by Justina Ford | Mar 14, 2022 | Business Mindset, Mindset To Manifest, Visibility Mindset and Strategy |
It’s one thing to set goals; however, it is important to clarify your goals so you know when you will reach them. In this post, we’re going to look at several practical tips for helping you go beyond simply setting goals. Instead, you’ll click away with the confidence and clarity to set goals that build momentum and purpose in your business.
How to Clarify Your Goals
To help put this process into perspective, we’re going to look through the SMART goals model. This isn’t a new method by any means, but it’s typically not a person’s go-to when setting goals. In most cases, you may have grabbed a piece of paper and answered the open-ended questions like where you want to be in 3 years, 5 years, things you want to accomplish, and so on. While there’s not anything wrong with that, setting goals based on that alone isn’t always enough.
Clarify your goals by being specific.
Being specific about your goals starts with thinking about what you want to accomplish. Do you want to make a certain income? Are you looking to enroll a certain number of people in your coaching program? Once you’re able to identify answers to these questions, you can begin to determine what steps need to be taken to achieve it.
Clear goals should be measurable.
This is where being able to track your goals comes into play. Let’s use the example of wanting to enroll clients into your exclusive coaching program. You’ll want to identify the number of clients so you’ll have something to measure and track. If the number is 5, then with each enrollment, you’ll be able to track how close you are to your goal. Having this number will also help you track income earned from each enrollment, which helps to know if you have an earned income goal.
Clarifying your goals involves making sure they are achievable.
Reality and expectations meet when it’s time to set goals that are actually achievable. If you’re just starting your business, setting a goal to make a million dollars in your first month may not be very realistic. When setting your goals, ask yourself if it’s something you can actually accomplish.
Clear goals are relevant to you and your business.
It’s easy to look at what others are accomplishing and set goals according to their success. This is the number one way to get yourself off track. Always set goals that are relevant to you and your business. Think about why you are setting the goal you want to achieve. Are you looking to get out of debt? Is there a dream vacation you’d like to save up for? Keep your life, business, and journey in mind as you clarify your goals.
Having clarity in goal setting involves time specificity.
In other words, your goals need to have a time frame in which you’d like to reach them. Without one, it could be easy to lose track of where you are in reaching it. Once you’ve written your goals, begin to think in terms of the tasks that it will take to reach them. Then, give those tasks a time limit. From there, you’ll be able to track your progress more fluidly.
Final Thoughts
Using the SMART goal setting method, you can begin to clarify your goals so you know when you’ll reach them. This rinse and repeat cycle can easily accommodate any business and style. Check out this podcast to hear more about clarifying your goals and how this method can be a game-changer for you and your business.
by Justina Ford | Mar 7, 2022 | Business Mindset, Mindset To Manifest, Visibility Mindset and Strategy |
When you want to create impact and influence, using your business is one of the key ways to do it. This will also directly affect your business, bringing you more credibility and visibility. Of course, this doesn’t need to be done with any prideful intentions, but with the motive to genuinely make a difference in other people’s lives. Here are five ways to do this through your business.
5 Ways to Create Impact and Influence Through Your Business
1. create impact and influence by Supporting a cause.
There are many causes and nonprofit organizations that you can choose to link arms with and promote with your business. You can support them through donations, contributing a percentage of your business’ sales to them, and volunteering (if applicable). If there isn’t a cause you feel particularly drawn to, you could always start one!
2. Enhance your social media presence.
Showing up and being visible online can be intimidating for entrepreneurs. It’s easy to hide behind word posts and graphics; however, you can create a great influence when you open up and allow people to actually see you. If you’re not used to going live or showing up personally online, the more you do it, the more comfortable you’ll become. Consider working in a daily live challenge to help you create a bigger impact through your business.
3. Show up with purpose.
In today’s world, it can be hard to stand out from the crowd, especially if your field is saturated. One way to navigate getting lost in the crowd is to show up with purpose. Make sure you are adding value to everything you are saying and doing. People will be drawn to you because your value is having some sort of impact and influence in their lives.
