I know a lot of us are struggling managing everything going on right now and this weird time that we’re in. I also realize this is a huge change for many people now working from home for the first time. Since I’ve owned my own business and have utilized a home office majority of the time, I wanted to share my top 10 tips for working from home. Hopefully this will help some of you out with the adjustment.
As I am sure many of you are experiencing, the flexibility of working from home is nice and truly something to be grateful for if you’re able to do so more than ever now, but it can also be really hard. These tips for working from home have helped me over the years to stay productive and be efficient even with the distractions that come with working from home. Check them out below and let me know which ones you’ll be incorporating into your routine.
#1 Create a schedule
I put this tip as #1 as I truly believe it is the most important. Just like going into work, you have somewhat of a schedule or routine you follow leading up to it. Do the same thing even when working from home. Having a schedule gives you an outline to your day and keeps you accountable. This could be anything from a 10 minute morning routine, getting in your workout before you start working, etc. Anything but rolling out of bed and getting right onto your laptop will instantly make you feel more productive.
#2 Get dressed
Of course working from home means your uniform options have shifted tremendously and staying in pjs all day is always tempting. My advice here is to simply change out of what you slept in. Whether you opt for athleisure loungewear or decide to fully put on an outfit, that’s up to you. But putting fresh clothes on sets the tone for the day and switch from home life to work life.
#3 Get ready/Self care
Now is the time to take advantage of giving your skin a break from makeup (or maybe just not wearing as much) and doing some sort of self care every day. For me, my skincare routine does the trick for both. I take care of my skin, it makes me feel as if I’ve gotten “ready” and it also relaxes me as a method of self care. I recommend creating some sort of small ritual like this to start your day off fresh.
#4 Designate a workspace
You definitely don’t need to have a home office to effectively work from home, but I do think it’s important to designate a specific space to where you are working. This will help to get yourself into the mindset of work and you want a space that is quiet so you can focus and somewhere you will feel comfortable (but not too comfy) sitting all day. What might help are these noise cancelling head phones, this laptop stand and if you don’t have a desk, this tray table is great.
#5 Entertainment
I definitely prefer to have some background noise while I am working but my tip here is do not turn on the TV while working from home. It’s a distraction and will take your focus away from here. Instead I would opt for podcasts or Spotify has a ton of “work from home” playlists.
#6 Schedule in breaks
Breaks are essential at home, just like they are at the office. Sometimes I get so sucked into work that hours and hours pass by before I stop. Whether it’s a quick 15 minutes just to take your eyes away, or a longer break to eat lunch &/or go for a walk with your kids if they’re home, it’s worth it. Taking some breaks throughout the day will keep your more productive in the long run.
#7 Time batch specific tasks
This is a tool that has become so beneficial to me in all aspects of life, including work. Time batching is essentially applying an increment of time to a task, for example, giving yourself 30 minutes to respond to emails, or 45 minutes for a meeting. Before I implemented this method, I had a tendency to work on multiple things at once and it really became so chaotic. Take the hectic-ness out of your routine and schedule out when and how long to work on a task, sent an alarm, and when the timer goes off, it’s time for the next task. I love this time cube from Amazon and it’s great for kids to use too!
#8 Utilize apps
There are so many great apps that are helpful when working from home! My recommendations below: Slack: Great for work conversations that aren’t via text message Asana: Project management and organizing tasks Loom: Screen sharing/recording & more Dropbox: For file storage and sharing
#9 Save daily home tasks for later
This is something you can include when you’re creating your daily schedule, but save your chores for after (or before) working. It’s easy to get distracted while being home and seeing all of the items on your home to do list that you want to tackle. but you have to remember that now is not the time. You have to set those boundaries for yourself so you aren’t pulled into a million different directions.
