Episode 076 | The real reason you're not getting enquiries and how to fix it FAST

Are you guilty of doing the busy work versus the revenue generating activities? The things that are actually going to bring in money for you in the short term and the long term? We want to be focusing on both. But if you're not making sales right now, I want you to be focusing on short term and apportioning amount and amount of time to the long term. So what should you focus on? Well, that's exactly what we're covering in today's episode, so let's dive in. Welcome to Marketing without social media. With me, Viv Guy. The only podcast for entrepreneurs who are ready to learn how to market their businesses in a way that not only feels good, but makes money and allows you the freedom to work less and play more. Every week, I'll be sharing with you proven techniques from my own experiences of building a seven figure business without social media and from other leading experts from across the globe to help you to market without social media and grow your business in a feel good way. Hello. Hello, my wonderful friends. Okay, so I want to share with you, I am someone who loves being behind the scenes. Surprising, I know, as somebody who started her life, went to uni, did creative drama and dance, but it turned out that I actually love being behind the scenes. And actually, as my life went on and my career went on, I always said, oh, do you know what? If I went back to the arts, I would go into directing. You see, turns out I'm an ideas person and I love creating. And my happy place is in that place of creating, of having ideas. Not so much in the implementation. Maybe that's the old neurodiverse brain, the entrepreneurial brain, who knows? But my happy place in my first business, it became my spreadsheets. Oh, yes, spreadsheets. The girl who hated maths at school, my coach said to me once, viv, you cannot run your business from a spreadsheet. Ah, damn. Yeah, that's where I was happy. I loved doing the numbers. It's kind of like when you do vision boarding and goal setting. I love that stuff. My God, ask me a three year or five year goal, a vision, what would you love? What do you want your life to be like? I can do that. I can do the steps to get me there. I just don't really love doing the steps. Which is why I always said my first business was successful, not because of me. People always like, oh, you should be so proud. But I always said, it's not me. I didn't do this. This is my team. My team have made this possible. And I am that person that will hold her hands up and say, like, my success? Yeah, maybe I had the idea. Maybe I helped motivate people and bring people together, whatever. I don't know. But what I do know is it was the skills, the zones of genius of that team that made that business, those millions of pounds possible. Why do we get busy? Like, why do we get busy in the busy and not the things that we know will move the needle? Because again, it feels safe. And we talked about this in episode 75, the visibility. Visibility is a tool. It's not a reward. But we avoid it because it feels so vulnerable. We feel exposed. We feel afraid. See the words here? Afraid. Feel fear, afraid. These words, they're vulnerable. And we don't want to be vulnerable. We don't want to be exposed and we do not want to be rejected. And sure, I started out as an actor and a dancer, like another lifetime ago, but visibility is still hard. I freaking love showing up and guesting on people's podcasts. I love going and speaking to people publicly. I love this stuff. But actually taking the steps that make those things happen, it's still hard. And it is a discipline that I have had to develop. And I'm going to be honest here and hold my hands up and say, freaking hell, it is still hard sometimes. I shared in episode 74 about going through an ADHD diagnosis, about my mental health, about being bullied in my teens, which still definitely impacts now. I went through a big trauma seven years ago, eight years ago at the time of recording this podcast, and it impacts me now. And it makes me at times, not want to show up. Like it makes me want to recoil. But I've had to develop a discipline because if I don't do this stuff, if I don't focus on the revenue generating activities, then my business will not survive and my business will suffer. And it has because I've dropped the ball. I have dropped the ball in the past. So let's talk more about this now, my friends, because we've all got to sort this shisel out. If you are somebody who has hit a plateau in your sales, your audience growth, you've maybe been growing your audience, but they are not converting into sales inquiries, sales calls and actual paying clients. Then let's talk about what we need to be focusing on to change that. So we wear so many hats, we start our businesses, and many of us have come, or many of you, not me so much, always been an entrepreneur. Pretty much. So many of us come from corporate, from other roles where we say, I don't want to do that anymore. I don't want to work for someone else. But we've been like managers of sales teams or managers within marketing departments, whatever that might be. I'm saying managers because a lot of the clients I work with have been managers. You may not have been a manager. Maybe you were a teacher, maybe you were a cleaner. It does not matter. But you've generally come from an organization where there are very specific roles. Somebody does the admin, somebody does operations. There's a finance team. I mean, there'll be different teams. There'll be like accounts payable, accounts receivable, blah, blah, blah. Different departments, bigger organizations, creative teams, marketing design teams, coach teams, sales teams, sales setters, sales closers. There are so many hats within big organizations. And when you become a solopreneur, even if you have a va, let's say in the early days, you are wearing all of these hats. All of these hats. And it's exhausting, but it's really easy to get stuck wearing the hat and put on the hat that is not