As an expertise-based business owner, you’re doing a lot.
Building relationships.
Marketing.
Sales.
Creating intellectual property.
Invoicing and managing your finances.
Managing any team members.
Tracking your results and your metrics.
…. And, of course, delivering for your clients.
The number of things you could be doing to grow your business is so much more than any one human (or one team and business) could do.
But too often, when we think we need to get more results, we inevitably look to add.
- Try another tactic
- Launch something new to generate revenue
- Do “more marketing”
- Add another system or tool or team member
But what if we flipped the script?
You don’t have to do more. What you do has to matter more.
Instead of trying something new, or adding something to your plate, ask:
How can I have the maximum impact with what I'm already doing?
Increase your skill, so each repetition gets more results.
Increase your efficiency, so each repetition takes less time.
Increase your frequency of what you’re already doing, so you get more repetitions in.
Increase the power of that one action.
That means that you might need to subtract first.
Instead of simply going through the motions on a lot of things that aren’t generating impact for you (and are kind of wasting your time and attention because they aren’t as effective as they could be), dial in on fewer, better activities.
- Cut the number of ways you are marketing so you can get better or more consistent at the one that is really driving your business.
- Tune out the noise from email newsletters (even mine!), consuming social media, or investing in courses that don’t address the skills you’re looking to improve right now.
- Stop going to random networking events or joining more communities, so you can be more invested in the relationships that matter.
- Put the new group idea or course on pause until you’ve got predictability in your messaging, marketing, and outcomes for your core offer, or until you’ve secured that part-time job for your financial ballast.
Because when you do a few things exquisitely well, with power, you gain momentum, decrease friction, and the results start to compound.
This is the impact of investing in your systems - and ensuring they're operating well - versus falling into the tactics trap.
An example: Outreach and Relationships
I encourage my clients to do warm outreach to build their networks and their sales pipelines. Even if you lean more traffic-based, relationships are the lifeblood of your business for cross-promotions, collaborations, and referrals.
We first just start by making a list of people in our ecosystem and sending those first emails.
And a lot of times, I get the response, “I did that and it didn’t work so what else should we try.” Which is normal when you’re at the beginning of doing something you haven't done before or done often.
But when you look to increase your skill, instead of diverting your focus, you can see things that can improve the outcomes and make the most of your time:
- The right people: spending too high of a proportion of time doing catch up calls with existing peers vs. intentionally cultivating relationships with connectors, potential clients, and ideal referral partners/collaborators.
- The right format: Some might respond better to text, and others to social media DMs. Or others need to have conversations in person.
- A stronger ask: Your emails might be long with a passive invitation, but you might see better results through shorter emails with a clear ask.
- Firming up the strategy: Having a way to add value in each interaction based on the relationship, not just “keeping in touch”
- Keeping track: How many outreaches actually happened? How many people really responded? If the activity didn’t actually happen then we know why the approach didn’t work.
In almost every activity you do in your business, you can get more effective and impactful with what already exists, instead of trying to juggle more things.
No one has time to do it all. So make what you are doing matter more.
What core activities in your business do you want to get stronger at, so they matter more? (And... what’s in the way?)