Today isn't about the shiny side of your wedding business, today I'm drawing back the curtain on some of the darker sides of the wedding industry.

I share my own learnings on all sorts of topics from rejection, negative reviews, betrayal, copycats and more. This is the stuff that doesn't get talked about enough but yet it's likely at some point you will experience some of it.

If something from this episode resonates with you? Reach out and let me know, you don't need to do business alone!

Want an amazing, inclusive wedding business community to be part of? Take a look at the Wedding pro members lounge - a place where you can be yourself.

Find out more about the members lounge.

Want to meet other likeminded wedding pro's so that you can share ideas, network and help each other out? Then why not go ahead and join my free Wedding Pro community over on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/weddingprosreadytogrow/

Find out more about how I can help you grow your wedding business over on my website or Instagram page:

www.beccapountney.com

www.instagram.com/beccapountney

Crickets: Facing Slow Inquiries (00:01:03) Strategies for handling slow business inquiries and staying proactive.

Disappointment: Dealing with Rejection (00:02:55) Coping with disappointment when opportunities or clients do not go as expected.

Complaints: Managing Negative Feedback (00:09:05) Strategies for handling complaints from clients and dealing with negative reviews.

Copycats: Dealing with Imitation (00:14:23) Understanding and coping with situations where competitors imitate or copy ideas.

Dealing with Negative Experiences (00:18:42) Speaker shares personal experiences of feeling let down and discusses the importance of protecting oneself from negative situations.

Protecting Yourself in Business (00:19:31) Strategies for protecting oneself in business, including setting boundaries, trusting gut feelings, and building confidence.

Personal Situations Taking Over (00:24:06) Managing unexpected personal situations that impact business, including health issues, loss, and relationship problems.

Making Poor Financial Decisions (00:29:46) Discussing the reality of making poor financial decisions in business and offering advice on learning from mistakes and budgeting.

Exhaustion and Burnout (00:32:35) Addressing the issue of exhaustion and burnout in business, emphasizing the importance of setting boundaries and taking time off.

Mentioned in this episode:

Wedding Pro members lounge

Find out more about the wedding pro members lounge: https://go.beccapountney.com/wedpro

Becca: 00:00:00

In business, it's really easy to talk about the positives, the strategies

Becca: 00:00:03

and all the motivational messages, but what about the other side of the coin?

Becca: 00:00:07

What about when things are not all so rosy and it's actually quite a struggle?

Becca: 00:00:12

In today's episode, I'm going to be diving deep into some really personal

Becca: 00:00:15

stuff and I'm going to be talking about some of the darker sides of business

Becca: 00:00:18

from overworking to negative clients and even people copying your ideas.

Becca: 00:00:23

How do we face those difficult aspects of owning our own wedding businesses?

Becca: 00:00:28

That's what I'm going to get into today.

Becca: 00:00:31

I'm Becca Pountney, wedding business marketing expert, speaker and blogger,

Becca: 00:00:35

and you're listening to the Wedding Pros Who Are Ready To Grow podcast.

Becca: 00:00:39

I'm here to share with you actionable tips, strategies and real life

Becca: 00:00:42

examples to help you take your wedding business to the next level.

Becca: 00:00:46

If you are an ambitious wedding business owner that wants to take your passion

Becca: 00:00:50

and use it to build a profitable, sustainable business doing what you

Becca: 00:00:53

love, then you're in the right place.

Becca: 00:00:55

Let's get going with today's episode.

Becca: 00:00:58

As much as we like to pretend that life is Instagram perfect, hopefully we all

Becca: 00:01:03

know that that just isn't the reality.

Becca: 00:01:05

We're all living very different lives and all sorts of things

Becca: 00:01:09

are going on behind the scenes.

Becca: 00:01:11

Often in business we talk about all the positives, the wins, the celebrations.

Becca: 00:01:16

I know from talking to clients one to one, speaking with my Wedding Pro

Becca: 00:01:20

members and even from my own personal experience that over the years in

Becca: 00:01:23

business it's not all perfect and often we face difficult situations.

Becca: 00:01:28

So today I want to talk about some of those difficult situations that

Becca: 00:01:31

you may be facing or may face in the future or perhaps you have

Becca: 00:01:34

experience of facing them in the past.

Becca: 00:01:36

I'm going to share my thoughts on each of those situations and hopefully

Becca: 00:01:40

that's going to be helpful to you.

Becca: 00:01:43

So the first one.

Becca: 00:01:44

is crickets.

Becca: 00:01:45

What do I mean by that?

Becca: 00:01:47

Have you ever felt like you've put everything into your

Becca: 00:01:49

business and yet no one's biting?

Becca: 00:01:52

I see this particularly when people are starting out fresh in the wedding

Becca: 00:01:55

industry because you go all in, you get your website ready, you get your

Becca: 00:01:59

social media pages ready, you get all of the stuff in order, you get

Becca: 00:02:02

your pricing together and you launch out there into the big wide world.

Becca: 00:02:06

And crickets, nothing happens.

Becca: 00:02:09

And it can feel a little bit deflating because you feel like something's going.

Becca: 00:02:14

Or maybe it's that you're more experienced in business and just

Becca: 00:02:17

for some reason, things have gone really quiet at the moment.

Becca: 00:02:20

It could be the time of year or maybe it's something else.

Becca: 00:02:23

And when this happens, when we feel like inquiries are slow or people aren't

Becca: 00:02:27

contacting us, we can get really deflated and we can start questioning ourselves.

Becca: 00:02:31

We can question our ability and we can question different

Becca: 00:02:34

aspects of our business.

Becca: 00:02:35

So if this is something you're facing right now, What

Becca: 00:02:39

should you be doing about it?

Becca: 00:02:41

Okay, the first thing is don't panic.

Becca: 00:02:43

I think it's really important to not get in a panic, especially when it could

Becca: 00:02:48

just be for a short period of time.

Becca: 00:02:49

Often we go through seasons where we have busier seasons and less busier seasons.

Becca: 00:02:53

So first of all, don't panic.

Becca: 00:02:54

Don't try and change everything.

Becca: 00:02:56

The second thing is, is when you feel this way, when you feel like things aren't

Becca: 00:03:00

going well, Instead of retreating and feeling negative and feeling like it must

Becca: 00:03:05

be a problem with you, this is actually an opportunity to lean into the situation.

Becca: 00:03:10

Because actually we need to ask ourselves the question, why am I quiet?

Becca: 00:03:14

Why am I not getting these inquiries?

Becca: 00:03:15

Is it actually that I haven't been out there?

Becca: 00:03:18

I'm not networking.

Becca: 00:03:19

I'm not meeting with people.

Becca: 00:03:20

I'm not showcasing enough what I'm doing.

Becca: 00:03:23

Is it that we're just new to the industry and therefore people

Becca: 00:03:26

don't really know who we are yet?

Becca: 00:03:27

And.