the one that is actually going to move your business forward because it feels comfortable. That hat feels nice. It's snug. It's a little bit like my spreadsheet hat. Oh, God. Finance and creating and projecting. I loved it. I loved it. So I want you to think right now, maybe you know the answer. What is the busy work that you are stuck doing that is not generating revenue? Hello, canva. If you are marketing on social media, how much time are you spending in canva creating and designing amazing carousels, amazing graphics for your posts, story graphics, templates, whatever that might be. I want you to think about where you're busy being. Busy websites. Oh, hello. I forgot. Web designer off the list. Yes. One of the big culprits I see is web design. Had someone today message me, oh, I just need to get on with doing my website. Lots of other people website. I'd spend him setting up kajabi. Oh, my goodness me. Like, stop right now. It does not matter if you don't know, if you're not aware, but you're not making sales, you're not visible, you're not growing your email list. Let's say I want you to spend the next seven to 14 days tracking every hour the tasks that you are doing. I have a productivity planner by intelligent design and it asks you. It's like a pomodoro planner, but it actually has like a daily planning down the side in 30 minutes increments. Yeah. So you could write down like accounts, canva, design, Facebook Live, whatever you are doing, I want you to literally find something, or if you don't have that, a notepad, whatever. Piece of paper, create a spreadsheet, Google Sheet, whatever it might be, don't get busy doing it. Literally, make it a two minute job. Just put the times of the day, create the thing, print it out, write it on a piece of paper. What are you spending your time doing? And then at the end of that time period, seven to 14 days, I want you to go through and I want you to highlight the revenue generating activities. And I'm going to say right now, if you are posting on social media and you are not generating consistent sales from social media, I'm talking like if you're getting the OD, OD client here and there, then I want you to. Then it's not a revenue generating activity that does not get ticked off as a revenue generating activity because this is what so often people think is a revenue generating activity. I'm creating content. I am marketing. No, you're creating content, but actually you're not getting discovered by new people and the people in your audience are not seeing your content. It's not converting, it's not doing the job. So let's focus on things that are really going to start generating revenue in the short term, and then let's think about what are the things that we can put in in the long term. But right now we need to get your business up and running and off the ground. So think about what those activities are. So I really want you to get clear. If you work a 20 hours week, how many hours are you spending on revenue generating activities? If you don't have clients? Well, hell, you should be spending like 90% of your time on revenue generating activities. If you have client work, of course you need to build that in. But right now, none of the other stuff matters particularly. So think about this. Leveraging others audiences, yes. Revenue generating. Developing a signature talk for those audiences. Yes. Setting up kajabi for your program that you want to sell as passive income? No. Creating and setting up a fancy schmancy kajabi and all that stuff. And a funnel within kajabi? No. Stick your stuff in a Google Drive. Make it really simple. Have a very simple funnel, as in give a talk, book a call, set up, calendly, put an email confirmation in there, literally map it out. Super simple. We do not need to be creating major moving parts at this stage. We want to be getting into people in front of people saying book a call. Or if you've got a call to action, a freebie, an opt in, something really high value that people take an action on. Great. You may want to use that to get them into your email list. But right now, if you're not making sales, I just want you to be getting into as many conversations as possible. Look at the thing right now in your business that would move the needle and do that every day. For me, the thing that is so easy to drop the ball on is reaching out to people. Reaching out to people and asking, hey, can I come and guest on your podcast in your group? Blah, blah, blah, blah. But I know when I do that, it generates revenue for me. So it's really important that I don't allow myself to drop that. It's the first thing I want to drop because I'm bored. It's boring, it's repetitive. And this is the thing. When we set up our businesses, we're pretty much bored of the grind of our jobs that we were doing. We want excitement. We want to do the thing we're great at. I want to work with clients. I want to do spreadsheets. I want to design stuff. I want to do the stuff that really lights up my soul. But right now, in your business, as a solopreneur, on your own, with a small team, maybe a va, someone else, you don't have that luxury. So you have to develop the discipline and think about, what can I do to ensure I do this every single day there's a salesperson, Charlie Day. She says that as soon as she built in to her day, a daily habit, I think it's nine