#10 Pick an end time
Just like when you “clock out” at work, decide a realistic end time for your work day at home and stick to it. At times, it is hard for me to unplug as I get sucked into work or work later at night after I’ve been with my kids, but I really have to make it a point to sign off at a certain time. It’s easy to feel like because you’re working from home you need to work 24/7 and be constantly available, but that’s not realistic or healthy. Take the time in the evening to yourself, so you’re fresh for the next morning to start again.
I’ve been a small business owner for 5 years now and when I tell people what I do, people love to hear our story of how we got started and how we run our business. I get a lot of “That must be so fun!” Which it is, no lie. I love what I do and have had a lot of fun this whole time. However, we never really get to the part about how HARD it is to run a business, especially a small business as most of the time, the owner/founder is not just creating products, we are also doing the marketing, social media, inventory management and so much more. My sister and I do have a team that helps us run parts of the business but I also have plenty of friends that just do it all themselves which I think is amazing and so incredibly hard. I’ve been wanting to share more about my business and also help out other small business owners so I thought it would be a great time to start with just what it really entails to be a small business owner and the 4 things that I’ve found to be the hardest part of being an entrepreneur.
Flexible Schedule:
My most common thing that I hear is “You can work from home AND manage your schedule, that’s a dream!” I do have to agree that it is awesome that I can have a flexible schedule and that if my daughter is sick, I can keep her home from school and take care of her myself. Or I can have coffee dates with my friends during the day (this doesn’t happen that often) or if I need to go to the grocery store in the middle of the day, I can. So yes, I love that about my schedule, but the reality is, is that I also work ALL THE TIME. So even though I might not be sitting down at my office for 8 hours like you do at a regular office, if you accumulate all the hours in a day that I’m working it’s more than 12 hours a day every day. When you own your business and work from home, it literally never leaves you, mentally or physically. I am always thinking about my business and my laptop or phone is always nearby. My sister and I text or call multiple times a day and sometimes we text just to gossip or talk about personal stuff but the majority of the time, it’s about our business so it literally is always there. I’m not complaining as I’ve come to accept it as part of my life and I tell people that I don’t have a “work-life balance” I just have “life” it’s all one thing for me and I’m OK with that.
TIP FOR SUCCESS: Stick to a schedule and allocate times for yourself where you don’t look at your phone/computer. It’s just way too easy these days to get immersed in emails and all that when we always have our phones on us. Being strict with yourself about the times you can check your emails and social media (relating to your business) will not only save your sanity but also make the actual time you allow for your “work time” to be efficient. In the past year, I’ve been much better about managing my schedule and allowing myself to have times where I don’t even pick up my phone and honestly, it’s changed me. I’ve found not only does it end up being better for my business and my family, but my stress levels as well.
If you’ve never worked from home before, it does sound like an ideal situation. You don’t have to get all dressed up, you don’t have to sit in traffic, you never have to worry forgetting your lunch… Of course all those are pluses and I agree it’s pretty great. On the other side though, for me it was hard to separate “home” from “work” in a physical sense. So I would go to make myself lunch and end up seeing all the dirty dishes in the sink and spend the next hour cleaning the kitchen and then realize how much time I just spent doing that when I should be working! It gets so distracting to not want to do those things while you are at home.
