One of the biggest mistakes I see newbie entrepreneurs making is either undercommitting to their business or putting SO much unnecessary pressure on it that it crumbles and fails.

In the first instance, your business never even has a fair shot at success. In the second, it can't handle all the stress! Striking the right balance between the two is key to a fun, exciting business that serves you for years to come.

In this episode, I'll teach you how to embrace your business with enough of an emotional and financial investment, without expecting it to support you right out of the gate. I'll also show you how and why to approach your business like the experiment that it is and discover where things aren't well optimized.

Want to start a business but feeling overwhelmed? Join my Finding Your Side Hustle Course and learn the step-by-step process for starting the business you've been dreaming of.

Ready for one-on-one guidance? Schedule a free coaching call with me so we can make progress on your dreams.

Hey there.

Welcome back.

week, we are going to talk about the step that comes after belief.

Right?

week, we talked about the, how.

Of accomplishing our business, being believing in it.

But today But today I'm going to give you a little bit of

that house so that you can stop.

Killing your business with unnecessary pressure.

Okay.

I see one of two main temptations for new businesses.

The first one is to treat it like a hobby where you never invest enough

money or emotion or effort into it.

So it never really has a real shot at succeeding, but you're

also never disappointed.

So you see how that might be appealing, right?

People may say, oh, yes, I'm starting this new business.

But they never actually really give it a shot to get off the ground because deep

down, they don't really believe they can and they don't want to be disappointed.

So I don't want that for you for sure.

Don't want you to treat it like a hobby, but the other one, the other temptation

I see is for business owners to treat their business with so much pressure.

And intensity.

That they kill it because they expect so much of it before

it's even off the ground.

We also do not want that.

We don't want to poison our business.

With stress and pressure.

That it can never succeed.

Now I've talked before about how business is simply like a science project.

It involves lots and lots of little tiny experiments.

This is how we create our business paths with just the right amount of commitment.

We don't want to under commit and only treat it like a hobby

and never really fully invest.

Emotionally or, or financially, we also don't want to overcome it and make

it such a big deal that we kill it.

I may have mentioned this example before, but have you ever read those books?

Choose your own adventure.

They were really popular back in the nineties.

This is like that.

It's like reading a, choose your own adventure book and

deciding if we like that outcome.

So every chapter or so.

It will ask you to make a decision.

Do you want to go this way?

Do you want to go that way?

Whatever decision you make leads you on a different path in your book.

And then the next chapter you can decide, did I like that outcome?

Sometimes it kills you off.

Sometimes it ends the book.

Because of the choice you made, but you can always go back and choose again.

Your business is exactly the same.

There is no real failure in business.

There's just one decision that leads to one outcome and another decision

that leads to another outcome, you can always go back and change your mind.

You can always start over with that experiment and

try to get a better outcome.

Next time.

So I have a wonderful guest.

I'm really excited about that is coming to talk to us and explain this very specific

customer path that we need to have for potential customers and how to create

what we call the perfect marketing funnel.

But I'm going to teach you the basics today because.

This is something that was so important for me to learn that if I had learned it.

10 years ago, I think it would have completely altered.

The course of my businesses.

It's very, very important that your customers go through this basic The

first thing that happens is they become aware of your business or your product,

a stranger finds you somehow and goes, oh, that person in that product exists.

Okay.

There's that awareness right?

Then they may become interested in, they either start getting

your emails or they start seeing your social media posts regularly.

And then they start coming to your website or more maybe your brick

and mortar store or wherever your products and services are located.

And then they become motivated to purchase and actually become customers.

So this path that a potential customer takes is often referred

to as a marketing funnel.

And very often we talk about customers in each.

Phase of this funnel as a cold, warm and hot leads, as you can see why, right.

Someone who is cold is just barely aware of you.

Not really familiar with you.

Doesn't trust you doesn't know you at all.

A warm one, maybe knows and trusts you, but isn't quite ready to purchase.

And then a hot lead is one who is ready to become a customer

and hopefully one for life.

Okay.

So that basic understanding of how a customer or client should

go through their path to becoming.

raving fan.

We'll change everything for you.

You have to make sure that your customers are going through each of these paths.

Essentially, you're just gaining their trust.

And their interests in order for them to be ready to invest time and money in you.

Now it's really, really powerful to start looking at your own path as a customer,

through other people's marketing funnels.

So I think about this all the time, because I'm a marketer.

I look at how I become interested in a new brand, how I learn about them.

If I get on their email list, if I follow them on social and

what finally incentivizes me to.

Take the plunge and finally purchase their product or service.

