If you own a business, especially if a portion of your prospecting is done online, you have undoubtedly been asked, “What do you do exactly?”. We’ve struggled with this question ourselves in the past, and used to find ourselves stumbling over our words, feeling like we needed to adjust our elevator pitches based on who we were talking to at the time. It’s easy to become a little frustrated, although you can’t show it, because even though you understand your business and your business model, not everybody else does. Plain and simple, people are not in your head. They don’t read everything you write. And they definitely have no idea what you’ve already said to other people.

When selling a product or service, you are automatically categorized. You might be the local boutique or the big-box name brand, but these are just categories. And once you’re in a category, people compare you to others in the same category. Instead of making yourself or your business what you “think” you are supposed to be like, make it more about YOU.

Today I want to teach you how to use link triggers in ConvertKit to make things crazy easy for already-existing subscribers. Obviously there are 1.493723 billion things you could use a link trigger for so this is just an example.

Let’s say you’re hosting a webinar and you want to send an email to your list telling them about it and asking them to sign up but because they’re already on your list (aka, already given you their email address, name, etc) they could really skip the whole sign up page thing.

If you’re a product based business, chances are you’re already on Instagram (if you aren’t yet, you should be!). Being a predominantly visual platform, Instagram is a vital business tool for those of us who are makers and creatives.

So you’ve made some beautiful things and you’re ready to take the photos and share them with the world... But what do you actually SAY?

Ultimately you want people to buy your work, but you need to write something other than “I made a thing, go buy it” for every post.

I’m going to let you in on four super-secret golden rules of using Instagram as a maker.

Owning a small business is challenging on so many levels, but taxes seem to be a big stressor on the minds of most creatives. While talking taxes is never glamorous, getting to know the basics of tax can save you time and money down the road. Here is a small list of the things you should consider when you’re thinking about your taxes.

YouTube is amazing. In just a few short minutes, you can learn how to do anything. Like how to create your own stand-out YouTube thumbnails in Canva!

Even better, you don’t need to have (or be) a YouTube Manager or a Graphic Designer to have a pro-looking channel. You’ll be happy to hear that Canva has already made it super easy for your channel to stand out and improve your click-through rate.

In today’s short training I’ll share how to create your very own YouTube thumbnails, so you can create your own unique style for every video and easily transform the overall look and feel of your channel.

So, this ain’t your first Trello rodeo.

You have Abagail and Emylee’s boards. Your business is insanely organized. You spend your days doing the things and moving the cards to the right, to the right.

Like Beyonce on opposite day.

Anyway, you spend most of your day in Trello and love it that way. But is that really a good thing?

I mean, I get it.

The app is a-mah-zing for planning and organizing, and that stuff is so important. But you need to focus on the doing, not just the planning and organizing, so maybe you need to find another way to get that stuff done.

Accounting for Small Businesses is oftentimes the biggest stressor for small business owners, especially creatives. Crunching the numbers can feel overwhelming. But without the proper preparation and tracking, not having the right cash flow clarity can be the difference between you being a thriving business and closing your doors.

Did you know that recent studies have shown that 50 percent of small businesses will fail within the first year? How about the fact that a staggering 95 percent will close their doors before they hit their fifth year of operation? That one seems a bit hard to believe, but in today’s economy it could be true. Here are some additional stats that may surprise you (source):

• 40% of small businesses are profitable.

• 30% break even.

• 30% are continually losing money.

YOU SHOULD BE IN FACEBOOK GROUPS IF YOU WANT TO GROW YOUR BUSINESS.

Yes, I totally just yelled that at you BUT only because I’m trying to make a point.

We have ALL heard this; if we want to grow our business, we need to be in Facebook groups and it’s true but you might be missing a key part to this process.

Here’s the thing y’all, being in Facebook groups means a lot more (or less?) than just running in and dropping your links then running away; it means being involved, being the expert and just being awesome - but that’s a discussion for another day.

I haven’t always been a podcast junkie. In fact, my Dad is the only reason I ever even found out that podcasts existed. As a teenager, I remember the endless hours he would listen to his favorite shows and swore I would never been as geeky as him. Fast forward to owning an online business, and it quickly became apparent that podcasts were a great alternative way to learn.

As much as I loved writing for our blog, reading other blogs just never really seemed to fit into my schedule. But listening to a podcast could happen in the car, while putting on makeup, doing the dishes, or cleaning the house. Basically, it made all the boring parts of my life way more interesting.