Stuck? How to Re-Energize your Business

When we are excited about what we do, we get that whole “YES!” vibe that people crave doing business with.

Likewise, when we are tired and overworked, overwhelmed, stressed out, people feel it. And that whole “Ew!” vibe makes people scroll past our posts or just say no to our services.

They need to feel drawn to us. And that’s nearly impossible when we’re tired and worn out. I promise, they feel it in your messaging just as much as you do in your life (cringe).

If you’re getting that “I don’t want to get out of my PJs” feeling, it may be time to re-energize yourself and your business so you can thrive and attract the clients you want to work with again. 

But how can you take that “OMG-if-I-have-another-call-today” feeling and flip it around to “HECK YES! LET’S DO THIS!” so people come running at your business with money in hand? Take a look at the steps below, then go take action!

1. Take Time Off

I know you may think this is the last thing you need or can do right now. But it’s the single thing you HAVE to do. The number one way to refresh is to walk away, take time to breathe, and come back, refreshed.

Go to a beach, a mountain, a cavern in the hills of Ireland, or even your bedroom for a 3-day nap… It doesn’t really matter. Just block off the time you need and take it.

Your business will be able to run without you. And if it can’t, then you need a better system in place (https://www.katelynehamilton.com/systemswithspeed).

All you need to do is set up your email to let people know you’re out or have your OBM or VA take care of managing your inbox while you're away.  

Let your clients know you’ll be away and who will be around to handle their needs, take care of any fires that your VA needs you to handle before going, and mentally prepare yourself for this break. Remember, your business will survive for a week or two without you in it! 

2. Vision board/goal planning for the year 

Knowing what you’re building helps you keep focus. Because you want to be really clear on the business and life you want, and WHY you want these things. Even when things get tough.

You can do this in a couple of ways. Setting goals, or creating a vision board, will help you map out exactly what it is you want, and what you're working towards. I want you to think beyond just "make 6-figures this year." Sure that can be a goal, but what will setting that goal do for you? How do you want to feel once you reach that goal? Why is this important for your business or your life? Then HOW can you start to cultivate those feelings NOW, along the way? 

Those feelings won't just magically appear when you hit that goal - it's all a part of the process, or the journey. So when those PJs days hit, they don’t hit hard or long. You take your break and you get back on course because your goals are leading the way. 

3. Revamp your service offerings 

Sometimes you just need to look at your business with a fresh set of eyes. If you’ve been consistently adding new products and services and have a ton of offers all across the board, it may be time to niche down to just 2-3. Take a look at all your offerings and evaluate what you enjoy doing and what your target audience NEEDS from you. Maybe you combine a couple of offers into 1 NEW offering. Not only will you give your people something fresh to devour, you’ll give yourself a renewed sense of purpose.

Create 1-2 flagship programs that really resonate with your audience and let the rest go. That singular heading will feel light and empowering. Re-energizing you fully and giving you so much less dead weight to carry.

4. Outsource more to team 

If you do not have a team, build one. The right team members not only make work light for you, but it also allows your business to thrive because you are focused on doing the things only YOU can do.

If you are proficient at helping people create change in their lives, but not proficient at graphics, you may waste an hour creating a beautiful graphic (yes, even in Canva! Have you tried digging through all those options??) that your designer could do in 5 mins. That’s an hour of your time that could have been spent connecting with your ideal clients over social or even in session with current clients.

Likewise, a team can do the posting to social, emailing your list, managing your inbox, sending invoices, setting up workflows and more efficient systems, etc for you. This ensures that you always have a consistent flow of clients coming in, and are extremely visible online, while you're taking care of serving those clients and leading from your zone of genius.

Having a team you can trust also means that you don’t get burnt out doing the tasks that you shouldn’t be doing. It means you get to take more time off because there are people to do the things you can’t do efficiently. 
Don’t let overwhelm and frustration zap energy from you or your business. Put these tips to use and discover how much you truly do love your work and the clients you work with...again. 

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a wife, stepmom, dog mama of three furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.

3 Must Do’s when Starting your Online Business

When I first launched an online business 3 years ago, I struggled most with figuring out where to start and what to do first to actually “get” clients. I think most people have an idea of what they want to do, but they don’t have the business experience to know how to build a successful business.

There’s so much more that goes into running a business than the actual work that you wanted to do in the first place. It’s why so many people don’t actually make it in the entrepreneurial world. They don’t know about or think about the other things that you need to do to actually be successful.

If you’re just getting started in the online space, or you’re looking to start an online business, here are three “must do” things when just starting out:

1. Get Clear on your Service Offerings, Messaging & Ideal Client

Clarity is oftentimes one of the hardest parts of building your brand. I get it. You “can” do so many things, but that doesn’t always mean you should. Start out by asking yourself what you WANT to do vs. what you CAN do and really focus on those 1 to 2 things in order to not confuse your audience. Then, create a persona or avatar for your ideal client. Know who you want to work with and then your messaging will become much more clear. While your service offerings can always evolve, it’s nice to start out with a smaller focus to draw your audience in and communicate who you are and what you do easier.

