Ep #97: Building a Sustainable Business

Want to have it all? Well, the best day to get started is today. Welcome to Love Your Living. A podcast for ambitious women who want to take their life and business to a whole new level of success. I’m Brooke Keeling, multiple six-figure business owner, passionate entrepreneur, and your host. Welcome to another episode of the Love Your Living podcast.Hey everyone, and welcome to the Love Your Living podcast, so, happy that you are here, so happy to be here with you guys.

Now, listen, you are likely going to get the real world in my world. I have contemplated even doing podcasts over these last couple of weeks. And the reason being is I don’t have a place really to record these. And my software isn’t working the greatest, and I have construction going on in my house. And I don’t even know where I’m working from one day to the next.

So to say that life has been a little insane is an understatement for sure. But I thought, you know what, I am all about showing up and I have been telling my clients, “I want to see the real you. I want to see what’s happening with you. I want you to tell me a story through your content, through your offers, through your communication.”

And so here I am. I am not recording with any of my software, so you’re going to hear some background noise. My sound quality is probably not the greatest. And my podcast crew is probably going to be like, “Let’s figure this out.” But that is okay because I’m here and I’m doing my best. And I’m here with you guys, and that’s all that matters.

So I want to know how you guys are doing. If you’re not part of the Love Your Living community, come and join us. I have had such an incredible time being in that group, hearing what people are going through right now.

We launched our Sustained Group, this week is week three. So we launched the Sustained Group a few weeks ago. And the energy that I have in that group is incredible. And it’s just such a reminder that we need community right now. We need support. A lot of people are feeling alone. And I really truly feel like this is going to be the beginning of finding our way in somewhat of a new world as we enter back into the world.

Now, for many of you, when I say, “Come join us in the community,” I want to know how things are going. Many of you listen to the podcast. And reach out to me, tell me how you’re doing, what are you struggling with? Because I truly, truly do want to help as many people as I can right now.

And in my world I see so much opportunity. And so diving into the nitty gritty, diving into strategy, diving into assessing a business, creating strategy around a business, looking at, you know, the problems, finding areas for solutions. And helping people build during this season of our lives is so incredibly empowering. And it’s work that I absolutely love to do.

So like I said tell me where you’re at, what’s happening in your world. And I’d love to help. You can book a consult call with me, a strategy session. And dive in to creating more of what we want in our world.

So today I thought, hey, why don’t we do a little behind the scenes of what’s been working in my business, what hasn’t been working in my business, and what we are doing. I think this will be powerful for all of you that are either creating an online element that have teams that you’re leading, that are looking to still continue to scale. But are really unsure as to what and when, right?

So one of the biggest questions that I have been asking myself, and that I have coached myself through and had coaching around over the last year and a half, probably the last year and a half, has been around how do you know when it’s the right time?

Because this recession that we are seeing right now, this isn’t a surprise to me. I’ve been talking about this with my clients, with my team for many, many months, for the last year, over a year. Throwing a pandemic on the top of it creates a little bit of a different element that we’re having to work through. But, nonetheless, it is trying to figure out how do we adapt to what we are seeing currently? How do we pivot our businesses? How do we know when the right time is?

So when getting coaching around this question, a lot of this, it came from me trying to understand, am I living in a place of scarcity? Am I living in a place of fear? Or am I just really trying to understand and take the data and analyze what’s in front of me and figure out how to make decisions within my business?

So I’ve studied money mindset a lot over the past couple of years. I’ve talked to a lot of heavy gurus within this industry. And my biggest aha recently coming into this phase that we’re in, is that rather than trying to change some of my thoughts and my feelings around having, you know, a positive money mindset. I actually now understand that some of the things that I was trying to overcome were actually super powers of mine.

And I want you guys to think about this. Oftentimes when we’re working on something or trying to change something, or trying to get coaching around something, that’s like something that can be really, really powerful for us to lean into. And see it as a gift versus see it as a burden and trying to fix that.