Start looking at your own path and you can learn so much about human behavior

and what makes people willing to buy.

So, if you are not yet seeing success in your business, it's simply

because one of these steps is broken.

That's it.

Or maybe not fully broken, but just not optimized.

All you have to do is experiment and figure out which one it is.

That's it.

Super simple.

They just have to take three basic steps.

Now, very often this path looks much longer than this sometimes the customer

path I have taken is years long.

I learned about somebody or something and I just follow them for a while.

And I'm a little more interested now and little less interested now.

And then I finally purchased for some reason or another.

Sometimes it's a very short customer path.

But it's very, very simple, cold, warm, hot.

All you have to do is figure out where the customers are falling out

of this path, out of this funnel.

And bring them back in.

So let's give you a very simple example.

Let's say that you want to start an Etsy shop selling earrings.

You have handmade earrings that are so cute.

You create a bunch of them and you list them on the shop and

then you just sit back and wait and watch and see what happens.

Depending on the results of this experiment, you You just

shift your efforts and pit it.

Now, obviously one of the biggest issues I see with business owners is that

there's just no people coming to them.

They don't have people coming to their online shop or their in-person shop.

People don't know about them.

Obviously the first step is going to be the most important one, right?

You have to get people coming to you.

So if people aren't coming to your shop, then you have a marketing problem.

You have to figure out how to get new eyeballs on your stuff.

maybe people are coming to the shop, but they're not buying.

So you can look at your analytics, your Etsy, shop analytics, and realize, oh,

I had a hundred visitors this month, but nobody actually bought anything.

So that's probably a messaging problem.

Maybe your photos aren't good enough.

Maybe people don't fully understand the life changing quality that your

earrings are, and maybe they can't envision themselves wearing them.

Maybe they don't know how to style them.

Right.

So all that is the Mo messaging part of your marketing funnel.

And then finally, maybe people are buying, but they're not coming back or maybe they

are visiting and showing interest, but they're not making that final purchase.

So that's some sort of a product problem.

Maybe the quality really isn't great.

Maybe they get the product and it was kind of lackluster or the shipping took

too long or the price was too high.

Right.

So.

Any problem you have in your business is going to fit in one of these

three buckets, marketing problem, messaging problem, product problem.

Okay.

dozens and dozens within each of these areas.

But it's very, very simple to find the broken step, because you will know when

people are falling out of this funnel.

Now let's talk about addressing your business, like an experiment for a minute.

There is a reason that I talk about it, like an experiment instead of calling it.

Your passion or your life's work.

Experiments by definition are works in progress.

Nobody says.

I created an experiment and it worked the first time and

I never had to tweak anything.

Now that's not an experiment.

That's just something that already succeeds that

somebody already figured out.

Every experiment has failures and successes and ups and downs.

It is a work in progress and it will need to be improved constantly

little by little when we get too attached to any particular product.

Message or process in our business.

Then, if it doesn't work, we're in trouble.

We can't get too attached unless we know it works.

People with failing businesses are those who are generally attached to

specific parts of their business.

And those parts are not working.

So essentially if we are not making money in our business, but

we keep doing things the same.

Well, Something's going wrong there, right?

Isn't that the definition of stupidity?

Sorry to sound harsh, but we can't keep doing things the same.

We have to analyze what's going wrong and we have to change it.

And we have to do so neutrally and calmly.

Not make it a big deal, not make it mean something horrible about us and,

oh, we're such terrible business owners because we can't figure this out.

No, just very neutrally examine each step of the process and we can

figure out what needs to change.

No.

As a quick reminder here, your business is not your baby.

It is simply a vehicle to your why.

So if you've listened to some of the podcasts before I've talked

about creating this, why that will.

Push you through some of the hardest times in your business, knowing

your purpose for this business.

It could be something service oriented, which I highly recommend.

It could be.

You know, I want to help these kinds of people.

It can be something very personal to you.

I want to give my husband freedom from his job, whatever your why is just realize

that your business is not the why your business is just a vehicle to your, why.

So if you find yourself putting too much pressure and drama on your business,

just reevaluate your why and ask yourself is this really the why I want to have?

And is there a better way to get there?

Then the business that's currently not working.

Just keep it light, keep it fun.

Stay super curious about what is going on in your business and don't make

it mean anything horrible about you.

Pressure and intensity in my experience are the death now to a business

thinking that this has to work.

I have to figure this out.

No, you don't.

You could do it this way.

You could do it a hundred different ways.

You will figure it out, but not with so much pressure and intensity on top of it.

A new business just cannot withstand that kind of pressure.

And it often just crumbles.

We don't want that for your business.