2. Set up Foundational Systems and Processes

It truly amazes me how many people do not have any sort of systems or processes set up in their business. I have come into so many 6-figure and 7-figure businesses where there is nothing truly set up or documented for how they do things. So can you be successful without them, sure can, but I promise you that if you set them up from the start you’ll actually save yourself so much time and stress in the long run. So what systems and processes should you establish first? My top 3 are: Asana for project management and process documentation, Dubsado for contracts/ invoicing and overall client onboarding (and hello automations!), Acuity for calendar automation and scheduling. For more of my top recommendations and details, click here.

3. Show Up Consistently 

If I could give you one tip, and only one tip, it would be to be consistent. Show up EVERY SINGLE DAY. Show up on social media, show up to work on your business, show up for your clients, and most importantly show up when you think no one is watching. Contrary to what social media and “society” may lead you to believe, building a successful business does not happen overnight. It takes the relentless hustle of showing up day in and day out for people to start to notice you, build trust in you, and want to hire you. Keep going when it feels hard, and keep showing up when it’s easy. Deliver massive value and I promise you will be on your way to having the successful business you desire.

If you’re willing to do these things, you will see success in your business. It may take time, that’s why consistency is probably the most important of them all. But I promise you will get there. If you want additional support in your business, I strongly encourage you to hire a business coach. They’ve done it before and they can help you work through the strategy AND the mindset blocks that come with owning your own business. If you’re interested in learning more about coaching, book a discovery call with me here.

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a wife, stepmom, dog mama of three furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.

How to Use Acuity to Scale Your Business

If you’re looking for a quick and easy system to set up for your business that will truly transform it, look no further than Acuity. It will drastically increase your efficiency, automate more in your business and change the way you work. What is Acuity? It’s a scheduling tool that functions as your personal assistant to book appointments, and packages with ease.

One reason why I love Acuity is that the learning curve is small. It’s really pretty self-explanatory and it will save you SO much time in your business. You’d be surprised how much time you waste with the back and forth of trying to book a call with someone and not to mention the potential lost business from someone looking for your services if you don’t have an easy way for them to connect with you.

Here are 5 features of Acuity that will help you to scale your business:

1. Automatic Appointment Scheduling

This takes away the back-and-forth “what’s your availability next week?” followed by “what time zone are you in?” emails that then can take days to actually get an appointment scheduled, in which your schedule may have changed. This cuts down on potentially missed leads, delayed meetings and time/frustration for both parties involved. You can embed your scheduling link on your website, and/or share the links on social media, via emails or DMs, etc. It simplifies everything to just send a link and say “here’s my calendar link, book at a time that will work for you!” You can go in and set your availability, block off days/times that don’t work for you, so it will automatically give your best availability in THEIR time zone and then the call will be automatically added to your calendar.

2. Pre-Screen Calls with Forms

The number one concern people have with having their scheduling link publicly on their website is the ability to “screen” calls before hopping on them. I get it, your time is precious - I feel the exact same way. That’s the benefit to using forms to screen your calls for you. You don’t have to use these for every type of call option you have, but if you have a link for someone to book a discovery call with you on your website, you can absolutely add questions that they have to fill out prior to being able to book the appointment. This way, you’ll weed out people who don’t feel like filling out the form to get on the phone with you and just want the “free call” and it’s here you can ask the right questions to make sure it’s a good fit for both parties.

The questions you ask can also give you better insights into who you’re getting on the phone with, their pain points and how you can serve them. This makes for a more productive call for BOTH parties. 

3. Multiple Appointment types (WITH CUSTOMIZATION)

This is a huge benefit compared to other scheduling platforms. You can create as many different appointment types as you want within Acuity - and you can customize the links. You can create a link for free discovery calls, coaching calls, paid one-off calls, etc. and link different forms (or no form) to each appointment type. You can also set a different schedule of availability for different appointment types. For example, maybe you only want to take potential new client calls on Mondays, and then client calls only Tuesdays and Thursdays - it’s super easy to set up these boundaries for each call type.

4. Reminders & follow up emails

You can easily set up reminder emails to go out automatically to reduce the likelihood of no-shows and missed appointments. You can set up email reminders and/or text reminders before your scheduled appointment. Similarly, you can send automatic follow-up reminders if you want to request feedback or send additional info about your services. These automations save time, and a delay in making sure you’re collecting or sending the right information to potential new clients.

