Welcome to this episode, which is my 2019 Year in Review. I know that I love listening to this style of content from other people. So it was something that I wanted to record for you. But it’s a little bit nerve-wracking because it’s pulling back the curtain into sharing what’s going on in my business, what happened this year, what I learnt and what I want to do better at. 

I cover my first year of running an online program, how much I invested in Professional Development and my approach to it, what beliefs I needed to change when running my retreat, starting this podcast and guest speaking, what a major highlight of this year had been, how my team has changed and grown over the past 12 months, what I invested in when it came to my personal life and what I want to do better at in 2020.

I hope you take something out of this episode that’s helpful for your business too. So let’s get stuck in!

A Year of Running My First Online Program

The major focus of this year for me has been my first online program. So to wind back the clock to really where it began. It was at the start of the year in 2018 and I had this feeling in my gut that had been there for a while, that the way I was running my business and what we were offering, it just wasn’t where I wanted to keep taking it. And looking forward, for me, the business that I wanted to have and that really excited me was the ability to be able to work from home and to basically have something that was online and didn’t require to be meeting with clients and delivering client projects. 

Also, the way that my business was set up, it, it was basically an agency model and so for me to keep growing, it was ultimately a matter of me taking on more contractors and taking on more client projects.

And for me, that just made me feel quite anxious and not excited at all. For other people, that’s their goal and that’s their dream, which is awesome. But for me, it just wasn’t. I already had about six months of work booked up for 2018 so I thought “right after that I’m not going to take on any more jobs, or any more projects and I’m just going to see what happens”. 

And so over those first few months of 2018, I just stayed open to what might be next for me, what might be something that just felt like a good fit. Because for a long time I just felt like I was, yeah, just, just not where I was meant to be and things weren’t really inflow. And I also knew that for other businesses that I looked up to, they were basically an expert one thing.

And at the time my business was offering a range of different things: websites, branding, copywriting, event marketing, you name it. And we were going really well, we had fantastic clients. But I kept thing: what’s the one thing I want to be known for and really become an expert in and be able to help people in?

Because I really believe that when you work across those different disciplines or different areas of work like I was, it is pretty hard to be the expert in all of them. I thought, “what’s my legacy here? What do I really want to be able to be the best at too?”.

And so we got to about mid-year 2018, and it was around this point that I listened to a podcast episode and this particular podcast episode was talking about how this lady in America had set up an online program and she was teaching social media marketing and she was sharing how it worked, how much she loved it, and what it was doing for her in terms of her business. And so I thought, “you know what? This sounds perfect. This sounds like the fit that I’ve been looking for.” 

I’m a pretty fast starter, so a couple of weeks later I opened up the doors to The Modern Marketing Collective, which was my first online program and the one that I’ve really been focusing on for just over a year now. And I want you to know that when I launched The Modern Marketing Collective, I had 275 people on my email list. So I really didn’t have much of an audience. I’d never run an online program before. I’d never had a funnel or run a webinar or anything like that. And 2019 for me has really been about putting my head down and being a student. 

It’s funny when just after I launched the Collective, I remember saying to someone, “Oh my gosh, that was really fun. What am I going to do now? I’m going to launch a course!”. And their response was, “Emily, maybe just focus on what you’ve created first. Just hold off creating something else for now”. Which I have to say was the best advice and I give that to you too. 

So a really big outcome and potentially a learning for you as well was that I just focused almost 100% this year on The Modern Marketing Collective, rather than adding all these different things or getting distracted by other things that I could be doing in my business.

I got to really understand the female entrepreneurs within my program a lot more, what their needs and wants are. I asked, I listened and I really became quite obsessed with running this program and just constantly tweaking it and making it better, looking at how to keep our members and add new members too. I redid the content mid-year just to elevate that content a little bit more, I did a couple of small launches, but for me, a lot of it has been what is called an “evergreen marketing system”. And so that seen us now adding a member a day or more, which is just amazing. 