4. create impact and influence by Connecting with your audience more often than not.
As your audience grows, it may seem impossible to connect with them all. However, this is where showing up online in a variety of ways is beneficial. When you are live, interact with those tuning in. If someone shares your content, make an effort to comment on it and thank them for sharing your content. Ask for responses and replies when sending emails and when they do, be sure to actually respond. You’ll be surprised by the impact this will make on your audience (and they’ll talk about it too!).
5. Adopt the storytelling method.
People are always looking for connections. And truth be told, they can see straight through the fluff. The art of storytelling allows you to use your own personal experiences, circumstances, and situations to connect with your audience and in return build trust. When you use storytelling, you can create a bigger impact and influence, which will lead to more visibility and sales.
Final Thoughts
Creating an impact and influence through your business comes with many benefits. Not only does it help you keep your why alive, but it also helps you stay focused on your motive to serve your customers and clients. Use the tips and suggestions above to help set you and your business apart from others while creating a lasting ripple effect.
by Justina Ford | Feb 28, 2022 | Business Mindset, Visibility Mindset and Strategy |
On one of my inner circle group coaching calls, the question of being multi-passionate came up. But not just being multi-passionate. The question revolved around knowing when to scale down, fuse together, and/or find that place of being confident in what you should be doing. I believe many women in business struggle with this because we’re told to niche down, carve away, and only pick one avenue to travel down.
In all actuality, it is very possible to have several passions and fuse them into your kingdom business model. Here’s how!
The Secret to Fusing Your Multi-Passionate Ways Into Your Kingdom Business Model
Be visible with purpose.
There is never really a reason to hide any of your passions. The only reason would be if it directly takes away from your ability to show up and show up with purpose. Sometimes you may find yourself not feeling confident with a certain piece you want to put out; however, you’ll want to check and see if it’s attached to visibility insecurity or if it’s something you shouldn’t do.
Focus on one thing at a time.
While being multi-passionate is certainly okay, sometimes it can cause us to want to chase every idea we have all at the same time. This is where it can get overwhelming and stressful. I tell my clients to focus on one thing at a time. In some cases, you may want to create a to-do list and write everything down. If God gave you the idea, that means you’re going to do it, but it may not be at that exact moment. This leads me to my next point…
Be okay with working on the current thing and seeing it through.
Getting in the habit of committing and completing something through to the end will help you when it’s time to pivot in your business. How often have you already jumped around, leaving ideas unattended or incomplete because you’ve started something new? This, too, can become a habit but one that doesn’t work for the benefit of your overall business. Not to mention, you’ll train yourself to misuse your multi-passionate ways.
Making following through a priority.
As multi-passionate women, it’s easy to bounce around from idea to idea without actually seeing it through. To prevent this from becoming your norm, make following through with your idea a priority. This means focusing on that one thing, creating the plan from beginning to end, and executing. You’ll be able to focus completely on everything involved without having to space yourself out.
Final Thoughts about fusing your multi-passionate ways
The overall takeaways I want you to get from this post are understanding that (1) you can absolutely be multi-passionate, and (2) there are ways to fuse your passions into your kingdom business model. Your business model may not look like mine, and that’s okay. The goal is to become comfortable with what you have to offer. Learning how to make your multi-passionate work cohesively will be the best thing you’ve ever done for your business!
by Justina Ford | Feb 21, 2022 | Visibility Mindset and Strategy |
Learning how to promote yourself without sounding arrogant is an entrepreneurial skill rarely talked about. Instead, it comes in the form of being told that you need to learn how to brand yourself and market your business. After all, until you gain traction, your ability to talk about yourself and your business is the only way to make what you do know. Here are my top tips for knowing how to talk about what you do in a confident, non-prideful way.
The truth of the matter is you are the one behind your business. Every idea that you come up with, every service, and every product created are all you, co-partnered with God of course. Therefore, you have to be comfortable with at least talking about yourself and what you have to offer. There are ways to do this without sounding arrogant, but in most cases, that is probably the least of your worries. However, to make sure you don’t cross the line, keep reading for a few tried and true tips.