Becca: 00:03:28

Actually, what we need to be doing is leaning into showing up, turning

Becca: 00:03:32

up, meeting with venues, meeting with each other, talking to people,

Becca: 00:03:35

telling people what you do, showing up regularly on social media.

Becca: 00:03:39

If people don't know you exist, then how can they book you in the first place?

Becca: 00:03:43

Maybe you need to spend some time working on your search

Becca: 00:03:45

rankings, turning up at Google.

Becca: 00:03:47

Maybe you need to look at some wedding directories or different places to

Becca: 00:03:50

advertise to get in front of people.

Becca: 00:03:52

Maybe you need to get along to some wedding shows.

Becca: 00:03:55

If you are not getting inquiries into your business, there is an opportunity

Becca: 00:03:58

there for you to look and think, okay, maybe just not enough people know

Becca: 00:04:03

what I'm doing, or it's not clear how I can help them solve that problem.

Becca: 00:04:07

The other thing is that it is a bit of a long game when we start in business.

Becca: 00:04:11

It's never going to be an overnight success or very rarely.

Becca: 00:04:14

So when you see really successful people on Instagram or online, you

Becca: 00:04:18

can think, wow, I want that success.

Becca: 00:04:20

But what you haven't seen is the years and years that have led up to that point.

Becca: 00:04:24

Now, where I am in business now here in 2024 is very different to

Becca: 00:04:29

what it looked like when I first started way back in 2016, you know.

Becca: 00:04:34

A lot of people who come across me now will just see what I've achieved right

Becca: 00:04:38

here, right now, but they won't have seen all of the work and all of the

Becca: 00:04:41

conversations, all of the struggles that have led me to the point where I am now.

Becca: 00:04:46

So if you are new at a business, just because things are quiet now doesn't

Becca: 00:04:50

mean it's always going to be quiet, because actually when you put the

Becca: 00:04:52

work in now, when you do that hard networking and chatting and being

Becca: 00:04:56

visible, it does start to pay off.

Becca: 00:04:59

So, if that's you, if you're feeling like it's crickets at the moment, let

Becca: 00:05:02

me encourage you don't retreat into yourself, don't panic, don't start

Becca: 00:05:07

questioning yourself, but actually lean into it and be proactive.

Becca: 00:05:12

Okay, the second category is something that I face myself on

Becca: 00:05:16

a reasonably regular occurrence.

Becca: 00:05:18

It's something that I'm trying to be better at myself

Becca: 00:05:21

and to struggle with less.

Becca: 00:05:22

But it's a feeling of disappointment.

Becca: 00:05:24

Has anyone ever felt a little bit disappointed in their business?

Becca: 00:05:28

Perhaps you've got a great idea for a new product or service and then you're

Becca: 00:05:32

disappointed that it doesn't quite get the reaction that you wanted.

Becca: 00:05:35

Maybe you're really desperate for a particular opportunity.

Becca: 00:05:38

Maybe it's been on your goals list to be recommended by a certain venue

Becca: 00:05:42

or appearing at a certain wedding show and you apply to be part of it.

Becca: 00:05:46

And then they don't want you or they don't reply to you and it can feel

Becca: 00:05:50

really disappointing or perhaps there's a client you've had a meeting with and

Becca: 00:05:54

you felt like it's gone really, really well and then they don't pick you.

Becca: 00:05:59

They go with someone else and you just can't wrap your head around it.

Becca: 00:06:02

And again, it can feel really disappointing.

Becca: 00:06:05

And personally, when I struggle with this, it goes round and round in my head.

Becca: 00:06:08

I don't know if anyone else resonates with that.

Becca: 00:06:10

I think, why was that?

Becca: 00:06:11

Like, what have I done wrong?

Becca: 00:06:12

And again, I tend to make it all about me.

Becca: 00:06:15

I think, why didn't they want me?

Becca: 00:06:17

Why did they pick someone else?

Becca: 00:06:18

Why did they not like what I did?

Becca: 00:06:20

Why did I not get this opportunity?

Becca: 00:06:24

Actually, when we look at it more objectively and not quite so taking

Becca: 00:06:28

it so personally, it's actually more helpful to realize it's actually

Becca: 00:06:32

probably nothing to do with us.

Becca: 00:06:34

We're actually making it about us when it's, it's not, it's

Becca: 00:06:36

actually about the other person.

Becca: 00:06:38

You know, if a venue decides not to work with you at this point,

Becca: 00:06:42

That doesn't necessarily mean it's anything to do with you.

Becca: 00:06:45

It doesn't mean you're not good at what you do.

Becca: 00:06:46

It doesn't mean you're not a good person.

Becca: 00:06:48

It just means maybe they are too busy at the moment.

Becca: 00:06:50

Maybe they've got other people involved.

Becca: 00:06:53

Maybe there's family connections or friend connections within their

Becca: 00:06:56

recommended list that they're loyal to.

Becca: 00:06:58

You know, there's a million and one reasons why, and actually we don't

Becca: 00:07:02

know the answers most of the time.

Becca: 00:07:04

And therefore we're wasting energy and time dwelling on it.

Becca: 00:07:08

The other thing is maybe it's just not the right time for you right now.

Becca: 00:07:11

I've had a situation before where I've wanted to do something and I've applied

Becca: 00:07:16

for it and then I was disappointed not to have been chosen and they

Becca: 00:07:19

chose someone else and I was gutted.

Becca: 00:07:22

And it wasn't something I shared, but internally I was gutted.

Becca: 00:07:27

And then about six months later, they came back to me and went, Oh,

Becca: 00:07:31

Actually, we want you now, Becca.

Becca: 00:07:32

Thank you very much.

Becca: 00:07:33

We've got this opportunity and can you be part of it?

Becca: 00:07:36

And I realized, okay, it was actually nothing to do with me.

Becca: 00:07:39

And it was me building up all these thoughts in my head that,

Becca: 00:07:43

you know, I'm not good enough and they want someone better.

Becca: 00:07:45

Actually, it just wasn't the suitable time.

Becca: 00:07:48

It wasn't the right opportunity.

Becca: 00:07:49

And in terms of dates, well, the situation when they wanted me the second

Becca: 00:07:53

time was much more convenient for me than it would have been the first time.

Becca: 00:07:57

So, you know, sometimes things just happen for a reason.

Becca: 00:08:00

What about when a couple goes with a different supplier and not you that can

Becca: 00:08:03

also feel like this is an opportunity to look at yourself and panic and

Becca: 00:08:07

think, Oh, my prices are wrong, or it must be something to do with me.

Becca: 00:08:11

But actually, it might be nothing to do with you at all.

Becca: 00:08:14

You know, when we make a decision about going for a coffee, you

Becca: 00:08:18

know, one day we might go to Costa, one day we might go to Starbucks.

Becca: 00:08:21

That doesn't mean that we hate the other one that we don't choose to go to.

