Service Based Business Society Podcast

SEASON 1
EPISODE 16

TITLE:Systemize Your Business For Success

Hello, and welcome to the service based business society podcast. I'm your host Tiffany-Ann Bottcher. Today, in our weekly episodes, we will dig into everything you need to know about scaling your service based business without losing sleep.

With my experience in creating over seven figures per month, and a passion for marketing, finance and automation, this show will provide tangible tips and techniques for scaling your business. Let's get started.

Hey, guys, welcome back, we have a special guest today. And today we are joined by Samantha Doris. Now she's a business efficiency consultant with a focus on cutting the BS out of your work days, so you can enjoy more freedom at home. Sam is a dubsado and clickup Wizard, mom of two and total book nerd using the purposefully productive method. She helps agencies and service providers to grow and scale their businesses by developing simple systems and leveraging the right tech to save days of time without the stress.

Alright guys, you know that I love everything about systems, business efficiency, and books. However, Sam likes one thing that I am not so into. If you've guessed it, it's Instagram. So Sam also hangs out and spends a lot of time on Instagram. We won't hold that against her. And we're going to welcome her to the show and dive right in. It's so nice to have you here and catch up and, and whatnot. So tell me what's been going on in your business the last little while?

Sam:
Yeah. Well, it's been a roller coaster, for sure. A good one and excited about the uphill for sure. For those that don't know, I am an operations consultant, specifically strategizing on the CRM side of things and project management clickup, things like that. And it's been really interesting, I've been shifting into the consulting side of things and the pivot from done for you. And really being a solopreneur into being a CEO, hiring my first full time employee. Like, that's been really fun. And just expanding in that way has been interesting. So it's been good.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
You know, it's interesting when you add to the team, and I think it really resonates with our listeners as well, you know, it's this piece of it's like, thank goodness help has arrived.

But at the same time, you're like, Oh, my goodness, in the short term, it really is almost more work.

Sam:
Oh, yeah. And, and it's interesting, because you've got this help, and they're more than happy to help you with stuff, but they don't know exactly what to do, or how to do it, or what that looks like. And so it's been a challenge, because we've been working on a lot of internal systems on our end, as well as onboarding a new employee working on client stuff, and it can be overwhelming, it can be a lot. So cautiously, I've been just one step at a time.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
I think it's, it's so good for you to say, you know, it can be overwhelming, because even when you come from kind of the operations systems mindset, I mean, we have so many entrepreneurs that don't have that kind of operation system tech piece, so that on its own, it's overwhelming, yes. And then you need to go through these changes and pieces. And so I know for our agency, about five, six months ago, we made a fairly significant kind of tech transition, we moved from Asana to clique up. And, you know, timing realistically, probably couldn't have been worse. No, good. And it was like, okay, but this is realistically also what our clients go through is that you're, you know, you're going along and things are working, or not working that well, but they're, they're going and then it's, you know, all of a sudden, you you really hit some success, and sales increase, team size increases, whatever that kind of boosted capacity is, and all of a sudden, it's like a pretty well system are potentially not really what we need them to be. Yeah, and now you're kind of making that switch. Really not that not the greatest time.

Sam:
Well, and that's something I tell my clients all the time because ironically, this is exactly what I help my clients and go through and like actually support them through this process. Because it can be a lot, it can be really emotionally taxing, you know, without realizing it, because you're going through an energetic uplevel at the same time that you're trying to logically build the back end of your business. So it can be a lot in that sense. But as I've been moving through it, it's like oh, well, we just did this, let's repurpose this and now it's part of our process and now we can just how's it so the first step was just coming up with that frame to be able to build inside of and be able to leverage that and then as we've been building for clients and building for ourselves, we've just kind of been adding the layers to it, which has been super helpful but yeah, by especially having an ops background or like that process mind, more so than the creative sometimes. It can be a lot for you even for someone like me, and that's exactly why I'm like, Guys, don't worry, we got you like we're here for you. It's just, you know, the same thing with your agency, I'm sure.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
Absolutely 100%. And, and often really, it's kind of a mindset piece of, I mean, usually it's not coming at, like I said, not at the greatest of timing. But it's a good problem to have like, we're, you know, we're growing and it's, you know, we're adding to you more, we're adding clients or whatever that is. So now we need to increase the capacity. But there's also kind of a shift that needs to happen within the organization to allow for those pieces to happen. And, you know, I, we spoke about it in a previous episode, but kind of shying away from that kind of discomfort and leveling up and almost being like, I'm not ready, and thinking small. And instead, you know, we talked about really leaning in and to being uncomfortable.

