198 | July Reset Checklist + Filling an entire summer with ONE email
There are six months left in 2024 which means it's time for a mid-year check in on your organizing business! Melissa is taking a July reset and she'll talk about what that means and how you can get some of that magic too.
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FULL TRANSCRIPT
Hey pro organizers. It's Melissa. If you were in the United States, we just got off of a holiday week slash weekend. So I hope everybody had a great time if you did something or for those of us who were just working as normal and didn't really do anything, it was just a random, mid day week off that then. Made. Friday.
I feel like Saturday and like, I dunno, whatever it was all over the place, but anyway, I hope you guys had a great time. So I am coming to you today with some very important news. I hope you're sitting down. It is halfway through 2024.
Okay. When we hit July 1st, I was like, oh my gosh, half of the year's over. That's crazy. But then I did the whole, like, is the glass half empty or is the glass half full? We can say the year is half over. Or we can say we still have half of the year left to go. Which honestly I think is pretty great. That is something that I'm trying to do in myself.
I'm doing a lot of personal work and I'm trying to be a more glass, half full versus glass, half empty kind of a person. And so I am choosing to look at it as not. Oh, my gosh, where have for six months gone and just say, okay, this year seems to be going really fast. I have six more months to make some things happen. I am giving myself the grace and I hope that you give yourself the same thing of, if there are things that you haven't quite accomplished yet, or goals that you have on your list for your business or your life that haven't really hit yet.
You still have six months. Before that ball drops on new year's Eve and we go into 2025, which is crazy. You know, like every year we get further, I go 20, 24 seems like it's really far in the future and it's just still regular world. So who knows. All right. Here is what I want to do on the podcast today.
I want to talk about with this wonderful, magical six months that we have left. What do we need to do with it? Okay. So I'm going to give you a few July, to dos, and then I'm going to throw something in at the end, in case you were still on the fence about the importance of email marketing, I'm going to give you a little, uh, a little taste of what our private coaching group is like.
And something that came up in that group that I hope will encourage you to start using email marketing in your business. But. Let's start with it's time for a mid-year check-in you guys. It is time to take a look at the first six months and then say, okay, I need to really give myself, you can do a letter grade.
You can do a percentage. You can do a, just give yourself a gold star. Uh, because you survived, that's also completely acceptable, but I want you to think about doing a business and life. Mid-year check-in. Please notice, I don't just want you to do this for your business. Your organizing business, whether it is full-time, part-time a passion project, a side hustle.
That business is a part of your life. And so I want you to be able to look at that and say, Is this still something that I feel good about if I'm not feeling as good about my business, what are some things that are making me feel that way? I really do some of that deep thinking. I have personally been doing a lot of internal work and a lot of deep thinking lately. And it's hard sometimes because there are times that you know what you need to do. And it's really hard to do that.
Or there are times where you go, I know I'm not working on this in quite the right way, or I'm not getting the results I want because I'm not putting in the work. So those are some of the hard conversations to have, but I think they're important because it'll let you use the next six months. So wisely. So here are just some questions that I like to ask myself.
And I think you can ask yourself about your business too. So what is working, let's start with the positive things. What are the things that are working in your business? And really be exhaustive about this. Is it making you happy? Are you connected with clients that you love? Are you connected with other organizers that you love?
What are the things in your business that are working. Then I want you to think about what is not working quite as well in your business. You know, or what has just truly broken. And then with those things, what are the steps I would have to take to make that thing not broken? It might be hiring someone.
It might be outsourcing something. It might be getting coaching. It might be just dropping it off of your list because you don't want to do it. Lots of different answers to those things. But if you are going to take a look at your business or really hard, look at your business mid year through. Look at what is working, look at what is not working and then say, how do I do more of what's working?
And then how do I get the things that aren't working back on the tracks? if you are a goal setter, then what are some of the goals that you set, whether it was at the beginning of the year or a second quarter started. Are you on track? Are you off track and an important question about all goals? I think is, is this still a goal for me?
Is this still something that's actually important to me? That is sometimes the question that we don't ask, we put a goal down and then we're like, wait, I guess we have to stick with that goal the entire year, even if it's totally impossible or my priorities have changed or the world has changed or anything else.
