We Evolve We Grow With Fabulous Foundations

Episode 9

[00:00:00] Laura: Welcome to Nine To Thrive with your amazing host, Nicky Williams, the business mentor who just has the magic behind her to know how to move business orders forward, and some strange Tech geek from Yorkshire, if you can tell, from the Yorkshire accent, Laura Burnett. And today we wanna talk to you about something that we both were talking about over messenger not long ago.

[00:00:26] When me, myself, in my other business, IT Moon a bit disjointed. Um, so Nicky, why was I feeling a bit disjointed? 

[00:00:37] Nicky: You just didn’t know which way to turn actually, you were like, I know I need to be getting on with things, but there’s just something, there’s something missing. That’s what you were feeling like you felt disconnected, I think.

[00:00:47] And that was when I said, I interjected and said, well, you need to go back to the beginning again. Which is bizarre really, because obviously Laura is fricking amazing. Um, she leads a lovely team in IT moon, she’s obviously my business partner, partner in the Thrive Business Academy, and you would think, uh, she’s got her shizzle together. And it doesn’t mean you haven’t got your shizzle together, it just means sometimes you just gotta go back to basics. 

[00:01:16] Laura: That is correct. And we, I think we say it a lot to everyone, don’t we? So even members in our membership, it’s go back to the beginning. Even people you just see on social media posting and you’re like, you need to go back to the beginning.

[00:01:32] Like I know when we had a biz chat not long ago in our membership, people talking about feeling like we’re just posting everywhere and not to have like a strategy behind the person and again, it’s go back to the beginning. And so I feel like Nicky needs to share with us what is the beginning. 

[00:01:47] Nicky: Yeah, and I call it the fabulous foundations. And by that term though, you would think that you just need to do that at beginning, cuz it’s a foundation of business. But actually it’s the foundation of so many different things in your business as it evolves and grows. It really is a place, a pit stop that you need to go back to on a regular basis.

[00:02:08] So whether you are starting out in your business or you’ve been in it sometime if you feel there’s a, a missing link, whether that’s your feeling or whether something just isn’t right. So for example, we were saying just now about, um, during our biz chat at the Thrive Business Academy, people feel felt disconnected with social media or their audience, or, um, they were trying to put a product together or pricing together, or they’re writing content and somewhere along the line they’ve got lost.

[00:02:38] This is when you need to go back to the Fabulous Foundations and working through it, and I really think it, this is, should be like a normal yearly pit stop anyway, you know, when we are putting together our goals at the start of the year, you know, we are, we are coming into November now. Now’s the time to start looking at what you are going to look at next year.

[00:02:57] And to do that, you might not have even realized that you’ve evolved in your business. You’ve grown in your business in one way or another, your own learning journey. You’ve evolved. You need to go back to the fabulous foundations and work through them, and that will keep you on track. Um, so what are the fabulous foundations?

[00:03:17] So I’m just gonna talk you through these, these just for a moment. So first of all, we’re talking about your niche. Now the niche evolves. So we were saying just now that Laura started out as a va. When I say she started out as a va, it was a very short term thing. Because she, she changed and evolved radically in such a short period of time, and so therefore, her niche became niche-er. If you remember that time, um, I don’t even know how long it was that you were like a practicing VA with you and Tamara. 

[00:03:53] Laura: Well, I’d been like a VA, but not officially a VA, just behind the scenes since a couple of years while I was working full time. But officially it would’ve been March, 2020 until I met you in around about June time. I think it was maybe. 

[00:04:12] Nicky: So March, April, May, June. 

[00:04:14] Laura: Yeah, that’d probably be it. And then June and that my audience was literally serve everybody, do whatever anybody wants. We’ll do social media, we’ll do Excel spreadsheets. We’ll do whatever people want us to do. If they want something doing on that involves a computer, we’ll do it we’re Jack of all trades. I think I used that word regular and then I met you. 

[00:04:34] Nicky: Yeah. And I think that’s what so many people do at the start. They either see other people excelling in their niche, so they think I’m gonna do that okay. Or they just think, I just need the money. So I’m gonna offer everything to everybody. But what we do with these fabulous foundations, we look at your passion, we look at what makes a difference, um, between you and other people, what your vision and mission is, which is totally unique to you.

[00:05:03] Okay? We look at your core values, cuz what happens if you bring your core values into your content and your messaging? Then you’d end up working or drawing in people that have similar values. Okay? And then once you’ve worked through all of this, you end up finding the perfect people to work with, which I call dream clients.

[00:05:23] Now, when you are starting out, we, we do, you know, you can look at your, who you are talking to, if it helps you with your content writing, et cetera, et cetera. But we need to go back to that because as you are growing and evolving in your world, So are the people and so is the knowledge that you can share.

[00:05:42] So we need to go back to this regularly. So it also looks at the way that you want to run your business model, your message to market, and also looking at your, uh, problems and solutions that you solve for others. Okay? So it’s a real sort of, Um, group of real good foundations that you need behind your business right at the start.

[00:06:02] Then ongoing. So as we said earlier, we were talking with Laura. She, she felt a little bit disconnected, wasn’t too sure what it was, and that’s usually the case. Okay. So you don’t know, you can’t put your, you know, your finger on it. You’re, you’re kind of like, I don’t know, just something feels off. When something feels off, when you feel lost, when you feel disconnected, okay, that’s when you go back to it.