Becca: 00:08:25

It's just on that day, that one suited us a little bit better.

Becca: 00:08:28

It might not be because of price.

Becca: 00:08:30

It might be because of convenience.

Becca: 00:08:32

It might be just how we're feeling that day.

Becca: 00:08:34

And so when it comes to customers choosing you, I understand it's easy to

Becca: 00:08:38

get personally involved because that's what we're like in the wedding industry.

Becca: 00:08:41

But actually you've got to start seeing it more like Costa versus Starbucks.

Becca: 00:08:45

If they go with someone else.

Becca: 00:08:47

That day it just felt like a better fit for them.

Becca: 00:08:49

It's not about them not liking you, and it doesn't mean you need

Becca: 00:08:52

to change who you are or change everything about your business.

Becca: 00:08:56

So I get it, I feel it regularly myself, I get those feelings of disappointment,

Becca: 00:09:00

but we need to try and re channel them and stop reflecting and digging so

Becca: 00:09:04

deep into ourselves and actually start to see the bigger picture and realize

Becca: 00:09:08

Maybe it's not actually all about us.

Becca: 00:09:12

Okay, the third difficult situation, and I've had a number of clients

Becca: 00:09:16

that I work with one to one and in my members lounge who've struggled

Becca: 00:09:19

with this over the last year or so.

Becca: 00:09:22

And that is a complaint from a couple.

Becca: 00:09:26

You know, it's all of our worst nightmare to receive a complaint.

Becca: 00:09:29

We love what we do.

Becca: 00:09:30

We work hard at what we do.

Becca: 00:09:31

It's our business.

Becca: 00:09:32

It's our baby.

Becca: 00:09:33

And when someone finds something wrong with us or what we've done,

Becca: 00:09:36

or they complain, It can feel really hard, especially when we've

Becca: 00:09:40

worked incredibly hard for them.

Becca: 00:09:42

And sometimes that complaint can be in the lead up to the wedding day.

Becca: 00:09:45

Sometimes that complaint can come after the wedding day and it

Becca: 00:09:50

feels really difficult, especially when we're in an industry where

Becca: 00:09:53

it doesn't happen very often.

Becca: 00:09:54

Most of the time we get these glowing five star reviews.

Becca: 00:09:57

Everyone loves what we do.

Becca: 00:09:58

When someone complains about something, it can feel really hard.

Becca: 00:10:02

I think on this one, again, we need to take a step back from the situation.

Becca: 00:10:07

Always, if someone writes you a complaint or someone complains to

Becca: 00:10:09

you, always just try and take stock.

Becca: 00:10:11

Take a moment.

Becca: 00:10:12

Don't respond to it instantly in that moment of emotion.

Becca: 00:10:16

And take the emotion out of it.

Becca: 00:10:18

We need to get logical about this stuff because, you know, if we're a

Becca: 00:10:22

big corporation like McDonald's or Coca Cola or something like that.

Becca: 00:10:26

They probably get complaints all of the time and they're not like crying

Becca: 00:10:29

into their pillow or going home to their husband like I would and saying,

Becca: 00:10:33

Oh, I can't believe they complain.

Becca: 00:10:34

They didn't like the taste of the Coke today.

Becca: 00:10:36

You know, it's just part of having their business and they look

Becca: 00:10:39

at it objectively and they're professional about their response.

Becca: 00:10:43

So we need to try and channel that and not again, not take

Becca: 00:10:46

it so personally, but I get it.

Becca: 00:10:48

It's difficult.

Becca: 00:10:49

So when someone does complain, you do need to step back and just think,

Becca: 00:10:53

okay, what is this actually about?

Becca: 00:10:55

is it something I've done wrong that I need to be sorry for?

Becca: 00:10:58

Or is it actually, you know, maybe they've just got a lot of stress on.

Becca: 00:11:01

Maybe their expectations were too high.

Becca: 00:11:03

Maybe they're just moaning.

Becca: 00:11:05

Maybe they've got someone else in their ear telling them that

Becca: 00:11:07

they need to make this complaint.

Becca: 00:11:09

Maybe they're trying to make some money back from me and kind of trip me up.

Becca: 00:11:12

Maybe it's actually nothing to do with me in the first place.

Becca: 00:11:16

So if you do get a negative comment on an email or a complaint.

Becca: 00:11:20

First of all, sit back, read it logically, give it some time, maybe

Becca: 00:11:23

talk it through with someone who's less emotionally attached to the situation.

Becca: 00:11:27

That's why I often end up having these conversations with people, and then go

Becca: 00:11:31

back with a really measured response.

Becca: 00:11:33

I've actually recently recorded a whole episode, very similar to this

Becca: 00:11:37

topic, which is going to be coming out with a fabulous lady called Jen

Becca: 00:11:41

Trotter, all about conflict resolution.

Becca: 00:11:43

So look out for that episode coming in the next couple of weeks,

Becca: 00:11:46

because we're going to go into that.

Becca: 00:11:47

more deeply.

Becca: 00:11:49

The other thing that comes off the back of this is people are

Becca: 00:11:51

really afraid of negative reviews.

Becca: 00:11:53

I don't know if you've ever had a negative review, but we kind of expect when we

Becca: 00:11:56

ask people to leave reviews that it's all going to be five star and rosy.

Becca: 00:12:00

But in reality, you know, sometimes we may get a negative review and

Becca: 00:12:03

sometimes I think people use that as a threat to try and intimidate us.

Becca: 00:12:07

They say, you know, if you don't sort this out, I'll leave you a bad review.

Becca: 00:12:10

Well, okay, but.

Becca: 00:12:13

That doesn't mean we want to be a pushover and be bullied just because

Becca: 00:12:15

we're scared of getting that bad review.

Becca: 00:12:17

Let me put this into context.

Becca: 00:12:20

I've got loads of great five star reviews on Facebook, but recently for some

Becca: 00:12:24

reason the spammers have been attacking my Facebook page and they just keep

Becca: 00:12:28

leaving really awful reviews about money, bitcoins, and trading and that kind of

Becca: 00:12:34

thing, and it just looks an absolute mess.

Becca: 00:12:37

You know, I actually think that's worse than a negative review

Becca: 00:12:39

in some ways because it's just muddying the water of my reviews.

Becca: 00:12:42

You know what?

Becca: 00:12:43

No one's really noticed, which says to me, no one really is

Becca: 00:12:46

paying that much attention to my reviews in the first place.

Becca: 00:12:49

But people are not stupid.

Becca: 00:12:50

If they were to go on my reviews and see that, they would be able to tell it was

Becca: 00:12:53

just a scammer doing something stupid.

Becca: 00:12:56

People are not unintelligent.

Becca: 00:12:58

So if they go to your page and see a negative review, someone's

Becca: 00:13:01

left your one star review.

Becca: 00:13:02

They're going to look at that more closely.

Becca: 00:13:04

They might read what they've said and think, is that reasonable or not?