And so for me, understanding that there’s a lot of things that have been happening in the world that we’re planning for. And having my eyes wide open to what we’re seeing right now has allowed me to kind of be a bit more realistic, and I have two feet on the ground.

And also plan and create a backbone for my business and for my life. And I think it’s really, really powerful to see that. That it truly is like a super power to be able to step into that place. And understand that we’ve done a lot of things. And the decisions that I’ve made, the cautions that I’ve taken, the planning that I’ve put into place have really allowed me to step into the current arena. Feeling very empowered and feeling very strong, and seeing the opportunity, versus living in a place of scarcity or fear.

So, what are we seeing right now in business? What do we need to know right now in business? And when do we know when is the right time to make the move? When we say like, “When is the right time to make a move,” so much of that – there’s so much drama that we create around it. And most of the time it’s around money, right?

It’s the financial investment that we are making in our business. And sometimes those financial investments, they’re scary, whether it’s a coach, whether it’s a new website, whether it’s new branding, whether it’s a new platform, whether it’s an assistant, whether it’s a new team member. Whatever it is, whether it’s a new office space, those big decisions are really scary in saying yes to.

And so the question that I kept asking my coaches and getting so curious on, because I would see, you know, there’s power in surrounding yourself by people that are ahead of you, right? So I take my own advice in this space. I have coaches in different areas of my business that have already done what I am trying to do. So they’re already, you know, 10 steps ahead of me. They’re already a couple of years ahead of me. And they can kind of guide me into that Promised Land.

But where you can kind of get sidetracked, or maybe even, discouraged, is in the comparison land. So when you see other people making big moves it’s really important to not compare yourself to where they’re at. And getting curious as to what you can be doing to growing that and giving yourself some space to create it.

Because where that person is in their life, what you have to remember is that most people have worked for years in private for what they are being accoladed for, for what they are being seen for in public, so remember that. We have to work for years on our goals and our dreams.

But looking at what other people, it’s so powerful to surround yourself by people that have already done what you are trying to do. Because, one, they can give you advice to that. But it also inspires you to think bigger. But as you’re thinking bigger, it’s the how do I do this? Or when do I know it’s the right time? Or when do I know when I pull the trigger on this big investment?

And what I can tell you and what has allowed me to get to that place of feeling like, okay, is this a scarcity mindset? Is it a money mindset? Do I just go for it? Do I work really hard to do it?

Setting big goals, taking action, investing in those things is going to allow you to get to them so much faster. Because it’s like setting your ass on fire, it’s making a deposit into your dream bank, right? Like you make the deposit, you’re going to get to work. You say yes to something that’s you taking that first step forward, versus second guessing yourself and backing out of it and waiting for the perfect time.

So one of the things that I’ve kind of realized, an aha moment and also during crisis is a lot of times crisis is like rip the fucking band-aid off and let’s go, right? But we also have to be smart about this. We also have to ask ourselves the right questions. We also have to be planned, have a good strategic plan in place so that we’re not just shooting our dreams in the foot. We’re not just like, you know, all in, but creating chaos around us everywhere.

So how do we know when the right time is? Here’s one of the big things that helped me. Understanding fully, truly, having this clear vision that I talked about this last time, as to where you want to go. And then being able to make decisions that align with that vision, I talked about vision a lot on our last podcast. And when you have that vision it’s so much clearer to be able to say yes and no to certain opportunities that come into your world.

So what’s really fascinating about this is just recently within one of my group programs. Someone said that they got really upset with the fact that they saw someone that they had been following for – within their realm of business for years; launch a new program that was something that they really wanted to. And they immediately were like, “Oh my gosh, like she did this first. Now I have to come up with a different idea. Now I have to do this thing. I can’t do it because she already did that.”

And getting really frustrated with the fact that someone else already launched what their business idea was.

