Small Business Talk
The Podcast to Grow your Business Faster
Are You Inspiring?
Show Notes
In today’s digital age you need to make sure that you can reach your clients and potential customers and to do that you need to be inspiring.
You need to be able to motivate. What are the little things you can do to make sure you are motivating your customers? Imagination drives motivation.
30 Day Challenge
Today is day 30 of a 30 day challenge that I am doing. As part of the challenge I had to drink 3 Litres of water. Not that big a stretch as I normally drink 2 litres most days. I just had to plan it and drink plenty in the morning because if I drank a whole litre just before bed then you know what will happen I would have to get up several times during the night.
The 2nd thing I had to do was exercise every day so that wasn’t too hard either. As most of you know I have a dog who loves to be walked each day. Some days I also did exercise with my daughter. We would get up at 6am and do yoga or movement routines for 20 to 30 mins each week day. As long as she was helping me that was easy as we were keeping each other accountable.
The 3rd thing to read 5 pages of a non fiction book each day. As long as I planned and did it first thing in the morning or last thing when I went to bed I could tick that off too. Last thing when I went to bed was not always ideal as I was often too tired to absorb as much as I should have.
I had to reach out and chat with business owners each day.
And would you believe the hardest thing was posting a photo of my 5 ticks – completed tasks in a social group. There started off being quite a few others doing this challenge and towards the end it was just me. It was embarrassing posting my 5 ticks day after day. Why should this be embarrassing it was just my 5 ticks it wasn’t even a selfie or a photo of me, it was just 5 ticks I had done each day. I was very self conscious. This is my 2nd set of 30 days and towards the end of my first 30 days I though “Why am I doing this? No one wants to look at me day after day – my ticks!”
I mentioned it to a friend of mine who had completed her 60 days (2 sets of 30 back-to-back). I have had a couple of goes in the middle and had to start again. She said that it gave her inspiration seeing that I was doing mine too. We were able to inspire each other. Then I connected with a few other people and they had been watching as well.
One lady reached out to be a potential referral partner because she said I was doing what I said I would do. You said you would do 30 days and here you are each day doing your tasks and I can see you. You do what you say you are going to do. You are walking your talk.
Even though I was embarrassed about it, social proof was working and people could see I was true to my word. The more I did it the more people saw I was doing it. Habits build habits.
Habits Build Habits
What did I learn
- Backing myself has ripple effects
- Being a good leader is leading through actions
- Little things matter
- Repeating little things over and over create big change
- Enlisting help keeps you accountable
- Doing your tasks early in the day make life easier
- Structure enables freedom
- You need to be flexible but make sure you follow through
Yes, sometimes it does need to be look at me so that you can inspire others by your actions. Sometimes you are a little further along their journey and seeing your path can inspire them to continue on. You are showing them it is possible and that can inspire others to keep going.
What Are You Doing in Your Business That is Inspiring?
Keeping your word in become more and more of a hot commodity with so many people not turning up when they say they will, not following through or delivering the services as promised.
Having values, commitment and a genuine care for your customers has become the new point of difference. What used to be called “Old fashion values”.
Community has become so big in last year or so and that is not going away anytime soon. Even if it is a bit embarrassing putting yourself out there and you think no body is interest in you or your hobbies, you may never know who you are inspiring to make their own difference.
You may get some flack, some push back but guess what that is just proof that you are on the right path and they are not your people and will never be.
I heard a great expression the other day for this situation: “bless and release”.
Talk to your people the way you want to be talked to and the way you would like them to talk to you. Be the leader in your tribe and inspire them to better a version of themselves.
Think about little things that you can do:
- to inspire your tribe.
- to help them, inspire them and show them the possibilities.
- to make you stand out in the crowd.
If you are a faceless name and business with no soul in this highly competitive world where people what to know your story and the people behind the business. They want to buy from businesses that are local, part of the community and ones that they can connect with.
Dance like no one is watching, inspire and enjoy your business and life.