Sam:
Yeah, oh, gosh, yes, embracing the suck is what I like to refer to it as. Because there are elements that are just man, they're going to feel really heavy. And it's going to feel like it's sludge brownie, like you're just in the thick of it. And I pry literally tell all of my clients this like it will feel like not fun. And then on the other side of it, it feels so much lighter and being on the back end. But it is a huge mindset shift. Because as you know, service based business owners, we started the business on our own, we're the only ones serving clients, we're also the only ones driving the bus, and to be able to kind of pass and delegate off to team members or you know, even if you outsource, like, for example, the first thing I outsource was my social media because it was taking up the most amount of my time. And now I just go here, you go team, and they take care of it. But it took them you know, it took me taking that leap of faith and just like seeing if I liked the process in order to really dive into, oh, I have a time back. This is actually really great. And sometimes it's never going to be good timing, but you just kind of work with what you got. And you have to take that first step and just try it, like just see if you like it, because it's the only way you're going to know one way or the other.

Just like you know, you didn't know if you liked the business you're building until you started doing it. So, the same kind of idea. For sure. 100%.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
You know, it's interesting social media is often I find social media is either the one that people hold on to the longest because they love it, or it's the first one to go because they're like, oh my goodness, I did not sign up for being like a social media influencer, right? I don't want to be a content creator. That's why I run my business.

Like, this is not what I signed up for. I'm confused. Yeah.

Sam:
And honestly, that I, I laugh because it's usually either the first or the last also with my clients. And I'm like, why are you? Why are you still holding on to this? And I love the word that you used, like a little bit ago, allow, like, you have to allow it to be easier and allow that support to come in to. Because I know for the longest time I resisted it, and I you know had a couple of vas. They did good work. You know, they were cool. People loved working with them. But it just wasn't like driving for me specifically. And it wasn't until I started allowing better support. And you know, the things that I actually wanted to come in, that the right person showed up and was like, I'm all in and now we're like, same wavelength, which is super cool. So yeah, definitely a release of control and opening to allow is a really excellent visual for that.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Yeah, in my own business, I really think about triage. I really triage my whole life if I'm gonna be honest. And I'm like, okay, broken arm, even if it's a compound fracture, not important. If we're having a heart attack. No, no, no. So as much as we probably in some other situations would be concerned about the fractured arm. Right now. We're going to put that off to the side. And we're just going to deal with it. Yep. And so allowing, you know, like you said, allowing some of these pieces to happen, you know. And at one point, you're not ready to allow someone to assist on things that are really important to you. Yeah, but as your business grows and shifts, you have to be willing to let go of some of the things to make room for other things. Yeah, otherwise, no one's doing the other thing. Right.

Sam:
Right. And that's so true. And it's and it's interesting, you say that, because the question that just popped into my mind was like, Well, how do you know what things you should be working on? Like, how do you prioritize the side of the triage of your business? And I was thinking back on a checklist that I made myself, like when I start my day, I only ever have three things that I'm focused on. Because anything more than that my brain cannot function. Like, usually one of those things is taking care of me. Like what am I going to do to bring joy for myself today? Well, you know, today's been a little bit of guitar. It's I'm gonna go and work later. Like, that's, that's taking care of me. And then the second is like, how can I serve my clients and show up for them really well today. And that's, you know, working on client projects, if I've gotten specific about that, and, and the more specific you are, the easier it is to feel accomplished in the day, which is interesting. And then the third piece is always what can I do for my own business?