And when we look at these big goals and these big visions and ideas, Big Magic is an incredible book that I love by Elizabeth Gilbert. And she talks about how when you have this beautiful idea that comes into your world, the universe presents you with this beautiful idea that’s right in alignment with your goals.

But you don’t grab it. You don’t take hold of it. And it just kind of moves on to that next person because you didn’t take that opportunity, maybe you talked yourself out of it. Maybe you said, “Now isn’t the best time.” Maybe you said, “Well, when conditions are better, when there’s not a pandemic, when I have more security,” whatever it is. That idea floats on to the next person. And she understood this. She saw this, but still she didn’t like, you know, not get pissed off about it.

And this brought up this whole kind of idea of, you know, when we have this idea we have to be able to take action on it. We need to be able to press the go button. And when you have that clear vision of where you want to be, it’s so much easier for you to say yes to those ideas that are coming in.

This is a very similar book that I read to my kids recently. And the book is called What Would you do with a Chance? And it’s all about this little boy who has all these chances that come around. It’s like this beautiful bright light that comes around him all of the time. And as he goes through his days he’s like, “You know what, I’m going to go for that chance.” And he leaps and he tries to grab on to this chance and he misses it. And all the kids laugh at him and he says, “Never again am I going to go for a chance. I’m embarrassed. I failed. I don’t want people to laugh at me.”

And then as he continued on, he realized that these chances, every time a chance came by, he’s like, “Go away, I don’t want you, you know, you made me look silly.” And the chances stopped coming around him, the opportunities stopped coming around him.

Until one day he realized these chances are fading, I haven’t seen one for a while. I hope this means that I don’t ever not see them ever again. And so he went out on a journey to find another chance. And he found the biggest, most beautiful chance, and it was huge. And he had his dog with him and he had all of his little tools with him.

And it was just such a little beautiful story about him finding this chance. And saying, “Oh my gosh, this is a really big one, I don’t know if I can handle it.” And he said, “I’m going to do this. I’m going to be brave.” And he took the chance. And from there on his life was never the same. He went from seeing color, seeing life and black and white, and all of these. You know, the dull fade of every day just the, you know, the same thing each day in and out, to this colorful of life. Or life full of color, and seeing all this opportunity again, these beautiful chances floating around from him.

We have to be brave enough to take the chance. We have to be brave enough to say yes.

And so my advice to my client that was talking about this is I said, “One, what we have to remember is entrepreneurs. Or we have to remember as we’re, you know, creating different opportunities in our world, is that there is going to be so many other people that have similar ideas to us.” But there’s room for all of us, there truly is. There’s room for all of us to create greatness in our life and in our businesses.

And we can have the same idea as someone else. What you’re going to bring to it is something completely different. So don’t be upset about it. But also allow yourself to feel that emotion, if someone does it before you, or if you’re sitting on an idea and you’re not taking action.

And then all of a sudden you see someone else. Maybe it’s the universe’s, you know, little nudge saying, “Get to fucking work,” right? Take – here’s your opportunity, you’ve been sitting on it for two years do something with it. Are you going to get mad? What are you going to do about it? Get mad and then get to work.

So sometimes I do think it lights this little fire under us saying like, “Oh, oh my gosh, like they’re doing my idea, how dare they?” Well, how dare you to not actually do something with it. We all think about things way too much and we don’t take action on them.

So going back and thinking about when is the right time? What should we be doing in our businesses right now in order to plan? Why do I have so many of my clients saying, “I’m not going to go back to my nine to five. I want to create business.” I am seeing so many people now come to me and saying, “I want to go for it. I want to create the business of my dreams. I want to create an online pillar.”

All of these new ideas and opportunities that are right there in front of us but so many of us are operating from a place of fear. And we don’t need to operate from a place of fear as long as we have a good strategic plan in place, and we know where things are going.

Now, of course none of us have a crystal ball. Wouldn’t that be just a dream? However, there’s a lot of data out there that is giving us some insight as to where the economy is going. What we are predicting for the next couple of quarters coming up. What we’re predicting for 2021. What we’re seeing.