00 a.m. Every day, she built in doing follow ups with people, people that had like, inquired, people that had commented or expressed an interest in her threads or emails, whatever. And by doing that disciplined daily task, even when she doesn't really want to, she's increased her sales massively. So I really want you to focus on getting out of the busy work and into the revenue generating activities. Now, of course, as you bring in more revenue, we can start moving the things that are not in your zone of genius out. Okay. The things that we still have to do to generate that revenue. So for me, I despise. It bores me. The researching potential podcasts for me to guest on. It's the thing that when I looked back a couple of years ago, I was like, why? Wow, why am I so bad at doing this consistently? And it's because the research part was the bit I avoided. I really disliked it. So what did I do? I outsourced it. It was the first thing because actually I was like, if I pay someone 200 pounds a month to do this research for me, it's going to generate so much more revenue in return. I'm going to make that back tenfold. So I really want you to think about what are the things that are stopping you doing the revenue generating activities? Is there a step in the process that is too difficult for you, that you procrastinate on, that you struggle to do? Is there something that you can do if you don't have the money to invest in a team member, to take that off your back, that you can do? Eat that frog. There's a book. Eat that frog. Is it the very first thing you make yourself do every day? Get it out of the way, do that 30 minutes on research, whatever that might be, 60 minutes, 90 minutes, you decide, but you do it without fail. And then after that, reward yourself, take yourself for a walk, have a coffee, whatever you want to do. But think about what that thing is, the other stuff. Just let it go. It's okay. You can stop doing that stuff if it is not generating revenue, if it's not stuff that is important right now. And it might seem important, it might be so important. I've got to have beautiful, curated Instagram feeds. But I have heard so many entrepreneurs, so many people come to me and my God, their Instagram feeds are gorgeous. Their websites are bloody amazing. God, they're better than mine. But guess how many clients they have. That's right. Zero. A big fat zero. Because none of that stuff matters. Not now. Not right now. So I'm giving you permission to put it in the pocket bucket. Doesn't matter what I recommend you do. Here's something to implement right now. Obviously you've got your little time tracker activity, piece of homework, but I want you to put something on the board in front of you. Can be a piece of a four paper. You might have a whiteboard. But think about those revenue generating activities. Set yourself a goal. I was chatting to one of my clients yesterday because she realized when we started doing some activities, she has no network of peers to reach out to. So actually she wants to reach out and start thinking about who's already got an audience of her ideal clients that she can have coffee with. So she's now setting it a goal. Because again, saying, I need to do more of this. It's not specific. Two people a week? Is that the goal? Five people a week? How many people are you going to make yourself have a conversation with or reach out to, at least I want you to put some goals. I'm going to reach out to five people a week, two people a week. I'm going to meet in person with one person a week for a coffee. What are these things that you are going to do that is going to shift the needle? So get really clear on that because this is what is going to help you and then time block it into your diary. I'm a Google calendar girl, but I also print a copy and it's literally to the left of my computer screen. What should I be doing at what time of day it's there, including my walk. I have a walk. I have a walk and a call with my accountability buddy. Then I have my podcast like guesting pitches and checking back and kind of prepping for interviews. I have my client work. I have my replies to boxes. It's all there. Time blocked out throughout the day. The things that are priority and it's so easy to want to take on other things. But I implore you, implore you, if you want to shift the needle, if you want to get and achieve the goals that you've set, the revenue goals, the time freedom goals, whatever you set out to achieve with this business, get out of the busy work. This is your friendly Viv kick up the butt. Get out of the busy work, guys. And if you want my help doing that, if you want my help figuring out what it is to focus on in your business, what do you need to be doing? Where should your time be spent? What do you need to do? What are the actual steps to take for those revenue generating activities? Then hop on a call with me. Vivguy.com call. That's right, vivguy.com call. These calls are free of charge and we will take a look at your business. That's right, me. My eyes on your business right now. Helping you figure out how to move forward, what steps to take to get you closer to achieving your goals this year, this quarter, this month? Let's see some results. So guys, I have loved hanging out with you again today. And if you love what you've heard, I would love for you to connect with me on Facebook messenger. Yes, it is marketing without social media. But I am a messenger girl. Why? Because I love a freaking voice note. Hello, chatty Cathy. And if you've loved what you've heard today, just drop me a message. Share with me your biggest takeaway. And while you're at it, I know nobody likes to take the time to do these things. But not many people realize how much your ratings and reviews help other people really struggling in their business right now to find this show. So if you really love what you've heard today, it would mean the world to me. If you would take like 15 seconds max to tap the five stars and write just one sentence about the show and let me know. And when you do, I'm going to do something for you, for you. In return. I'm going to enter you into a draw where you can win a free 90 minutes mentoring call with me and we draw this every single month. That's all you've got to do. You don't need to send me screenshots. I have that come through to me automatically here. Guys. It's been amazing to hang out with you today. I have loved, love sharing all of this, getting out of the busy work, revenue generating activities stuff with you today because it is the big game changer to make sure you don't miss the next episode, to subscribe to the show so that you automatically get notified when the next episode drops. Cannot wait to hang out with you next time. See you soon.