Like, how can I build this to what it is I'm trying to get to, because if you don't have that lens of it, you're gonna feel stuck where you're at for a very long time. And I think that's, you know, going back to that CEO mentality, it's, it's okay, I'm driving the ship, but like, where's it going? Like, where actually ARE WE are We tried to go to

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
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You know, it's interesting, because we have this, you know, especially as a business is growing, you know, if you started as a solopreneur, and you are, you're, you're all you're doing all of these roles. And so you've got this time where you're working in the business, you're performing the services, you know, you're doing the the piece for the client, and then you're working on the business and creating the strategy and growing things and setting up systems and stuff. And realistically, as the business grows, you need to do more and more of that. But, you know, I often see and I'm sure you see the same thing, where, you know, the focus continues to be on the in the business almost too long. And then the business stuff starts to really suffer.

Yeah. And I often say, you know, like, that really is the driving when you've said, you know, steering the ship, it's absolutely, because if you're not taking those times to kind of check in and say, Okay, are we still on course, you know, it's like, the ocean is pretty big. And you can let it coast for, you know, short spurts, so you're not but but every once in a while, you have to be like, are we still on? Course? Yep. Because otherwise, by the time you, you know, look up, and you're like, Oh, we're really at the wrong things. But we should have made us, you know, when it's a slight adjustment early, yeah. But you know, if you leave it too long, suddenly, you're like, Well, we are, we took the long way, for sure.

SAM:
Right. And sometimes it's scenic. And And ironically, it takes those mistakes in order to go back and be like, Oh, wait, wait, wait, we've been here before, let's, you know, self correct this, which and it's funny, you say that too, because usually it is those little shifts that make a huge difference later on down the line. And working on the business versus in the business is literally, that is the shift from solopreneur, or service based entrepreneur to CEO.

Like when you start, it doesn't matter if you have an employee or not, when you start to expand the business is when you start to flip that switch in your mind like, Okay, where do I actually want to end up? And you know, you don't, so many people have heard this expression, but like, you don't get on an airplane, if you don't like the plane knows exactly where it's going, you know, if you're flying into Phoenix, that's where the plane is going, you get on the plane, you go to Phoenix, and you're there, there is no question as to like, Oh, I wonder where I'll end up today. Like, oh, you know exactly where you're going. And business is the same, especially as you're growing, and you're scaling. And you have to understand what it is you want it to look like so that you can reverse engineer the plan in order to get to where you want to go, if that makes sense.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Totally makes sense. Yeah, kind of comes back to you know, really in ensuring that you have the data that the systems are giving you the information you need. Yeah. And, you know, I, people shy away from the word data, as much as they shy away from the word CEO. It's, you know, it's but realistically, sometimes I say like, forget about, you know, all of the data calculation analytics, forget about all the words, and let's just focus on, you know, does it make sense? Yeah. You know, are you on track to be where you want to be? And if not, how much? How much are we gonna sit by? And what are we going to do? Yep. And kind of, you know, forget the, the words that make the, you know, the retraction happen, and instead just lean in and say, okay, like, where do we want to be? Where are we now? What do you know, it's a road trip, realistically, let's figure out the path to get there.

Sam:
Yeah, sometimes you stopped for gas and sometimes you stopped for snacks. And you have to have a little bit of both.

What would you say if you were talking to, you know, a service based business owner that's growing and maybe they're at like that 5k mark, or they're just starting? And they're wanting to get to that 1015 20k months, like what would you tell them to look at most in terms like data or numbers, because that is a CEO, like that's the CEO opportunity to understand where your business is going. When I started blowing up in business, it's because I really started looking at my own numbers, particularly my finances, and understanding why they were happening and what I was doing in order to influence them. And that, like, that's my personal experience, I started doing that in January, because I had to do my taxes, I had to finish out last year. And then I was like, oh, and then I made some adjustments, and this year has been really, really good.

Comparatively, which is cool. So what would you say to a service based business owner that's kind of on that uphill trend, in terms of like, what to focus on or look at?

