Small Business Casual: Content Marketing, Productivity, Customer Experience for Entrepreneurs & Creators

Text Emily!

Were you sick of social media, uh, long before yesterday!? 

I'm not alone in the sentiment that modern social media is problematic in a lot of ways. But... don't worry, this episode isn't completely bashing social media! 

I'm showing the value in it as I encourage you to keep going, even when you don't feel like it or don't feel like it's working for your business. 

Social's not going anywhere anytime soon, but how we engage with it can (and should) evolve. This episode is one part social media burnout buster, one part reality check, and one part the pep talk you need to rinse, reset, and refresh! 

You'll get ideas for rethinking how you're using social media platforms and where you're focusing your creative energy to achieve your goals. 

Inside the episode: 

• A social media journey that dates back to the late 90s
• The plot twists and pivots of social media 
• Signs you might need a little more giddyup in your social game 
• Defining your top goals for social media 
• Considering who you're speaking to 
• Evaluating your strengths and aligning them with the platforms you choose 
• Streamlining for your realistic bandwidth 
• Giving platforms a purpose
• Committing to experimentation 
• And more! 

Quotes & Resources Mentioned 

 👉🏻 EXTENDED SHOW NOTES

“Human nuances cannot be fully captured by social media carousels.” - Karen Kenney

FREE coaching mini-sessions with me via Hannah Grimes 

Andréa Jones Mindful Marketing Podcast Episode #357 - Bluesky for Business? Here's the Deal

About Me, Let's Connect!
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I’m Emily Aborn, a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where we spend our time wishing for Summer, hiking, stacking wood for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

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Text Emily!

If your business had a body, how would its heartbeat be? 

Would the pulse be alive and thriving? Or slowly dragging forward? 

In this episode, we’re doing a mid-year check-up on our marketing, content, and messaging! You’ll walk away with the tools you need to do a full scan with clarity, revived energy, and next steps. 

Put on your surgical-grade gloves, get out the stethoscopes, and let's refresh and refocus with this full-body business inventory: 

• Taking the health history: reviewing where you've been the past six months 
• What brings you in? Where do you want to go from here? 
• Checking for signs of life: taking the heartbeat and checking the pulse of your business 
• Digging deeper with diagnostics: running the numbers
• Brain scan time! How's your mindset? 
• Your personalized health recommendations: making a plan to move forward
• And more! 

Resources mentioned: 

👉🏻 EXTENDED SHOW NOTES

Tonya Leigh's School of Self-Image Podcast Episode #444: How to Make the Next Six Months Your Best Yet

Andrea Jones Mindful Marketing Podcast Episode #356: What To Do When Marketing Feels Hard

About Me -Let's Connect!
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I’m Emily Aborn, a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where we spend our time wishing for Summer, hiking, stacking wood for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

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Text Emily!

Do you feel stuck shouting into the void? 

Trapped in comparison? 

Drowned out by the noisy online space? 

What if you don't need another opinion, strategy, opt-in, course, or coach? 

What if you don't need to be more, be less, or dance to the beat of a different drum? 

What if your marketing could be WAY MORE FUN and feel more comfortable for YOU!?

I believe it can, and my goal in this episode is to show you how! This episode will help you turn down some of the outer noise, remove the allure of chasing after the perfect solution, and help you get out there and start doing the work AS YOU. 

You'll get clear on how you BEST show up and express yourself online, in your marketing materials, in your communities and networks, and beyond, so you can do more of what feels good and is true to you. 

• Why marketing can feel like a nightmare 
• You're not too much, and you don't need to be more 
• A reflection question that will shine light on YOUR best marketing techniques 
• Marketing playgrounds for Disruptors, Spark Plugs, Connector Cables, and Quiet Magnets
• A FREE mini-quiz in the extended show notes

Resources & Links Mentioned 

👉🏻EXTENDED SHOW NOTES and Mini-Quiz

About Me -Let's Connect!
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I’m Emily Aborn, a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where we spend time wishing for Summer, hiking, stacking wood for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

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Text Emily!

We all get by with a little help, but... 

Determining what kind of help you need, where to look for it, and how to give yourself permission to ASK for it, that's another matter entirely! 

In this episode, I'll share some common signs that you may need extra hands, eyeballs, or tools in your business and what to do before you bring in the assistance you need. 

• 6 Common cries for help and what they might mean 
• Ways to get help in your business
• Things to have in place BEFORE you bring in an extra set of hands
• Your permission slip to invest in your vision
• And more! 

👉🏻Extended Show Notes 

Resources & Links Mentioned

Jess Mercier, Brand Designer 

NH SBDC 

Hannah Grimes Center for Entrepreneurship Keene, NH 

SCORE Granite Region 

About Me -Let's Connect!
Text the Show!
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I’m Emily Aborn, I’m a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where we spend our time wishing for Summer, hiking, stacking wood for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

Email: [email protected]
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Text Emily!

