What are you making "hard" for no reason in your online business?
Transcript
Another thing I've been thinking about since deciding to bring these voice memos in as part of my content plan is this notion of friction. So, I'm easily distracted. I can easily get lost in a daydream world. I lose things a lot. So for my whole entire life, and I didn't even realize I was doing this until recently, my whole entire life I've set up little tricks or systems to kind of keep me on track. So, I'll give you a couple examples. Keys. I know that this is a really, really easy thing for some people, but this was when I finally figured out to do this and could train myself to do it, it was mind blowing to me. Having a little dish or a bowl right inside the front door where I drop my keys when I come in the door. And those keys go in there and then they come out of there when I leave.
And that changed my life because I was constantly, constantly losing my keys or my wallet or sunglasses or whatever, and super frustrated spending tons of time hunting around the house for things. I know that's an easy thing for some people. It was not for me. Another thing is seeing things visually. I have to see things in my life, like my belongings and my things, or it's almost like they just don't exist to me. So the whole Marie Kondo folding method where things are folded and put on their sides, stood up on their sides so you can open your drawer and see all of your yoga pants and t-shirts and sweaters. That system is brilliant to me. Because if I have things folded one on top of the other, literally anything that's one or two down, I might as well not even own it because I will never, ever, ever wear it or use it.
So, I have implemented that visual system also into my office space and the way I plan stuff, and the way I would organize my food photography props when I was doing a lot of that. I couldn't have them hidden away in a cupboard. I have to be able to see stuff. So, back to the original point of friction. Those are ways that I reduced friction in my personal life to make things easier for myself. And so, there's all different ways to do that. Erica Reitman talks about this and she calls it easy auditing your life, and looking around what are the things you're doing that are just dumb that you haven't taken the time because our brains will just default to what they know, but you haven't taken the time to really think through.
There's really an easier way to do things. And so, that's now what I'm starting to do in my business. Because I think we fall into these patterns of well, so-and-so XYZ business development guru, or marketing bro said, this is the way things are supposed to be done. And, we just keep beating our head against that wall even though that system or that way of doing things isn't working for us. So, that's what I'm doing and these voice memos are an example of that. What are the ways in your business? And this is going to look different for everybody. So, I can share my examples as I go and as I create more, but I would really encourage you to look at your own business and say, okay, what are the things that are just super frustrating to you or things that you know you want to be doing?
For me, I was like, I know I want to be putting out a lot more content. I know I have a lot of ideas, but I was just hitting massive resistance. So, what can you do even if it doesn't look like anything that anybody else is doing? What can you do to make that process easier? What steps can you put into place to make that easier? So for me, it's voice memos.
I know I've also heard other examples from people where they do a lot of lives or YouTube videos or things with video. And instead of having the camera packed away in the closet or the cupboard or wherever you store all that stuff, and the tripod and the ring light and everything, they just have a spot in their office where it's just set up all the time, 24/7. So if they have an idea or something, it becomes easier and they can be in the moment and in the flow and record that stuff, instead of meeting the resistance of, Oh, crap, now I got to get this stuff out and do this and do that and scheduled on my calendar. It's like you're putting all these other extra steps in there that you just don't need.
Meet Sarah
Sarah is an award-winning Designer, Creative Director & Brand Strategist for billion-dollar companies turned entrepreneur. She’s passionate about empowering online coaches and experts with tools that help them build businesses aligned with their values and lives, not the other way around.