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
So my history, like my previous education, at the undergraduate level is in accounting, so often, you know, I default to the, you know, the financials. 100. That's, that's where I, you know, I go, but I think often, you know, it's kind of what you just said about, well, I got to January, and I was doing my taxes, and that is the entrepreneur story is we don't have financials, we have, you know, a tax return at the end of year. And so we don't, we're not making those minor adjustments through the year, we don't really know how you know how much money we're making or not making. If there's money in the bank? Well, we're making money. And if there's no money in the bank, then we're not making money, right. And so, but that's not often actually reflective of the true story. And so, one of the first things that, that I realistically try to get to with businesses and clients is, what are the fixed costs of your business? Yep. What do we have to make no matter? What if we stopped actually working tomorrow? What are these fixed costs? And then what are the the variable costs? What are the costs that go up, if you sell another job, your costs go up, if you sell less drops, your costs go down. And we've really the end goal there is to figure out, what is the profit of these jobs that you're doing? Yeah. Because, you know, a lot of times it's, we're nowhere close to be covering the fixed expenses, right? Or, you know, certain kinds of work are is super profitable. And there's other work that is not profitable, and is really, and it's like, okay, let's do a little less of that. Yep. And, you know, there'll, there will always be some people say, you know, oh, that's kind of, you know, like, it's almost a marketing piece. Yep. You know, I get them in the door. And so that's great. That is a conscious management decision.

But if you don't know the numbers, that is not a conscious decision, that's just you winging it, that well,

well, it's a conscious decision to be, you know, ignorant is a strong word, but ignorant to what it is, is actually happening. And it's a choice to know or it's a choice to not know, also, like equally. Yeah, 100%.

Yeah, I was listening to something recently, and they said that not making a choice is a choice. Yeah, exactly. And I was like, that was the expression I was looking for. Yes, I was like, well, that's powerful. Yeah. Yeah.

It's that waiting, you know, it's that like, analysis, paralysis, and just kind of waiting until the decision realistically has been made for you. Because time is passing? You didn't. You didn't make a choice.

Sam:
Yeah. And that in itself can be powerful, especially as you're going through and, you know, sometimes not making those decisions is like make or break like, Okay, well, you know, let's say you're you're wanting to speak more at summits, or you're wanting to get on more podcasts or things like that, like, okay, that's fine. You also have to choose to fill out the applications and like to put in the effort in the work to actually find those things. And the right opportunities will come to you. But if you're just sitting there looking at an application, and you choose not to fill it out, you're essentially also choosing the consequences on the other side of that. It's just like, if you've decided you want to lose weight, but you choose not to go to the gym, there's going to be consequences. Do you have to go to the gym in order to achieve your goals? No, but if you've decided that's what's important to getting there, like as part of your process or your journey, then it's important and that and then that kind of ties in with like, the corporate world talks about OKRs and KPIs. And like those key performance indicators, all those are, and this is, there's a book called The four disciplines of execution, which is just a fantastic leadership book, but they talk about lead measures and lag measures. And all those words are the effort it takes to get from where you are to where you want to be. And then how do you know you've made it there? So the lead measures are everything you've done up until that point you're looking for, or that result you're looking for, and a lag measure is everything after the fact. So you know, the number of followers on Instagram, that's a lag measure, you have absolutely no control over that. You can control how many times you post what content you put out, the quality of your content, reels, not real stories, polls, whatever.

Those are all leading measures. And so when you start to understand your numbers from that perspective, and this goes for you know that that was a content example, but this goes for sales, it goes for messaging, it goes for, you know, literally every piece of the business. If you don't understand why you're doing the things you're actually spending time doing, you're just wasting a crap ton of time, genuinely, and life is way too short for that BS.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Isn't that the truth? You know, back in my corporate days, we really did a lot of that Kate, you know, KPIs, no viewers, and I, you know, we definitely talk through the process with a lot of my clients, but in a different way. And so if I go back to the time of the corporate KPIs and OKRs, it used to be a meeting every month, it was like, four hours long. And it was one of those, you know, could have been an email type meeting. So yeah, like, Oh, my goodness, don't fall asleep. Because realistically, you have a bunch of different managers from a bunch of different departments. So you've got someone from accounting, you've got someone from sales, you've got someone from all of these different, you know, more service related pieces, and everyone is talking about the data points that are relevant to that. Yep. And so number one, that's not really great like it, you know, what's relevant to someone in accounting is not relevant to the, you know, they're different data points and different data measures, but you also have a varying level of, you know, different things we're examining. And I remember, so clearly, someone said that one of you know, they're OKRs, their objective was to be the very best Yeah, in the industry.

And it's like, okay, so how do we measure that? Yeah, how do we know? How do you know when you've got there? And they're like, well, we'll just be the bats. And it's like, but that's not actually like, what, what is the scale? Who is deciding what the best means? I mean, you know, it's very different. If you have like a public company, and you've got, you know, we're comparing financials, and we're saying this specific debt, but I'm like, a private business. Yeah.

