6 ways I blocked myself from freedom in my business—and what I do now instead

A few years back, I found myself in that spot that I know many of you are in right now. You're busy, you have clients, but there's no freedom and you're not making the income you want to yet. In today's episode, I'm sharing why finding freedom in your business can be so challenging and what you can do to change this.

– When finding more clients means more money (but less freedom) and how you can scale in different ways.
– Why focusing on service-based work takes up so much of your time and what you can do instead.
– Why building a library of courses and memberships isn't always the answer to a scalable business that gives you freedom.
– Why having sales processes in place is so important and what happens when you don't.

 

 
Today, I'm sharing a couple of the ways that I accidentally blocked myself from creating freedom in my business. Ultimately, we don't know what we don't know. In hindsight, now looking back on the past six or so, years of my business, I never quite know how long I've been in business because there have been so many different iterations.

But looking back on the past years, it's so clear about all of the things that I didn't realise were important at the time or realise the mistakes I was making at the time because I simply didn't know that they were mistakes. We don't know what we don't know. And I found myself in that spot where I know that many of you are at right now, where I was busy.

 

Mistake #1: Doing the same things over and over and over again in your business and expecting a different result, expecting something to magically change.

I honestly thought that the solution, the thing that would magically give me freedom in my business was if I just got more clients because more clients meant more money, and more money meant more freedom, right? But unfortunately, this wasn't the case. The things that demanded my time and energy, only grew as my business grew. 

And the little problems that existed in my business at that point in time also grew. As the business grew, the problems grew. So I ended up burning it all to the ground and I started again. I started letting go of all of my clients and I started the current iteration of my business with the intention of scaling it. This is where I realised how important it is to start your business as you wish to continue. Start with that end vision in mind and then put the foundations in place for that business. 

 

Mistake #2: My offers suite was mostly reliant on my time or my team's time.

And most of what we offered was service-based strategy or implementation. And while I loved doing the work, it also meant that I had to be available pretty much 24/7 when something went wrong. So even when I wasn't at my desk, mentally, I was still there. I was still worrying about what was going wrong, what could go wrong, answering calls, answering emails. 

 

Mistake #3: I went and built out a library of courses and membership and this didn't solve it either. 

So once I let go of my clients, I started building out a library. I had courses on Facebook ads and Instagram. I was building one out about doing Pinterest marketing and I had a membership. And this podcast had started to take off. I thought, great, you know, let me create these different paid courses where people can come and learn about the specific marketing things that I'm talking about on the show and let me create a membership where they can get more premium content, like a deeper dive than what I'm giving on the podcast episodes.

Only the thing was that I was the marketing generalist. So the podcast episodes I was sharing were tips and tricks. They were how to run your Facebook ads and how to grow your Instagram audience. But then when it came to actually learning about Facebook ads or Instagram, they went to the Facebook ads expert or the Instagram expert rather than the marketing generalist.

I didn't realise my listeners didn't want to learn about marketing. They wanted to make more sales, right? They didn't want to learn about marketing. They wanted to implement the marketing things that would grow their audience, that would grow their business, and that would lead to more sales.

And month after month of delivering masterclasses, bonus podcast episodes, cheat sheets, all of the things that I gave my membership members, that led to content creator burnout where I ran out of ideas. I was no longer loving it. And as a result of that, I couldn't show up a hundred percent anymore.

So I ended up closing that membership. I ended up retiring all of the courses and I started from scratch with a bit more of an intentional offer suite this time. One that would help my ideal clients at each step of the journey to building an online business that was profitable when they were offline with each of the different challenges that they face.

 

Mistake #4: My marketing calendar was ad hoc and I showed up whenever I felt like it.

This podcast has been pretty consistent since day one, but for the rest of my content, it really wasn't. And that's because I kept reinventing the wheel on every single platform. I'd think, Oh, I need to post to Instagram this week, but I don't feel inspired. So I'm not going to. And then I would have a week where I felt so inspired that I was posting every single day. 

So now the only content that I focus on creating from scratch is these podcast episodes and everything else they cascade. 

And that's how I build trust with my audience, right? I'm not constantly having to reinvent the wheel. I'm not showing up when I feel like it. My audience can count on me to show up three times a week on the podcast and nearly every day on Instagram.

 

Mistake #5: I didn't have any sales processes in place.

And I thought if I could just put my courses up on my website, people would find them and they would buy it. I did a couple of launches, but those were the only times that my courses actually sold because you need a sales process for somebody to buy. It's not enough to just talk about your offer. There needs to be a way that you are taking them on that journey to buying the offer.

 

Mistake #6: I did all of the things in my business because I could do them without asking whether they were the best use of my time. 

I was in this mindset of saving money rather than asking, what is the opportunity cost of my time here? What else could I do? That's a better use of my time and that will grow my business faster.

And then once I started to hire, I also held onto control because I thought, Oh, nobody else can do this as well as I can and that led to them not doing it as well as I could because I wasn't setting them up to succeed. I wasn't giving clear instructions and I was hiring the wrong people for the task.

Now that I know I can't have a hundred percent control and have freedom as well, that's been so much more effective because now I can set my team up to succeed with good instructions. I can hire the right person for the task, or I can delegate the task to the right person in my team and I can let go of it and not worry about it.

 

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