Becca: 00:13:07

We've all been onto websites.

Becca: 00:13:09

You haven't been onto a website for a hotel and gone to look at the reviews.

Becca: 00:13:12

One of my favorite things to do when I'm looking at a hotel is to look at the

Becca: 00:13:15

reviews and then go and look at the ones that are one star because they're often

Becca: 00:13:19

quite funny and people can leave one star reviews about the most ridiculous things.

Becca: 00:13:23

Which I think.

Becca: 00:13:25

Get over it.

Becca: 00:13:25

Why are you leaving that as a review?

Becca: 00:13:27

Like that's ridiculous.

Becca: 00:13:28

So people will think the same for you.

Becca: 00:13:30

If people leave you a ridiculous one star review, they can see through that.

Becca: 00:13:34

So I wouldn't worry about it.

Becca: 00:13:35

The other thing is always reply to your negative reviews.

Becca: 00:13:38

Again, you'll see the big corporations doing this.

Becca: 00:13:41

They get negative reviews on Twitter or X as it's now known, or on Facebook,

Becca: 00:13:45

they'll always reply underneath and just say something very professional.

Becca: 00:13:48

Like, I'm so sorry to hear about your experience.

Becca: 00:13:50

There's not what we expect and we'd like to do something about it.

Becca: 00:13:53

Please email us more information.

Becca: 00:13:55

And then they put an email address.

Becca: 00:13:56

So if you do end up with a negative review, again, don't panic.

Becca: 00:14:00

Don't get really upset.

Becca: 00:14:01

Just look at it objectively.

Becca: 00:14:02

Think, well, at least I haven't got Becca's spam reviews with all

Becca: 00:14:04

the Bitcoin trading platforms.

Becca: 00:14:07

And actually I can just reply.

Becca: 00:14:08

and put something very professional underneath.

Becca: 00:14:11

Don't retaliate in any way, shape or form, and people will see through it.

Becca: 00:14:15

In fact, especially if you've got positive reviews.

Becca: 00:14:18

The other thing you can do is if you get a negative review,

Becca: 00:14:20

just ask a bunch of people.

Becca: 00:14:21

It will give you that motivation to ask a bunch of people to leave

Becca: 00:14:24

you a positive one, to try and counteract that negative one.

Becca: 00:14:29

Okay.

Becca: 00:14:30

The next thing I want to talk about in terms of negative

Becca: 00:14:33

difficult situations is Copycats.

Becca: 00:14:37

Now, this one, I think, again, is a bit of a difficult situation because often people

Becca: 00:14:43

can become a copycat without realizing.

Becca: 00:14:45

Let me explain.

Becca: 00:14:47

Have you ever put out a Facebook post or come up with an offer or even come

Becca: 00:14:50

up with a new business idea only for one of your competitors or someone

Becca: 00:14:54

else to do something very similar in a very short time frame afterwards?

Becca: 00:14:59

Now, often we will jump to the conclusion and we'll go, That person's copied me.

Becca: 00:15:03

I can't believe it.

Becca: 00:15:04

They've looked at what I've done and they've copied me.

Becca: 00:15:07

Actually, they might not have done.

Becca: 00:15:09

It could be a very innocent explanation.

Becca: 00:15:11

I mean that's happened to me before where I've planned

Becca: 00:15:13

something for a couple of months.

Becca: 00:15:14

Maybe I've planned a boot camp or a week long training.

Becca: 00:15:17

about a certain topic that I think is important and I go to put it out there and

Becca: 00:15:21

I realize someone else is doing something very similar at the same kind of time.

Becca: 00:15:25

Now that's a completely innocent thing.

Becca: 00:15:27

I've not planned that.

Becca: 00:15:28

I've not looked at what they're doing.

Becca: 00:15:30

I'm not that interested in what they're doing particularly.

Becca: 00:15:32

It's just happened to fall on the same time at the same week.

Becca: 00:15:35

You know, trends are similar.

Becca: 00:15:37

People are talking about similar stuff.

Becca: 00:15:38

It's bound to happen.

Becca: 00:15:40

So if this does happen to you, if you host something or come up with a new

Becca: 00:15:43

product offer and someone else does go ahead and put something out at a similar

Becca: 00:15:48

time, do not jump to the conclusion and think, they're copying me, it's awful.

Becca: 00:15:52

Because actually the chance are is an innocent situation.

Becca: 00:15:55

Unless it's happening regularly, you know, every post that you're

Becca: 00:15:57

putting out is being copied.

Becca: 00:15:59

Well, then maybe we've got more of a problem.

Becca: 00:16:01

The other thing to remember is that this will happen.

Becca: 00:16:04

Copycats will happen.

Becca: 00:16:06

However, a copy is never as good as the original, right?

Becca: 00:16:08

Again, let's look at the big brands.

Becca: 00:16:10

You can go and spend 800 on a Mulberry handbag.

Becca: 00:16:13

It will be great quality.

Becca: 00:16:14

It's a beautiful bag.

Becca: 00:16:15

You get a great customer experience.

Becca: 00:16:17

Not that I've done it, but maybe one day.

Becca: 00:16:19

You can also go to the market in Tenerife and probably pick up a counterfeit

Becca: 00:16:24

Mulberry handbag fairly easily.

Becca: 00:16:26

It's not the same thing.

Becca: 00:16:28

Okay.

Becca: 00:16:28

It's not even slightly the same thing.

Becca: 00:16:29

It might look kind of the same, but you know, deep down, it's not the same.

Becca: 00:16:33

It's not as good quality.

Becca: 00:16:34

It's not got the same experience.

Becca: 00:16:36

You know, it's not the same, although it may look the same from the outside.

Becca: 00:16:40

It is not the same.

Becca: 00:16:41

It's the same when someone copies you.

Becca: 00:16:43

People copy my ideas and thoughts and do what I'm trying to do all of the

Becca: 00:16:46

time, but they're never going to be me.

Becca: 00:16:48

And actually, you know, I can be one step ahead of the crowd.

Becca: 00:16:53

You can be one step ahead of the crowd.

Becca: 00:16:54

A copycat is always in your midst.

Becca: 00:16:56

They're always trailing behind you.

Becca: 00:16:58

So they're never going to have that competitive advantage.

Becca: 00:17:01

So, you know, as I always say, stay in your own lane.

Becca: 00:17:04

Don't look left and right.

Becca: 00:17:04

If there are people that you're worried about copying you, just don't engage.

Becca: 00:17:08

Or if you're worried about being accused of copying

Becca: 00:17:10

someone else, don't follow them.

Becca: 00:17:12

Don't look at their stuff.

Becca: 00:17:13

Because then it can be completely innocent.

Becca: 00:17:15

If you do end up accidentally, you know, doing something at a similar time, you

Becca: 00:17:19

can be like, I actually didn't know.

Becca: 00:17:20

And you genuinely didn't know because you're not looking at what they're up to.

