It's in the Making

This episode answers the number one question at the moment “Should I be selling at the moment? If so, how?”. In this episode, I talk about my own struggles in this area and give you some ideas on how you can be selling during this time of crisis. The short answer is, yes you should be selling at the moment! I make the following points in the episode:

1. You need to survive. 
2. There is actually more money out there than you think. The governments are pouring money into household incomes to support the economy. Those who are suffering financially are being supported. 
3. Don’t over dramatise this. Stop making statements like “Noone can afford me at the moment”. This is a mind game you are playing with yourself. There may not be as many people that can buy, but there are still a lot of people who can & actually want to.
4. Make Adjustments. You may need to pivot and change things up a bit, but you can still sell. Just make sure that it will serve your audience and is relevant to what they are experiencing right now. It might mean you advertise and push a lower priced item during this time.
5. Get your messaging right! Your messaging and how you communicate with your audience will make a difference in your sales right now. Don’t turn off and pretend that nothing is happening, speak to the current climate and offer solutions. Your message will mean everything. 

Get my free guide How to navigate your creative business through Covid 19. I want to see you not only survive this, but thrive! All the best!

Links mentioned in this episode: 

• FREE - Email Template for Florists
• FREE - How to navigate your creative business through Covid 19.
• Amy Porterfield Episode 307. 
• The Village Markets - Insta Market idea.
• Summergrove Estate - A wedding venue offering Virtual Tours. 
• Amanda Jane Jones - Rainbow window display that went viral. 
• Tess Guinery - Prayer Wall
• Amanda Jones (The Honest Jones, One Minute Film) - Audio/Video Live
• JJ Heller - New Song written. 
• Figtree Pictures - Messaging Example
• Married By Josh - Messaging Example

This episode is a special bonus episode with guests from different places around the globe. I gathered a few of my favourites together to share some encouragement and advice with you as you navigate your creative business through this crisis that is currently disheartening the entire world. We’re living in such a crazy time.

If you’re wondering how you’re going to navigate your business through this time, or you need some positivity and encouragement - this episode is for you. We’re all in this together. Now is not the time to give up, lose heart or spiral into a negative trail of news articles. We can’t be in denial, but we can step up, show up & do our part to help our communities get through this together.   Let me give you a word of confidence during this time of uncertainty - you will get through this!

In this episode you will hear from: 

• Laura from La La Social Club
• Brooke from Brooke Art Studio
• Riz Macdonald from Foundd Legal
• Ashlyn Carter from Ashlyn Writes
• Amy Parfett from the Wed Shed
• Abby Muendel from Abby Muendel Photography
• Annalise Maddrell from Going Bare
• Swell Magazine

Resources Mentioned inside the episode: 

• FREE Riz Macdonald's (Foundd Legal) Business Challenge
• FREE Ashlyn Carter’s Copy Swipes
• FREE Email Template for Florists during the Coronavirus
• FREE  Checklist “How to get your Creative Business through COVID 19"

In the episode I answer the following frequently asked pricing questions: 

1) Is there a formula for pricing or do I just need to guess my prices? 

There is a pricing formula! In this episode I answer 7 questions and this is my most popular - Is there a formula I can use or should I just guess my prices? I also put together a Free Guide that will take you through the Pricing Formula. If you’re a visual learner (especially when it comes to numbers) I think you’ll find it very helpful. 

(answer inspired by business finance hero Shanna Skidmore)

2) How do I price correctly when everyone else in my industry isn’t?

Stay in your lane! There is more to this answer, but basically, I just encourage people to not look at the competition, but rather, look at the data and the facts. To run your business and for your business to be sustainable you NEED to price properly.

3) Should I list my prices on my website?

I encourage you to get in front of your potential buyers in a conversation through email, over the phone, or by skype. If your prices are on your website, you may deter some people from even contacting you. These people may actually be willing to pay your price after you take them through a nurturing sales process. In a nutshell, you want to have as many people enquire as possible to have the best chance at converting the most people into high paying clients. Inside the episode, I give some ideas of when you need to have your prices on your website, but these are only in unique cases.

4) How should I price my services to friends and family?

Short answer - just be consistent. It’s up to you!

5) Do I have to raise my prices to make more profit? Or is there another way to make more money?

You can do other things such as decrease the costs in your business. The other option is to get more clients, but that’s not usually the desired outcome because that means more time investment. Basically you have two options to increase profit - increase price or decrease spending.

6) If I know I need to increase my prices, what do I do with current clients on retainers? 

Communication is key and incrementally increasing your prices by 10-20% (no more) at a time. It’s also important to show how you’ll be adding value with the price increase. This will reassure current clients. Obviously, if you have one-off clients, you cannot increase your price.

7) What if people don’t book me because my prices are too high?