And also if you’re a bit of a stats person, we have a retention rate each month of about 97%, which means that 97% of the female entrepreneurs who are in my online program, which is a membership style model, choose to stay on each month for ongoing support and mentoring which is amazing. We also delivered some live Masterclasses with different guests experts and I ran a few member events too, um, across Australia, which was lots of fun to meet some of the different ladies who I work with.

The key to The Modern Marketing Collective has been that focus. And that’s something that I see a lot of people potentially struggling with a little bit is that they create one thing and then they go and create something else. And so they’re kind of cannibalising their efforts to actually meet that success with that first thing that they launch. And it’s totally fine if it’s not going to be the right fit for you. There’s no point trying to push something that just doesn’t feel right, but I really believe that success comes from that discipline and commitment and focus on being obsessed with what you have created and just keep going with it. And testing and tweaking and trying until it does become that bread and butter in your business, which is what The Modern Marketing Collective has now become from my business.

I really, really recommend you find that one thing that is going to give you that income from your business, that the bread and butter. And then what else you create is that bonus revenue for your business, and when you can start testing different things. So that’s a wrap up of launching and running my first online program for a year. 

Professional Development

Something related to running my online program was that in 2019 I invested – and I always do every year – in professional development. I took three major online programs, a couple from Australians and one from an American. I spent about $10,000, or a bit more on professional development. And so to some people, that’s nothing. To other people, that’s a lot of money and it’s all just based on different people’s perspectives. And so I wanted to share my approach to investing in professional development. 

The way that I look at what to invest in now is asking, “Will I be able to make that money back by investing in this program?” And if I believe that’s the case, and if I feel that that’s an area that I want to upskill in, that’s when I’ll decide to go ahead with it. 

When it comes to professional development, I encourage you not to view it as a cost in your business, but to think about it as a growth vehicle for you. And instead of thinking “I can’t afford that”, I’d love you to think about if you had to make that money in the next 30 days, what would you do? Give yourself that challenge. For example, let’s actually put out some different offers or go a little bit bolder or reach out to people or past clients and let’s make that money. And so it’s really a matter of backing yourself in your business. 

I like to also invest in people who are really the best in their area too. And apart from the trainings and content itself, I really take a lot of value from just observing how they show up at that level in business. How do they show up and deliver? And that’s what I’ve absolutely loved and taken a lot of value from learning too.

Running a Retreat

Now. I also ran my first retreat this year and I want to share kind of a weird thing with you. I was going to charge $500 for my retreat. And it’s interesting because I had kind of taken on board this belief from other people. I kept having people say to me “Oh yeah, there’s no money in events. You never make any money, you just cover your costs.” 

And so I was just going to put on this retreat, which would barely cover my costs. I created my spreadsheet, with my line items in terms of expenses. And I thought how can I cut this all back? I thought “ok if I buy three boxes of cereal and two bottles of milk, that’s how much breakfast would cost” and to start with it was about keeping it really low expenses for me. And I wouldn’t make any money from the retreat and probably be out of pocket. So, that was really silly!

Anyway, I had a chat with a few of my different business friends and a couple of them, in particular, was like, “Emily, what are you doing? People are paying to be there and learn from you. That’s worth a lot. And also the more you charge, the more incredible of an experience you can put on two and then you can pay for these different things”. 

That was actually quite a big deal for me to charge. I charged a couple of thousand dollars and it really was the biggest amount that I’ve asked for in terms of an event.

I was on such a high having amazing women booking and now for next year I already have three times the number of people on the waitlist to be able to run another retreat, which is really, really cool. So that was a lesson in pricing for me and seeing clearly I have some stuff going on in my brain around pricing and money, which I need to move past. 

At the retreat, I delivered all new content and I knew that I would leave the retreat knowing whether it was something that I wanted to do again or not. I could have easily ended up thinking “like that was okay, but I didn’t really love running it.” But I absolutely loved it and the feedback from each of the ladies who attended was that it was quite transformational for them. And for me personally, it was so fulfilling. 

