The biggest, most exhausting mistake that I see online business owners making is trying
to do all of the marketing things without really any idea of what they're trying
to achieve. Posting all the reels, engaging with all of the other accounts
on Instagram, maybe even running Facebook ads, but with no real strategy behind
it. Welcome to imperfect Action. I'm Steph Taylor. For years, I
read all the books, downloaded all the freebies, and did all the courses,
but it wasn't until I started taking imperfect action that my business had its
first million dollars year. Imperfect action is about doing things before you're ready,
prioritizing consistent action over perfect action, and moving forward even when you're not sure
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show notes Hey, welcome back to in Perfect Action this episode seven hundred and
ninety two. Today, I'm sharing five ways to simplify and streamline your online
business because I think when we've been running a business for a while, it
can very easily grow into a little bit of a monster, let's say,
an untidy monster, where we just keep adding more and more and more without
really stopping to think about whether we need the things that we are doing,
or whether we need to be doing more and maybe we need to be doing
less. So today, let's dive into the strategies to simplify and streamline your
online business. So, the first way to streamline your online business is to
really identify all all of the areas that are taking up a lot of your
time or that are taking a lot of manual work from you, and then
start to put a strategy into place for how you will save time in each
of these areas. Now, I know it feels really counterintuitive because it can
feel overwhelming to do this kind of work, like you're probably too busy to
sit down and write down all of these areas that are taking too much of
your time and to really, you know, look at all of these things
on one piece of paper, but overwhelm aside, you're not going to solve
it all overnight, And if you can see where your time is going,
then at least you can start to put a strategy into place to save your
time and your energy. For example, if somewhere that a lot of your
time is going is chasing up client invoices, well maybe you could delegate it,
delete it, or automate it. So what would that actually look like.
If you were to delegate the task, you would maybe need to put
together a process for how you would chase up those invoices, and you need
a person who can execute on that process for you, such as a virtual
assistant. Or maybe your other option is to delete the task. Now,
you can't really delete chasing up client invoices because then you just wouldn't get paid.
But there are other ways you could remove this task from your to do
list. For example, you could require that your clients pay upfront via a
checkout system rather than you invoicing them after you've done the service. You know,
so they have to actually pay before they can book in the project,
or before they get delivery, or before they book in the call. The
third option is automate, So this might look like setting up automated follow up
emails when someone's invoice is overdue, or maybe you could even as part of
the automated emails, you could remind them about that clause in your contract that
states you charge a percentage interest on over to you invoices. Okay. The
second strategy to streamline and simplify is to lean on the tech systems and tools
that are available now. When you think of simple, I know that tech
and systems are probably the last words that come into your mind. And this
is fair. You know, they can be really complex if you don't know
what you're doing, but in reality, they've come a really long way since
all of the clunky things that were available to us ten years ago, you
know, And right now, a really simple way that you can streamline things
is putting in a scheduling system, a booking system, like if you are
going back and forth with a client trying to schedule their coaching calls, use
acuity or calendarly so that they can find a time that works for them in
your calendar. And you can even use these tools to collect payment so that
you're not having to chase up those client invoices. And it saves you from
having to calculate time zones. It saves your million emails of does this time
work for you? What about this time? And it's a nightmare trying to
do that kind of stuff. So that's a really simple one to set up.
Another example, if you are constantly forgetting to follow up with people who
inquired about working with you, look to potentially using something like click up,
a task management system where you can keep track of your pipeline and you can
see who you need to follow up with and when you need to follow up
with them. The third way to really streamline and simplify your business is to
get really clear on your marketing and sales processes and streamline and automate as much
of them as possible. Now, the biggest, most exhausting mistake that I
see online business owners making is trying to do all of the marketing things without
really any idea of what they're trying to achieve, posting all of the reels,
engaging with all of the other accounts on Instagram, maybe even running Facebook
ads, but with no real strategy behind it. And I could talk about
the importance of strategy in your marketing and sales literally until the cows come home,
but this episode isn't about that. Now. Instead, instead of trying
to do all of the things, get really clear on the journey that you
want somebody to take with your business. For example, let's say they see
your Instagram carousel, they read the call to action, which is to download
your free ebook. Then they visit your website and they download the ebook.
Then they receive an automated email sequence that nurtures them, and you give them
a call to action to book in a call. And by setting up this
one automated sales process, it's selling for you. And then all you need
to do is think about how you can get more people to download that free
ebook. And you can do this by plugging in literally any of the tactics.
You can post reels, you can run Facebook ads, you can do
podcast episodes, you can do interviews on other people's podcasts, et cetera,
et cetera, et cetera. But by having the actual process in place,
then you're not constantly on this hamster wheel of nurturing people and attracting people at
the same time. Okay, the next strategy to streamline and simplify, to
become really intentional about what you do and what you don't do in your business,
and doing less can feel really hard when you have spent most of your
career thinking that your value is defined by how productive you are. And if
you're an overachiever like me, I know, I feel you. I feel
you, and especially in business where the input that you are putting in directly
can influence the end result. Now, you can do anything, but you
can't do everything, and you're actually more effective when you're doing less but with
more focus and intention. So spending a little time each month or each quarter
planning for things, what are your goals for this quarter? What actions do
you need to take to get there? And all of this becomes even more
important when you have a team. Otherwise you run the risk of running your
business really reactively doing the things that pop up as the most urgent tasks,
rather than proactively and intentionally doing the things that move the needle. And I
know I'm guilty of trying to achieve all of the goals all at once.
I get this, I get this so so well. I understand it,
like even this quarter, at the moment, I'm looking back at the goals
that I set for the business and I'm thinking, Wow, I really underestimated
how long it would take us to do all of these things. And it's
not the first time I've done that. What complications can you remove from your
business? That is number five the fitth strategy. What complications can you remove
from your business? Now? When I say complications, what in your business
feels a little bit icky or doesn't feel aligned? Like, what is it
that you dread doing? What have you been putting off for months? What
has been sitting on your to do list every day that you keep delaying.
What is taking a lot of your time and energy that you don't love and
that doesn't deliver a worthwhile return on time invested. You know, for example,
if you are posting to Instagram daily and you hate it and it takes
you half an hour to write one caption, that's a really easy complication you
can remove. And you might be thinking, but won't that stop me from
getting new clients? Well? Will it? I don't know. If you've
looked at your numbers and you know that this is where new clients are finding
you, then great, keep it, but find another way to get that
complication off your plate. Maybe hire a copywriter to write the captions or batch
them and do them once a month or once every two weeks. So there
you have it. Five strategies to simplify and streamline your business. Number one,
identify all the areas that are taking a lot of your time or a
lot of manual work, and put a strategy in place for how you will
save time here. Number two. Lean on the tech systems and tools that
are available. Number three, get really clear on your marketing and sales processes
and streamline and automate as much of these as possible. Number four, become
really intentional about what you do and don't do. And number five, what
complications can you from your business? Identify them and get ruthless with eliminating them.
That is it for today's episode. Keep the awesome reviews coming, guys,
like I've been really enjoying reading everyone's rating and reviews because I've been focusing
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And that is all from me today. Thanks so much for listening.
Catch you next time.