Becca: 00:17:25

Stay in your own lane, have your own plan.

Becca: 00:17:27

And if people copy you, I know it sounds cliche, but try and see it as a positive

Becca: 00:17:31

thing, because it means they think that what you're doing is a good idea.

Becca: 00:17:34

Over the years I've had a couple of different people copying me and in various

Becca: 00:17:38

different guises and actually none of them are anywhere now because, you know,

Becca: 00:17:43

a copycat can only get so far for so long working off other people's ideas.

Becca: 00:17:48

You're much better to have your own creativity and take

Becca: 00:17:51

things in your own direction.

Becca: 00:17:54

Now going a little bit deeper again in this situation, you know,

Becca: 00:17:57

sometimes it is the case when it isn't an innocent explanation and

Becca: 00:18:01

there's been probably two times I can particularly think of in my own.

Becca: 00:18:05

business journey where I feel like I've been betrayed.

Becca: 00:18:09

And sometimes it can be that a copycat is genuinely a copycat or someone that

Becca: 00:18:14

you trusted can go ahead and betray you.

Becca: 00:18:17

Perhaps you've got someone on your team and they then go up and set a

Becca: 00:18:21

business up in competition with you.

Becca: 00:18:23

Maybe they take your ideas.

Becca: 00:18:24

Maybe someone takes some of your contacts away from you or, you know,

Becca: 00:18:29

does something sly behind the scenes.

Becca: 00:18:31

Unfortunately, the dark side of business is.

Becca: 00:18:33

This stuff does happen.

Becca: 00:18:34

And some people are cutthroat and they will do anything to be successful.

Becca: 00:18:39

No, these things unfortunately do happen and we do have to keep

Becca: 00:18:44

our eyes open to it, but we only learn from it after it happens.

Becca: 00:18:48

You know, I.

Becca: 00:18:49

I like to think that I am the person I am online.

Becca: 00:18:53

If you meet me in real life, in my day life, in my work life, like I

Becca: 00:18:56

am just Becca, this is who I am.

Becca: 00:18:58

I am an open book.

Becca: 00:18:59

And I think sometimes I can be a little bit naive in that I

Becca: 00:19:03

always see the good in people.

Becca: 00:19:05

Absolutely love people.

Becca: 00:19:06

I just want to see people succeed.

Becca: 00:19:08

And I always think everyone has the same intentions as

Becca: 00:19:11

me and the same morals as me.

Becca: 00:19:13

I think this is something that a lot of us kind of fall into the trap of

Becca: 00:19:15

thinking, well, I wouldn't do that.

Becca: 00:19:17

So why would anyone else?

Becca: 00:19:19

So when someone does let you down.

Becca: 00:19:21

it can trip you up and it can make you feel a little bit icky, quite frankly.

Becca: 00:19:26

And I've had some really difficult situations like that

Becca: 00:19:30

over the course of my business.

Becca: 00:19:31

And I think it's important that we do talk about these things, not in a way

Becca: 00:19:34

to, you know, I'm not going to talk about who it was with or any of the details.

Becca: 00:19:38

That's not helpful.

Becca: 00:19:40

But just to understand that, okay, sometimes this stuff happens and

Becca: 00:19:43

we need to keep our eyes open.

Becca: 00:19:44

So how can we protect ourselves?

Becca: 00:19:46

Well, the first thing is sometimes we can't.

Becca: 00:19:48

Now we could put up boundaries and not see the good in people

Becca: 00:19:51

and assume everyone is bad.

Becca: 00:19:53

I don't know about you.

Becca: 00:19:54

I'm loving the TV show on BBC at the moment.

Becca: 00:19:57

They also have it in the U.

Becca: 00:19:58

S.

Becca: 00:19:58

called The Traitors where half of the people in the TV show are faithful

Becca: 00:20:02

and some of them are traitors.

Becca: 00:20:03

And what happens is they all turn against you.

Becca: 00:20:05

each other.

Becca: 00:20:06

And no one trusts anyone.

Becca: 00:20:08

And actually, that's a really negative environment to be in.

Becca: 00:20:10

It's not comfortable for anyone because everyone feels like they're

Becca: 00:20:13

being second guessed all of the time.

Becca: 00:20:15

We don't want to be feeling that about all of the other people in our industry.

Becca: 00:20:20

We want to be able to be vulnerable.

Becca: 00:20:21

We want to open up to people.

Becca: 00:20:22

We want to be able to trust people.

Becca: 00:20:24

And on the whole, you know, out of all the hundreds and thousands of

Becca: 00:20:27

people I've worked with since 2016, There's only been a couple of bad eggs.

Becca: 00:20:32

Almost everyone else has been wonderful, brilliant, and so we shouldn't let

Becca: 00:20:37

those couple of negative people influence how we view everyone else.

Becca: 00:20:42

Having said that, I do think there are things that we

Becca: 00:20:44

can do to protect ourselves.

Becca: 00:20:45

So, for example, now, if you have someone working for you or coming into

Becca: 00:20:49

your team, make sure you write up an agreement between the two of you that

Becca: 00:20:52

says You know, once you finish, you can't do something for six months in the same

Becca: 00:20:58

field as me, or you can't use what you've learned from me to profit for yourself,

Becca: 00:21:02

or you can't be in conflict with my business whilst working for my business.

Becca: 00:21:06

All of these things can just help protect you.

Becca: 00:21:09

The other thing is, I think if you I think we know in our gut, if you get a gut

Becca: 00:21:13

feeling about something not feeling quite right, often that's a sign to us that

Becca: 00:21:19

yeah, okay, maybe we just need to take a little step back from this situation.

Becca: 00:21:23

It's our business, we don't have to do anything we don't want to.

Becca: 00:21:26

And the final learning I've had from this is actually, I think often the reason that

Becca: 00:21:31

this stuff happens to us is when we don't have the confidence to do stuff ourselves.

Becca: 00:21:37

So when we are feeling a little bit unconfident, we might think, Oh, I

Becca: 00:21:40

need to do this with someone else.

Becca: 00:21:41

Let's work together on this.

Becca: 00:21:43

And if they're a much more stronger character than you, sometimes

Becca: 00:21:46

they can end up taking over.

Becca: 00:21:48

And again, I think sometimes it's unconfidence.

Becca: 00:21:52

It's, it's, it's not feeling like you really know what you want to do

Becca: 00:21:56

yourself and you feel like you need someone else to help you with it.

Becca: 00:21:59

You don't.

Becca: 00:22:00

And very early on in my business, I realized.

Becca: 00:22:03

Okay, I don't actually need other people.

Becca: 00:22:05

I don't need to rely heavily on other people.

Becca: 00:22:08

I can do this stuff on my own and that's one way I protect myself.

Becca: 00:22:11

It's not, I've got better again, but once you're burnt, it is hard to be vulnerable.