Launching a Podcast

Now, of course, I also launched this podcast in 2010! Now a big takeaway from the podcast was around the idea that someone would come and ask me to run a podcast or someone would say, “Hey, you should really have a podcast. Go and do it now”. It was about me saying this is something that I want to create. Now step by step, let’s actually put a plan in place to create this. Even though I felt a bit like, “Oh God, am I really gonna like put myself out there like that. It could easily be a total flop and no one really listens to it.”

Anyway, I launched the podcast, and from day one I decided not to edit the podcast myself. So Brianna will be listening to this. She’s my podcast manager and editor from Bamby Media. She’s amazing. I have a few other friends that are now working with her and I knew it was just going to be silly if I tried to actually edit the podcast and manage all that myself. That’s not the best use of my time in my business. There are other people who are going to be way quicker, have way more idea what they’re doing, and so that’s something that I invested in straight up to have someone manage that for me. 

Now in terms of the podcast, would I recommend it for other people? It is a lot of work for me. If I wanted to cut my workload, the podcast would be an easy way to do that, but it pays off a hundred times over from the level of connection that I have with you guys that are listening. And the impact on my business growth too, plus that connection with people that I interview and have since been asked to be on other podcasts and, and more speaking opportunities and all that type of thing, it has been totally worth it in my business. And like many things, I’m like, why didn’t I do this earlier?

Speaking

So the biggest speaking event that I was paid to speak at this year, I put myself forward for. And so it’s again, that theme for me in terms of stop waiting and actually be a bit bolder, get clear on what it is that you want and then start asking for it or creating it for yourself.

And also this year I showed up in my Instagram stories, which I typically do, but still, it just makes such an impact because people then see me speaking and then asked me to run guest expert training for them. When I meet people, it’s quite funny. They’re like, Oh, I watch your stories. It’s like great to meet you. And that sense of connection and know, like and trust you, and the fact that they feel as though they know me just kind of accelerates that.

At the start of the year, I did one of my first speaking gigs. I was so nervous, so nervous, but over time doing them this year I have felt more confident and I’ve loved running some guest expert trainings in different people’s programs. That’s been really, really fun and kind of, again, just getting into my groove, practising, seeing what resonates and just continue doing it. 

Connections

This would have to be one of the highlights of my year: the different female entrepreneurs that I’ve connected with. I think you can all probably resonate when you have those friends in business who are hungry as you. Thinking bigger, challenging ourselves and they’ve all shown me what they are able to create, which pushes me forward too. So that’s absolutely been one of the best things.

If you’re looking for like-minded business friends, go and ask people out for coffee on Instagram that you feel like you’re like-minded with or go to some events or go to work in a coworking space.

My Team

I went last year from two designers who were delivering my client projects to a fuller team. One of the first things I did this year was to hire a bookkeeper and she reconciles all my transactions. It was taking me hours, and I knew it wasn’t the best use of my time, so I outsourced it. 

I also hired a virtual assistant, who takes my show notes from my podcast, publishes them across my email marketing, my Facebook and my blog and more. I was telling the ladies on my retreat that they all need to get a virtual assistant, but they’re not allowed to have mine. I don’t want her to be too busy!

Next up is my podcast manager, Brianna from Bamby Media, she edits, and uploads the episodes to podcast platforms and provides the embedding code to my virtual assistant to then embed in my website. 

I have a Pinterest manager, who pins images from my website to my Pinterest to help maintain my ranking on there.

I also hired a personal assistant who helps with my membership support and admin. It was getting quite a lot to manage some of the emails and repetitive tasks. So if you can’t automate any of them, then I knew I needed to have someone else that could do those tasks that I really didn’t need to be doing. It didn’t add any more value to my business with me doing them. So she manages an inbox, manages Facebook requests, subscriptions, payments and all that type of thing.

So as you can see, I did expand the team this year. They are all contractors, project-based or hourly based. So I don’t have hired staff as such. And, and it might sound like that would be quite a lot per month, but it’s, it’s really not. And the amount of time, that this team saves me – I am now the biggest advocate, I’m like, ”right, what else can I outsource?!” 

