Your Home for Heart-Based Business
As I round the corner into this ninth year of podcasting and after over 700 episodes, today Iām announcing a pause for both shows.
Listen in to hear what factors helped me reach this decision across time, money, energy, depressing industry articles, the pace of both showsā growth, and mix of additional business factors that make this an important moment to pause and regroup. You might also appreciate the even deeper dive with my longtime friend (and first coach) Adrian Klaphaak in Pivot episode 360: š¦Ā Unpacking a Big Business Decision and Dissolving Related Doubts.
While I will be sad not to bring fresh episodes to your earbuds every week, I truly want to say thank you so much for being here. This only represents a small fraction of listeners, but I was genuinely touched receiving the Spotify Wrapped for Podcasters stats at the end of 2023 after I knew I would be pausing once all the episodes āin the canā went live.
Thereās one thing I know for sure: I will miss you during this break š„¹
Pause and regroup on any of your creative projects so you can create space to hear whatās next.
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/270
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āI donāt get on the airplaneāand definitely not the stageāunless all invoices are paid in full.ā
When my friend and fellow keynote speakerĀ Joey ColemanĀ said this to me over coffee, I started drilling him for details: Really?! How do you have the nerve to say that to a speaking client?! How do you avoid caving in to make sure their event doesnāt fall apart if they havenāt paid in time? What about clients who work for highly bureaucratic companies that insist on their āstandardā net-120 terms?
In this illuminating conversation, Joey shares his best practices for getting paid on timeāevery time by setting, stating, and upholding better boundaries (and contracts) with clients.
More About Joey: As an award-winning speaker for over twenty years, Joey Coleman works with organizations around the world ranging from small startups to major brands such as Volkswagen Australia, Zappos, and Whirlpool. His First 100 DaysĀ® methodology fuels the remarkable experiences his clients deliver and dramatically improves their profits.
It is unbelievably challenging to start and run your own business. Because you are so bold to do that, give yourself permission to courageously set your boundaries. The more clear and comfortable you are stating how to work with you and holding firm when pushed, the happier you will be as a business owner, and the longer you will be in business.
Try Joeyās approach to sharing the investment for working together. List a range on your website, and the first time your desired client learns how much it costs to work with you should be hearing it from you, not reading a document.
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/269
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What mysterious ingredients make a book launch successful? What number of first-week and first-year sales truly make a difference to a bookās longevity? What can you do to turn lagging numbers around?
In a flagship illuminating post for the industry, Todd Sattersten, publisher and owner ofĀ Bard Press, shared his findings in The Magic Number. In this behind-the-business conversation from October 2023, youāll hear him generously talk me through how I could help Free Time get thereāwith a much-needed morale boost at the end.
More About Todd: Todd Sattersten is the publisher and owner ofĀ Bard Press, a book publisher that works with authors to create best-selling books in business, personal development and technology. Before Bard Press, Todd served as general manager of IT Revolution and president of business book retailerĀ 800-CEO-READ.Ā He is the author ofĀ Every Book Is a StartupĀ and the co-author ofĀ The 100 Best Business Books of All TimeĀ (Portfolio, 2009). Todd lives in Portland, Oregon with his wife Amy and their three awesome kids.
Put your ego down. Remember, you want your readers to be better, to improve their lives. Our job is to find more people to help, and there are still so many opportunities for that. You donāt actually have to stop promoting the book after itās launchedāthere is nobody stopping you!
Send a survey out to your readers and community, ideally 90 to 120 days after the book comes out. Check out the one Jenny sent hereāand please take it if you can at the same time!
š Check out full show notes and share: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/268
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Laura Mae Martin has a fascinating role as the Executive Productivity Advisor at Google in the Office of the CEOāone that she helped create six years ago (with big thanks to Jenny Wood for introducing us!). ****She coaches Googleās top executives on the best ways to manage their time and energy and sends out a weekly productivity newsletter that reaches over fifty thousand employees.
Today weāre talking about her forthcoming book, Uptime: A Practical Guide to Personal Productivity and Wellbeing. We discuss what the most senior-level executives do differently when it comes to time management (and what they still struggle with), five strategies for saying no, taming inbox stress with The Laundry Method, cozy corners, pairing activities with certain locations (hot spots and not spots), and what differentiates truly excellent executive assistants.
More About Laura: During her nearly fourteen-year tenure at Google, Laura Mae Martin has worked in sales, product operations, event planning, and now executive coaching. She holds a bachelor of science in business administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, with her husband and three children under five.
Give yourself plenty of down time in order to have highly productive uptime; drop the guilt! Rest leads to better overall productivity.