Who's the best? Well, whoever, you know, it's like, well, that's very matter of opinion.

Sam:
Yeah. And it's hard to sit. And this is where the CEO piece comes in is like, Okay, well, if the CEO is driving the bus, what's important to the CEO, because it's important to the company. And when you get into the leadership side, and you have, you know, whether it's a team of one or a team of three, you have to have some kind of greater vision or greater plan for what you're trying to accomplish.

And I remember very distinctly, at the beginning of this year, really sitting down and being like, What is this company? Because that's what it is, this is a business, this is a company, what does this company actually stand for? Like, why are we in business? Why are we operating it? And really getting to the root of those kinds of questions, helped me to be able to understand, like, what actually is most important for us to be doing, and creating and serving and how, and making sure that it's all in alignment, because outside of alignment, it means we're not actually working towards the goal that we've set.

So for example, like something we've been working on, we want to help people live their actual lives, instead of being stuck in their business working, you know, ungodly hours in the business, because that sucks. Life's too short for that I could literally get hit by a bus tomorrow, you know, like, your dog could pass away. Like, that's morbid, but you face the reality of the fact that time is the finite resource that we have, you start to think a little bit differently, and then you can use that and start to develop, okay, well, if that's our goal, if we want to help people get unstuck, what's the fastest, most direct, impactful way that we can do that? Well, we're going to shift into some group coaching programs and move a little bit away from the one to one stuff, you know, think things like that you start to make decisions based off of the larger vision versus the temporary now. And it's a really hard transition, including cash flow. And I don't think a lot of people talk about this, like, when you make a decision as a CEO, that's uncomfy. But you know, it's where you're going. That transition period, that flux sucks, it absolutely sucks.

And managing the cash flow, managing expectations, managing clients, you know yourself like there are a lot that is a lot of layers of cake in that's like a that's like a seven layer cake right there. At a minimum, like, there's a lot to it. So yeah, I don't know that a lot of people are talking about that. But something to ruminate on, I suppose.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
It's interesting, because you know that the businesses who are most likely to run out of cash in a cash flow situation are businesses that are in high growth. Yeah. And, you know, made worse if you have terms like if you're a business with 30 day terms, and most businesses with 30 day terms don't have an actual app brunch collection rate of 30 days.

Let's be, you know, call a spade a spade. Yep. And so, you know, industry is more typical, what I have seen is going to be more like, you know, mid 40s. Yeah, on a 30 day term. And so now you have paid out all the expenses for the sales. And so great sales are increasing, that means expenses are also increasing. And so when you're not collecting that right on time, you start to see a problem, because now the cash is not coming in. And so a lot of times in those moments, things start, you know, now you're the busiest your business has been, you're growing, it's great. But now there's this, you know, oh, we'll get to the invoicing. A lot of times if you don't have someone on your team who's doing accounting or the bookkeeping, or however that system is, it's done. You know, it's like, oh, you get you know, you get home late, you're like, Oh, well invoice tomorrow, oh, well invoice tomorrow.

So now you're starting your 30 day terms late because you didn't actually get the invoice, don't write, and then you're collecting late because that's just the way that it's gonna go. And so that cashes out, but that it's not being collected right away, and that for massively successful businesses run out of cash.

Sam:
Yeah. Which is a terrible thing to happen. And that was something that I've experienced that in my business is like, at the beginning of this year, I was running terms for, you know, one of my offers, it was like, it was a $500 deposit. And then two monthly payments after the fact. Well, by the time that the, you know, the service was done, I still had to wait an additional 30 days or more, in order to get that second monthly payment, I was literally choking out my cash flow. Because even though the service was done, provided the client was satisfied and happy and it was awesome. I choked myself and flowed really badly. In an effort to increase cash flow later, what it actually did was prevent me from growing in that right now. And so it was, it was interesting as soon as I removed that $500 deposit and I just said it's pay in full or it's two payments.