Becca: 00:22:17

And so I'm very careful now about people I choose to work with, people

Becca: 00:22:21

that I choose to run projects with, people that I choose to run events with.

Becca: 00:22:27

That's taken me a long time and I need to really know and trust those people.

Becca: 00:22:29

And that's why I've loved working with Kelly Mortimer on our wedding

Becca: 00:22:34

business retreat because we were very open and transparent early on.

Becca: 00:22:38

We're very we'll talk to each other.

Becca: 00:22:40

We both have our own businesses, but I trust her and we've

Becca: 00:22:43

had a great experience.

Becca: 00:22:44

So don't let one negative experience in this situation rule the rest

Becca: 00:22:49

of your life and your business.

Becca: 00:22:51

So, all of that to say really, is that these things do happen, sometimes

Becca: 00:22:56

someone might betray you and there are some measures you can put in place to

Becca: 00:22:59

protect yourself, but ultimately you can't protect yourself from everything.

Becca: 00:23:03

So still go out there and be a good person.

Becca: 00:23:05

And I think what's got me through all of the situations I've been through,

Becca: 00:23:09

and there's not a lot, it makes it sound like there's been a lot.

Becca: 00:23:11

There really hasn't.

Becca: 00:23:12

And they're not big.

Becca: 00:23:13

I know people have been through much bigger things like other

Becca: 00:23:16

people completely taking their businesses over and things like that.

Becca: 00:23:19

But I think it's to keep your eyes peeled to.

Becca: 00:23:22

Keep your wits about you, about what's going on, and ultimately

Becca: 00:23:27

to do things right yourself.

Becca: 00:23:28

Because you can't control other people and their sneaky behavior.

Becca: 00:23:31

But you can know that you've done everything right in a situation.

Becca: 00:23:34

If you feel like you're accountable and you can say, yeah, you know what?

Becca: 00:23:38

They did screw me over, but actually I was a good person.

Becca: 00:23:41

I haven't done anything awful.

Becca: 00:23:43

I'm not going to now bring them down online even though

Becca: 00:23:45

it will feel very tempting.

Becca: 00:23:47

Actually, you know what?

Becca: 00:23:48

Let them get on with it.

Becca: 00:23:50

I'll move on with my own life.

Becca: 00:23:51

And, you know, people don't get very far in life by not being a nice person.

Becca: 00:23:57

So be a good person, keep your wits about you, and hopefully you won't have

Becca: 00:24:01

to deal with any of these difficult things that I'm talking about now.

Becca: 00:24:06

Okay, let's take a little different The next thing I want to talk

Becca: 00:24:11

about is, what do we do when a personal situation takes over?

Becca: 00:24:16

It's very easy for us, especially at the beginning of a year

Becca: 00:24:18

to set out goals, isn't it?

Becca: 00:24:20

It's natural and I think it's a helpful thing for us to do to say,

Becca: 00:24:23

I want to achieve this this year.

Becca: 00:24:24

I want to make this much money and I want to.

Becca: 00:24:27

So I've set myself these targets and I want to go here and do that.

Becca: 00:24:31

But what do we do when that starts to unravel through no fault of our own?

Becca: 00:24:36

What happens if we have a problem with our health which slows us down

Becca: 00:24:39

or takes us on an unexpected turn?

Becca: 00:24:42

What happens if we lose someone close to us that was unexpected or maybe it

Becca: 00:24:46

was expected but is still difficult?

Becca: 00:24:49

What happens if we have a difficult situation with our

Becca: 00:24:51

children or with some friends?

Becca: 00:24:54

What happens if we go through a relationship breakup?

Becca: 00:24:57

You know, there's all sorts of different things that we have going on

Becca: 00:25:00

in our lives when personal situations take over in an unexpected fashion.

Becca: 00:25:06

You know, that's a fact of life and we can't do a whole lot about that.

Becca: 00:25:11

So what do we do when we've planned out a year and all of

Becca: 00:25:15

a sudden something like that?

Becca: 00:25:16

hits us.

Becca: 00:25:18

I think the first thing is to give yourself a break because you know

Becca: 00:25:22

we do go through these situations and the worst thing you can do

Becca: 00:25:25

is beat yourself up about it.

Becca: 00:25:26

Like it's no fault of your own if one of these things happens and actually

Becca: 00:25:30

it is again a bit of a fact of life.

Becca: 00:25:32

There is ups and downs.

Becca: 00:25:33

I always talk about the business roller coaster.

Becca: 00:25:35

There's peaks and troughs.

Becca: 00:25:36

We go up and down.

Becca: 00:25:37

We can fly and then the next minute something happens and takes us off

Becca: 00:25:40

guard and we feel like we're down at the bottom of the dip and then a minute later

Becca: 00:25:45

we're whizzing back up to the top again.

Becca: 00:25:47

If these things happen to you, just remember it probably is just a period

Becca: 00:25:51

of time and for that period of time, you may have to do things differently.

Becca: 00:25:55

You may have to take your foot off the gas.

Becca: 00:25:57

You may have to ask for additional support.

Becca: 00:26:00

Sometimes it's about being vulnerable.

Becca: 00:26:02

You may have to limit what you do.

Becca: 00:26:04

Maybe you can't be as visible on social media.

Becca: 00:26:06

Maybe you don't have the time to do that for this period of time.

Becca: 00:26:09

You know, it's similar when people have a baby, obviously that's a very positive

Becca: 00:26:13

life situation, but it does take over.

Becca: 00:26:15

So when you have a baby.

Becca: 00:26:17

In the middle of owning a business, you know, the reality is you cannot keep going

Becca: 00:26:21

in exactly the same way as you did before.

Becca: 00:26:23

You have to adapt, you have to change, and sometimes you have to

Becca: 00:26:25

take things easy for a little while.

Becca: 00:26:28

But it is often only for that short period of time, and we need to

Becca: 00:26:31

give ourselves that time because we don't get that time back.

Becca: 00:26:35

again.

Becca: 00:26:36

So when a personal situation takes over, take a step back, give yourself breathing

Becca: 00:26:41

space, give yourself a break, maybe change some of your goals and look at

Becca: 00:26:46

what are the things that I absolutely have to do, what are the things that

Becca: 00:26:50

I would like to be able to do and what are the things actually I can put off

Becca: 00:26:53

for six months or a year or get someone else to do and look at it logically and

Becca: 00:26:59

think, okay, I can't achieve everything, but what can I do to keep going?

Becca: 00:27:04

Now, a couple of years ago, again, I went through a really difficult

Becca: 00:27:07

personal family situation.

Becca: 00:27:09

And it's not something that anyone particularly knows a lot about other than

Becca: 00:27:12

in very close circles of mine, but it definitely has an impact on my business.

Becca: 00:27:17

I was actually looking through my financial accounts because

Becca: 00:27:20

obviously we got to the end of the tax year in, at the end of January.