Stop wasting energy points! Eliminate any emails from your inbox that you donāt need to see: the unread, notifications, newsletters (Jenny uses SaneBox for this), and make sure you help the things you need to see stick out.
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/267
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While the title of this episode, The Framework Frameworkā¢ is tongue-in-cheek, Iām pulling this out of the BFF bonus vault because itās one of the communityās favorites.
Iām sharing the first steps to how you can set up a framework to help bolster your IP and your business; either by scaling through programs like certification and licensing, and to make your material more memorable and accessible to the groups you care most about reaching.
I shared this in June 2023 as a follow-up to the fantastic workshop that Pamela Slim did for us on Certification and Licensing. You can access over 100 bonus episodes and that workshop by joining Free Time as a paying subscriber. Youāll get instant access to Stephanie Hustonās How to Batch Create and Customize Your Annual Content Calendar, with an epic multi-tab template in Google Sheets. Be sure to also check out the resources below, including Wes Kaoās detailed LinkedIn post on how to turn your ideas into frameworks.
šEnjoying the show? The best way to thank us is by leaving a rating or review
āļøĀ Check out Jennyās personal business essays on Substack, Rolling in Dš¤¦š»āāļøh
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š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/266
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What do you do when you lose your biggest client? If you havenāt already, listen to part one for some answersā264: What to Do When You Lose Your Biggest Clientā and save these links for a rainy day :)
The next time youāre going through something challenging in your business, remember: you are not alone! I hope you find comfort through the voices of some of my dearest friends, former podcast guests, and favorite Heart-Based Business owners who are speaking from experience about how they've handled situations just like this.
If you want the full scoop on what founding BFF member Leanne Hughes calls ābusiness reality TVā on how I have been handling losing my biggest favorite client, I encourage you to check out the full series of posts at Rolling in Dš¤¦š»āāļøh. Thank you for listening, and huge thanks to our contributors to this series!
šEnjoying the show? The best way to thank us is by leaving a rating or review
āļøĀ Check out Jennyās personal business essays on Substack, Rolling in Dš¤¦š»āāļøh
š Subscribe to the Time Well Spent newsletter for access to the Free Time Toolkit
š¬ Iād love to hear whatās on your mind! Take the Free Time listener survey
āļø Submit a voice question or comment: http://itsfreetime.com/ask
š§ Make sure youāre subscribed wherever you listen to podcasts
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/265
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What do you do when you lose your biggest client? That was my Spotify search query for podcast episodes on this topic in the summer of 2023. It came up emptyāthere was not a single podcast episode on this topic. Of course not. Who wants to admit out loud and in their archives that they've lost their biggest client? In the past, I probably wouldn't have fessed up to this either. Except for the fact that now it's what I wish I could see, read, and hear. Todayās compilation episode is here to fix that!
If you've been reading Rolling in Dš¤¦š»āāļøh, you know that the origin story for my new-ish paid Substack was losing my biggest, most beloved corporate client in the summer of 2023. Getting The News shook me up so much because not only was it one of my longest-running favorite licensing clients, but it also represented at least six figures of income for the next six months being instantly wiped off the table.
Now, at least, we will all have something to turn to (and return to). My goal is not to provide advice but rather to offer some comfort through the voices of some of my dearest friends and favorite Heart-Based Business owners who are speaking from experience about how they've handled situations just like this.
Maybe you don't need this episode right now, but if something does happen in the future (even if we hope not), you'll remember that you can come back and listen on a proverbial rainy day.
Please share with any fellow business owner friends who might be going through a tough time, and enormous thanks to the wonderful group of friends and former podcast guests who shared their stories for this two-part episode!
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/264
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āI am great in the early, messy days and I know that about myself, so I designed my business around serving others in that stage.ā
In this conversation with business strategist (genius!) Michelle Warner, we cover the three growth stages most relevant to tiny business owners, how to fix broken business models, validating product-market-founder fit, the difference between traffic-based versus relationship-based sales and marketing, borrowing aligned audiences, leading a free monthly Q&A to ācatchā their interest afterward, imagining sales as a downhill snowball, and how to scale while still staying Delightfully Tiny.
More About Michelle: Michelle Warner designs tiny companies that are built to last. With an MBA from one of the worldās top business schools and 15+ years experience growing small businesses, Michelle focuses on layering real world experience on top of classic business fundamentals to design businesses that are sustainable and scalable in the long term and resilient and adaptable in the short term.
Itās the way she grew her first business to 7+ figures, and itās what sheās used to help 300+ CEO's create businesses that work for the important stuff: profit, energy, passion + time. Sheās also the creator of Networking That Pays, the introvert-friendly, always awkward-free connection system that brings in reliable leads, consistent referrals and meaningful connections for your business - in 5 minutes a day.