And like that, its cash flow fixes itself immediately. And it's, it's hard when you're in it, especially from you know, from the perspective of oh, we need cash because we have bills to pay, we have kids to feed we you know, you could do the numbers go on, you know, the list goes on. You have to manage your own expectations about what it is you're trying to do. And also how to get there. Like there's a little bit of strategy in this is what we're doing this is the plan. And I'm 100% like, going to be okay, if everything hits the fan and doesn't end up the way that I think it's gonna play out. But I know it'll be okay. Like, there's that balance of like, abundance and like, you know, the woo with the work on like, together, they have to, they have to be together. Otherwise, it's an emotional roller coaster of health.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
Like, just to put it mildly, casually, just super casually.

You know, whoever said that, you know, working for yourself was easier. If you know, I don't know,

Sam:
I wholeheartedly disagree. And I worked for somebody else, but I was my own boss in what I was doing. And it's harder than that. And I'm like, wow, I had so many things I didn't have to worry about previously. It's an interesting dichotomy for sure.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Yeah, I, you know, there's always the funny funny, like tech talks and things about you know, like, I didn't want to work nine to five. So now I work 24 hours a day and those kinds of things that I personally have been really trying to take some of my hours back. i Because, you know, he you know that we like to automate a lot of things and you do the same and then I take that time, and instead of being like, Oh, I created all this time. I'm like, Oh, I can take on more things. Yeah, I can lose other things. Yeah, look at the capacity we created. And then it's like, Oh, my goodness.

So one of the big shifts that I just recently made, because coming into, you know, school kids being off for summer and whatnot. I was like, Okay, so I'm not really sure how my schedule is gonna work. Yeah. As it's currently presented. So I am very guilty because I like working late. I've always been to work late. It's quiet. You know, you kind of get in the vibe, but before you know it, it's lately Yeah, like

Sam:
Yeah, yeah. And you're like, Oh, now look at the time. So I've been trying to fix like,

I know I know guilty guilty so and it's but it's like I'm just doing my lights do and you know, you get working on something you don't even really notice. Yeah. And so I haven't tried to go to bed way earlier like when I put the kids to bed and like to sleep first. Yeah. And then get up at it's like so now I'm like getting up when I used to go to bed and it's like this very weird transition. But I'm like, oh my goodness, I feel better because I'm Getting more consistent. Yeah. And it's like, even though it's not like regular hours, it's still more of a routine. And I'm a routine kind of girl. So it was a bit of a struggle before. And so I'm like, Okay, I'm trapped out for a while.

The only part that is really tough with the new schedule is that the husband's time is not really in alignment, because I'm like, Okay, it's time for bed. He's like, it's eight o'clock. I'm like, he's like, What are you talking about? You're like, peace out like, great night.

Sam:
Yeah. And that, that, that time is also really important. And that's, that's something that a lot of my clients go through, as well as like, Okay, well, this is what I want. And this is, you know, as the CEO, where does your time actually need to be focused, because there's a very fine line between doing the things that absolutely light you up as a service provider, because that's where your zone of genius is, your budget should be there as much as humanly possible. And you run a business. So there's always going to be stuff that you don't necessarily love doing.

Like I know, for a fact, I would love to be able to sleep in every morning. But there are some mornings where I choose not to, because it's important to what I'm building. And that can be a lot of just like with, you know, being intentional with your time and being intentional with your schedule. One thing I've been looking at is like, Okay, what actually do I need to be involved with what makes me happy versus not. And if it doesn't make me happy, or if I'm not the only person that can do it, we got to slide that off my play as quickly as humanly possible. And there's a little bit of a transition time and a requirement of like releasing it off of your plate. But as soon as you do you, then you have to be like, Oh, this is exactly what I asked for. And allow yourself that time to be doing your flow and like in that zone of genius and like really flippin excited about that and being intentional about like, Okay, well, now that I have the free time, I'm gonna, you know, take that time with my husband, I'm gonna, I'm gonna schedule that thing that I've been trying to do for freaking months or I'm gonna, you know, for me it's golfing with my dad, sometimes it's like, dumb as that sounds. We'll just literally go to the driving range, like on a Tuesday. If the schedule allows it because he's a contractor, he can work his own schedule. And so that 's, it's kind of fun. But you have to not feel guilty about it. And that's been really hard for me for sure. For sure.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
You know, it's funny that you say that because I was as you were talking, I was like, and it's just not allowing the guilt to take over and you're like, and I feel guilty. I'm like, Oh, my goodness. Yeah. Get well because you do down you're like, I should be working. Yeah, I should be working. And it's like, okay, but you did the work. You did like and now the work is your good. Everything is like a good place. And now you're supposed to be enjoying the benefit of, you know, something else. I had these visions when I left my job that I was going to be like, we have this super cute little breakfast place where I live. It's like all you know, became crunchy. They make their granola. Amazing Chai lattes. Super cute. Yeah. And I'm like, Oh, I could drop my two oldest stops at school and my littlest.

