, you would be taking a day off. Don’t run errands, don’t catch up on work, don’t pass Go and collect $200. Have a nice slow day for yourself. That means turn off your alarms. Have lunch with a friend or loved one you don’t see all that much. Just take a day for yourself. Self care is sexy folks.

Option 2: Natalie’s idea or reducing stress is to do meditation. I have misgivings about meditation but Nat insists it’s a great practice to get into. She recommends finding a few meditation practices on YouTube and watch them. If you’re an Audible member they have a few free meditation practices you can download. They also have a 7-day free trial so you can try Audible out with no risk.

Natalie likes to meditate first thing in the morning in order to get ready for the day. She also likes to do bed-time meditation practices as well. Practicing meditation helps one focus and can help alleviate stress.

So there you go folks, you have a choice. A choose your own adventure, if you will.

What will you do? Let us know in the comments below!

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Oliver Roos on Unsplash

The post Episode 042: Make Your Own Challenge appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

Did you miss us? We sure as f*** missed your smiling faces! So let’s get to it, shall we?

Your challenge last week was to order your business credit report. Nat and I both ordered our business credit scores and it gave us a case of the sads. Let me explain…

First, anyone can order any business’s credit score.

Natalie’s score is better than mine (obviously). I wasn’t counting, though (that’s a lie, I was totally counting). The score is 0 – 100 apparently.

Obviously, banks will use some of this information from your biz credit report (as well as personal credit) to determine with your creditworthiness when you apply for loans or lines of credit.

What can help your score?

Having a line of credit or credit cards, or suppliers you buy from and have a trade or credit line with them that can be a huge boost.

Try to keep a low credit utilization. Make sure you’re making payments on time.

So the information is nice to have but the credit report we received was not all that helpful.

This week your challenge is to hire a damn bookkeeper. It’s likely you already have a bookkeeper. Make sure they’re doing a good job, or maybe just replace them (kidding about the blatant bookkeeper).

I’m using Less Accounting, which provides online accounting and also bookkeeping. Natalie, however, is doing her own bookkeeping.

The good news is that you have many options. You can use a freelancer, an online service, or perhaps a cpa who also does bookkeeping.

Oh, and here’s that commercial we promised you. Do YOU remember this?

Not sponsoring us this week

• 1password – A great password manager that I personally love more than my own family.
• Less Accounting – Online accounting and bookkeeping for small businesses.
• Bench.co – Online bookkeeping for fancy folks.

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Filip Mishevski on Unsplash

The post Episode 041: Hire a Book Keeper appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

Welcome back everyone! Are you ready to jump into things? We are!

Last week’s challenge we signed up for HARO (Help a Reporter Out) to get ourselves a little free PR by looking for story queries from reporters that we could answer.

The process of answering these inquiries, for Natalie, turned out to be a lengthy process. For myself, I provided more of a summary in my responses to those inquiries I felt qualified to answer.

Natalie signed up for four different feeds, General, Travel, Business, and Technology and she would spend roughly ten minutes or so reviewing the reporter queries before finding one she could answer. I didn’t take as much time in sifting through the queries nor did I take a substantial amount of time answering the inquiries. Of the two of us, Natalie was the one who received a response from a reporter. (She’s received two different replies and been featured in two stories).

Is it worth your time? I think so and so does Natalie. All it takes is one small bit of coverage in a nationally recognized publication to propel your business visibility and it costs you nothing!

It’s time for you (us) to find out our business’s credit worthiness. There may come a time where you need to up your business’s game and one way to do that is with an infusion of cash (business loan).

Unlike personal credit reports, business credit reports are not given away for free annually. You have to pay for them. Also, unlike personal credit reports, anyone can obtain a copy of your business’s credit report if they’re willing to pay the $40 fee.

Where can you get your business credit report?

• Experian Business Credit Reports
• Dunn & Bradstreet has a service where they provide a credit report and monitoring (includes 7-day free trial).

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Filip Mishevski on Unsplash

The post Episode 040: Get Your Business Credit Report appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

Howdee-doo dear readers (and listeners)! Did you have a good week! We certainly did! Let’s get right down to it.

Did you revisit your business’s purpose? Natalie and myself hit the pavement and thought about our businesses purposes. I struggled mightily with this.

What is my why? Not to steal the phrase from Simon Sinek but it’s the best I got. I spoke with a man named Arthur Nakane, known affectionately by everyone as The One Man Band. He said something to me that resonated with me.

“The answers are around you; within you, and with you.” 