[00:06:24] So I would recommend you go back to it once a year at least. Okay. And then, um, and what happens is if you’ve done it thoroughly the first time, the second time you know it back to back, and you know what, what is still current and relevant and what needs changing. It becomes very visible what you are missing links are and where you feel disconnected.

[00:06:46] Okay? Also, as you grow, as you are changing, Audience as you are changing your products, that’s a time to look back. Also, product creation, your service creation, that is also when you need to go back to it. Because we can get so close to our business, we can get so close to it that we cannot see it from the perspective of the person we’re serving.

[00:07:08] So that’s another reason to go back and revisit the fabulous foundations. Um, anything to add Laura? 

[00:07:17] Laura: Yeah, so just like, what- so when we talk about fabulous foundations, we actually have a full training on it within our membership. So for those who are not in the membership listening to this, there’s like some key points where you come out.

[00:07:29] So your foundations in summary would be number one, your niche. So what’s your niche? Number two, what’s your business vision? Um, which, like, for example, mine currently in IT Moon is making tech simple and magical. So what is your business vision? I’m very impressed. I remembered that, 

[00:07:48] Nicky: But it’s, it just nails it doesn’t it? That’s, that’s nailed because in just a couple of words, you are summarizing like the essence of IT Moon. Fantastic.

[00:07:59] Laura: Pretty much that Yes. And then you need a mission statement, which I know mine’s a long one. And that is something that I was disconnected with because in IT Moon it was two parts to it.

[00:08:11] I taught people through courses and master classes and things. But then I also have the doing Bit where me and my team did everything, but now we only do the doing bit. Cause the teaching side is all within the new business Thrive Business Academy. So that’s where like my mission statement were total disjointed because it was still saying, I do both when I don’t.

[00:08:30] So I’ve done a change in my business and I’ve not gone back to the beginning to change. So your mission statement, have a Google, like, you know, other people’s mission statements, even like the big corporations and all the big companies out there. You know, be it Asda, Tesco, have a look at theirs and it’ll give you ideas.

[00:08:47] Your value proposition. Dream client, otherwise people call it the ideal client. Um, your business model and message to market as well. And that is what pretty much Nicky makes sure everybody covers to make sure you’ve got your foundations in place. If I’m correct. 

[00:09:06] Nicky: Yeah, totally. And so when we are talking to our members and we’ll know, okay, have you done that bit?

[00:09:12] Okay. Well, if you’re not feeling connected to a part of your journey, if you don’t know what to put out on social media, we haven’t done our message to market. If we’ve not done our message market, have we done our client work? You know, do we know what problems we’re solving? Do we know the reason why we’re posted on social media?

[00:09:27] Do we know that we’ve got, you know, it all starts with that. And then you can put a social media plan together. You can put an email marketing strategy together. Everything. This is like the, the core, the pivotal point in your business. That is right at the center of everything that you do, every service go back to your fabulous foundations.

[00:09:48] Is it in line with it? Because quite often people pivot and they move on to something else, and they’ve lost their way. They’ve lost their messaging, they’ve lost the reason why they’re doing it. And we say, Right, go back to this. Because when you are writing your mission and your vision, it really comes from the heart, from you, and it really focuses on what you are doing this for, you know who you are doing this for and the change that you want to make. Um, so it’s really, really very essential and a well worth put in a couple of hours once a year aside just to do this. Um, you’d be bonkers not to because you gain, you, you know, your business will grow because of it, and your income will grow in turn.

[00:10:30] Laura: Hundred percent. And I totally get what some people were thinking like, Oh, that’s just rubbish. That’s just boring because that was me . That was me when Nicky told me to do this, but then when you do it, it does just all click. And obviously this podcast is very focused on lead generation and you might be thinking, why the hell has this got anything to do with lead generation?

[00:10:52] But like Nicky just said, this allows you to create a content plan for your social media. You know, we’ve just created a whole new membership Email Marketing Made Easy, talking about how through market. But we’ve put this training in with it of how to get your foundations in because it’s so important. If you don’t, you can’t do email marketing if you have no idea what your actual aim is and what your actual vision is for your business, because how can you see the goals?

[00:11:17] You can’t set yourself goals if you don’t know what you actual wanna do. So a hundred percent important to do. You definitely just, you just need to do it. I just, I don’t know how else to reiterate. You just need to do it. 

[00:11:28] Nicky: But also as we’re talking about evolving and growing and the email marketing made easy membership, um, also within that, platforms are evolving and growing that social media, email marketing platforms. Okay? So as they evolve, you need to evolve with it as well. Okay? And that’s part of the learning process. So that’s why we felt so passionately about Email Marketing Made Easy. First of all. People aren’t making the most of email marketing, and also they’re not evolving with, uh, the times with technology, with the way that you can communicate effectively with your dream clients or your ideal clients.

[00:12:05] So, um, it’s about evolving in your learning process, your delivery and your foundations is what I would, um, also message to all of you listeners, that it’s so, so important to constantly learn, constantly evolve, constantly go back to the foundations. 

[00:12:26] Laura: I love it and I think we’re gonna leave that there for today then. So thank you very much for listening in. Hopefully it’s got you all wanting to go back now to the very beginning and get them foundations in place. If you don’t know what the foundations are, you’re just gonna have to listen back because we tell you exactly what they are. And if you haven’t already, make sure you join our free community on Facebook where it’s all about lead generation.

[00:12:51] And you can get to us by going to thethrivebusinessacademy.com/group and that will take you to the Facebook group. Um, otherwise, we will see you on the next episode. And thank you very much for watching or listening.