Becca: 00:27:24

Well, not the end of the tax year, but when our accounts have to be

Becca: 00:27:27

submitted, we have to have paid our tax for in the UK for the 22, 23 tax year.

Becca: 00:27:32

So I was looking through my accounts for the last five years to see

Becca: 00:27:36

what's been going on in my business.

Becca: 00:27:38

And the year when I had that really difficult personal situation going on.

Becca: 00:27:42

My income is lower than all of the other years.

Becca: 00:27:46

And there is no doubt in my mind that that is a direct correlation to

Becca: 00:27:49

the situation I was going through.

Becca: 00:27:51

Because while I kept my head above water and on the outside, none of you

Becca: 00:27:55

would have known that was going on for me because it wasn't something I

Becca: 00:27:58

felt like I needed to share, of course it had an impact on my business.

Becca: 00:28:02

Of course, I wasn't doing new things and exciting things because.

Becca: 00:28:07

Actually, there wasn't the headspace and the time to be able to do that

Becca: 00:28:11

with the other stuff going on.

Becca: 00:28:12

So what did I do?

Becca: 00:28:13

Well, on the whole I survived.

Becca: 00:28:15

I kept going.

Becca: 00:28:16

I did all the things that I needed to do.

Becca: 00:28:18

I did the priorities, but there were other things that I let slip

Becca: 00:28:21

and that's okay because now after that situation concluded, I've got

Becca: 00:28:26

myself back to where I wanted to be.

Becca: 00:28:27

I'm back on track with my goals and now I can look back at that as a period

Becca: 00:28:32

of time, which yeah, it was awful.

Becca: 00:28:33

It wasn't great at all and it did impact my business.

Becca: 00:28:37

But it didn't mean I had to quit.

Becca: 00:28:39

It didn't mean I have to give up.

Becca: 00:28:40

It doesn't mean that I can't do anything again.

Becca: 00:28:42

And it was just a period of time.

Becca: 00:28:45

So if you've got this going on right now, if you've got a personal situation

Becca: 00:28:49

that feels like it's taken over, then give yourself a break, ask for help.

Becca: 00:28:55

Be honest with people if, if it's, if it's helpful and look at what you

Becca: 00:29:00

absolutely need to be doing, what you'd like to be doing and what you

Becca: 00:29:03

can actually leave and not do until things are looking a bit better.

Becca: 00:29:09

Okay, there's two final different things I want to talk about.

Becca: 00:29:12

I know this isn't the most Positive, rosy episode, but I do think we need

Becca: 00:29:15

to have these difficult conversations.

Becca: 00:29:17

And if there are things that I'm talking about today that you identify

Becca: 00:29:21

with, or you find yourself struggling with, and you want to chat further

Becca: 00:29:24

about it, please do reach out to me on Instagram at Becca Pountney

Becca: 00:29:28

or by email Becca at beccapountney.

Becca: 00:29:30

com.

Becca: 00:29:31

And let's chat a little bit more.

Becca: 00:29:32

Don't struggle with these things alone.

Becca: 00:29:35

Okay, the next thing I want to talk about is making a poor financial decision.

Becca: 00:29:40

You know, when we own our own business, we have to make decisions all of the time

Becca: 00:29:43

about what we invest in, what we spend our money on, what we don't spend our money

Becca: 00:29:48

on, because we can't never spend money on anything because otherwise we can't grow

Becca: 00:29:52

our business, but equally we don't want to just spend loads of money and not.

Becca: 00:29:55

Okay.

Becca: 00:29:55

Anything back for it.

Becca: 00:29:57

And I think the reality is in business and the longer in business, the

Becca: 00:30:00

more you'll see this is at times you will make poor financial decisions.

Becca: 00:30:05

We don't always know what the best things are for our business.

Becca: 00:30:09

We can try, we can try and make wise decisions, but occasionally

Becca: 00:30:12

we'll make poor decisions.

Becca: 00:30:14

You know, I've definitely had a couple over my time where I've invested in

Becca: 00:30:17

something that I thought was going to be really beneficial and then turned out

Becca: 00:30:20

not to be, or perhaps a course that I've paid for and haven't had time to finish.

Becca: 00:30:25

But yeah, at other times I've invested in things that have been one of the

Becca: 00:30:28

best things ever for my business.

Becca: 00:30:30

I've invested in courses or programs that have been incredible or software

Becca: 00:30:33

that's helped me or I've outsourced work and it's given me time back.

Becca: 00:30:38

Not all investing is bad investing, but what happens if we do make

Becca: 00:30:42

a poor financial decision?

Becca: 00:30:44

Well, the first thing is don't, again, don't look into yourself.

Becca: 00:30:47

Don't feel guilty.

Becca: 00:30:48

Don't beat yourself up.

Becca: 00:30:49

None of those things are actually positive.

Becca: 00:30:51

Just learn from it.

Becca: 00:30:53

When it comes to making financial decisions in your business, you

Becca: 00:30:56

need to look at it with wisdom.

Becca: 00:30:58

And again, objectively, are you budgeting at the beginning of the year?

Becca: 00:31:01

How are you putting certain amount of money towards marketing or sales or

Becca: 00:31:05

travel or Facebook ads or whatever it is that you want to do in your business?

Becca: 00:31:10

Are you putting money against those things?

Becca: 00:31:12

Because if you are making a budget, putting money against those things

Becca: 00:31:15

and then spending that money on those different allocated things, even if

Becca: 00:31:18

they don't work, I wouldn't class it as a poor financial decision because you

Becca: 00:31:22

haven't gone above and beyond your budget.

Becca: 00:31:24

You just maybe could try doing it in a different place.

Becca: 00:31:27

The other thing is we need to test things.

Becca: 00:31:29

And so sometimes you will have to invest in something and

Becca: 00:31:32

see whether it works for you.

Becca: 00:31:34

It, what works for one person might not work for someone else.

Becca: 00:31:37

So, for example, wedding directories, you may pay for a year on a wedding directory.

Becca: 00:31:40

For some people, they work incredibly well, they get a lot of business.

Becca: 00:31:43

For others, they don't.

Becca: 00:31:44

But you won't know that until you try it.

Becca: 00:31:47

Also, when you do make a financial investment like that, make sure

Becca: 00:31:49

you're making the most of it.

Becca: 00:31:51

Make the most of the resources they have to offer you.

Becca: 00:31:54

Make the most of that decision, because in order to see if it's going to

Becca: 00:31:57

give you a good return on investment, you need to put your all into it.

Becca: 00:32:01

into it.

Becca: 00:32:01

Don't just do something and then give up on it a month later.

Becca: 00:32:04

If you're going to invest in something, do it for a sustained amount of time.

Becca: 00:32:09

The biggest thing is don't beat yourself up.

Becca: 00:32:11

Don't feel guilty because occasionally we'll invest in something and

Becca: 00:32:13

it didn't quite work out for us.

Becca: 00:32:16

Don't do crazy risky investments easily.