Non-Business Things

I hired a stylist this year. I had a session with them in January as I was sick of feeling very daggy. I wanted to feel a bit more confident in what was wearing. And so I did a shopping session with them. She actually introduced me to all these different brands I’d never heard of, helped me understand some good cuts to wear for my shape. I’m super short, so that can be a challenge. And she put me into jumpsuits and you’ve probably seen me in jumpsuits – now they’re my go-to thing. She put me in wide-leg pants, which I always thought I was way too short for. 

This is a business lesson too in terms of hiring people who are experts to help make up in areas that perhaps are not what you do. And it was a time saver because otherwise, I find I just go to the shops and waste time without finding anything.

We also hired a cleaner. She comes twice a month for two hours each time. So four hours a month. Not that much, but she does what I call “the deep clean” of the kitchen and the bathroom, the mopping, the floors, the windows.

And so for me, I knew I could spend that time doing that cleaning. But if I spent those four hours a month actually working on my business and making sales and marketing, that would be better. And that’s what I really wanted to do anyway. 

So for $35 an hour, twice a month at two hours each, and when she is here, I literally sit and the time flies because I’m so focused on the business. So I see that as an easy “yes” to be able to free up that little bit of time each month and to be able to spend that extra time actually doing really important things in my business too.

I know that a lot of people say “when my business gets to this certain stage, then I’ll hire a cleaner” or there’s a bit of a feeling around “I can’t do that, what is having a cleaner saying about me?”. Which I totally feel. I don’t have kids, we don’t have a big house. And some people are going to judge this. But for me it just makes sense. It makes my partner and I happy too because we don’t have to spend weekends cleaning. And just like for many things, you can start small with these investments and then you can work your way up from there.

I also joined F45 and I could not imagine paying that much for a gym membership. It’s something like $55 a week. And I was just like, “that is ridiculous” – I was paying $30 a month at my old gym. But I love it. I feel strong and healthy. It’s a five-minute walk from where we live, rather than getting in the car. I wanted to share this because I think that we can put off doing things for our own wellbeing. But for me it really has been a great, to feel strong and healthy and to be exercising regularly too.

I also ate better this year. I’m now in the habit of having a green juice every morning because I wasn’t that good at eating vegetables! 

Areas for Improvement

First, I would have liked to do less mulling over and thinking and a bit more action taking and doing. I know that I can get into my head and do a lot of thinking and planning, which is really, really good. But I want to make sure that I’m taking action just as much if not more too.

I also want to stop shifting the goalposts. So I set my initial goals in January 2019 and when I look back, I’ve achieved quite a few of them.

But the thing is, I don’t really feel fulfilled because I kept increasing my goals in terms of what I expected myself to achieve. And so that’s something that I want to try not to too much next year. I actually want to make a document that I can’t go back in and edit so I can actually reflect on my goals and how I’m going, rather than keep increasing them as I start hitting some of them.

Something else for improvement is that we didn’t really have a whole lot of switch-off time this year, which is definitely not a good idea. So that’s something I want to work on next year too. And part of that is about having a hobby or reading some fiction books. I know that doing that is actually really, really good for me to be able to switch off to. 

Wrap Up

Overall, it has been my biggest income year, which is really cool. But more important really than that I’ve had the most fun and I feel as though what I’ve been creating and delivering has been the right fit for me, which is something for the first few years of my business. I just had that sense of anxiety around “what am I meant to be doing” that I couldn’t shake. 

One of the biggest wins from this year is that I got through it without having really big instances of anxiety. And I got through the year feeling on purpose and excited by what I was creating too. 

And of course, there’s been challenging times, but it’s been overall a year that I feel really proud of and I’m excited for what lies ahead in 2020. 

So I hope maybe there are a couple of things that you can take away from this year in review. Send me a message on Instagram at @emilyosmond and let me know what resonated and what’s ahead for you.

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