And I can go for like those cute little yogurt granola breakfasts. And this is gonna be great. And I can tell you that in a year. It happened once. Yeah, one time. And I was like, what better to take a picture because I'll be back and

Sam:
see that it's so funny that you say that? Because I've noticed, like when I am like, oh, yeah, what like, why did you start your business, it's to do those yogurt dates to do those granola dates. Because that's what life is frickin about. Like, it's about the relationships, it's about the time that we're spending doing the things we absolutely love doing. Like, I can tell you for a fact, working outside is one of my all time favorite things of all time.

I have, I literally contemplate moving states. So I can do it more months out of the year, because I live in Ohio, like and summer is the only time that I can enjoy the heck out of this. But if you're not intentionally doing that, you are consciously saying that's not actually the life you want to live. And there's a part of you that's still playing small, because you don't think that you can have the other side of it. And as soon as that switch flipped for me, it was like, and then business exploded because I stopped doing the things that I was like, I should be doing this. Like, I should be like, for example, I have a Facebook group I have. I don't use it. I really don't use it a lot. I don't know that I want to have a Facebook group because I love Instagram. And so therefore, that was one of those things that like yeah, I should do this because it's a really good strategy.

I can leverage it. But now it's just your dollar expense in my accounting that I'm not leveraging right now that I don't really need right now. So it's like why do i Why am I still doing this thing, even though I feel like I don't need it. And it's just releasing the shirts like literally just letting them walk right out the door. It doesn't matter what guru told you to do it, who's really successful at it if it says not to feel 100% in alignment with what you want. It's a no, no, no.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
It really comes back to that it's your business. And so you get to make a call. It's it's, it's like you have to deal with consequences, good or bad. And you get to make the call. I was working through some very creative type tasks. And the client was really like, could go this way, could go that way. I said, just so you know, neither are wrong. There's no wrong answer. What? There's no wrong answer. This is totally my personal preference. So what you might personally prefer is very, like, it's, it's different than you could survey 100. That doesn't matter. I said, But none of it matters. It's yours. You got it. And it was kind of like this, almost like the permission to just make, make a call and realize that it's up to you. Yeah, good or bad.

Sam:
I think that's probably the most fun piece that I work with my clients on is like, Okay, well, but like, how do you want to do this? I don't care what Sally the social media lady said, I don't. I don't care what that coach over there told you like, what feels good for you, what feels fun, like that is probably the best question that you can ask yourself is like, what feels fun right now to do in business. And then you create a baseline minimum of what it actually takes to do what you want. And it's usually not that much. It's not as far as you think it is. It's not that much harder than what you actually think it is. And that's, that's powerful, that permission slip is mind blowing. Because that's usually when everything clicks, you ask anybody that's had a really fast growth first like, or that goes, Oh, I had, you know, $30,000 a month, and it happened overnight. Like those kinds of stories? No, it's not overnight. They're just had a really big mindset shift. And they let go of the stuff that was actually dragging them down. And they started doing more of the stuff that was lighting them up, hands down. Yeah, yes.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Absolutely. And, and remembering that those people that are telling those stories that, you know, the people who are having the opposite aren't sharing as loudly. And and you know, because you get online, and sometimes it's almost people like, oh, but you know, so and so's got this business, and they're selling this and they're doing that, and it's like, okay, but but people who aren't like, you know, top top are not sharing, right?

Sam:
Or if they are, it just looks like Oh, but they do XYZ or they spend X and ads or they do you know, these strategies, and it's like, it's so far removed from where, where you feel like you're at as a service provider that sometimes it takes finding that person that's like, one half step above you, or like they've just done it, or they're, you know, two years removed from it in order for you to go, oh, wait, I'm actually way closer than I realized. And that's a huge, yes, that makes a huge difference.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
For sure. Absolutely. So if you have one tip you know, give to our listeners that they could implement today and would make a difference in their business tomorrow. What would that be?