You don’t want everyone to book you. The aim should be to get 30% of your enquiries turning into clients. Not everyone. Not everyone will pay your price and that’s ok.

Links mentioned in this episode: 

> Pricing Formula - This pricing formula guarantees profit every time.

> Hannah Murphy & Jess Shipton Episode

> Copywriter - Elise Hodge

> Copywriter - Ashlyn Carter

> The School of Beautiful Business - Waitlist

> Two Warm Hands - Ceramicist

> My facebook group “Make It - The Creative Business Podcast”

> Shanna Skidmore

In this podcast episode I’m interviewing Riz Macdonald! She is the owner of a company called Foundd Legal that helps people like us, creatives, designers and makers, stay legal & protect our businesses. Now this is something I know nothing about so I was so excited to be able to pick Riz’s brain for you guys. Here is just a few of the things we talk about in this episode:

• Contracts
• When and who to use contracts with
• Privacy policies
• Terms and conditions
• The importance of all this legal stuff

Riz breaks down everything into simple language, which I really appreciate. And to make things even nicer,  she has a beautiful accent to listen to. 

Links mentioned in this episode: 

> Foundd Legal website

> Foundd Legal Instagram

> Riz’s Instagram post about using contracts with friends

> Mailchimp

> Active Campaign

Are you struggling to attract your ideal client? Are you posting on instagram and hearing crickets? Do you feel like your business isn’t growing and you’re not sure why? These are all questions that my guest today, Sandra Chau, is going to be answering. Sandra transformed her business and many other creative businesses with visual strategies. She provides tips on how to use cohesive imagery in your business, how to make your Instagram look aesthetically pleasing and how to take and find photos to use in your business. This episode is all about how you can implement a visual strategy in your business and strengthen your brand. 

Links mentioned in this episode: 

> Sandra’s Instagram page (a great example of strategically used, beautiful imagery)

> Sandra’s online School of Visual Branding

> Sandra’s website

> Stop Looking Like Everyone Else - Free Online Workshop

> VSCO - an awesome photo editing app Sandra uses

In this episode I interview the queen of productivity, Hannah Murphy. Hannah is a university student with a business on the side (wow!) The fact that she can manage both studying and a business is testament to the fact that this girl knows how to organise herself! In this episode, she shares her story and also her batching tips and tricks. We use the word “batching” a lot, so for those who don’t know, batching is grouping similar tasks together and doing them all at the same time or on the same day, in order for you to work most efficiently. Hannah breaks this concept down further in the episode through a little mini training session. Hannah so kindly broke down her batching strategy into 5 simple steps. Here is a little sneak peak into the 5 steps: 

1. Work out when you want to work. This one's my favourite! She says the first step is to figure out when you actually want to work and how often you want to work. This way you can make sure your work doesn’t interrupt that dream life you’re trying to create. 
2. Brain dump all the tasks you do. Hannah thinks there is something really liberating and powerful about getting out a pen and paper and writing absolutely everything down that you do in your business. 
3. Categorise each task. Once you have it all down on paper, you can categorise the tasks. A little Marie Kondo style! Sort and group together similar tasks for optimal organisation. She gives some really great examples of how she does this in her business.
4. Plan your batch days. Now that you know what’s going on in your business, you can plan your week out and allocate similar tasks on the same day. 
5. House them somewhere. Lastly, Hannah encourages creatives to house their tasks in a project management tool. This way, you don’t have to try and remember everything you’re doing, your project management tool can do that for you. Her recommendation (and mine actually) for this is ASANA. It’s the best!

I hope that you enjoy this episode as much as I did! All the best with batching your work and creating a more productively, and ultimately, more profitable business!

Links mentioned in this episode: 

> Hannah’s freebie - How to Create a Productive Schedule in 30 Mins

> Asana

> Hannah’s Instagram

> Hannah’s Pinterest

Rest. It’s such a beautiful word! One of my favourites actually. The word brings warmth, breath and joy to my heart. I mean, who doesn’t love rest?! Usually when we think of rest we think of sleeping, time out, holidays and a binge session on Netflix. But, in this episode, I want to talk to you about a new type of rest that doesn’t come immediately to your mind.  What I want to share with you is a ‘rhythm’ of rest -- of soulful rest, that can transform your life. This is not a sleep, it’s not a holiday (although all of those things are very healthy and very important) it's a rest for your heart. A time to reinvigorate your heart, soul & mind.