Stick to the facts.
While it’s easy to create a bunch of fluff to try and give you and your business some credibility, it’s best to just stick with the facts. Don’t feel like it’s necessary to give your whole back story to talk about your signature program (unless it’s absolutely necessary). You’ll have opportunities to go into lots of details about yourself if you choose to start or be featured on a podcast, write a book, or something similar.
Talk about your accomplishments.
Don’t hesitate to add your accomplishments into the mix. Whether you’ve recently received a coaching certification, written a book, or completed the beta portion of your new signature program – talk about it! Leveraging your accomplishments is another way to help build credibility for you and your business.
What is the reason why you started your business in the first place? Always keep your why in mind when creating your content. Being personable is what will help attract your ideal client and customer. Although you don’t have to get too personal, there is a connection that should be made between what you share and what those searching for what you offer can relate to.
Make adding value your number one priority.
Adding value to your promotions is one of the best ways to keep from sounding arrogant and salesy. Valuable content will not only appeal to those who will benefit from you and your business. You’ll also gain organic traction. People always share content that is valuable to them. This allows you to natively tap into their circles of influence and so on. When you make your promotions about your ideal client (and customer), you’ll prevent yourself from sounding arrogant and prideful.
Final Thoughts
The tips mentioned above are a few of the best ways to promote yourself without sounding arrogant. However, keep in mind that you will need to develop the skill of confidently talking about yourself and your business. Finding the balance will be the key to your business’ success!
Don’t Forget to Listen to this episode!
For a more in-depth discussion on this topic, listen to the podcast episode. I share the mindset shift that has to take place in order to promote without feeling like you are being prideful.
by Justina Ford | Jan 24, 2022 | Business Mindset, Visibility Mindset and Strategy |
When I speak of getting clarity on your business pillars, this is the same thing as saying creating content pillars. These are similar because when it comes to knowing what you will offer your customers and clients, you’ll want to come across crystal clear. This clarity will also come in handy when it’s time to promote your services. Below are practical ways to get the clarity you need so you can confidently identify your business (or content) pillars.
Ways to Get Clarity on Your Business Pillars
Begin with why you started your business in the first place.
You started your business for a reason and most likely it was to provide a solution, educate, train, etc your ideal client in some form or fashion. Did you start to help stay-at-home moms successfully launch a signature course? Are you looking to help other women in business create content that will grow their business? Or, did you start your coach company to help business owners in a particular niche? Whatever the reasons, it is here where you’ll begin to identify the what concerning your business pillars.
Narrow down your focus to a few key things.
It’s easy to come up with five to ten ways you’d like to serve or create in your business. However, how much of that are you truly willing to invest your time into. Your primary focus may start with a signature course then branch into an inner circle coaching call, mini sessions, or one-on-one containers. Before you jump into selling, you want to have a foundation and clear pillars to how you want to filter content through your business. But first, you need to brainstorm according to your ability to follow through with what you want to put out.
Decide how many pillars your business will stand on.
Here’s an example of what I mean by different pillars. A labor and birth coach may focus on nutrition during pregnancy, postpartum care, and exercise through pregnancy. Another labor and delivery coach may focus more on self-care during pregnancy, emotional stability during labor, and post-partum care. These are different pillars that distinguish from their overall expertise in helping moms through the labor and birthing process. One is choosing to maximize her potential to help by not only creating content around her primary pillars nutrition, exercise, and postpartum care, but also creating services around those pillars also.
Identify your business pillars.
Although you’ll be writing these down, they are not something you’ll need to stay married to. As you evolve, your business will evolve as well. Pay attention to the shifts that occur and be open to moving with those, especially if they pave the way to help you better serve your clients. If you haven’t done so already, grab a piece of paper and start with the first suggestion. Then, when you get to this step, write the words “My Business Pillars” across the top of the paper. Start writing down your pillars. These will be similar to an umbrella or the overall solutions you want to offer, pain points your clients deal with, and your personal expertise. Beneath them, you can then go into more detail with the themes and services you’ll focus on..