So if you are off track on some of your goals, decide, is that something that's important to me? Then, if you're on track, what can you keep doing? To make sure that that stays on track for the end of the year. I want you to also take a look at both tactical and strategic things in your business. So tactical would be some of those extremely important, but sometimes tedious tasks of our business, right?
Making sure all your foundational properties are done and making sure that they are attended to Google business. As an example, are you blogging? Are you sending out an email newsletter? What is your social media look like? All of those tactical things that take time in your business.
And this is a great time. If you haven't automated some of those steps. Please do. There are so many ways that you can automate those tasks for free. And it will save you so much time and energy and frustration and all sorts of the things. So I want you to look at the tactical parts of your business. Is your foundation set? And are you doing all the things you need to?
What I hear a lot from people is, oh, I'm working on that. Oh, I'm working on that. Oh, I'm working on that by the way I say it myself. So please don't think I'm immune. But what are some of those things that you keep saying, oh, I'm going to do that. Oh, I'm going to do that, but you haven't done yet.
Let's get off the fence on those. A lot of times, those end up being tactical things like blocking, being more consistent about social media, that type of thing. So let's get off the fence on those tactical things. I also want you to look at the strategic things. What are some of the big picture things that you have going on in your business is your pipeline of potential clients and projects.
Not like you want it to be. Is your networking, maybe not where you want it to be, or if you're like, Ooh, I do not like the word networking police phone, please. Don't say that word. Um, things like that. Am I making enough personal connections with people who can help my business and whose business I can also help? It's an important part of networking is make it a two way street. So I want you to look at some of those bigger picture things.
Where are my financials? Am I making what I need to, or want to in my business? If you are a team leader. How is my team functioning? Do I have holes there that I need to fill or do I have difficult decisions I might need to make, or do I need to promote someone to lead organizer?
So it look at those big picture, strategic things. And I think a lot of those strategic things also go along with the, what is working and what is broken question that we had earlier. For myself, if you listened to the last podcast, which was about my trip to Japan and how it really was, very life-changing for me, I came back from that trip and really, really wanted to like, kind of not blow things up.
I certainly don't want to blow things up, but I want to do things differently. And so I am personally taking this mid-year evaluation very seriously for myself and for my own business. I not only have pro organizer studio, but I do have my organizing business as well, and trying to figure out really what is the right business model for me right now?
What is the right combination of those businesses? And am I devoting too much energy to one and not enough to another? Or what do I want to do? So I'm having some of those hard conversations. Stations with myself and figuring out some changes that I want to make for a better work-life balance and to be able to help more people. As I said in the last podcast. I call it slowing down to speed up because I have been doing a lot of things this year and I want to make sure that I'm doing them all very well.
And I'm just evaluating for myself what I want my life to look like. I don't want to work all the time. I definitely want to be able to give more to my family. It's my second daughter senior year coming up this fall. And so I'm very acutely aware that, you know, we really only have a year left with her and I want to just be a really present and good mom.
I am doing a lot of re-evaluations. I, if you were in the same mode as me, let me know, reach out to me. I've had a couple people that said after the last podcast that they are really kind of on the same journey. So I'm happy to be there as support for anyone that needs it.
But I am personally using July as a combination for myself of. A journey of discovery and really just figuring out my own businesses, green flags and red flags. We talk about green flags and red flags a lot with clients, but I want to start talking about it with my business. You know, what are some green flags I have in a Pro Organizer Studio and Home By Eleven. What are some red flags?
By the way, if you are familiar with the Taylor swift lyric, it's me. Hi, I'm the problem. It's me. Usually all of the things. I'm struggling with my business, come down to something about me, or something that I need to change. So I'm really doing that internal work. A few things that I'm doing.
I'm just going to throw these out here in case they are helpful to anyone else. I am. Huge devotee. Of the book. Atomic habits. Such a great book, please, please, please, please read it. If you haven't. It's great for clients. It's great for us in business. But on the way home from Japan, Delta had a, that those things called masterclasses that were available. Um, in the inflight entertainment system. And James clear had a masterclass.
