Connect Your Phase One with Your Online Presence
Michelle Ward
Lesson Info
17. Connect Your Phase One with Your Online Presence
Lessons
How I did It
27:32 2What Are We Gonna Cover?
08:43 3Why You Need a Plan
03:49 4Do You Really Need a Plan?
24:14 5What Makes Up Your Safety Net?
13:13 6Your Breath Easy Number
24:01 7How to Save Money
12:50How to Make Money
10:57 9Your New Breath Easy Number
10:43 10Interview (SKYPE) with Jema Valle of Date Night Planners
12:42 11Calling out Your Common Freelancing Fears
27:15 12What's The Worst That Can Happen?
33:14 13Your "Perfect" Day Job and Your Plan B
23:56 14Beginning Your Phase One
31:23 15Best Platforms for Minimal Cost
30:56 16Interview with Steffanie Housman of Old Town Suds
16:58 17Connect Your Phase One with Your Online Presence
16:05 18The Dreaded Question: What It Is and How to Answer It
29:28 19Best Practices for Family Support
12:49 20Available Support System
09:34 21Who Makes Up Your Support Squad?
08:17 22How to Put Together and Action Plan
26:01 23What does your SNAP Consist of?
38:39 24Best Practices to Ensure Follow Through
10:15Lesson Info
Connect Your Phase One with Your Online Presence
we're actually gonna go back a little bit. What we talked about in the last segment, which has faced one, and I want to show you, should spend a little bit of time showing you how you could connect your face one with your already existing online presence. And I think this is valid both for people that already have established their businesses and those who haven't already who might have more, you know, personal social media sites or blog's or stuff like that. So we're going to put lives in the hot seat. But you don't have to go anywhere you're seeing. Just pretend you're seat. It's hot right on. We need to see. You know, what do we need to do with your shop or your site or your social media accounts Right now that will streamline your phase One. If you have the workbook, their space for you to write this down on page 44. As we go through it with Liz, I hope that there are ideas coming to you based on on what you already have existing. We love to have you write them in the chat because ...
I'm gonna put can on the spot later. Teoh hear them? But let's pull up, Liz is I think there was a blogging and, uh uh, Instagram like I was going to say, interest that za total combination Someone make that. That's a lot of money. So, um, I love this. Could we see it yet? On the screen? Fabulous. So here is Liz is blocked by the wind designs dot com, a journey of discovery, experimentation and creation of selling handmade goods. Just give us an overview as to what this block is and why you created it. I've I've always been a dabbler of crafts, and I have a lot of different craft hobbies. Andi, I've always had an interest in trying to start a startup business selling something, but I haven't been. It's been hard for me to narrow down what I actually want to make and sell. So I started this block a couple of years ago thinking this would be a way for me to be hold myself accountable, keeping track of the things the crafts that I experiment with and what I'm learning in terms of craft business, but it doesn't have very many posts on it. Uh, and I kind of it dropped off when I got engaged and we got very organized a wedding very quickly, and it just got overwhelmed with things. Um, And then when I I I lost my son about eight months ago And, um and I was pregnant and I was full term, and it was really hard to me and all I wanted to do that got me through. It was all I want to do was make things any time things got overwhelming, which at the time was all the time all I wanted to do, isn't it? And I realize I've been given this gift of time of extra time that I didn't expect right now. And so that's what's pushing me and inspiring me to really get back into it. Um, I've changed my name. I recent kind of came up with a name called Otter and Compass for your business. My business. Hey, my interests are nature and handmade goods and maps. I'm a geographer cartographer. In my day job, I want to get more into the creativity side of that, but I want to keep have a business that kind of is in large enough umbrella that if I want to diversify into other interests, I can. So that's where I came up with water and compass for a new business name. My INSTAGRAM account has that, and I want to be able to create a new blawg that Aiken transition over from this old one. I love this for so many reasons, and thank you for for sharing your story with us. We have a lot like, you know, who have a lot of traumatic things living here on. You know, your story might be similar. Might be very different. But I think really what it shows is that you know, those begrudging life lessons I think that comes out of trauma and the trust that we have that comes from trauma and the control that we want back of our lives and the choices that we get to make in terms of what we spend our time on on I and I'm. And I'm excited to see this blogged, uh, be started by you lives before you knew what it waas, right, cause I think that's a trap we get into. We feel like we have to have it figured out first, and I think especially when it comes to blogging and writing. And I have a really fairly large majority of my clients. When they come to me, they say I'm feeling called to write I don't know what that looks like yet I know what it is, but they were like stopping themselves. They just need to right and a lot of the times. One of their first homework assignments is, like, just right. Just open just right One blawg post right one block post. And I put it in quotes because they might not have a BLAWG yet. And I don't care if they have a blogger and I don't care if they post something publicly. I just want them to write something that's for them. So I think that blogging journaling is a really great discovery tool. Also, by writing your thoughts and having them in one place, you're gonna be able to see common threads and connections that you couldn't make otherwise realizing. Like I always post about knitting, I didn't realize that I post about moving three times a week or whatever. It's sometimes hard to see that you could see the themes emerged, and I love that you're themes for your business are so expansive, you don't have to pick nature or maps or what was the other thing that you mentions. Travel, travel, right? It doesn't have to be or or or let's embrace the and of our creative Selves. And let's embrace the end of our career because