One thing that a lot of entrepreneurs suffer from is business stress. Although working for yourself gives you freedom, it can also give you the freedom to stress yourself out! It is so easy to slip into a routine of working 24/7. Business stress can make you so miserable that you go back to your 9-5 life. If this is starting to sound like you, then you may need these reminders!
Everyone on earth has the same 24 hours a day, so use yours wisely.
It may be crazy to think about, but even the most successful people in the world have the same 24 hours. If you are constantly wishing that you had more time in the day to get things done, chances are that you need to work on your time management skills. There are lots of different tools out there, so use them! There are even some specifically for getting things done, but it’s important to remember to choose what works for you. Remember, a to-do list isn’t for everyone!
Sometimes, you need to create a schedule and divide your time into blocks. Your blocks could include things like:
-an hour to call back clients
-30 minutes to answer your social media messages
-an hour to schedule this week’s posts on all your platforms
By giving yourself these limits, you decrease your chances of casually working on one thing and not getting anything accomplished when the day is over. Another tip is to set yourself up to avoid distractions! When you work from home, distractions are everywhere! That makes it even more important to create space in your home that is dedicated to your work and free of distractions. If you don’t have a separate room to use an office, consider dedicating a corner in your house to your business. If your home is simply too distracting, head to a library or coffee shop!
You are worthy enough to set boundaries with your customers.
Over-extending yourself is super easy to do when you work for yourself. It’s really easy to get into the habit of taking on too much at a time, making promises to clients that you just can’t keep, and overall setting yourself up for a 24/7 job. If you are starting to dread your work, this is a sign that you’re probably close to a burnout. Why? Because you keep saying yes when you should be saying NO!
Of course, you want to make your clients happy. You want to exceed their expectations and watch the good reviews pour in. But you need to set boundaries. By always saying yes without thinking about your own schedule and abilities, you damage your happiness and this could lead to a bad review anyways. For example, let’s say a client decides to completely switch their color scheme the day before their event. If you simply smile and say of course we can do that without charging some sort of fee and hiring extra help…you are setting yourself up for failure! You now have to trash all of your plans and rethink everything.
To avoid this, you need to set boundaries with your customers like policies for returns, damages to equipment, deposits and refunds. This way, if something goes wrong, your client has already signed contracts that determine exactly what the next step is and you can take your feelings out of the equation. In addition to this, you need to schedule some you-time every single day to just chill out and be yourself without worrying about your customers. This can seem a bit silly, but just leaving early for a meeting and spending a ten minutes in your car listening to music can really make a difference in your day.
Your marketing plan should have just as much focus as your day-to-day business routine.
Another source of business stress for entrepreneurs is their finances. When it comes to ditching your guaranteed salary for the possibility of being able to sustain yourself off of your products and services…it can be beyond stressful! Why? Because you are the only person to blame if you don’t have enough sales. If you’re constantly checking your bank account, calculating the profit that you made today, and making calculations to see if you will make rent this month…you are probably losing your mind. In case you didn’t realize, this is business stress at its finest and it sucks!
If you aren’t seeing the sales you need to be successful, you likely need to focus a bit more on your marketing plan than freaking yourself out. Start by looking at your website, social media, and any other forms of advertisement that you use. Are they current? Are they targeting the right audience? If you need some help on how to ramp up your marketing plan in just 30 days, head over to my other post where I talk about just that! Once you start to put a bit more effort into your marketing, you’ll see a big change in your profits and decrease your constant stressing about rent.
Take Advantage of online resources!
Business is one of those things that you can never know too much about. There are tons of courses, reference sheets, tips, tricks, tutorials, certifications, and templates that you can use to take your business to the next level. You can learn things like marketing, design, advertising, Youtube, video-editing, photoshop and so so much more. I can tell you right now that business is always changing in every single industry, so it would be smart for you to change with it. Never close yourself off from new lessons to be learned. If you do, you’ll find yourself stressing about everything that you don’t know how to do rather than taking steps to learn how. People aren’t born knowing how to implement a ten-step marketing campaign or how to program email blasts in Kartra. It is a process, so take steps to get better at it.
You are in Control.
When it comes right down to it, I love being an entrepreneur, but I would be lying to you if I said that I’ve never suffered from business stress. It can really tough when everything is weighing on your shoulders and it’s really easy to get into a funk where you tasks pile up, emails go unread and things just don’t get done. Do not let yourself get to this point, but if you are there (or close) try these tips to bring yourself back to reality. The truth is, even the most successful business owners get burnt out, but the best of them know how to snap back and get themselves back on track.
If you are looking for online help to take advantage of, check out my online business coaching membership and subscribe to my youtube channel where I post twice a week about my business and how I do it!