TIP FOR SUCCESS: Make a space in your home dedicated to your business only. It doesn’t even have to be an entire room, even if it’s just a corner, it’s important that you have that space. Also, decorate it so that you actually enjoy working in there! Pack yourself a lunch so that when it’s lunch time you’re not spending a lot of time prepping it (and accidentally cleaning the kitchen too!) and just grab it out of the fridge, heat it up and enjoy! And another thing, give yourself an actual lunch break! It’s easy to work while eating but you really do need that mental break during the day. Music is also a big thing for me. Since I’m at home by myself, it drives me crazy to work in silence so we have a Amazon Dot in every room and we also subscribe to Amazon Music Unlimited which is awesome as I always have music to listen to! If you don’t have it yet, try Amazon Music Unlimited and get a 30-Day Free Trial
The first year is sometimes all what people think about, because there’s so much to do that first year from the idea, to putting it all together to the launch of the business. It’s all so exciting and keeps you so busy. The 2nd year is still about growth as you are still fairly new and getting your name out. The 3rd and 4th year are a lot harder to continue and maintain the growth of the business and is something that we rarely hear about. For us, our growth was so rapid and in our 2nd year of business, we hit a million dollars in sales. I never thought that we’d be able to do that so fast and it was so exciting but to tell you the truth, it hit us hard our next year knowing that we had to try to maintain that level of growth. I don’t think my sister and I, and our team, worked harder than that 3rd year of our business. It was incredibly difficult and stressful trying to keep up with that kind of growth. Obviously, we managed to get through it as here we are in our 5th year of business but the 3rd and 4th year is pretty common to hear of when business owners really start to struggle to keep up with growing their business.
TIP FOR SUCCESS: Always be learning. Especially in this online world that we live in where things change seemingly on a weekly basis. It’s been quite some time since Instagram changed their algorithm from chronological yet I can’t escape the amount of people that continually complain about it. I’ve never been one to complain about something that I can’t control. Instead take all that energy into learning just how to make that change work for me. I have immersed myself in reading blogs, ebooks and taking courses from experts in small businesses, social media, facebook ads, etc.. and every bit of that goes into how I run my business and the changes that we make to adapt to the environment.
Hiring team members:
When it comes to growing your business, hiring a team should be on the top of your list. It is essential because you alone, can not do everything. The more you grow, the more work there is so you’ll want to start putting together a team of people that can help you do the things that you don’t necessarily have to take care of. My sister and I always knew that there are certain things that only she and I can do and that we needed to use our time to grow our business and things like packing orders and customer service were best delegated to team members that could manage it. We still oversee everything but the we’re not actually working on those things until an issue is brought up that needs one of us to manage it. Hiring a team sounds great but in reality finding the perfect team members is much harder than you would think.
TIP FOR SUCCESS: Be clear with yourself the kind of person that you are looking for in your business and the position you are hiring for. Once you start to interview you will find yourself thinking that each candidate seems great and that they will do a great job. I can say that I’ve hired quite a few stellar people for our team and a few that have ended up being the worst match for our business. Interviews don’t really give you the whole picture as some people are just really good at selling themselves but when it comes to actually working, well the effort isn’t exactly there. Make a checklist of who your ideal employee would be for that employee and try to ask questions to gauge that they will fit those characteristics. Of course not many will fit every single thing you are looking for but as long as you have a general idea, that is what will help you narrow it down.
If you don’t have the need for a full time employee or looking for a virtual assistant, upwork and fiverr is a great place to find people that are experts in things like social media, SEO, facebook ads and a ton more! It’s great for those things that you have no idea where to even start but also don’t have the time to learn it all.
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I hope some of my experience being a small business owner can help those of you who are just starting out or those of you who are looking to grow your business. It’s not easy being an entrepreneur and I believe in community and always helping out others who are in the same boat. I’m always happy to answer any questions you may have about running or growing your business.
Note: Some links in this post are affiliate links which means I may make a commission if you purchase through my links. I truly appreciate you supporting my blog and hope that you find this information helpful!
Over my many years of blogging, I’ve gotten so many questions about how to start a fashion or style blog. The big topic these days is how to make money blogging and while that is very important and something that I love to help other bloggers out with (check out the bottom of this post for more on that!) the foundation of your blog is where you really need to put your focus in before you even jump into making money from it. Even if you already have a blog, this post will still be a great reference for you to make sure that you’ve got all the pieces in place to help you grow your traffic and monetize your blog. First thing that I have to mention is that yes, you will need to invest some money in this. As they always say, it takes money to make money. The good thing about starting your fashion blog is that it doesn’t cost a lot of money but just know that once you are able to monetize your blog, you will be make it back easily so the costs of running a blog are worth it.