So let's talk about your wife for a second.

Let's give you an example.

Maybe your why is helping postpartum moms, you feel really called to help

moms who maybe struggle with little postpartum depression or feel overwhelmed?

And you want to help them in some particular way.

Maybe the first thing you try is some coaching.

You want to get them on the phone and you want to give them tips and

tricks for managing some of these emotions that are coming up for them.

But maybe the coaching doesn't work, maybe people aren't willing to get on the phone.

Maybe they're feeling so sad.

They don't even know.

How to hire you or maybe your.

Trying to get people who are on a budget and they can't pay

you what you want to be paid.

Well, maybe you want to try something else.

Maybe you want to try membership instead where they don't have to get

on a phone with you, but they can watch some of your videos or read some

of your blogs or some of your PDFs.

Maybe you want to create some sort of network where they can connect

with another postpartum mom, right?

There's a million different ways of.

Serving your potential customer.

Of fulfilling this.

Why that you have.

But you get to figure out the best way that works.

Now, if you are totally committed to only being a coach to these moms,

It might work.

It might not.

You just have to be willing to be a little bit flexible

depending on what your potential customers need and want from you.

Be willing to pivot and shift a little bit.

Now, maybe you have a why that is so big and scary.

You don't even know how to.

Approach it, maybe you need to break it down into smaller, more manageable

goals in order to not get stuck.

So another example of a why maybe your, why is simply that

you want to make enough money.

To support your family.

You want allow your husband to retire from his job and you You want to support

your family because he hates his job.

Okay, great.

That can seem really scary and big and totally out of reach.

For your information.

It is not.

I've seen many women do this super fun and exciting to watch.

But maybe instead you just start with a small goal to reach this.

Y your first goal is maybe just to make enough money to cover gas for the month.

You just want to make a couple hundred dollars to make sure that

you get to pay for the gas bill.

Super exciting.

And then maybe once that happens, your next goal is to make enough

money to cover the utility bill.

So step-by-step, you were reaching for this big, why that you have,

instead of immediately saying this business has to support my family.

Eventually it's not working.

Too much pressure.

Too much commitment.

Right.

You have to scale it back a little bit so that your business

can learn to grow little by little without all this pressure.

Again, make sure you are not making these little failures.

Means something about you.

Okay.

So when things don't work in my business, I work really hard on ensuring that

I don't allow my brain to slip into.

Wow.

You suck.

The mean girl talk, right?

I don't allow my brain to say things like you're never going to succeed

at this just because one thing didn't succeed doesn't mean I'll never succeed.

Even if 30 things don't succeed doesn't mean I'll never succeed.

Something has to work eventually.

I'm just going to keep trying until I find the thing that works.

And trust me most of the time, it's way fewer than 30, but most people don't get

anywhere near trying 30 different things.

They quit at number three or number four.

So just keep going, neutrally, calmly assess.

What's not working and pivot.

By looking at your business, like an experiment, you get another bonus.

And that is that it's more fun when you look at it with all

this pressure and you're just so over committed and going crazy.

Cause it's not working the way you think it should.

You lose all the fun that can come from running your own business, which, you

know, I'm a fan of talked about that in previous episodes, you can just calmly and

curiously poke at the business and decide.

Is this working the way I want it to Nope, let's pivot.

Oh, this looks like it's working pretty great.

What's the next step where Where people might be falling out of this funnel.

Now final thought.

If you really want your business to succeed, you have to be

willing to scrap everything.

And start over.

I know that sounds scary.

And, and to be Frank it's rarely necessary, but sometimes it is.

I personally have had a why to help moms find more joy in

their life for many, many years.

But for me, it was a blog for a long time.

And a couple of years ago, I realized this is not the avenue anymore.

It, it wasn't what I wanted to do.

It wasn't helping people the way I wanted it to help them.

And I scrapped the whole thing and it was hard.

Part of me was so sad to let go of all those blog posts.

I'd spent hundreds and hundreds of hours.

Curating and writing and taking pictures for, but I chose that decision because

I knew it was the right one to get me closer to my why and to make me more

money and to be more successful for me.

In all the goals that I have for my business.

So.

Don't forget the minute we get too attached to a process or a product

or an idea we become vulnerable.

To staying stuck in something that doesn't work.

Let that pressure go.

Don't stay so committed to every little step of your business.

Be willing to open up and make changes where necessary,

and then be willing to see.

Radical success.

Stay calm, stay curious, and get excited for the ride ahead.

You could to change anything that's not working at any time.

That is the magic of owning your own business.

And it's so much fun.

All right, friends, get out there and do it.