5. Selling Paid Services or Packages 

Acuity makes it really easy to sell paid services or packages. You can set a price for a single appointment type, or you can create a package which is a series of calls someone can redeem with that package option. The benefit? It tracks all the calls in that package for you for each client. It also connects with both Stripe and PayPal, making it easy for clients to pay you.

Truly there are SO many customizations you can make within Acuity and that flexibility is so helpful and what makes it a superior platform compared to other scheduling tools out there. Added bonus - it syncs with your iCal, Google calendars, Outlook calendars, etc. so there’s no “double bookings'' on your calendar either. I have used many other scheduling platforms out there with clients and every time I switch them over to Acuity because it’s just THAT much better.

The only negative thing I’ll say about Acuity is that they recently changed their affiliate program and they say due to “tax laws” they can no longer pay people in more than half of the US - which is unfortunate since I literally sing this platform’s praises every day… but here I am still sharing and promoting it - so you know it’s gotta be good!

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a wife, stepmom, dog mama of three furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.

There IS a right time to take that next step… here’s HOW

Starting a business seemed SO overwhelming and scary. Where do you start? How do you just start a business? What do I need to know or do? It seemed like so many things that I didn’t know how was I ever going to actually get started?

I leaned on others who HAD started businesses and guided me through the steps to help me get up and running. Here’s the thing. You can’t screw it up.

As your business grows there comes new anxieties, worries, frustrations that arise and maybe you find yourself feeling some of those same emotions you felt when you started your business. What’s next? How do I get to that next level? While I still believe you truly can’t screw it up no matter what you do because every step you take is a learning experience in and of itself, I think there can be a right time to take the next leap.

Here are some things to consider when you’re looking to take your business to the next level:

1. Time
   

Do you constantly feel like you don’t have enough hours in the day to get everything done? Or maybe your to-do list keeps spilling over day-to-day with more things constantly added. Evaluate your time. Track it. What are you spending most of your time on and does it move your business forward? Time is one of the MOST VALUABLE, if not THE MOST valuable asset you have in your business. So if you’re finding yourself spending most of your time on activities that do not drive your business forward, I’d say it’s time to outsource those activities.

2. Money

Everyone values money differently. What value do you place on money and is your relationship with money positive or negative? In my opinion, money is energy. And where you put your money your energy flows. We all could find so many reasons NOT to invest or take that next step in your business, but when it comes to money, you have to truly BELIEVE in what you’re spending your money on or investing in. You can always make more money and if you let your fear of making a bad investment stop you from taking that next step in your business then you’ll always be stuck right where you are. Because let’s face it… in order to take that next step and grow, there will likely be some sort of cost associated with it. But instead, think of what you will get in RETURN - more time? Less frustration? More accomplished in a day? While money should absolutely be a consideration as you make that next step in your business, it shouldn’t be the only consideration or thing that is holding you back.

3. Knowledge

Will this investment give me more knowledge to help me better serve my clients or run my business? If you’re looking to become more knowledgeable about a particular subject or learn a new skill or tool for your business - by all means invest in that course, program or coach to do so. BUT I challenge you to also ask yourself if it’s truly knowledge you NEED or can benefit from fully in the long run, vs. outsourcing to someone else who has that knowledge already. The other question to ask yourself is, is this something you WANT to know how to do? Sometimes I think we feel obligated to learn something because it’s what “everyone else in the industry is doing” when maybe we don’t really have any interest in it at all. Knowledge isn’t always power if you don’t DO anything with that knowledge.

4. ROI

Before you make any sort of investment, think about the return that will come from that investment. Maybe you don’t know to what extent that return will be, or how fast - but those are the questions you should be asking. Is this investment, or the next step a short-term gain or long-term gain? For instance, I believe my 5-hour intensives are a huge short-term gain if you’re in need of getting some systems set up in your business to increase your efficiencies on the backend of your biz. On the other hand, if you’re looking to invest in public relations to get your name out there and hopefully score some press coverage, that is absolutely a long-term gain and strategy. Those results cannot happen in 5-hours or 5 days. So you have to be aware of the type of return you’re going to get from your investment and be clear on the timetable and decide if that feels good to you.

5. Efficiencies

Will this investment create greater efficiencies in your business? Y’all know I am ALL about being efficient. I hate wasting time on things that don’t matter. I don’t create shortcuts, I create efficiencies. Being efficient means that you’re “achieving maximum productivity with minimum wasted effort or expense.” So will this investment help you be more productive with less wasted effort or expense? Remember this includes time too because time is money.

6. Support

Do I need more support right now? Will this investment and next step make me feel more supported in my business? How will more support give me the ability to grow my business? Having the right support team is crucial for long-standing success as an entrepreneur. This journey is full of ups and downs and sometimes those next steps are scary and the right support team will help you to feel empowered to do more and show up as your next level self. Whether it’s support from a coach, VA, OBM, project manager, bookkeeper, etc. what support is important when taking the next step in your biz.