You don’t need more time or more motivation. You don't need more inspiration, another planner, course, shiny object, or time management method… what you likely need is more attention. 

And LESS distractions and clutter. 

Today we’re going to bring a fresh spin as we get into attention management, reducing distractions, and freeing yourself of mental clutter! My goal is that this episode will help you reduce and eliminate and feel less frazzled, distracted, and ahhhh more focused. 

• What if time isn't the problem? 
• The nature and stats of distraction (it's not your fault!) 
• How to choose where your attention goes based on seasons, balance, and what you need in your business 
• 4 Ways to distract-proof yourself
• And more! 

Links & Resources Mentioned

Crystal Nerpel's book, Loving Your Home: Clean up your focus, not your house 

Matt DiGeronimo's Article, “Time is Not the Bottleneck. Attention Is.”

About Me -Let's Connect!
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I’m Emily Aborn, I’m a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where we spend time wishing for Summer, hiking, stacking wood for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

Email: [email protected]
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Text Emily!

One of the keys to building trust, expertise, and credibility, and helping people understand what you’re sharing is communicating with CLARITY. 

When it comes to our businesses, forget content, cash, and all the other stuff they say is king… Clarity is King. 

In this episode, we'll take a look at how clarity comes through in our messaging and communication as we establish a clear, solid foundation for trust in our community, with collaborators and clients. 

In the episode: 

• Clarity as a key to building trust 
• What clarity isn't 
• What clarity is 
• 4 Ways to cultivate clarity in your communication 
• 3 Ways to build trust through clarity 
• Questions to reflect on
• And more! 

Resources & Episodes Mentioned 

Plan Your Content with Ease: Four Structures to Give a Whirl 

Repetition vs. Cohesion: Why I want you repeating yourself MORE! 

Avoiding Distractions in Your Content 

NEPG Meetup in Westford, MA: Saturday, June 14th 12pm-2pm 

The Four Agreements of Collaboration 

Barb Davids of the Small Business Sweet Spot Podcast

Vanessa Von Edwards on Instagram (Warmth, Competency, and Confidence) 

About Me - Let's Connect! 
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I’m Emily Aborn, I’m a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host of Content with Character. I'm a dog mom to Mr. Clyde and wife to Jason. Our little family lives in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where we spend time hiking, stacking wood to prepare for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

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Book Your Content Strategy Session with Me!

Text Emily!

There have been plenty of times I haven't trusted my gut, both in life and in business. 

Sometimes ignoring it has me chasing a shiny object... 

Sometimes it leads me to think I need to change everything NOW... 

I've collaborated with the wrong people, tried things I didn't want to do, and I've even posted something I didn't feel 100% about, but I did it anyway because #consistency. 

My MAIN downfall is not listening to my gut and ignoring red flags, or second-guessing the color I'm seeing. 

Red, yellow, or maybe even green? Gah! What color is the flag? That’s where we’re headed in this episode: 

• 6 Common reasons we ignore the red flags
• 7 Red flags reminding you to run the other way 
• 7 Yellow(ish?) flags reminding you to proceed with caution 
• How to get better at spotting red flags and upholding your word to yourself 
• 5 Ways to say no professionally (and a bonus silly one 🤪) 
• And more! 

Episodes & Resources Mentioned 

Do You Need a Regroup? (Apr. 2025 CWC) 

How Your Messaging Sets Boundaries & Achieves Your Goals (Feb. 2025 CWC) 

Let's Talk Boundaries (Dec. 2024 CWC) 

Setting Time Boundaries for Your Business and Life (Jun. 2024 CWC) 

About Me (aka Let's Connect)
Text Me!
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I’m Emily Aborn, a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where we spend time hiking, stacking wood to prepare for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

Email: [email protected]
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Text Emily!

More followers, page views, website traffic, podcast guesting spots, it all sounds great in theory… but it’s not always better. In most cases, it's just MORE. 

In this episode, we get into 6 ways to make your message MORE impactful as we shift from a numbers-driven mentality to an intentional, strategic mindset focused on right-fit vs. just more. 

Inside the episode, we go beyond the numbers in: 

• Podcast guesting, pitching, and speaking engagements 
• Clients, money, and projects 
• Search engine optimization (SEO) in keywords and beyond 
• Website traffic, site visitors ≠ clients
• Social media 
• The words you choose
• And of course, MORE!

Resources & Links Mentioned

👉🏻 EXTENDED SHOW NOTES 

PodMatch (please note, this is an affiliate link, meaning I do earn a teeny tiny commission when you sign up, which in my opinion should want to make you do so MORE, but to each their own) 

My Podcaster Bundles are an invaluable resource for guests, hosts, and guest/hosts :)

Barb Davids of Compass Digital Strategies 

My quick tips on brevity and clarity: 

1. Start with WHY now
2. Ask why it matters to THEM
3. Use specific emotions and wording 
4. Use your REAL conversational voice. Don't be generic, overly buttoned-up corporate, or try to sound like anyone other than YOU 

Connect with Me!
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I’m Emily Aborn, I’m a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire where we spend time wishing for Summer, hiking, preparing for Winter during the Summer, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

Email: [email protected]
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Text Emily!