And so I took the whole thing on my way home from Japan, and it was really good. I actually really loved it. Also, a masterclass is not that expensive. So if you subscribe even for just one month watching the James clear one, watch a couple others. I think you can get some great stuff out of it. But point of the story is I love atomic habits and I love the concept.
I'm just sometimes not good about actually putting it into motion. So. I have downloaded an app. It's called grit. Daily habit tracker, and this thing has been really, really good for me. I keep referring to a July reset. I've been calling it that with my family and with friends and everything else.
And it has been really great. So I put things on there as simple as make the bed. Um, which by the way is a great way to start the day, make the bed all the way up to two hours a day on weekdays of deep work. So no distractions, no social media, no texts, no phone. And it just two hours of really solid deep work that I'm doing. So it has really helped me.
Also, one of the things on my list is at least 10,000 steps a day. A lot of you probably do that and don't even think twice about it. For me. It's just something that I have to work up to. I'll be honest with you, exercise, not my favorite thing. And so. Really trying to look at I'm about to have a milestone birthday next year.
And I really want to go into that year feeling good. So 10,000 steps is one of the things on my habit tracker. And I've been doing that. If you have followed along on social media, I've been throwing up a few pictures occasionally of my beautiful walks. I have also been meditating every day and it's just really a great way to clear your head and really just devote minutes. To doing something good for your brain and your body. The other thing that I've done is, and I totally recommend this. I have gotten rid of distractions. And what I mean by distractions are obviously we're all calling our phone a distraction because it is. But what I mean by distractions are, it's not just that it's on my phone.
It's that it's, it's sitting there like with a flashing light going, you know, read me, listen to me, do this. I did a huge podcast clean out. And there are a lot of excellent business podcasts that I listen to. And honestly, what I found myself doing is feeling really guilty if I hadn't listened to it yet this week.
Or, oh my gosh, there are 22 things in that episode that I need to go. Then I need to go implement by the way, if this is that episode, if this is that podcast for you. It is okay to take a break. We will still be here, but I was feeling a lot of pressure. And it's a lot of pressure of like, oh, there's a shiny object. There's a shiny object. There's a shiny object. I think I know where I need to go. I have to go do it. I can't have all of these other competing voices out there. I also unsubscribed from a ton of emails. Even emails that I typically like to get, I took a short hiatus.
I will go back to them. But I can't have the new stuff coming in and just making me feel like you're not doing enough. I have really disconnected a lot. I moved, social media law in large part off of my phone. Thanks a lot, Instagram that it really makes it completely impossible to do it anywhere other than your phone.
That's great. Appreciate it. Facebook is off my phone. My personal Instagram is off of my phone. It just is really feeling good to detach a little bit from all of that stuff. I also have been saying no a lot. And that is not something that I'm good at. If you have listened to this podcast. I know I've talked about it before. I don't like saying no, I don't like disappointing people.
And I don't like feeling that I have left someone, you know, kind of hanging if they have any sort of requests, whether it is big or small, but I have realized. In this month of July. I have to say either no, or just not right now. So that includes, I have had friends that have wanted to get together and I have had. Places that I needed to be, or, meetings that I was supposed to be at and all sorts of things that I have just said, no, I'm really sorry.
In July. I can't do that. I am really trying to keep July very separate. And just sacred time devoted to very specific things that I want to accomplish in my life and in my business. So saying no. Is a really hard thing to do, but I, I. Urge you give it a try. Because it's saying yes to things that then you either can't fulfill or that you are frustrated by having to do, or that you do not genuinely have the time for is not a great recipe.
And I can tell you that from personal experience, so. Also, I'm going to recommend to you. Get a change of scenery. I am currently recording this. From just a quick two day personal retreat that I'm doing. And I am in the forest. It's beautiful outside. I can hear birds chirping. You probably can't hear them on, on the recording, but there are birds chirping and there are nature noises outside. And I took a hike today and it just has made me feel so much better and more centered and more relaxed. Which is not something that I typically am not, I'm not really a chill out relaxed kind of a girl.
That is something I recommend. If you are someone like me and you need a little bit of a change of scenery, or you just need some silence. Highly recommend. If you can get away for a couple of days, try to do it. Or even if you can just have a change of scenery. For one day. Every once in a while, if I have a lot of admin work to do, I will go to a coffee shop and just do it in a different place because sometimes my own desk is just not all that inspiring to me.