Arthur’s words helped me formulate what my business purpose is and what it means to me. To do my best work it has to be something I take pride in, that I believe in. I’m motivated by my work and what I do for my clients.

For Natalie, she kept her purpose simple: To empower her clients to be successful and to achieve their business goals. Simplicity is beautiful and not every purpose needs to be a long-winding diatribe of values. I do envy her ability to get right to the heart of a matter.

What is Help a Reporter Out (HARO)? It’s a service that syndicates journalists’ story queries to a newsletter list. Subscribers to these lists may then reply to the journalist inquiry, providing a valuable source and resource to people.

The positive effect of getting featured by a reporter is that you and your business may be featured on a prominent publication. One of my clients, Urban Southern, used HARO to land a story on Fox Business and subsequently saw not only their strongest month of sales ever but also their greatest year of revenue to date.

HARO is a great vehicle to get some free PR traffic to your business and about any exposure you can get is going to be valuable. Make sure to let the reporter know to include an link to your business website.

What to do

• Signup for an account at Help a Reporter Out: https://www.helpareporter.com/
• Signup for the appropriate topics that match your interests.
• Keep an eye on those HARO emails and reply as early as is convenient.

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Filip Mishevski on Unsplash

The post Episode 039: Help a Reporter Out Why Don’tcha! appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

This week’s episode is brought to you by Natalie’s Blue Whale impression. Let’s talk about last week’s challenge!

Our challenge from last week was to read a business book. The book I chose to read was Traction by Gabriel Weinberg, the guy who founded the independent privacy-first search engine Duck Duck Go. The book covers a variety of channels one might use to help market their business. It’s a no-nonsense approach to attain growth quickly by testing these myriad marketing channels quickly.

Natalie opted to read Fix Your Business in 30 Days by Melissa Emerson. It’s a 12-week course that takes you through various aspects of your business and how to fix them. So Nat started going through the book to help her with her own business. Preparation, Purpose, People, Profit, Processes, Product, Planning, and Perseverance.

In all, these books provide a treasure trove of information that is easily consumable. Just make some time to read a chapter and then apply the lessons to your business in whichever way makes the most sense.

We talk about our business’s purpose. Is it a high-reaching ‘flowery’ type of thing? Is it not? Personally, I’m having a hard time identifying my purpose.

With a business, there’s the Vision—the thing that guides your business in what you do, it’s a big picture type of thing that we have to be able to articulate what it is they do. Then there’s the Mission. The mission sets the tone for how you go about your work and how you achieve that vision. The Purpose is your why, the reason you get out of bed.

Why do we get out of bed to take a risk in running a business each day? Take some time and think about it.

A couple other books we suggest are Atomic Habits and also Profit First.

Businesses not sponsoring us this week

Shorthand

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Jordan Madrid on Unsplash

The post Episode 038: Identify Your Business Purpose appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.

Last week we had a challenge and YOU had a challenge. Did everyone do it?

We had a very specific challenge last week. It was to join a local Chamber of Commerce. There are a pair of chambers I attempted to join. One of which never got back to me (still working on that one) and also another chamber (Alta Dena) which I did join. Natalie joined the Chamber of Commerce in the city in which she lives.

Why put forth the effort to join a Chamber of Commerce anyway? Well, for one, it provides an opportunity to network with other business owners in your neighborhood which can lead to potential new business endeavors or projects. You also get to be at the forefront of what’s happening in the business community and gain a clearer understanding of how government impacts your business since Chambers are deeply intertwined with their local government. There’s a lot to learn and opportunity to grow.

Your challenge this week should you choose to accept it.
Read a damn book! Yes, reading books is pretty darn cool. It turns out that books are chock-full of ideas and information that will inspire you to try something new or provide fresh perspective.

That said, we’re not talking about reading a book for enjoyment purposes. You want to educate yourself, folks! We’re recommending, for this challenge, to educate yourself. So what books would we recommend?

Natalie has a book she’s been eye-balling called Fix Your Business in 90 Days.  It’s a 90-day plan to get control of your business and get back your life. Readers will get concrete advice on the problem areas of running a small business with a step-by-step turn around system to build a flourishing enterprise.

I’m going to be reading a book called Traction, by Gabriel Weinberg — it’s a book that provides a number of in-depth tips to help to grow your product or business across various marketing channels.

A couple other books we suggest are Atomic Habits and also Profit First.

As always, don’t forget to leave us that gushy 5-star review on iTunes and what not. And remember, kids, keep it simple and most importantly Keep it Doable!

Photo by Anete Lūsiņa on Unsplash

The post Episode 037: Read a Book appeared first on Do Weekly Podcast.