we live in the age of the Internet and we can build businesses that feel and our expansive. It's not about limiting ourselves. We could still be successful. So with this block, I know it's not. It's not named with the same name as your business and the posts. Are they more personal than the things that you think that you want to write for your for your business? Yeah, a bit more personal than I thought I want. But at the same time, I think it's important to get those those personal stories out there still show the inspiration as well. What, what's pushing me? What's driving me? Yes. So how does that connect to your phase one and what you want to accomplish? First you see a connection between this blawg and what you see his face. One of your business. I that's that's something that I'm I'm having trouble making up my mind whether I want to keep this going of the experimentation and sharing the experimentation and the development of the business. Part of me really wants to do that. Maybe do that thundered under the under the new name. But I also like the idea of getting on instagram and sharing the process there. Yeah, doing the combination. Yes, I like this. Let me tell you what I see. And I think that there are a few ways you could go about this because I always feel like there's a few ways to get off about this. There's never usually anyone, right answer Thankfully, eso This is really great because you could you could just change the name right. You could always in this stops being by the wind sailor. It could be otter and compass. The theme of this blogged is very conducive to what you're telling me about your business. It absolutely works with the products that you know you want to be putting up. If you want it just as a start. And I know that a website and a blogger as part of your face one you don't have to start from scratch, you could just update this, You could add. I think this is on Blogger, right? It is. I'm not super familiar with blogger, but I think that it's great you have your about me. You could update that to talk more about otter and compass. I think that you should be able to connect your instagram so it come. It shows up on blogger that people could just click your instagram and find you. You should if you decide, like let's start in XY shop wherever you're selling or Shopify you could add a link there and then you go through your posts. You said that there aren't that many and you decide what you want to keep up on the things that you don't want to keep up, You take down and you put them in draft form and no one has to know that they're they're on and other things. You could start totally fresh if you want Teoh or you could just leave up certain post and you get to decide what it is you want to share. And from what I'm hearing, it seems like you don't want to stop writing the personal posts about yourself in your in your journey. And I like that you're already, um, comfortable in a way semi comfortable of just talking about the journey and figuring it out, right? We don't have to hide the fact that we are still figuring it out. And we're new at this. I'm telling you, that is what will resonate with people and that will help you find your tribe in your community faster. You don't have to put a mask on to say I'm gonna figure all this out on my Balog is only going to be, you know, post about how maney sales I made this weekend and doesn't know. So you know, as much of your story and your journey as you are comfortable sharing, Uh, please go and share it. Otherwise, you could say, You know what? Let's retire this block on. Let's just let's have that Shopify site and and find another another space to block. You can decide to take it down, but you could make life easy for yourself that make that connection. How does that sit with you? Um, another thing with the block is is that I've learned, and obviously there were big gaps and trying to develop a routine and read a schedule for myself to make sure that I am actually adding posts on a regular basis. That's that's something that I've learned Mike for. My experience so far is that it's embarrassing on broadcast to get to the world right thing. This is from 29. That's not that that far before. But I see like Okay, there's only 1 2015 posts and 3 2013 posts. So what you might want to do is look back over those four posts and see what maybe you could republish and and make current. So you could still not to say that you can't have post from 2013 up there. But when someone comes to your blog's fresh now they want us. They wanna at least know that it's an active blawg. Otherwise, they're not gonna pay attention to it on. And I like that you brought up getting on a blogging schedule, and I think the thing I need to, like put big, bold exclamation points around is that blogging doesn't have to be complicated, right? And it doesn't have to be these, like enormous s a Post. I know a lot of the clients that I work with when they talk about blogging. They're like, Oh, but I need five hours to write a blood. No, no, no. A block post could be an image of what you're working on and a caption that says, Like what? My Saturday looked like the end That could be your bog. I mean, it could be that easy. So feel free to brainstorm. I find that when you have, like Siri's when you create a Siri's, it's often easier to come up with content for that. Siri's because you have, like that construction already of I know every I used to run the Syria Syria's called tough question Tuesday, where my block. I would just like a little bit of an intro and a tough question and then would say, answer the question in the comments. It was very easy for me to get content up on Tuesday because I just knew I was just coming up with a question finding an image on Etsy looking it all together. So don't make it complicated. And could we put up the instagram? Listen, Instagram also So I love that you said that you just found your business state like you just came up with your business name just a bit ago. But this is an instagram account that has existed for a while. So was it easy to just switch the name over? It was very easy. Its great eso. That's really great. So you can you can keep your instagram. You were name or whatever it is. But if you wanted to make things more cohesive than it's great that she's already otter encompass and your instagram is so pretty and has to do obviously with the nature and travel, I noticed that you are not really on there when I was scrolling through your