1. Your domain/blog name:
I know this can be the hardest part! I have helped several people (including my sister) name their blogs. For mine, it just came together quickly as my husband was always known as “Ish” in college because of his last name. Even though we weren’t married at the time I started my blog I knew I eventually would become an “Ish” too so when I started my blog I wanted it related to fashion and myself which is where “I am Style-ish” came from! You can do something similar as a play on your first or last name. One caveat, is that if you have a different or unique spelling of your name that might not be easy to remember, I suggest going a different direction. Most people will not remember the unique-ness of your name and it may be hard for them to find you if they google you. You want to stick with something simple, easy to spell and easy to remember.
If you are stuck, my recommendation is to make a list of things you like. It could be anything, like if you like dogs, doughnuts, makeup, clothes etc… and then narrow it down to what you want to write about on your blog and then pull adjectives or words from those specific things and combine the two. Of course you will also want to make sure that the domain name is still available too but that’s why you need to come up with a few different variations to play around with. You can easily see if your domain is available here:
Once you have your domain purchased, make sure to go create accounts with the same name on social media networks that you’ll be using. As a fashion blogger I recommend getting a facebook page, instagram and pinterest. A lot of people also have twitter (I do as well but I’m not active). Don’t feel like you have to join all of them and be active right away but go ahead and save your name/account so that when you do decide to start using them, you will already have your account name saved!
I do want to mention that you will find that most of my social media handles go by “tiffanyish” rather than I am Style-ish and I did that on purpose as I found over the years that no one remembers that my blog is “Style-ish” and they end up googling “I am stylish” or “I’m stylish” which has led to a lot of confusion with readers. So again, make sure to learn from my mistakes and to create a name that is not too unique that people won’t have trouble spelling or remembering.
2. Choosing your blogging platform:
When I started blogging in 2008 there were not a lot of platforms to choose from and since I started blogging as a hobby, I chose the best free platform there was and that was blogger (or blogspot) which is hosted by google.
Eventually I bought my domain, meaning I went from iamstyle-ish.blogspot.com to iamstyle-ish.com. I have continued since on blogger just because it was easy and I didn’t feel I need to change. I also knew it was going to be a long and expensive process and I didn’t want to commit to it. Since then I’ve started quite a few blogs on the wordpress platform for my business and helped a few friends get their blogs started and I definitely started to see the advantages of using a wordpress hosted blog. I am finally going through the transition of transferring I am Style-ish from blogger to wordpress and I’m now crossing my fingers that everything will transition smoothly. I have over 8 years of blogging and thousands of photos to move over, so my advice, don’t be like me and make sure to start out the right way! Don’t get me wrong, I think blogger is a great platform as it’s very user friendly, very cost effective (you only pay for the domain that you purchase once a year) so I think that blogger is great for hobby bloggers. If you are serious about blogging and eventually want to make money from it, starting on WordPress is the way to go.
One big thing to note, wordpress has two different ways to start a blog, wordpress.com (free) and wordpress.org (self hosted). Make sure to start your blog on wordpress.org as this is the only way you’ll be able to customize your site and make it your own. Wordpress.com is the free version and it’s very limiting as to what you can do for your blog, one thing being that you may not even advertise on it. So if you are wanting to make money from your blog, that’s definitely not the option you will want to go with. A lot of people make this mistake so make sure that you are signing up for the right account. When you are on wordpress.org, you will need a hosting company. This basically means your blog will have your own spot on the internet that is all yours. I recently signed up through BlueHost and it was such an easy process so I highly recommend them (they are also one of the main hosting companies that wordpress recommends which is why the process is so easy). Just sign up through my link here and you’ll be able to purchase your hosting and install it onto wordpress in one click! Trust me when I tell you that it’s a lot more complicated when you don’t go through a hosting site like BlueHost. Hosting is not expensive at all and totally worth it. Bluehost has plans starting at $3.95 a month and if you end up deciding that blogging is not for you or you just don’t have enough time to dedicate to it, they offer a 30 day refund so don’t feel like you are locked in forever!