Sam:
Oh, gosh, if I only had to pick one thing, go look at your calendar. This is going to I every single farm, work and time. Yeah, that's a word. Every time I do this, it makes a really, really huge impact. If I've looked at my calendar, and there is an audit that takes place, if there's something I do not like on my calendar, it does, there's nothing else that goes on it like it ever again. Because if I don't like that piece, or if I've spent my time doing something I don't want to be doing like and you can get it off your plate, for example, I really, really don't like it.

This is like a hard example because I don't put these things on my calendar. But I don't take sales calls unless it's actually a sales call. This is a perfect example. I don't typically do coffee chats. Because to me, I love connecting, I can do that in a DM I can do that in a voice note via DM, I don't necessarily need to jump on a 15 or 30 minute phone call and you know, have a conversation with you and understand your whole background story.

Like I'm a very intuitive person and I can get it pretty quick. And I just want to know in a one liner sentence How can I really support you? How can I help you? And a lot of times I'll take care of that in the DMS within the first couple of minutes like how we're growing together and how we can support each other awesomely. If there is, you know, something that pops up on my calendar I'm like yeah, I don't know. I'll just evaluate it to determine whether you want it there or not.

Um That being said also, the first thing that goes into my calendar is fun as well as backwards is that as I plan my necessities, which is always my family time, and me time, because those are non-negotiables. To me, those are on the calendar and so no matter what, after that, what fun do I want to have? I go line dancing on Wednesday nights, a couple times a month, because I love it because it makes me happy. And the more happiness you put in your calendar, you're gonna see really, really big shifts start to kind of come from the weights of that and if there's not a lot of things that bring you joy on your time.

I wonder, What the heck are we doing on this planet? Man like life, I literally got a tattoo. Life's too short. It's not that serious.

So that would be my best advice, like life's Life's too short. And it's not that serious. So make sure you're, you know, building big fun into it. You can be doing work and doing serious things without dying. internally.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
Yeah, yeah, there's an add on. She's a business coach 30 Yeah, you know, her, she, she has been, you know, doing business coaching for a long time. And she doesn't do sales calls. And she sells some high ticket programs. She just I just saw something on Facebook, I think it was like the you know, was like a 10 10k offer kind of thing.

Sam:
You don't need it. A lot of times if the right client will know exactly what they want to do if you do this is this goes back to knowing where you're driving the bus, and how you're serving your clients on the way there when your messaging and your marketing strategy is really dialed in. So that the right people that follow you know exactly what it is you can help them with, they're going to know that they want to work with you or not within seconds of landing on your page. And then from there, no, you don't need a sales call.

How does this work? What does this look like? You know, then the questions after that are okay. Are you going to let your own BS stop you? Or is there some other question that I haven't answered yet? That's it. Like, I don't even want to do sales calls most of the time? I usually don't. I'm like, Yep, here it is. This is what I do, booboo. Check my website.
Guess that's where the rest of the information that I like it's fantastic. Yeah. Yeah, there you go.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
So what is that website? Where can people find you?

Sam:
My website is purposefully productive.com. I know it's a mouthful. But it is intentionally created because we want to save you time. And you know, make sure that you move with intention in your life. So purposefully productive.com and my Instagram handle is the same as purposefully productive. And that's usually where I chill out most. Because Instagram is on fire. Also considering starting a tech talk, but DVD.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
No tik tok. Yeah.

Sam:
we haven't broken into it yet. I just, it sounds like a good idea. But I just haven't carved the intentional time to do it the way that I want. And that's the other thing. I am not going to have something fast. If I'm going to do something. I'm going to go all in and I'm going to do it the way that I want to do it. Not just because I've taken in all my plate. So that's that big.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
Thank you so much, Sam. It's been so nice to have you here and I appreciate you having me.

Sam:
It's been a really, really huge blast. And I can't wait if you guys have any questions. I'm in the DMS all the dang time.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher
Awesome. That sounds great. Tiffany, thank you so much.

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