Instagram like no pictures of you for to keep inhabit, the more nature based in and other things that you're doing, which is great, right? So you don't need to post you know pictures of yourself for what, like whatever you're comfortable with and you want to curate and the experience that you want someone to have when they come visit you on your social media homes. I always call it, you know, my social media homes, my Internet homes, because that's what it feels like it's like you're welcome welcoming people into your home and you get to decide what your home looks like on what people see and what you're shoving in the closet. A lot of that stuff. So I hope that by Liz sharing best that you guys at home can see. How can you just dream? How could you work with what you already have? That's really it, right? So that we don't have to make things so so complicated. Anything coming through on the chat with in terms of like how people could see streamlining and connecting phase once what they already have? Well, first of all, I want to invite people to follow. Yeah, Otter and Compass, right. You'll see the birth of a whole business we have. People were asking about it in the chat room so they water and compass on. And one question that has come up. Um, interpretive, when you're talking about writing. Oh, and first of all, I just went unchecked. My last block post, October 2014. Don't feel that a lot of people are having with that keeping up that cadence. So do you have any specific tools for people that you work with who want to write and are blocked in addition to what you've just shared, but any sort of how to exercises for, right, it's gonna be really annoying. This is gonna be an annoying thing to say, but my client came up with us. Just use it all the time, but in seat. But in C, Just put your butt in your seat and say it's time to write, right? If you wait for inspiration to strike you, you're probably gonna be waiting a long time. Andi, I think just like everything else. We've been talking about being proactive, putting your writing time on the calendar you could absolutely experiment with when you feel like it flows most. So don't feel like you have to force yourself to write during your lunch hour unless you you really want to write during your lunch hour. And that's when you enjoy writing. Don't feel like you have to write first thing in the morning or last thing at night. So experiment with when you when you feel, uh, when you're most likely to feel the flow and the creativity and put that in your calendar and put your butt in seat and and just right on. Like like the Pomodoro technique. Set a Pomodoro 25 minutes just right, Whatever the heck you want. And if nothing comes to you, I am a big fan of the stream of consciousness, like morning pages style. Anyone's familiar with the artist's way. Probably a lot of people are you could literally right my shoes air, Read the carpets Black. It's really sunny in here. I didn't have my coffee yet. And just whatever comes into your head. And if you spend your 25 minutes just doing that, then that's That's fine, right? Uh, in the War of Art Stephen Press Field talks about resistance, and the only way for you to beat resistance is to show up into your work. It doesn't matter if you throw all that work in the trash at the end of the day at the end of the week at the end of the year, what matters is that you put your butt and see and you do the work, so you just have to make a commitment to yourself, make it a priority, put it on the calendar, and I think take the pressure off to that it has to fit into a box. Or it's something that's gonna be seen publicly if you instead make the focus on I'm just writing for me. I'm writing for me. Then, uh, then hopefully that that is a lot more frank. So let's let's take away Olive. Liz is wonderful social media accounts and go back to the keynote. Thank you very much. And we're going Teoh, is there something else to add before we move on? I just wanted to chime, and I love the whole live interaction here you now have another 10 instagram.
Class Materials
Ratings and Reviews
a Creativelive Student
Fantastic course! I highly recommend it. Michelle is a wonderful teacher: energetic, passionate, funny, and encouraging. Kenna is also a great facilitator; the most natural and genuine host I've seen so far on Creative Live! Great job both of you. And a well-deserved shout-out to the in-class participants, who were engaged and candid about their own situations. Best of luck to both of you with ditching your day jobs. This class has given me the structure and several practical tools to facilitate my own transition to creative entrepreneurship and out of a soul-sucking job. Michelle shared many supportive messages that made me look more confidently at my "uniquity" and its value in the creative marketplace; as a result, I am now eager to take the action towards building my art business. I will use my S.N.A.P. to comfortably and confidently get to where I want to be, so that I don't snap at my day job in the process ;-)
Becky Pennington Arce
This course is truly AMAZING! I've been in hyper - forward motion since the first day! Thank you Michelle! This course was honestly different then any other! It gave actionable items, where to find support, and tons of yummy resources (which if very time consuming and somewhat impossible when you have a DAY JOB!) My Day Job is actually "ditching" me but by having a plan (which Michelle gives step by step details how to do), I'm totally comfortable and even EXCITED to be DITCHED! Several items that she shared I've already been able to implement into my creative business plan AND my personal life! Double whammy! I ended up buying the course to make sure I didn't miss anything! Super excited to continue and wish everyone luck on their own creative journey! ~Enjoy!
Heather Young
I was one of the fortunate studio members of this class. Wow! So much great information, step by step instructions, enthusiastic encouragement and fun! Michelle takes you through the baby steps needed to form a solid foundation to get ready to ditch your day job and do it with a plan, a safety net and a support network. A common sense guide to doing something uncommon and (to some) seemingly nonsensical. The videos will teach, inspire and encourage, the workbook will make it real for your own situation and the resources that are provided will be invaluable as you prepare to ditch your day job. You will be so glad you purchased this class!