7. Priorities

Evaluate your business and life priorities. What is at the top of your list. Does this next step/investment in your biz align with your current priorities? For example, for me this fall I’ve had this nudge to hire a business coach to help me take my business to that next level. Someone to support me, brainstorm with me, give constructive criticism, work with me on mindset, etc. but I decided to wait until December/January to move forward with that decision. Why? Because I’ve had a lot on my plate this year especially planning a wedding and I knew I couldn’t show up the way I want to when I hire a coach. I knew I didn’t have the extra time and attention needed to drive my business to that next level currently. And guess what, that’s okay!! I am so proud of and happy with my business and where I’m at currently and the clients I get to serve and once my priorities shift a little bit here soon, I’ll be able to take that next step.

8. Goals

What are both your short and long term business goals? Will this next step and investment get you closer to those goals? How? Be specific! Always keep your goals in mind when you decide to take the next step in your business. Maybe it’s a certain type of lifestyle you want to achieve? Maybe it’s hitting a certain income level or doing something you’ve always wanted to do. There are so many different types of goals, but just make sure your next step aligns with at least one of them.

As you evaluate your next investment, think through this list. I think that will let you know if now is the right time to take that next step for that specific investment you want to make… or maybe it’s enlightened you to take a different approach or step first.

Let me know if this was helpful as you look to grow your own business and share this post with a friend!

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a soon-to-be wife, stepmom, dog mama of two furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.

This 5 Step Process will Help you Analyze Your Business and Drive Consistent Results

Creating the campaigns and new programs, helping your clients succeed and get massive results, launching your latest project -- all super sexy, fun and exciting things, right? That’s what we all love doing in this business - creating and seeing our clients get success… BUT for all the exciting things, there’s a handful of stuff behind the scenes, the unsexy things that we must do to drive our business forward. Because the truth is that without the unsexy stuff, we can no longer do the fun, exciting stuff well.

One of the unsexy things you should be doing consistently in your business is ANALYZING it. For every launch, new campaign, social media or marketing initiative, you need to be reviewing the data to see how it performed. Use this 5 step process to help you analyze your business to see quicker results.

1. Go back to your goals

The first step in analyzing your results - whether it be from a launch, social media strategy or just overall biz growth - is to go back to your goals. What were you trying to achieve? A certain level of awareness? A specific number of people signed up for your new program? Hitting a certain income goal? A number of new followers? Etc. Every specific strategy and tactic in your business should be connected with an overarching goal and a specific way to measure that goal’s progress. Otherwise, you won’t know what’s working and what’s not.

2. Pull the Data

So many platforms these days have built-in analytics tools to help you gather and pull the data needed to analyze your business. Google, Squarespace, Wordpress, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, ActiveCampaign, etc. all have built-in analytics tools that will break down your data in whatever time period you’d like. A lot of tools actually allow you to compare to another period of time too so you can see how you’re doing month-over-month, or from one campaign to the next.

3. Determine what went well and what didn’t

Pulling the data is the easy part. It’s figuring out what the data means that can be the hard part. Impressions, referrals, open rates, exit rate, engagement, traffic -- these all can be really confusing terms. A general rule of thumb is that the higher the number, or percentage, the more successful it was. But, if you started from scratch, then all of your numbers will likely be up. So, what you truly want to look at is the little details. What posts were the most popular? What time of day did you get the most email opens? Which subject line performed best? What price point or package was the most popular for people who signed up for your course? Where did people drop off on your website? What ads drove the most traffic back to your website? Look for patterns. See what tactic may have worked the best, and what didn’t perform very well.

4. Make necessary tweaks or adjustments

Once you figure out what worked and what didn’t, it’s time to make notes and adjustments. If you’re analyzing a campaign, maybe you needed more time to promote, or maybe the places you did promote didn’t convert. Think about what you could do differently next time, or what you could amplify that went well and take notes. If you launched a new marketing strategy you’ll analyze and tweak in the same way.

For example, over the last three months or so I launched a new Instagram strategy in my own business to gain more followers. I’ve done this completely organically because relationships and authentic followers matter to me. So far I’ve been focusing on liking, commenting and following people that are in my target audience based on hashtags. This has helped me to grow my following, but my engagement hasn’t gone up as quickly. Therefore, I had to tweak my current strategy to make sure I was also equally engaging with my current followers as I am with new potential followers. This will hopefully, in return, drive up my engagement on my posts.

5. Set New Goals

When you set goals they’re usually (if you’re setting SMART goals) measurable and applicable to a specific time period, event or campaign. Once you analyze the results of that campaign you’ll likely need to set new goals. Maybe they’re similar to the first goals you set, or maybe you crushed those and you realize you need to set even BIGGER goals. By consistently analyzing and goal setting, you’ll make sure you’re not staying complacent in your business and instead of growing and seeing consistent results.