Do you ever feel like you’re over-scheduling every minute of every day? 

Or maybe you just usually wing it and hope for the best? 

Perhaps you fall somewhere in between?

Whether you’ve shown TIME whose boss or let it run the show and bowl you over, this episode is for YOU. 

This is a live, from-the-field report after running several time management experiments. I crash tested six different productivity methods, all in the name of helping you figure out which one is best for YOU, your personality, and the tasks at hand! 

• The first place to start when getting reorganized 
• How Chat GPT helped me get a grip on my overly busy schedule 
• Pros, cons, who it's for, and who it's not on six different time management techniques: Eating the Frog 🐸, Pomodoro 🍅, Time Blocking ⏰, The Eisenhower Matrix ⚛️, Batching 🍪, and Intuitive Flow 🧘🏻‍♀️
• Learnings, takeaways, recommendations from personal experience, and more! 

👉🏻 EXTENDED SHOW NOTES 

Resources & Links Mentioned 

• Lisa Zawrotny's Positively Living Podcast: Shame-Free Productivity Conversations
• My Substack with all my life and business experiments! 

About Me -Let's Connect!

I’m Emily Aborn, I’m a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where I spend my time wishing for Summer, hiking, stacking wood for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

Email: [email protected]
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Text Emily!

Can you / should you befriend clients? Should you take on friends as clients? What are the pros and cons? Just how blurry should those lines between professional and personal relationships be?

Often debated in business circles, with some swearing by mixing friendship and business and others avoiding it like the plague... to mix or not to mix? That’s the question we’re tackling today! 

By the end of this episode, you'll be able to determine for yourself whether or not you want to work with friends, befriend your clients, collaborate with pals, and have a better understanding of how that can look for your unique business.

• The definition of "friend" 
• The varying levels/circles of friendship from inner to outskirts
• Things to consider when befriending clients, having friends as clients, and collaborating with friends in your business 
• Pros and cons of mixing personal and professional relationships
• And more! 

EXTENDED SHOW NOTES 👇🏻

"A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you." – Elbert Hubbard

My friendship filters/criteria: trust, respect, mutual DELIGHT! 

🟢 The Inner Circle
Consists of your best and closest friends. The people you trust with your thoughts, fears, and dreams. You can be fully YOU with these people. You’re comfortable being vulnerable and yourself around these people. This circle is most often small and tight-knit. 

🟡 The Middle Circle
These are good friends, work friends, “business besties”, etc. You might spend time together and likely still have meaningful conversations and share mutual support, but there’s a little distance in terms of frequency or depth. This isn’t a bad thing! It’s impossible to have tons of close or best friends, but you might have a lot in this middle circle. You might share resources with these people and collaborate, but chances are your personal lives aren’t deeply intertwined.

🟣 The Outer Circle (Acquaintances, Loose Ties, Connections)
These are people you might know their name, you may have connected or chatted a few times, connected via social media, and engage from time to time, you may interact with them in business settings, support each other’s work, and professionally refer each other, but you don’t have a personal connection and probably don’t go out of your way to get together beyond business or professional spheres. 

🔵 Situational Friends
Friends come and go. Childhood friends, college roommates, library book club friends, gym friends, neighbors, people you might be connected to either from past or present activities – they’re often situational friends. You’re probably friendly, and in some cases might even get together, but it doesn’t tend to extend past the situation or context you usually see them in. Unless you take some sort of action to deepen that connection, maintain it, or move it up a level. 

4 Pros of working with friends or befriending clients:

• Established Trust & Rapport: You already know each other, making communication and collaboration smoother.
• More Fun & Enjoyable: Working with people you like can make business more fulfilling.
• Shared Values & Vision: Friends often align on values, making decision-making easier.
• Natural Referrals & Growth: Friends want to support each other’s businesses and spread the word.

4 Cons of working with friends or befriending clients:

• Boundaries can become blurry (both personal and professional boundaries)
• It might be harder to deliver tough feedback, or you might not be able be fully yourself 
• You run a risk of showing favoritism or feeling obligated to overdeliver
• If things go wrong, it can impact the personal relationship

Let's Be Friends - Connect with Me!
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I’m Emily Aborn, a Small Business Copywriter, Content Marketing Consultant, Speaker, and Podcast Host. I live in the backwoods of New Hampshire, where I spend time wishing for Summer, hiking, stacking wood for the eternally long and freezing winters, reading, and procuring random and useless knowledge for future trivia games. 

Email: [email protected]
Website
Facebook
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Substack