The Weekly Glow Up: June 28, 2023
Welcome back to the Weekly Glow Up, where I share tips and resources that you should know about as a creative who wants to make money from their art.
Here’s what I’ve got this week:
1. ⚙️ Systems for Success: Figuring Out Your Priorities with the Eisenhower Matrix
Coming up with things to work on for your business isn’t hard.
Every business owner I’ve talked to has a never-ending to do list.
But doing more things isn’t the secret to a successful business—doing the RIGHT things is.
The Eisenhower Matrix is a tool you can use to sort out what you actually should be working on in your business.
Here’s how it works:
You draw a 2x2 matrix, creating 4 boxes.
The X axis represents urgency, and the Y axis represents importance.
So your top left box includes tasks that are both urgent and important. These are the ones you do first.
Your top right box includes tasks that are important, but not urgent. These are the ones you should schedule.
Your bottom left box includes tasks that are urgent, but not important. These are the ones you should delegate to others to do. Even if you’re a one-person show, is there a way you can automate all or pieces of the task (as in, delegating to a machine?)
Your bottom right box includes tasks that aren’t urgent or important. These are the ones you delete, AKA don’t do at all. Because why would you waste your time on something that’s not urgent OR important?
Next time you’re having trouble getting clarity on what you should prioritize, give this tool a try!
2. 🧠 Why a Smaller Audience Can Mean Bigger Business Growth
Without fail, every single creative business owner I speak to is afraid of niching down.
“Niching down” refers to limiting your products or services to a specific subset or people, or producing a specific type of product or service.
And I understand the fear.
You started your creative business for freedom, to pursue the projects you want to work on.
You don’t want to be put in a box. You don’t want to feel trapped or stuck doing one thing forever.
But the number one rule around marketing your business is:
When you speak to everyone, you speak to no one.
The potential clients scrolling past your posts in your feed need to feel like this post was unequivocally created and written for THEM.
The more specific you get about the challenges you help people solve, and the types of solutions you specialize in, the more interested your ideal customers will be in your work.
If your posts are so generic because you’re trying to include everyone you could possibly help in your content, nobody is going to resonate with it.
And—niching doesn’t have to be scary. It doesn’t have to be as limiting as only working in one color palette or one medium forever.
You can solve a specific problem, like “creating gifts for homesick loved ones,” which leaves the door open for you to create any kind of art that falls in that category, while still focusing your audience more narrowly.
Specializing is good for your business.
Specialists can charge a premium price for their services because they’re seen as experts, as the “go-tos” for a particular audience or type of product.
If you’re still scared about niching down, hit reply on this email and tell me what you do right now in your business—I’ll help you come up with some ideas around how you can focus in on an audience while still retaining your creative freedom 😊
3. 🍵 Client Tea: Informational vs Inspirational Content
Last week I was working with a client on their content strategy.
A few of their posts were what I’d call “informational.”
They told all about what this client did in their business. They laid out the facts and outlined the products and services.
And yes, your potential customers need to know about what you do and how you do it.
But there’s a difference between informational posts and ones that inspire clients to take action.
Your audience is seeing a loooooot of different content in their feed. It’s important that yours stand out and scream “I’m for you!” to them.
And how do you do that?
By connecting your stories and your explanations of what you do to benefits for your ideal client.
All of your content should speak to one of these:
pain points or challenges they’re experiencing
the transformation your product or service will make in THEIR life
why they should care
Look at your last 3 posts—would you categorize them as purely informational, or inspirational to your ideal client?
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