Results aren’t always QUICK. But as long as you’re seeing consistent progress from the set goals, analyzing and refining model, you’ll see greater success over time. This is something I like to do on a monthly basis just to understand at a baseline level where I’m at. I usually recommend a 3-6 month “trial” period to determine if an overall marketing strategy is working… but I like to keep tabs on things on a monthly basis to start to notice trends along the way. Are you analyzing your business consistently?

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a soon-to-be wife, stepmom, dog mama of two furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.

Why you Need to Invest in Marketing

If you’re a business owner and not investing in marketing, you’re missing a huge opportunity to grow and scale your business. Every business needs marketing. It took me a while to realize though that not everyone understands what marketing is, and why you need it in your business. I have a background in marketing and PR and it’s one of the many benefits to hiring me as an OBM. I find that usually all of my clients need a little bit of help building out and executing their marketing strategy.

So first, let’s define marketing.

Marketing: the action or business of promoting and selling products or services, including market research and advertising.

I think there are a couple of key words in that definition that make people shy away from marketing -- the words selling and advertising. But to be honest, if you’re in business, that’s a part of it no matter how much you like it or not. It doesn’t have to feel icky or turn people away. In fact, good marketing does quite the opposite.

Here are 3 reasons why you should be investing in marketing in your business:

1. Generates brand awareness

If you’re not marketing your business how do you expect people to find you? You can’t only rely on word-of-mouth to generate business for the long-term. YES, word-of-mouth and referrals are great ways to generate business, but you need to establish yourself in your industry with proper marketing. Part of this is learning to show up where your audience is only. You can learn more about how not all marketing is the same in another blog post I wrote here.

2. Establishes Credibility

When you show up online, you’re establishing credibility in your space. You’re building your reputation so to speak. How do you do this? By providing valuable content and information to your target audience. Show up consistently so they can begin to build that know, like and trust factor with you. Think through your own process before you determine who you want to work with or what company you want to buy from. If you were to google a company, or search for someone in social media and they had either no presence online or an inconsistent one, would you decide to hire them, or would you buy from them? I know I wouldn’t. I am 1000x more likely to invest in a BRAND (person or company) that have established themselves, shows up consistently and provides me free value FIRST.

3. Not all marketing is the same 

I go into much greater detail about this in another blog post, but I want to reiterate that not all marketing is the same. By investing in someone who knows what they’re doing in terms of marketing, you’re going to have much greater success, much faster. I’m not saying that you’ll never have success doing it on your own, but it surely won’t be as quick. There are SO many different marketing strategies you can take action on, but the thing is, just because it worked for Cindy Lou doesn’t mean it’ll work for you. Your business goals, your target audience, and your competitive market is likely very different than Cindy Lou’s. You need someone that can help you design and tailor a strategy and execute tactics specific to your business needs.

While I believe that there are other components that help a business be successful, I truly believe that investing in marketing is extremely beneficial for any company at (almost) any stage of business. It’s worth the investment.

What scares you about investing in marketing?

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a soon-to-be wife, stepmom, dog mama of two furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.

Systems for Success: How to Save Time and Grow Your Business

Setting up systems in your business is a step that so many entrepreneurs find overwhelming! Where to start, what to set up, how to work them, etc. It can be exhausting and lead you to just continue to push off setting them up.

Here’s the deal though, if you don’t have any systems in place in your business, you’re actually wasting valuable time and stunting your business growth. While you’re spending time creating, revising and sending contracts and invoices, what else could you be doing? Or maybe you’re bogged down in the back and forth of finding a time to set up a meeting with a potential client that you never actually get that meeting set up? Or maybe you’re missing a valuable opportunity to convert someone into a client with a killer freebie.

Systems don’t need to be overly complicated or overwhelming. In fact, every industry or profession has systems in place in order to create a successful business. Restaurants, stores, large corporations, etc. all have systems in place so that the business runs smoother, is more streamlined and productive, therefore more profitable.

Want to save time and grow your business? Of course you do! Implement these 4 steps to create systems in your business:

1. Write down your business activities

Do you even know what all you do in your business? Would you consider yourself proactive, or reactive? Sometimes we get into this cycle of just reacting to what needs to be done vs. truly realizing all of the things that are going on in our business month-to-month. Take inventory of your business activities such as writing content, scheduling email newsletters, creating proposals or invoices, scheduling calls, business planning, project management, meetings, website updates, creating funnels for launches, paying team members/tracking biz expenses, etc. There are so many backend activities that you need to get organized in even understanding what all you do to determine where to start putting systems in place.