3. Make your blog pretty!
If you are on a budget you can certainly use the standard templates that come with the wordpress blog. You will want to pick a theme that you can identify with and goes with your style. However there are a lot of beautiful pre-made themes out there to purchase that you may find go with your aesthetic and you have a lot more choices in customizing the look and feel of your blog. A simple google search of “wordpress themes” will come up with plenty of results. My favorite sites that create beautiful, modern and girly style templates are:
Bluchic (you can find one of their templates on my other blog, tiffandjen.com). They are all very sleek, modern and easy to navigate.
Etsy: It’s not just for cute crafts and jewelry, Etsy has plenty of sellers that have created gorgeous blog themes for you to purchase. Georgia Lou is one of my favorites on Etsy.
Creative Market: This is a great resource for a lot of other blogger related items I’ll cover in another post! They also have a lot of great wordpress themes and even ecommerce themes if you plan on opening on a store along with your blog. Eclair designs is one of my favorites for pretty wordpress themes.
When you purchase a theme, you will receive an email with a download file. Make sure to read the instructions on how to install the theme. It’s fairly easy but just make sure you follow their instructions exactly as they will show you the best way to set up your theme so that you can customize it to your liking.
4. Create your content:
I’m going to assume that you know you want to concentrate on fashion and style for your blog. It’s great to have that focus but if there is anything more specific that you can make your blog and your style more “you”. For me, when I was working in the corporate world, I focused more on what to wear for work and my shopping finds. Now, I still like to focus on my sale/shopping finds but I also focus on dressing casual yet stylish as well how to dress as a mom to a preschooler. It’s OK to evolve as your readers will continue to follow you as your lifestyle changes, but it’s great to have a specific focus so that when readers come across your style that relates to them, they will want to continue to follow along.
Creating content can be tough right off the bat, and sometimes even when you’ve been blogging for a long time! I can have weeks where I just have no idea what to write about but some weeks I have so many ideas there’s not enough time in the day to write all those posts! Keep a notebook with a running list of topics that you’d like to write and if you ever need any ideas, refer to that list and continually add to them so you’ll always have something to write about! You don’t have to blog every day, but my suggestion is to start with at least 3 days a week to get you in the rhythm of blogging and then adjust from there if you want to blog more or less. Also plan ahead. For example for holiday season, you’ll want to do some gift guide posts so make sure that you keep a calendar of when you’ll be posting your holiday content. Or maybe you want to share what you’ll be wearing for all your holiday parties. Get that on your list so that you’ll be prepped with photos and content when the time comes to post.
5. Promote your blog and posts via Social Media:
Hopefully you followed my instructions above to save all your social media handles with your blog name! When you grow your blog, start growing your social media accounts as well. The easiest thing to do is to simply start networking within that platform. Every platform is different in the way you’ll want to promote your own blog. But the most important thing is to not make it all about you. When you are on facebook, go to other blogger’s pages and start to interact with their posts. You can even share their post on your own facebook page. I know that makes me very happy when I see another blogger do that for me and I often will do the same for them! On your own facebook page, along with promoting your own posts, share other interesting posts that you find on facebook that you think your followers will be interested in. On Instagram, start to follow bloggers that you love and start engaging with them and their followers. Comment, like and follow and be genuine about that as people will likely want to engage back with you. Not every post has to be about your blog but I recommend keeping your photos on brand. So if you are mainly focused on fashion, don’t share what you had for lunch every day. People are going to be following you for your style and not until you have a more established following you’ll want to keep your content consistent so that they know what to expect. It’s not to say that you can’t share a food pic once in a while, just make sure that it makes sense and incorporates into your feed.