And my desk is really cute. My office is cute, but you know, sometimes you just need to change the scenery. So. My July reset. I'm very happy. The first week was very, very good. Although you can laugh and say, well, the first week of your July reset, included a holiday, it sure did. But this week has no holiday. So I'll let you know, at the end of this week, how I'm feeling. But if you have the time and the space and the ability take a couple of days to just do some mid year.
What's my good stuff. What's my stuff I need to improve on. And what do I want to get done for the second half of the year? I will be rolling out some of the things that I'm working on for the second half of the year and the next few weeks. To wrap up this July. This second half of the year. Mini-sode, I am going to go back to something that I talk about a lot, which is email marketing.
I'm going to give you a little piece of, one of our coaching calls, where one of our organizers who has been on the podcast before Kim Snodgrass from rustic home organizing is talking about her journey to an email newsletter and what a little bit of work ended up doing for her calendar and for her bank account.
So. I will give you Kim, and then I will see you next week with a brand new episode about something that I am so jazzed to talk about. Um, and I'm just going to leave it there. You'll have to see next week. All right. Here's Kim to tell you. Let's get on that email marketing.
Newsletters so, okay. I just want to remind everybody how much I hate them.
Okay. So much, but however, however, I had about seven people kind of ghosting me, which I was okay with. I've got a lot of summer stuff between weddings and kids turning 21. And I went ahead and just said, okay, I've got this new thing in my life. I wake up every morning with a non negotiable. It is just non negotiable.
It is happening. It doesn't matter what it's happening. And so I woke up one morning and my non negotiable was a newsletter, which Melissa knows that that's like a seven or eight hour endeavor for me. She does not enjoy it, you guys. So, I just went and did it. I got eight clients and filled up my summer.
Yeah, send the stupid newsletter. Who told you this? I know. Yeah. Literally one day I'm like, Oh, I'm just going to enjoy the summer. And then I had to send out a little thing that said I'm booked till August 19th. So pretty great. We'll send out the newsletter. And what'd you put in it? I literally don't remember. It was so cheesy. And I'm going to tell you. It was so cheesy it got you your entire summer, summer filled. Here. Okay. I did, I came up with it on my own, but I used. I use magic rights. I don't use chat GPT.
I don't know why because I don't like to change I guess, but I did five and underused items in your home. Oh, you want to know what my five items were, I do mason jars command garbage bags. Tape measures and a friend. Okay. I love that. And yeah, I got eight. Yeah. Booked up my whole summer. So I think you don't give yourself enough credit that you are able to do stuff like that. Like you, you are really hard on yourself and you go, it took me eight hours to do it.
But like. This one only took six. So I'm getting better. We're getting better. I'm going to get you down to like one hour here before too long. I promise. I did it. And I did switch to Flodesk. I will say it's a lot more user friendly than MailChimp. I hate MailChimp. And Squarespace. I did not like Squarespace email at all.
Flow desk is super easy. It's so beautiful. Even the ugliest email you send on flow desk is going to be more beautiful than anything you can put on MailChimp in my opinion. So, yeah. Yeah. So that's just my little tidbit. Send out a newsletter and make sure your ghosting people are on that list. I would argue too, even though it took you a long time, so it took you six hours.
Which is again, we'll, we'll be able to get that down for you. Six hours to fill your entire summer. Yeah, I know. Right from my desk with a glass of wine. I mean, also is three glasses of wine. Be honest. It's six hours. No, but like, that's time well spent. I mean, if we could get that down to two hours.
And then you fill your whole summer, that'd be even better. Yeah. Yes. And I, I raised my rates. Everybody, you need to do that too. Even if it's five bucks an hour, raise your rates even for the summer. Yeah. Slow time. Raise your rate.
Then you don't have to stress out about working so much. So, before you got on, I was saying Heroku, well, she's this way on my screen. She was in Japan with me and I gave a presentation and so one of the things I talked about is raising prices and someone in the session literally raised their prices while I was talking, which I was like, good job.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, honestly, when you're slow, why not? Because then you don't feel like you have to get as many clients. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. Well, I'm really happy for you. That's all I got to say. That's all the end.
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