Becca: 00:32:18

either.

Becca: 00:32:18

You need to be financially savvy.

Becca: 00:32:20

You need to have a strategy.

Becca: 00:32:21

That's why budgeting at the start of the year is helpful.

Becca: 00:32:24

If you're struggling with the financial side of your business,

Becca: 00:32:27

then get some help with it.

Becca: 00:32:29

Take my Wedding Pro Business Builder course, for example.

Becca: 00:32:31

In module four, I've created a bunch of spreadsheets to help you work out

Becca: 00:32:35

the finances in your business, to stop you having your head in the sand, and

Becca: 00:32:39

to start looking at, okay, how much does this business cost me to run?

Becca: 00:32:42

How much can I spend on different areas of my business?

Becca: 00:32:44

And how can I ensure I'm profitable by the end of the year?

Becca: 00:32:50

Okay, that brings me to my final thing I want to talk about the final difficulty

Becca: 00:32:54

that we see sometimes in our businesses and that is exhaustion and burnout.

Becca: 00:33:00

I see this far too often and I've seen it in my own life as well.

Becca: 00:33:05

You know, we talk about owning your own business and having Financial freedom

Becca: 00:33:08

and time freedom and how great it is that when others are having to go to work and

Becca: 00:33:12

not get that much holiday, we can have flexible lives and do whatever we want.

Becca: 00:33:16

And in some aspects that is true.

Becca: 00:33:19

And I love being self employed.

Becca: 00:33:20

I think I'm probably the least employable person ever now.

Becca: 00:33:23

Cause I love the freedom to make my own decisions.

Becca: 00:33:26

However, the other side of that coin is there's been a lot of times when

Becca: 00:33:29

I work late into the evening, there's been a lot of times when I do a whole

Becca: 00:33:33

lot of hours that I'm not paid anywhere near amount enough for, there's times

Becca: 00:33:38

when things get really busy and you burn the candle at both ends to get

Becca: 00:33:43

things done and sorted and it can be exhausting and it can lead to burnout.

Becca: 00:33:48

And I think.

Becca: 00:33:49

When we hit that stage, it's easy to forget why you started

Becca: 00:33:55

the business in the first place.

Becca: 00:33:57

Because often we started it because we wanted that flexibility, that freedom.

Becca: 00:34:00

And now all of a sudden we're working 100 hour weeks and not getting paid enough.

Becca: 00:34:04

So if that's you, what do we do about it?

Becca: 00:34:07

Well, I think The first thing is to look at your own calendar and

Becca: 00:34:11

to look at your own boundaries.

Becca: 00:34:12

Are there things you need to put in place to make sure you have time off?

Becca: 00:34:16

Are you making sure you're giving yourself holiday breaks through the year and

Becca: 00:34:19

not answering your phone all the time?

Becca: 00:34:22

Are you making sure that you're not checking your emails at one o'clock in the

Becca: 00:34:25

morning and you've got personal boundaries on when you're responding to things?

Becca: 00:34:30

Are you looking at whether there's things in your business you can outsource?

Becca: 00:34:33

Because if you're so busy, because you've got so many customers, then

Becca: 00:34:38

financially you should have a little bit of money available there in order

Becca: 00:34:41

to help someone, pay someone to come in and help you take some of that load off.

Becca: 00:34:47

Is it that you need to put your prices up, so you're doing less things, less events,

Becca: 00:34:51

but earning more money from it, so you're not You know, going out really cheap and

Becca: 00:34:55

doing 100 events a year, but just being completely exhausted by the end of it.

Becca: 00:34:59

Are you better to double your prices and do half the amount of events?

Becca: 00:35:03

It's the same amount of money, but a whole lot less time.

Becca: 00:35:07

You know, living in a state of exhaustion and burnout is no fun for anyone.

Becca: 00:35:11

And actually, when we are feeling like that The thing we need to do, number

Becca: 00:35:15

one is rest and not feel guilty.

Becca: 00:35:17

There's a lot of guilt and self reflection coming out of today's episode.

Becca: 00:35:20

But also it means we need to take a little bit of time for ourselves,

Becca: 00:35:24

and then we need to reflect and look at our own situation and whether

Becca: 00:35:28

we're making it worse for ourselves.

Becca: 00:35:30

What could we change to make our lives less?

Becca: 00:35:34

Stressful and busy.

Becca: 00:35:36

Because if it was a boss that was telling you had to work 100 hours a

Becca: 00:35:39

week with no holiday, no sick pay, no nothing, and you had to answer emails

Becca: 00:35:44

at one o'clock in the morning, I promise you, you would have something

Becca: 00:35:46

to say to them in your next appraisal.

Becca: 00:35:49

However, when we're doing it to ourselves, somehow it feels acceptable.

Becca: 00:35:53

Well, guess what?

Becca: 00:35:53

is not overly acceptable and you need to start putting some boundaries in place.

Becca: 00:36:00

I hope today's episode has been helpful for you.

Becca: 00:36:03

As I said, it's not the most positive of things to talk about, but I think

Becca: 00:36:06

it's important that we don't just talk about the glossy, rosy, perfect side

Becca: 00:36:10

of things, and actually sometimes get into the nitty gritty of things like

Becca: 00:36:14

crickets, people not replying to us, disappointment about not being picked,

Becca: 00:36:19

complaints, negative reviews, copycats.

Becca: 00:36:21

All of those things that happen to us when we own our own business.

Becca: 00:36:26

We need to be talking about them more.

Becca: 00:36:27

We need to be sharing about it more.

Becca: 00:36:29

So I hope you found today's episode helpful.

Becca: 00:36:31

As I said, if you want to chat more, if there's something that really resonated

Becca: 00:36:34

with you, or if you enjoyed this episode, please do reach out and let

Becca: 00:36:37

me know at Becca Poutney on Instagram.

Becca: 00:36:40

I reply to all my messages.

Becca: 00:36:42

Or drop me a message, becker at beckerpatley.

Becca: 00:36:44

com.

Becca: 00:36:45

And if you just feel like you need a bit more of a supportive community

Becca: 00:36:48

around you, if you feel a little bit isolated in business, or like you

Becca: 00:36:51

don't have people that you can talk to about this stuff, then let me urge you

Becca: 00:36:55

to check out the wedding pro members lounge, because you will find in there

Becca: 00:36:58

the most supportive, lovely, kind, encouraging wedding pros on the internet

Becca: 00:37:03

who inside that private community.

Becca: 00:37:06

are vulnerable with each other and are honest about what's going on in

Becca: 00:37:09

life and we don't pretend life's rosy.

Becca: 00:37:10

So if you feel like you need an encouraging arm around you and

Becca: 00:37:13

a community to support you, then get in touch, let me know and I

Becca: 00:37:17

can point you in that direction.

Becca: 00:37:19

I'll be back next week.

Becca: 00:37:20

Have a fabulous one and I'll see you then.