2. Determine what you could automate

Start by writing out your process for each of the business activities that you listed. Note any tools or systems that you use already to help you do the task at hand. Then determine if there is a way to take yourself out of the equation. Could you set something up one time and then repurpose it each time you need to do the task? For example, do you offer the same service at the same price to where you could simply automate your onboarding experience for new clients? Or maybe instead of having potential clients email you to set up calls you put an automatic scheduler on your website with pre-call questions to help make it easier for people to access you and not miss out on any potential opportunities. So many times we think we need to be involved in every step of the process, but once we write it down we realize that if we just set it up, it can truly be duplicated without us. As humans we like to overcomplicate things, when really we can always simplify the process.

3. Research tools 

There is truly a tool or platform for EVERYTHING. I’m all about simplification though, so I am not recommending you try ALL THE TOOLS, but I am suggesting that you look into what would be the most helpful for you. There are a lot of platforms that can do multiple things for you, such as Kajabi (lead pages, email marketing, webinars, course hub). It really just depends where you’re at in your business, what you need right now and what you want to pay for. If you’re just starting out there are a ton of free or low cost options that you can set up that actually can talk to each other. For example, I link Acuity to zoom for meetings and to my email list. There’s definitely tools out there for everything. I list out some of my favorites in another blog post here.

4. Evaluate

Take some time to see if these new systems work, give them a month or two. Refine the processes to make them work better for you along the way. If you find a particular tool, system or process just doesn’t make sense, change it! There will be a learning curve to some degree, but if you find it’s causing you more frustration than help, find another way. And at the end of the day, you can always outsource!!

Once you implement these things and put those systems in place, your business will run much smoother and you’ll have created time and space in your business to continue to grow!

If you’re still overwhelmed thinking about implementing systems in your business, schedule a discovery call and we can chat about my 5-hour systems intensives where I help you identify what systems to put into place, set them up for you and teach you how to manage them. 

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a soon-to-be wife, stepmom, dog mama of two furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.

How to Use Asana for your Business

Do you try to keep everything you have to do in your head, or written down on a million sticky notes cluttering your desk?

This was me for so long. Trying to remember everything I needed to do, but inevitably something would fall through the cracks because I either didn’t write it down, or it got lost in the colossal mess on my desk. I really like writing things down, but I finally had to admit to myself that my old system of “organization” was simply no longer working for me.

Being a busy entrepreneur, I always had an idea in my head or something I needed to get done for myself or a client. My head was filling up with stuff to always “remember for later” instead of allowing me to focus solely on what I was doing at the time. Finally, I started putting EVERYTHING in my calendar. Personal appointments, workout classes, client calls, scheduled work time blocks, etc. This significantly helped, but still what to do with the other “tasks” that needed a home so to speak?

One day, I was introduced to Asana and it totally changed my life. It’s quite possibly the best thing that’s ever happened to my business. Here’s 4 reasons why I love Asana and how it can help you stay organized in your business:

1. Easy project/client breakdown

   I love how simple it is to have a project for each client I work with. These projects can be organized in either list view or board view. List view is more task oriented in my opinion, while board view is more visual. I use list view the most and load in all my to-do’s for my clients and then each day work off of my combined “My Tasks” list that Asana compiles for me. In each project, you can then further organized by section and add specific tasks to each section of a project.

2. Collaboration with others.

   If you have a team it is SO simple to add them to your Asana account. You don’t have to worry, if you want to keep certain projects private or even a personal project you can do that as well, but otherwise you can use this to assign tasks to your team members. Asana lets you add up to 15 people with the free version. People can also “follow” a specific task if you want them to stay in the loop of when a project is complete, or any comments/questions about the task. It really simplifies collaboration among your team, or your clients. I also use Asana with a couple clients for approvals and collaboration or certain campaigns or projects.

3. Recurring Tasks

   This is seriously GOLD. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel here. If you have a task that you do every single day, week or month, or bi-weekly, etc. you can simple set your task to repeat for a certain day(s) and even time if wanted. Once you check it off as done for that week it’ll repopulate with the next day/week’s due date. For example, I have a weekly task to remind me when to write these blog posts, and weekly recurring tasks for my VA to schedule them to my social channels. I love that I can just add it once and be done and don’t have to worry about re-adding it to my to-do list weekly.

4. Document your processes/create templates

   Creating and documenting processes can be annoying and frustrating. Especially when people don’t follow them, or they get misconstrued. I love creating templates in Asana that I can customize for each specific thing such as onboarding a new client or team member, or a process for content creation and approvals, or a detailed launch strategy. You can also lock down your templates so no one can alter them by mistake.

There’s so many other reasons why I love Asana, for one, it’s FREE. Sure there’s a paid version, but I’m telling you that you really don’t NEED it. I can still do everything I need to do successfully with the free version. The timeline and forms options are only available in premium, which the timeline feature does intrigue me because currently I create those in Excel. So if you want to upgrade, you absolutely can and you’ll get even more features.

