3 Changes I’m (sort of) Forced to Make in My Business that Excite Me
I can honestly say it’s taken me the full 9 months for my mindset to have the space to change around how I view my business in light of a baby on the way.
I’ve really had to process things like worrying about being able to show up as soon as I can to not lose clients nor momentum, and I’ve had to battle a feeling that somehow taking time off for maternity leave was a “burden to others”.
But this process of welcoming a new person into my life has put parameters in place that have actually helped me think more clearly about what’s important to me in business and what would be easier ways to approach it.
Here are 3 things I’m changing (with pleasure!):
I’ll no longer commit to (unpaid) calls or sessions
There’s a concept in the world of coaching that it’s good to offer “Discovery Calls” to give people a taste of coaching and see if we’d be a fit to work together in the future.
If I think about my personal rate of success for this, I’d say it’s pretty slim.
The people who have hired me had already decided they wanted to work together before the call so calls wind up being short and just about scheduling and payments. It’s as if we didn’t really need to set time for an experience.
On the other hand, people who don’t wind up working with me in a coaching engagement are usually people needing some quick answers or support that last the full duration of the session.
As it stands now, scheduling any kind of call, even if it’s only 30 minutes long, would require me to think about child care (or how I’d be able to navigate a call with a baby starting to cry).
It only makes sense to me now to use DM or email communication to schedule new clients and only set up calls that are for paid sessions (this justifies organizing childcare and it makes me laser focused on a few areas I can help people with well through what I like to call “VIP Intensives”).
2. Less info sessions, more social media communication
One thing I used to offer periodically was free webinar sessions to share information about a topic relevant to professionals.
For the same reasons listed in point 1 in that it would be hard to schedule a 30-60 minute webinar with a baby (or not lucrative to get childcare), I’m planning on either only doing text-based communication (like a free email series about the same topic) or mini live social media videos (these should be easy to do since I don’t need to commit to a schedule and can pop on for 5-10 minutes while the baby is asleep).
3. I’m streamlining my pricing (which should streamline my market)
Pricing is always a tricky one: historically, my rates have depended on whether the engagement was B2B or B2C, and the scope of the engagement (i.e. I wouldn’t offer the same rate for Executives and expat spouses, who have different needs).
It only makes sense at this point to have a streamlined rate regardless of the demographic or who (the company or the individual) is paying for it.
I’ve found what I feel to be my personal sweet spot for pricing (both for short intensives as well as long term coaching engagements) in light of this, and it’s also a rate that makes me feel justified being away from the baby and is in alignment with revenue goals.
It’s as if the baby has given me permission to be more narrow with who I work with and how, which are actually in alignment with what I want to grow into.
Sometimes having a parameter or constraint can actually be more helpful than thinking broadly!