You know, it’s fascinating to me as what I’m seeing; I don’t have TV at my house. But I have been back and forth from my parents’ house, they do have TV and my mom watches the news in the morning. And the commercials that I’m seeing, some of the interviews that, the news and the media is stressing on right now is all about how there is this new wave, and a new way of doing business. And companies are going to be working remotely. And it shows like all of these young people on computers working remotely. And this is what the world is going to.

You guys, this isn’t new. This is not new. This has been around for the last couple of years, is businesses, you know, creating more flexibility, working remotely, project management from afar. We can do business with people all over the world, all around the world. We have the software. We have the technology. We have the means to communicate with people that are not face-to-face, that are not right within our office building, and that are not right within our community.

And that’s what we need to see as business owners, how do we grow? How do we expand? How do we get in front of more people than just who is in our tight little circle right in front of us? That is the way of business, there’s nothing new to this. It’s just crazy. It’s hilarious to me to see the media really creating fear around this. It’s just a new way of doing business. It’s a new normal. And we need to learn to accept that and embrace it, and how to strengthen that within our own businesses.

Right now, over the last like 30, 60 days, if you haven’t been getting really clear on how you run your business, now is the time to do that. What you want to see, what you don’t want to see, we have to pull back the curtains. And do an assessment on all areas of our businesses to understand where our money is going. What is the return on our investments? What’s working, what’s not working? What does our culture look like? What does our team look like?

Doing a deep dive and an assessment in our business is crucial. If you haven’t done that, you need to. So, sit down and do that within your business. Do some goal setting. Map out all of your quarterly goals. It’s time for a reset.

Again, 2020, you know, we started, you know, on a certain – in a certain area. So many of us had big goals, dreams, aspirations, the world shifted that for us. So now it’s time to reassess and understand, okay, what are we doing for the rest of Q3? What are we doing for Q4? And the truth is, you guys, in less than 30 days and in about two weeks we are going to be halfway through 2020, halfway through.  We will be into June already.

So being able to look at what were our goals, and understanding that likely we’re not going to be on trajectory to what we set at the beginning of the year. It’s just adapting and finding more opportunity, maybe even some opportunity that wasn’t there previously. But seeing the glass half full versus half empty, it’s all perspective. It’s all a shift in which lens we’re choosing to look out of.

There’s so many gifts that I have received during this time. Gifts such as, how do I work more efficiently when I don’t have the structure that I so much rely on, right? How do I, you know, a lot of people want to be able to have this flexibility of building a business from their couch, building a business from anywhere. What does that actually look like? How efficient can you actually be? What do you actually need?

Or working moms and dads, people that maybe want to have more time with their kids during the week, what’s really important, having more family time. How does that look within your business? How do you structure your tasks within a day so that you can spend more time with your kids? How do you work from home more effectively?

There are so many gifts that are coming from this, things that are a test. I feel like this is a test. It’s a test, as how can we adapt? How can we become stronger?

And a lot of this is, what people aren’t seeing is what a lot of this is helping us do is create more of what we want, versus what we don’t want. But we’re holding on so tightly to what we don’t want, to what was comfortable, to what we complained and bitched about all day, every day. Let that shit go, and step into more of what you do want.

When we can be open to receiving that, when we can be open to seeing, well, what is happening within our day. And how can we be solution oriented, versus victim oriented, versus bitching and complaining about our kids, about our time, about whatever.

Saw a quote recently that said, “If you don’t come out of this pandemic with a new skill, a new habit, a new trait, a new business, a new goal, time wasn’t your problem.” You never lacked time, you lacked discipline. So think about that. We all complain about not having enough time, now we have all of this time and we’re not doing anything with it.

So right now in our business what we need to be doing is planning. Winter is our season; it is a time to grow, to plan a business.