In this episode I will share with you: 

1. A break down of my own definition of rest, “to cease from work in order to remember, restore and return. Remember what’s important, restore what may have been lost, and return rest to others through service”. 
2. I also breakdown what I mean by rhythm and what a rhythm of rest is. I talk about rhythm being a song and I how believe that rest needs to become a song in your life, a beat that you sync your life to. 
3. I talk about adopting a daily rhythm of rest and what that might look like. I talk about my daily rhythm. We get really practical with ideas on how you can rest daily and have this become a routine &/or spontaneous thing each day.
4. I share with you my weekly rhythm of rest that I call the Sabbath. I talk about why I have a Sabbath every week and why I think the Sabbath is important. I share with you briefly what the Bible says about the Sabbath and why I believe that God loves rest and wants us to rest. Despite your worldview and belief system, you’ll love this concept of a weekly rest. So don’t tune out  just because I mentioned the word “God”. This episode is for everyone - I promise!
5. Recently I’ve been inspired to have a monthly rest pattern and I talk about some ideas for this inside this episode too. 
6. My husband and I have unintentionally been having a yearly rest pattern. I want to share with you what this is. It’s not just a holiday, sipping kombucha by a pool (although that is great and I’m totally up for that too!). It’s about a yearly rest rhythm that aligns with my definition of rest - remembering, restoring & returning. It will all make sense to you once you’ve listened to the episode. 

I talk about a few Biblical concepts in the episode that you might be interested in delving into deeper. In this episode, I look at the concept of the ‘Sabbath’. If you’re interested in learning more about this, I’ve put together a free guide where you can have a look at some passages in the Bible yourself and see what you think. Interested? Here is the link.

Links mentioned in this episode: 

> Nancy Ray on monthly rest. Nancy talks about a monthly rest, but also a daily, weekly, yearly rest too. Nancy is a kindred spirit. I was inspired by this episode, which made me reflect on my own life and the way I incorporate rest. You can listen to her episode called “Rule of Life” if you’re interested in more content on this topic. 

> FREE GUIDE - “Biblical Business - The Rhythm of Rest”. If you’re interested in going deeper into what the Bible says about the Sabbath or you’re interested in learning about why I do the Sabbath the way I do, download the freebie and take a look for yourself about what the Bible says.

> My facebook group “Make It - The Creative Business Podcast”. I hope to have more actual conversations with listeners on the page, so if you’re wanting to chat, that’s the place to be.

In this podcast episode, I catch up with Elise Hodge to talk about ‘About Me’ pages. Elise is a copywriting wiz and also has a Christian blog called She is Light, but also teaches copywriting to creative entrepreneurs. She helps creative women craft compelling copy that will convert prospective leads into paying clients. Inside the episode we unpack more of Elise’s journey as an entrepreneur and we look at 7 amazing points on how to craft a compelling ‘About Me’ page on your website. Her 7 points are:

1.     Your about page is not about you
2.     Introduce yourself
3.     Identify your customers problems
4.     Expand on the problem
5.     Insert yourself as the solution
6.     Tell your story
7.     Include a call to action

In the episode, Elise goes into detail and explains each of these points, so it is definitely worth the listen!

Links mentioned in this episode: 

• www.elisehodge.com.au
• www.sheislight.com
• The Bible – Matthew 5:14-16
• Elise’s About Me page
• @elise_hodge

We live in a world that has come to hooray the hustle and congratulate the busy. It's true, that we even find value in how busy we are and we think THAT is success. But success is not busyness. ‘Busyness’ is a facade to the problems and issues we face in life and business. Business is a strategic and smart way to face the issues in your life & business. 

It is possible to have a smart business, not a busy one. In this episode, I talk about my journey from busy to smart. I outline 4 things I did in my business to turn it around. Here is a snapshot of those 4 things that I did to make my business smarter: 

1. I assessed what was working & what wasn’t working and focused on the things that were actually moving the needle forward in my business. The things that weren’t working, I quit. 
2. I increased my prices & set a limit on how many clients I needed. Increasing my prices, meant I could reduce the amount of clients I needed in my business. This meant I was working less and making more money. 
3. I developed a smarter marketing strategy. We often can get so busy marketing in ways that aren’t actually bringing in revenue. I identified what marketing strategies were bringing in money and focused on these few things. I then said no to other marketing opportunities.
4. I developed better systems! With good systems in place, I could work less and save time on mundane tasks. I will give you examples of how I did this in the episode.

Freebie: My Top 10 Business Tools for Creatives

In this episode I connect with and interview a great friend of mine, Jasmine Flamenco. She is a serial-preneur! She's had her hands in a lot of creative pies and has recently settled into a Graphic Design business where she creates some beautiful and unique logos, websites and designs for other creative business owners. During the interview we talk about  Jasmine’s journey from studying graphic design at university, working for Graphic Design companies and then doing her own thing. I also pick her brain around the importance of visual branding, a logo, a website & a pretty Instagram feed. I think you’re going to love some of the really practical tips she gives us on all things visual in a creative business.

To connect with Jasmine, follow these links to her Instagram page and website.

Links mentioned in this episode: 

• The Wild Now
• Tess Guinery - Apricot Memoirs and The Moon Flower Monologues
• Brendon Burchard - High Performance Habits
• The RE Club