Focus on sequence over strategy: you can execute strategies perfectly, but if youāre doing them in the wrong order, itās not going to do a thing for you.
Take five minutes a day to reach out to one person across any of these four themes: thank youās (be specific!), connections, asks, and catch-ups.
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/263
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āThings today are waaayyyyy better than Things have ever been.Ā Cavemen had sticks. In the Middle ages they had typhoid. We have iPhones and Hermann Miller chairs and shoes with air in the soles. Inside the soles! How do they get the airĀ insideĀ the soles??? We are living in the Golden Age of Things, in the Golden Empire of Things.ā
āShalom Auslander's Fetal Position via Beckett Drove a Deux Chevaux
I first encountered the Apple billboard a few days after Christmas.Ā I was walking down Fourteenth Street in the Meatpacking district, and there it wasāan Apple ad declaring āNewphoria!ā in enormous print.
We donāt needĀ newphoria. We needĀ oldphoria, the joy in what already exists. We needĀ simplephoria, the joy in streamlining. We needĀ enoughphoria, the celebration that what we have and who we are is already enough. Newphoria, at least as it relates to running a small business, is not always all itās cracked up to be.
Todayās post is a crossover from Rolling in Dš¤¦š»āāļøhāyou can read the post and reply in the comments here: Climbing Down the Entrepreneurial Ladder.
Celebrate your own -phoria, the joy in running your business in the way that works best for you!
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/262
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If youāre anything like me, you may find conducting online launches for your programs or events exhausting and sometimes even cringe-inducing. Thankfully, todayās guest, Anne Samoilov, is here to help!
Anne is a long-time expert in the space who has helmed product launches for Laura Roeder, Marie Forleo, and Jonathan Fields. Today, weāre talking about why some of us find big, splashy launches so draining; how to set up automated or evergreen launches (and her take on the pros and cons of these); how to find non-cringey launch strategies; be willing to take on clients or projects that have nothing to do with your business.
More About Anne: Anne Samoilov is a launch strategist and VFX Producer. She started her work online as the creator of Fearless Launching, an online training program that teaches impact-driven entrepreneurs how to create simple, streamlined, and standout launches without relying on templates or cookie-cutter strategies. She has also led the VFX teams for TV shows on Paramount Plus and Starz. Check out Anneās podcast, The Fearless Launching Show, where she shares insights and tips on how to have an amazing product or business launchāyour way.
To take on clients or projects that have nothing to do with your business; it can bring in revenue and reconnect you with latent skills.
Spruce up your thank you pages! Put your bio, mention ways to work with you, offer a freebie. Bonus: create a launch library with some of the copy that has worked best from previous launches.
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/261
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āWhenever you have a choice of what to do, choose the more interesting path."
In honor of our upcoming Free Time x Long Game IRL event in Miami on February 1 and 2 (itās not too late to join!), today Iām bringing you a favorite episode from the earliest days of the Free Time pod. In this conversation with Dorie Clarkāaka āDCāāone of my closest friendtors, we discuss how she "optimizes for interesting," says no to good opportunities, builds relationships by following her "no asks for a year" rule, and when to call on trusted advisors to ensure you don't quit something too soon.
We're discussing her bestselling fourth book, The Long Game: How to Be a Long-Term Thinker in a Short-Term Worldābe sure to grab your copy for even more insights on how to apply strategic thinking to your biggest vision.
This episode originally aired on September 28, 2021.
More About Dorie: Dorie Clark helps individuals and companies get their best ideas heard in a crowded, noisy world. She has been named one of the Top 50 business thinkers in the world by Thinkers50, and was honored as the #1 Communication Coach in the world by the Marshall Goldsmith Leading Global Coaches Awards. She is a keynote speaker and teaches executive education for Duke Universityās Fuqua School of Business and Columbia Business School. Dorie is the author of The Long Game: How to Be a Long-Term Thinker in a Short-Term World, Reinventing You, Stand Out, Entrepreneurial You.
āYou donāt have to do this,ā for types of events that you hate attending! Decline joyfully.
What decision would you make about a current or future project if you were optimizing for interesting?
šEnjoying the show? The best way to thank us is by leaving a rating or review
āļøĀ Check out Jennyās personal business essays on Substack, Rolling in Dš¤¦š»āāļøh
š Subscribe to the Time Well Spent newsletter for access to the Free Time Toolkit
š¬ Iād love to hear whatās on your mind! Take the Free Time listener survey
āļø Submit a voice question or comment: http://itsfreetime.com/ask
š§ Make sure youāre subscribed wherever you listen to podcasts
š Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/260
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