There’s so many people again, that I’m working with that have decided to go back to a new way of life. And I couldn’t be more thrilled, more excited, more proud of people that have that perspective, that have that strength and that bravery to say, “You know what, I want something different in life.” Life is short, you guys, what do we want? What do we want our life to look like? What do we want to create? What do we want to go back to?

Now, it’s also super smart to be smart, to be smart and to plan. I have some awesome guests coming on our podcast, or on our – within our group over the next few weeks. And this is why; here are the things that I feel like people right now.

People need reality, so there’s not like frivolous like let’s go buy a Ferrari and live this crazy lifestyle. I think messaging that is on that point of like all of this like extra and, you know, creating this like fancy glammy type life, isn’t necessarily what people want right now. People want security, they want prosperity. They want to love the life that they have currently.

But also we need to be mindful of the fact that we still need to be able to be dreaming and to be able to create more a bigger picture of our life within our home. And feeling inspired within ourselves, creating more of that element.

But also there’s a big piece that is missing, and I think a lot of people are craving, and that’s business. It’s business strategy. It’s how to be smarter. It’s how to build wealth. It’s how to create strategy. That is what, that combined with creating your own happiness, this own life within that you absolutely love. Rather than the fakeness, rather than, you know, all of the boojiness, the facades that we put out. We want real, like let’s get back to real. Let’s get back to living for us.

One of the other things that drives me crazy about some of the things that I’m seeing, that I completely disagree with is posts around like, “Well, it doesn’t matter if I workout anymore, because no one’s going to see my butt.” “Or I guess it doesn’t really matter if I have my eyelashes done or my eyebrows, or if I have make-up on, because no one’s going to see me anyways.” You guys, how about we do it for us? How about you show up for life for yourself? How about if you put that lipstick on for nobody else but you?

What if you were healthy and strong and fit for you? Not because your butt looks cute in jeans for who the fuck cares, walking down the street, but for you, getting back to those important things.

Through talking a lot about that within our community, creating wealth, creating happiness within, creating a life that you love, a life and a business that you love, there is such an incredible opportunity for us to do that right now. To take a time out from the world, time out from the noise and build what we want, and taking action.

Action is key right now. We’ve been sitting and waiting on the sidelines now. I think a lot of people took like the first 30 days, the first 45 days, it was like a little bit of chaos, it was a little bit of like, oh my gosh, what do I do for this? It was like a, you know, a vacation plus a little bit of like, okay, you know, what do I apply for, what do I get through in the short term.

Now, you guys, this is a long term game. We have shifted now into there’s many states that aren’t even like fully opening up until September, until the end of the year. It’s game time, it’s go time.

Building strategy right now is huge, building your strategy. It’s what I’m teaching heavy, really heavy with my one-on-one clients in my Sustained Groups right now. It’s how to build a sustainable business, going away from, you know, creating the likes. Creating massive ad spend, paying for leads, building foundation, building connection, building rapport, building your teams, building a business that is sustainable. That’s what your business will need from now moving forward, and also how to do that remotely, more remotely.

How do you build connection through the online space, through the online world? How do you create a more dynamic team? How do you continue to strategize? How do you stay on track with different pieces within your business, while you are working remotely? I think that’s going to be the next big thing that a lot of businesses, big businesses, for sure, have to figure out, and how to lead their team remotely, virtually. That’s going to be the new way.

How do we sell more virtually? How do we lead? How do we work together more virtually? These are all questions that if you’re not asking yourself, you should be asking yourself. And whatever problems that you’re seeing in your business right now, those problems are like your gold nuggets. Those problems are there to help you, to guide you.

So rather than dismissing them or trying to put a band-aid on it, uncover them, dig that shit up, that’s gold. They’re showing your way, showing you the way to even stronger business, to even stronger relationships. To even stronger love for the life that you’re creating, stronger connection towards your goals, so think about that.