How to make money blogging:
This is probably the number one question I get these days and because of that, my sister (who also gets the same questions) and I started Gal Guides. Gal Guides are guides or short books that my sister and I wrote that shares all our secrets about how we make money not only blogging but also with growing our brand and our online store. We specifically wrote them for women who are interested in fashion/style blogging and you’ll find that all our guides and tips are geared towards that.
Something that you may not know is that my company, T&J Designs is my main focus and I blog as a means to help with growing the business but it’s also become a part time job of mine that I truly enjoy. I work with a lot of influencer networks for sponsored posts which is a large reason why I can make a full time income even though I only work part time on the blog. My first guide, The Top Influencer Networks that Will Pay You to Post, shares everything that I’ve learned these past few years of working with influencer networks. I’ve narrowed down to the best ones for you to work with, how much you get paid, what kind of brands that they work with and more! Head over to shop the guides, if you purchase this guide, you’ll also get a free printable to help you track everything from what campaigns you applied to, to due dates of posts, the deliverables of each campaign and most importantly when you’ll get paid.
My sister wrote her guide on how to reach out to PR and brands in order to get paid collaborations. We are currently offering a special price on the both guides + 3 bonuses which you can get HERE. If you want to start making money blogging but you have no idea where to start, these are the guides for you. These guides are for all levels of blogging but I will say that to work with a lot of the influencer networks you do have to have to provide your analytics about your audience, so while these guides will definitely get you a head start in working with the networks, you’ll still want to work on growing your audience so that you have a great chance of landing campaigns with brands and networks.
We will be adding more guides soon on a lot more topics such as how to grow your instagram, how to get more traffic to your blog and if you are interested in starting your own fashion business we’ll also be adding guides on how to start and grow your brand, how and where to buy wholesale for your store and SO much more.
Stay up to date with the launch of all our new guides by adding your email below. For this month only, we are offering 2 subscribers the chance to win a one hour consultation with either me or Jen to ask us any or all questions related to your blog or business!
I sometimes am not able to keep up with my blog but I’m usually pretty active on instagram. My sister is also the same and we agree that instagram is our favorite social media app. And you probably know that we own t+j Designs and our business is everything to us. We are always working on our business and finding new ways to grow it.
GROWING OUR BUSINESS THROUGH INSTAGRAM
We really decided to grow our instagram this year based upon what we were seeing in the social media world and how it was translating to our business based on brand awareness, more visitors to our site, more customers and more sales. As with all our business decisions, we had put together a strategy before we launched into growing our instagram accounts and found that in a short time, we had stellar results! Before we knew it, each of our accounts (my sister’s account, my personal account and our business account) had increased by 20,000 followers in less than 6 months!
When we weren’t concentrating on it as much it took us nearly a year just to get 5,000 followers so to see this kind of growth made us very excited. In the recent months, we’ve gotten questions from lots of people asking us about the growth of our business, the growth of our instagram accounts and just general “how did you do it” type of questions. SO… we put our heads together and decided to write an ebook!
THE IDEA FOR THE EBOOK
I do have to give credit to my good friend Tasha, who is not only an amazing coach to small business owners but who has written several very good, very informative ebooks for the small business owner. Because of her, I’d always been interested in writing an ebook but had no idea what to write about. We took a trip to Vegas together this summer and after a conversation about my instagram growth and what it has done for my business, she urged me to write an ebook about it. Her motivation really pushed me to really think about pulling my thoughts down and so on the plane ride home, the first draft was done! I sent it off to my sister and after a series of drafts and changes, we are so happy to finally be able to launch it.
HOW WE GAINED 20,000 INSTAGRAM FOLLOWERS
This information is mainly geared towards brands and growing your business as that was the main goal of why we decided to work on our accounts. The reason why we concentrated on our personal accounts as well as our business account is because in the four years that we have been running t+j Designs, we’ve found that our customers love getting to know us, the owners, rather than just following the brand.
UPDATE: This book was written in 2015 and instagram has updated a few things – mainly algorithm changes and how photos show up in our feeds. I have deeply discounted the price due to that fact, however most of the advice in this book is still very applicable on how to find your target audience and grow with the right followers.