You can also color code EVERYTHING, which being super Type A, I love that! It integrates with SO many other programs such as Slack, Google Drive, Toggl, etc., sends daily “to-do” emails, allows me to see my tasks at a glance for the day, gives you multiple workspaces per client, etc. I’m clearly a bit obsessed, but for good reasons! Feel free to send me an email at Katelyn@Katelyhehamilton.com, or connect with me on Instagram or Facebook with any questions! Also, I’d love to hear from you if you love it as much as I do!

If you haven’t checked out my latest FREE offer, the Get Your SH!T Together Strategy Workbook, you need to head here to get it NOW. It’s the exact process I walk my clients through to help them determine what automations they need in their business to achieve their short and long term goals, and ultimately grow their business.

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a soon-to-be wife, stepmom, dog mama of two furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.

The Secrets to “Selling” Yourself on Instagram

Everyone is so sensitive to the word SELL or selling or being “salesy”. We live in a world where products are pushed in our faces all day long. On social media, television, billboards, emails, at work, etc. And we’ve all had those really obnoxious and annoying sales people, or the generic MLM copy and paste messages (I can say that as I have been a part of an MLM),  or the people who just won’t leave you alone. But at the end of the day, if you are a company with a product or service you are selling something to someone no matter how you position it.

Social media can be one of your biggest advocates in terms of generating sales. I want you to stop thinking about sales as an icky term or feeling. At the end of the day, you want to build your know, like and trust factor to make selling seem more like sharing.

Right now, Instagram is one of the most popular platforms for with more than 1 billion users. So how do you get noticed? How do you build a successful Instagram platform that people want to follow? I am going to tell you the secrets to “selling” yourself on Instagram, but first things first, you have to make sure your profile is set to PUBLIC for these tips to work:

1. Write the Perfect Bio

   When you write your Instagram bio, you really just want it to be easy to read and quickly give people an overview of who you are, what you do and how you can help them. Under the Name section, you can customize however you like, but use a name that you want people to identify you as and use keywords for what you do. For example, my name is written as: Katelyn | Online Biz Manager. You do have a character count so you have to be strategic, but this is quick and digestible so that the first thing people see is my name and what I do.

   Under your bio section, use a hashtag relevant to your industry and then bullet out (and spice it up with Emoji’s) what you help people do, your mission statement, or what types of products you sell. My bio reads:

   #OBM & Get Your SH!T Together Strategist👊🏼

   I help successful entrepreneurs:

   ❗️Organize

   ❗️Prioritize

   ❗️Strategize

   Finally, make sure you include a link to your website, or multiple links through Linktr.ee.

2. Set up a Linktre.ee

   Unfortunately, Instagram only lets you list one link at a time in your bio. This is definitely less than ideal as most companies have many things they want to direct you to: website, blog, email list, shop, etc. and it can be a pain trying to change the link every day when you make a new post.

   Luckily there is a solution. Linktre.ee is a website that allows you to use one link to pull up a page where you have buttons that link to everything you want to share with your followers. The best part? It’s free. If you want to customize it a bit more, add animation to some links, remove the Linktr.ee logo and upgrade the analytics, there is a paid version. But if you’re just looking for something simple to give you the ability to share multiple links, the free version will work just fine. I love having the ability to see what links are most popular and engage my followers in many different ways.

3. Use Hashtags and Engage with Your Target Market Engagement

   Using hashtags in your posts are a #GAMECHANGER when it comes to  increasing your post engagement and exposure. You want to make sure your hashtags are targeted. Instagram allows you to have up to 30 hashtags on each post. Make a list of all the phrases and hashtags you think your ideal clients would be searching for. What do you do? What do you enjoy? What services do you offer? Then go search Instagram for the different hashtags and you’ll see all the variations and the number of times each hashtag has been used.

   Make a list of 25-30 hashtags to use consistently on your posts. But when making this list you don’t want to pick the MOST popular hashtags with hundreds of thousands or millions of posts. Because that likely means your post will be quickly lost on the explore page of Instagram and your potential clients won’t be as quick to find you. Do a mix of 5-10k + 20-100k hashtags on your posts. For example, #onlinebusinessmanager has 13.6k posts, but OBM has 43.5k. You want to mix these up, as well as including your own personal hashtag in there such as your biz name too.

   Part TWO of hashtag engagement includes then searching these hashtags and scrolling through them and liking and commenting on people who use these hashtags, as well as clicking on a photo, analyzing the profile of the person who posted it - are they reputable? Do they have a larger audience that you could benefit from? Because if they seem similar to you, you can always go and look at who likes and comments on their photos and then engage with their followers as they would likely be interested in your stuff too if they’re interested in theirs. Engagement is KEY. Try to do this a few times a day and you’ll slowly see your follower count grow ORGANICALLY without using a bot or service to grow your following. Which btw, just don’t do that. Put in the work and be targeted vs. trusting a bot or service to do the work for you.   