Here’s an example:
The structure my business is built on is Intuitive Business Coaching and Healing. The pillars that hold this structure up are mindset, messaging, manifesting. Even more, fleshed out they look like this:
- Healing & Manifesting God’s Way
- Brand Messsaging & Positioning
- Visibility Mindset
- Sales and Money Mindset
- Beauty and Presence
Now beneath these pillars are a variety of self-paced courses, live courses with inner circle coaching calls, one-on-one containers, a training vault, and downloadable resources that fall under coaching, certification, brand agency services, beauty agency services, and book publishing. But it all begins with your brand pillars, and also starting with one service and growing into the others.
Final Thoughts
The sole purpose of getting clarity on your business pillars is so you can confidently talk about the value of what you have to offer people. You’ll also be able to better connect with your ideal customer and client. And, your marketing message will be elevated. If this is something you’d like to get help with, I’d love to connect and work with you! Whether you want one-on-one coaching or to join the next inner circle group coaching program, I will help you get the clarity you need to move your business forward.
by Justina Ford | Jan 16, 2022 | Business Mindset, Visibility Mindset and Strategy |
As an entrepreneur, you know the importance of being able to reach your ideal clients. Thing is, very few know how to go beyond the demographics to reach them. Business 101 involves building an avatar that would help identify who your business will help. It’s time to step into Business 201 and learn how to take your avatar up a notch. Here’s how to do just that.
How to Go Beyond the Demographics to Reach Your Ideal Clients
It’s important to keep your ideal customer-based narrowed down; however, there are ways to expand it to include ideal clients you may have never thought you’d reach. This is where understanding how to go beyond the demographics comes into the picture.
Re-evaluate the locations your ideal customer may be.
As we continue moving forward in our technologically advanced world, this means you have even more platforms to reach your ideal clients. Take a look at what platforms you’re currently using and gather the following data:
- How often you’re posting on it.
- The amount of engagement received from ideal clients.
- Return on investment (of time and any money spent on it).
With the data from the previous points, you can decide if that platform is still worth you using for reaching your ideal clients. If not, look at other options.
Add an interest and hobbies point to your avatar.
When first establishing your avatar, it’s normal to include the age, location, gender, and personality. It’s even common to add his or her spirituality status, but rarely will you think to include their interests and hobbies. Why is this important? For starters, identifying specific hobbies and interests will open up new doors for creating content around those points and open new doors to finding your ideal clients.
Including interests and hobbies will make connecting with your ideal clients more personable. Knowing that your client likes cycling may not seem important to what she is coming to you for, but it provides another layer of trust.
Maximize the description section on your platforms to describe your ideal clients.
Avatar aside, you can go beyond the demographics to reach your ideal clients by writing about them in the description section on your social media platforms. Each of the different platforms provides you with a small space to add a description and most people choose to talk about themselves. While that certainly helps people get to know you, you could also use that space to talk about who your ideal clients are.
Here are a few examples:
- Moms of small children who want to launch their new business.
- Women of faith looking to grow their visibility.
- Multi-passionate women that want to leverage social media to grow their business.
- Middle-age women looking to self-publish their story.
These are just a few examples of how you can utilize the description space to speak directly to those you want to attract and connect with. Notice how each of the samples is short and sweet. When someone lands on your page and reads that, they’ll either stick around or they won’t. You should never be out for numbers, but out for those who want what you have to give.
Final Thoughts
It doesn’t take much to go beyond the typical demographics to reach your ideal clients. The three tips above are great starting points for taking your avatar to the next level so you can reach more people who need the services and products that you offer. Take some time to evaluate your current avatar. Make any necessary tweaks and add the suggestions above. Then, take the actions to position yourself to reach out with what you’ve discovered.
If you need help with visibility positioning, I’d love to connect with you!