We’ve been able to connect with our customers on a more personal level than if we were just a brand to them. So in doing so, our brand has grown and we found that instagram was a really great place to find our target market and connect with them there. We often get asked how important is the personal account vs a brand account and to me, I think it really depends on your situation and your business. Obviously I could go on and on about instagram marketing and growing your business, but that may be another ebook for another day. 🙂 Let’s move onto what is covered in this book!
THE 8 SIMPLE STEPS TO INSTAGRAM GROWTH
We cover all of our tips and techniques about how we grew including, the exact ways on how we find our target audience, how we interact with them, how to use hashtags and also how to join loop giveaways and make them effective for you!
BONUS SECTION: INSTAGRAM SALES
We also wanted to include some extra info so our two bonus sections are things that many people have asked us about. Getting sales right through our instagram account has changed things for us. Our instagram sales make up for a big chunk of our monthly sales! Having an easy way for customers to purchase from us without asking them leave the app has been so effective and not only creates new customers but followers who are engaged and continue to follow us just to see our next sale. We share all that knowledge of how we do it in the first bonus section.
BONUS SECTION: LOOP GIVEAWAYS
And for those of you that are interested in joining loop giveaways – well we have the ultimate list for you! Jen and I have participated in many loop giveaways and we’ve been in lots of great ones and also some bad ones. We tell you what to look for, which ones are the best for you to join and we share a list of our very favorite loop giveaway hosts who are all very open to having you contact them to join their loops!
TIPS FOR BUSINESS OWNERS AND BLOGGERS
Although this is geared towards businesses, we had a few friends who read through the book all agree that a lot of the tips work really great for bloggers. I tend to think of bloggers as a brand anyway, so a lot of the tips really do apply. You may not have a physical product to sell but bloggers are definitely brands themselves so even if you don’t own a business but want to increase your instagram following, this ebook will still apply to you!
An important thing I wanted to mention is that this ebook is recommended for those of you that already have accounts and are familiar with instagram. If you are brand new to instagram this may not be the best ebook for you but will be great after you have established your account and have gotten a feel of how it all works.
Life has been crazy lately and I’m so busy that my head is spinning constantly and I haven’t had a moment to rest. And that is quite literal as I’ve been back from China for a week and I’m still not on a consistent sleep schedule. It’s more like a “no sleep” schedule, I’m getting about 3 hours a night. I’m thinking it won’t be about January until I actually get some sleep!
I absolutely love being a business owner and feel lucky and blessed to be living my dreams and doing what I love but what I learned from this year is that being a retailer this time of year means getting no rest or vacation starting from November and I suspect all the way through January. We started our business only about a year and a half ago so last year we were too new to feel the rush of the holiday shopping madness but this year, OH MY. What a difference a year makes. This is not me complaining at all, there is nothing more thrilling to be as busy as we are, it’s just that this busy-ness truly smacked me in the face as I didn’t expect it to come this quick at all! I get a lot of emails from readers about what it’s like to start a business and how I’ve managed it all and how I made the decision to leave my corporate job to start a business. I can tell you that it’s been rough and it hasn’t been easy but every single thing has been worth the risk. Just seeing what my sister and I (with the help of my parents and brother) have done in this short amount of time, makes me immensely proud and happy. To see our jewelry on customers and to get wonderful emails from people that enjoy our line is a joy that I never experienced in my corporate life. In my year and a half of doing this, I’ve never thought “ugh, 4 more hours left” or “only 3 more days until the weekend.” I used to have those thoughts constantly when I was working in the corporate world. Every day I’m exhausted but happy and thrilled to be doing what I’m doing and I’m so thankful to everyone in my life who has supported me and helped me live out this dream.
Some of our recent press!