4. Using IG stories / Highlights

   Instagram stories is a gold mine. It allows you to give people a “real person” behind the pictures. You are humanizing yourself in a world where social media can seem so “fake” or “picturesque”. Share VALUE on Instagram Stories. Show examples of your products or services - in what you do for your clients day in and day out. THEN save these videos to your HIGHLIGHTS. This is where you can essentially save your stories for people to watch past the 24 hour mark.

   Think about the things you want to share most in your business. Probably tips of some kind, maybe product photos, or information on your latest course offering and then merge that into the results your clients are getting from your course, etc. Stories are a way to build that trust factor to show you are the real deal and not just some girl (or guy ;)) that is trying to sell someone something on the internet and not delivering value.

5. TAKE GOOD PICTURES GUYS.

   Who here loves to look at grainy, blurry, dark photos? No one? Didn’t think so. Y’all. Instagram is a PHOTO app. So make sure you are taking and sharing GOOD PHOTOS. Invest in some brand photography. You can likely find someone to do a brand/lifestyle shoot for $150-250 in your area. Maybe cheaper if you commit to doing them consistently (I recommend 4-6 times a year) and can negotiate a deal. These photos are SO worth it. You can use them on your website, blog, email marketing and over and over again on social. They make you look PROFESSIONAL and people stop the scroll for GOOD PHOTOS. They won’t even READ your content and will scroll right past a shitty photo. It’s WORTH IT.

   I am not saying to get rid of the selfies or at home photos forever. Hell, some of my top engaging posts are selfies.  BUT when you take photos on your iPhone, make sure you have good lighting. I invested in a Diva Ring light on amazon and it is SO worth it. The lighting is NIGHT AND DAY difference.

   Outside of having professional photos and good lighting, look into downloading an Instagram Preset. You can buy them from like $4-7 on Etsy. All you have to do is download Adobe Lightroom CC and load in your preset. What this is, is a custom “filter” that is pre-saved to this app. You connect your camera roll to the app and then select the photo you want, apply the preset and BOOM, a beautifully filtered photo in 5 seconds. This helps to streamline your feed and all of your photos have the same look and feed. Trust me when I say, PHOTOS ARE EVERYTHING.

6. BE CONSISTENT. TELL A STORY. OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

   Consistency, consistency, consistency. How many times do I have to say it? You need to be consistent on social media. I advise sharing every day at least once to Instagram Monday-Friday. If you don’t want to post on the weekends that is totally fine and up to you, but engage at times when your audience will be searching and watching. Test out different times in your posts and see what one seems to get the most traction. Over time you’ll be able to tell what times are best for you. But if you dont post consistently, you’ll never know.

   Along with consistency in posting, be consistent in sharing your story. What IS your story? Were you broke and then you manifested a 6-figure salary? Were you homeless and now you’re a millionaire? Are you a college dropout turned success? Did you leave the corporate world to create a thriving, passion-filled business? SHARE IT. Only about 5% of your newsfeed sees each of your posts. So tell your story and build the trust that YOU built your business and they can too, or you had XYZ problem and your product SOLVED IT. Sometimes you have to repeat yourself a few times for people to actually hear it.

7. Business Page

   If you are running a business on Instagram, make sure your page is set to business. To do this, go to your page and click the three lines on the top right, then click settings on the bottom. Then scroll down and make sure it says Business Settings (if so, then you have a biz account, but if not it will likely say something like switch to business account). You have to have a business Facebook page to link it to, but otherwise you’re good to go. This gives you the ability to look more in depth at how your posts are performing, audience insights and account growth, clicks and more.

   Do you feel like you’re in on the “secret” now? Or maybe you were hoping it was something magical that would grow your account to 100k quicker? Nope. That’s because there really is no secret or special sauce. It’s those small things that you have to do consistently to show up and stand out against everyone else in your industry. At the end of the day though, if you’re doing these things consistently, your audience will find you and your sales will grow. Now that doesn’t seem too salesy, does it?

I hope this was helpful for you! If you want even more great content delivered right to your inbox, sign up for my email list here.

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Katelyn Hamilton is an Online Business Manager and Get Your Sh!t Together Strategist. She helps busy entrepreneurs organize, strategize and prioritize their business to go from overwhelmed to out-in-front.

After spending 6 years in the corporate world working with multimillion dollar companies, top-rated chefs and celebrities, she launched her own business to find more flexibility and freedom. She matched her corporate salary in just one year of starting her business.

Katelyn is also a soon-to-be wife, stepmom, dog mama of two furry friends, fitness lover, sports fanatic (Go Dawgs) and dreams of living at the beach.

Click here to book a free call to talk more about your business goals and to see if hiring an OBM is the right fit for you.