So what you should be doing right now, you guys, is preparing. We’re going to see a lot of this stuff lift within the next few weeks. And I’m not saying lifting, going back to normal, there is going to be a new normal. So uncovering that within your own specifics of business, and figuring out, like how do you adapt to this? What support do you need within your business? How do you work remotely? How do you set up structure while you have kids at home?

Or while you’re not used to working from home, how do you create that relationship dynamic, if you’re someone that really thrives on the energy of other people? Those are all things that we have to uncover, that isn’t going to go back to normal really, really quickly.

And you should be planning too, how are you going to stand out? How is your business going to be stronger on the other side? There’s a lot of people going through behind the scenes rebrands right now. Restructuring how they work within their businesses. If you’re new to the online space, or if you’re not on the online world right now, this is something that isn’t new.

Project management 101, we just implemented a new project management system which has been amazing so far. And it allows my entire team to stay on track with tasks, for our quarterly priorities, for our big goals and deliverables.

Everybody is in there seeing who is doing what on a daily basis. Taking that from black and white, like paper, live in the living doing, goal setting in person and writing these down on our goal sheets has been a night and day difference. Because it also allows us to all see what we’re working on, if we’re not working on mutual projects, and give each more grace to work and flow throughout the day and support each other.

So working on your business is huge right now. How do you adapt? How do you pivot? If you’re having troubles with that, please reach out. Like I said, there’s nothing that excites me more, to dive into some of these things that we think are such a struggle. But also creating a plan and mapping that out so that we can come out even stronger.

And if you’re someone that’s thinking like, oh man, like I want to create a side hustle. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Creating more revenue streams for ourselves is super powerful.

I was having this conversation with one of my friends the other day. I said, “You know what, I’m super grateful that there’s different areas of business that I could be working and leveraging right now.” Because maybe even like looking outside of it from a revenue standpoint, but looking at it in terms of like a skill set and tools, and resources that I have, because now all of my eggs are in one basket. So be open to learning new ways, and adapting, that’s what we need.

Alright, so if you guys are not a part of our Love Your Living community already, please get in there. I am doing a real estate webinar coming up here on how to invest in real estate, especially right now, super, super important.

I am doing a little series on wealth management, bringing in guest experts on wealth management, on how to do business planning right now, how to stay on track from some very heavy hitters in different industries, how to make big decisions in your business.

And a super fun surprise that I haven’t even revealed yet that we’ll be doing in a couple of weeks, on how to just level up in your life, and in your business, even in today’s world.

So stay tuned for all of those. I have some fun stuff coming up for you guys, and keeping it real over here in my house, would love to connect, reach out to you.

If you are, listen, we have an offer right now that is a bit mind blowing. If you guys are just starting out, if I have anybody on this podcast that’s just starting out in business, that maybe money is a little bit tight, but you want some resources right now. We had a program that we launched this last year called Made to Get Paid. And I am offering that at an insane, insane value right now. You can get it for $97.

The reason why I have chosen to launch this as a lower priced item is because I feel like regardless of where you’re at in business, people need community, they need help, they need guidance right now. And you need to have an online way of doing business. This is foundational work. It is building an online business 101, and creating dollars in your bank account. And I wanted a way to offer this that was affordable to everyone.

And so we are running that offer right now. It’s likely the only time we’re running this offer. But it’s my way of helping and saying thank you. Thank you for tuning in. Thank you for showing up. Thank you for being a listener. Thank you for being a client. You can grab this for $97 only. So go get your copy of Made to Get Paid, and go get yourself paid.

And let me know how I can help you guys. I’ll be back, keeping it real likely for the next few weeks as we navigate through the pandemic and construction. So thank you guys all for tuning in and I’ll see you next time.

To team up with me to grow and scale your business to multiple six figures and seven figures while creating a life that you absolutely love. Head on over to LoveYourLivingOnline.com/application. I want to hear from you. I want to hear your goals, your dreams, your aspirations, and how I can help get you there. LoveYourLivingOnline.com/application. You can also check out this link in the show notes. I cannot wait to hear from you.