To those of you that that are wanting to take this path in life and becoming an entrepreneur I encourage you to start taking the steps to make your dreams a reality. It’s definitely scary and you’ll lose sleep over all the risks that you have to take but to finally be living your dreams is the most amazing thing ever.
I don’t feel like I’m any kind of expert but with my experience I can tell you that these are a few things that I’ve realized what has helped me along the way.
super long and wordy post, click through to read more….
1. Be financially ready – When we started the jewelry line, I was still working as a consultant and was doing both jobs. I knew I wasn’t going to do both forever, so I set a goal date of when I wanted to be full time dedicated to my jewelry line and I saved and saved until I knew that I had enough to not have to work X amount of months. Having a goal date helped put in perspective that this was going to be “real” and that I may have to live without an income for a certain amount of months. But putting together this plan helped ease my mind and my fears and helped my husband and I know what to expect.
2. Be prepared for the hard times – Yes not getting paid for all the hard work that you’ve put in sucks but remember this is your business, not just some job that you clock in and out of and expect a paycheck every two weeks. If you put yourself in the right mindset and knowing that you won’t see a profit for awhile, it’s a lot easier to go through and you can put it in the back of your mind. Plus you can use it as motivation to get to where you want to be!
3. If you have a business partner – Communication, communication, communication – My sister and I have always had a good relationship and we’ve definitely become closer with the start of the business but with that said, we’ve definitely ran into a few bumps a long the road. Nothing major of course but all that could be (and is) solved with better communication. Us living in two different cities and time zones probably doesn’t help but even if we lived in the same city and worked in the same office, communication is always important no matter what. Just being sure that your business partner is on the same page at all times is essential. To us this means, not just understanding and being on the same page about long term goals, but short term and daily/weekly goals as well. If you are running the business on your own or even with a small staff, make sure you have set your goals and your staff understands your goals! It’s so much easier when everyone is working towards the same thing.
4. Network like you’ve never networked before – Not only has networking helped us grow like crazy but networking has also helped me meet so many other amazing female entrepreneurs that I can get together with and bounce ideas off each other and learn from each other. When you network, your community doesn’t just grow a little, it grows a lot! You never know who knows who and who could end up helping you in which way. I’ve been connected through friends of friends or co-workers of someone that I met through networking, or even just acquaintances of a networking friend that happened to be able to help out. Networking through my blog has been amazingly helpful as well! I’ve even done some “cold call” networking where I’ve found out that somebody works at a certain place and I just wrote them an email or called them to introduce myself. It’s crazy just how knowing a few people and asking the right questions can lead you to so many more opportunities your way.
5. This.
from Pinterest. I don’t have the original source but if you do, let me know so I can credit it properly.
Believe in yourself. Create your own opportunities. Nobody else is going to do it for you.
And really lastly I couldn’t have done any of this without my support system. My husband has been amazing through all of this. I worked through the entire Thanksgiving week and in the past month, I’ve probably only spent a few full days with him as I left for China and came back but now spend most of my nights and weekends working with our shipping team and don’t get home until after he’s asleep. He doesn’t like being away from me this much but he also understands that it’s what I need to do right now. Through everything the business has been through, he’s supported me 100% and although the decisions are mine, having him behind me has been amazing. The same with my family. Along with my sister, who has been amazing to work with and partner with, my parents and brother have been a huge part of this business from the start and to have the support of our family I think just motivates us all to go bigger and do better each and every day. I’ve been through some rough days but talking with my family on those rough days help me find a different perspective and understand why we all are doing this.
My business isn’t just my job or my career, it’s my life and I couldn’t see it any other way. I don’t talk about this topic a lot as I do try to keep my blog and business separate (although it’s a fashion/style blog so of course I will incorporate it in some way! I just don’t talk about the business side of it so much.) but if you want to follow someone with fantastic advice about being an entrepreneur, check out Tasha at Imperfect Concepts. Her Instagram is always full of great advice and what books/articles to read. Plus she’s just the sweetest, coolest chick I’ve met on the internet!
