It’s Soul Biz Time!!!  Welcome to the FIRST in what will be a new, and likely ongoing, series of posts to support my love of sharing biz advice to the spiritually minded.  It’s all part of my growing work with my Soul Biz series offerings, like my Clarity Sessions and the upcoming mentorships starting in 2014 and my future Soul Biz Alchemy course coming in 2014 as well.  I thought a great way to start off would be a little bit of a controversial way…the 5 worst pieces of business advice I’ve been given through courses and coaching that I actually paid for!  Consider it my way of helping you avoid some of these pitfalls!

Actually, before that, let me hand you this big piece of biz truth:

 

You MUST invest in yourself and your biz!

You must invest your time AND money!

 

I’ll talk more about why investing is critical and how to know you’re investing in the right programs and coaches in another post.  Today I want to focus on sharing what I’ve learned through 1 year and $10,000 worth of investing.  Let me share with you the 5 worst pieces of business advice that I’ve been given over this year of studying, working, and expanding my business, all advice that one way or another I paid to be given.

1. Don’t talk to anyone and don’t be accessible.
What I Was Told:  Don’t make yourself easy to reach and don’t put yourself in a position where people think they can talk to you easily or for free.  Think about your favorite experts in the spiritual field.  They don’t hang out on social media, engage with people who follow them or read their blog, or freely give out advice to people who don’t pay them.  Experts get paid but bloggers give it away for free.  If you don’t want to just be a blogger anymore you have to stop being easy to access and position yourself as an expert.

What I Know:  That’s complete bullshit.  It’s especially bullshit when your business is spiritually based and involves working with people in some capacity.  It’s pretentious, silly, and makes you look like just another business producing “stuff”.  When you don’t connect with your readers, followers, and future clients or customers you can’t ever truly know what it is that they need and what you can do for them.  It also feels kind of disingenuous to me to have a people centric business and never deal with people.  I tried applying this advice to my business and it killed my business for two months.  The more I opened up to my followers and the more I made time to talk to people, without charging them for it, the more I was able to grow my business.

 

2.  Don’t give anything away for free.
What I Was Told:  Never give things away for free because it gives people little reason to ever pay you.  If you really feel you need to give a freebie make sure there’s a reason behind it and make sure it isn’t something you could make money with.  Things like wallpapers, a single page worksheet, of a recording of a free preview call or podcast should be all you give out for free and it should be in exchange for social media shares, list signups, and so on.

What I Know:  Giving things for free, even things you could charge for from time to time, creates trust and also helps to give people a better idea of what you do and what they can get if they work with you.  If you think that someone is just going to read your blog for a bit and then suddenly plunk down hundreds or thousands of dollars to work with you one-on-one or even take a course you’re teaching, you’re being a bit unrealistic.  That isn’t to say it doesn’t happen but it’s REALLY rare that someone is going to dive into working with you without getting a taste of what you have to offer.

 

3.  You have to pay attention to your list, especially your unsubscribes.
What I Was Told:  You have to spend a large percentage of your time in your business focused on growing your list {i.e. email list}.  This is where your money is and when you don’t know what’s working and why people are unsubscribing then you won’t know what to change in your business to make more money.  If you can’t sell to your list you can’t sell to anyone.

What I Know:  Your list matters, this is true, but spending all your time focused on who’s opening your emails, how many are being opened, and who’s unsubscribing and why is a waste of your time.  Why did they unsubscribe?  Because you weren’t for them.  What did you do wrong? Nothing.  What do you need to do differently?  Probably nothing.  Most of the time when someone unsubscribes from your list it’s because they have decided that something about you, your message, your offerings or your business just no longer fit for them.  And that’s fine!  If they unsubscribed chances are they were never going to buy anything from you.  Losing a subscriber to your list just means you’re getting closer to your core, ideal customers paying attention to you.  It’s nothing to be sad about!

 

4. Don’t stand out TOO much from your competition.
What I Was Told:  Try to find a middle ground between you and your competition.  Find a few of your different competitors and find how you can stand out while still being like them enough that you’ll be visible by the their following as well.

What I Know:  Standing out matters.  When you look like your competition you remind people of your competition.  Inspiration from your competition is one thing but not standing out from your competition’s branding, message or overall style is just bad for business all around.  Not only does it make people think of your competition, especially if they were doing things that way first, but it also makes you look like you’re either unoriginal or fishing for your competition’s customers.  The best thing to do is find where you stand out most from your competition and then find a way to accentuate that difference.

5. Create an image of your personal life that your ideal clients want to mimic but don’t already have, even if you have to fake it.
What I Was Told:  By representing a lifestyle that your ideal clients want to have they see you as an avenue to that lifestyle and therefore become more inclined to invest in working with you.  Even if you have to fake this and exaggerate your lifestyle the idea is to present yourself as having the lifestyle your clients want so they will want to have you show them how to get it.

What I Know:  That couldn’t be more inauthentic.  Specifically it was presented to me to show that you have more “fun time” than you may actually have, present your home and your personal life as high end and exclusive even if it isn’t.  Just be you and be honest about your lifestyle, your business, and what you have to offer.

Honestly “exclusive lifestyle” and spirituality can be tough to mix, and “exclusive lifestyle” also tends to trigger deep money issues for a lot of people and unless you’re prepared to help people deal with their money stories.  I had the chance to really learn that lesson earlier this year when I posted pictures of my kitten Pixel when she first came home peeking out from inside one of my Birkin bags where she was hiding.  Yup, that picture, that I thought was adorable, caused a stir with emails and Facebook messages about how I was “flaunting” what I have, including a few comments from people saying they would never work with me because “you clearly don’t need my money if you have a Birkin bag.”  Ah, oh well.  The picture’s cute and I don’t feel I have to hide material things I have because I other people don’t have them, but at the same time I’m not going to give the impression that I’m driving a Bentley and taking international vacations every few months when I’m not.  {But one day I’ll get that Bentley, and when I do I’ll gladly share pictures of it on Instagram with no shame!}

 

So, the bad advice lead me to learning a lot about me and my own business quickly.  I learned that I thrive on connecting with you all {which is why I’m starting my Wild Spirit Tribe membership community in January} and that I like creating and sharing as much as I can.  I guess you could say that every penny that I spent on the different people and places that I heard these things turned out to be worth it because I sort of learned in reverse, which in an odd way saved some pain and frustration.  Best of all by NOT following any of these advice and mostly doing the opposite my business just grew and grew this year.

 

I would LOVE to help you grow, or start, your online spiritual biz for 2014!  If you’ve been wanting to get things started but are feeling stuck, uncertain what to do, don’t know where to start, or just lack direction with your biz dream, it’s time to get a Soul Biz Clarity Session before 2014 starts!

 

 

If you’re serious about starting your biz or kicking your biz into high gear for the new year, I have a special offer through December 21st!  If you book your session before midnight on Nov. 3oth you’ll get $200 off your session.  Book between December 1st and December 21st get $100 off!  

And stay tuned for the next Soul Biz Blog Post in the next couple of weeks!