152: Creating Business Rituals to Strengthen Your Community

Today I want to talk about a mental trigger. I'll explain what that is in a moment. One of the trickiest ones that I've had to think about in my business, and that is rituals. Okay, so let me set this up for you. If you're not familiar with mental triggers, they are psychological drivers that influence human behavior and decision making. They're found from psychology and behavioral economics. And the triggers kind of tap into the subconscious process that can significantly sway how we think, how we feel, and how we act. So there are many mental triggers. They're used in persuasion and influence and form. Really an essential part of a lot of marketing strategies. And so this is a super fun topic. You could dive into all sorts of mental triggers. But today I want to share with you the one that I have kind of struggled with the most and how I have worked to build it into my business. And it's one on rituals.

I'm Bonnie. Christine. And this is where all things creativity, design, business and marketing unite. I'm a mama living in a tiny town tucked right inside the Smoky Mountains, running a multi seven figure business, doing the most creative and impactful work of my life.

But when I first set out to

become an entrepreneur, I was struggling to make ends meet and wrestling with how to accomplish my biggest dream of becoming a fabric designer. Fast forward to today. I'm not only licensing my artwork all over the world, but also teaching others how to design their creative life and experience the same success. I'm here to help you spend your life doing something that lights you up. I'll help you build a creative business that also creates an impact, changes people's lives, gives you all of the freedom you want, and is wildly profitable. Welcome to the Professional Creative Podcast.

So rituals in your business can really deepen the bond between you and your audience. And so within your content, you can build in rituals that build a stronger community feeling. So if you want to think about a ritual, it's anything that you do on a regular basis, right? So it becomes ritualistic. And the way I like to think about it is that if I, if, if it's something that I stopped doing, people would start asking why they would miss it. So, for instance, if you are a listener to this podcast, you know that I sign off in the same way every time. And if you're brand new, you have to listen to the end to hear it. But if I didn't do that, now that I've done it over like hundreds of times, right. If I didn't do it, then I would hear from You. I know that I would. So that is a form of a ritual. My ritual is to sign off in the same way on my podcast every single time. You would miss it if it were gone. And so that is something that ties us together. It deepens our connection. Another ritual is that my membership, they get content delivered at 11am on Fridays. And so if that were to go away, right, if it were not to be delivered, or if, if it were to be sent out at 6pm Instead, we would hear about it because this ritual has connected us together. It's expected. So I'd love for you to think about rituals that you could build into your business. Small, big, large, medium, all different types. So let's say a ritual could also be something like an annual event. Maybe at the end of every year you do a year in review, blog post or YouTube video or podcast or email, to the point that if you skipped it one year, people would be like, where is the year end review? I want it.

Right?

Or maybe it's an annual conference, or maybe it's a seasonal workshop, or maybe on the first Sunday of the month you do something special with your audience. It could also be kind of smaller than an annual ritual. It could be maybe like a monthly session, a monthly live Q and A or something like that. It could be a weekly challenge or a weekly call to action of some kind. And then it could also be something like a sign on or sign off ritual. This one, I think felt hard for me because when I first read about it, I wasn't sure that I had any rituals. I wasn't sure that I was creating this common, deepened connection through consistent and ritualistic kind of activities. And so the more we can do this, the more we feel community.

Okay, picture this. Have you ever spent hours scouring through your video or maybe your podcast content trying to find that one place that you said that one thing. Or if you've forgotten or never found it and you had to re record everything. I've been there and it's so frustrating and honestly a huge waste of time. But it hasn't happened to me ever since I started using Searchie. Searchie is the software that I use for all of my videos and all of my podcast content because it not only transcribes it, but it makes it searchable by key word. And so for you to see this in action, I have an example set up for you over on BonnieCristine.com resources. Again, that's BonnieChristine.com resources and you can actually play with Searchie and see how it looks on one of our videos, because once you understand what it does, it's a game changer. I also host all of my workshop and my class, my membership and course material through Searchie as well. So students can search for any question that have and go to the exact time in place where I talked about that one thing. And just imagine this. If I ever do a Q and A and they want to know if I answered their question, all they have to do is search for their name and see if I did or not. It's literally like having your very own personal search engine for your content. So no more wasting time scrubbing through your video or audio to find that one golden nugget. With Searchie, you can easily find what you're looking for in seconds. Just type in a keyword or phrase and Searchie will pull up all the relevant content. It's a game changer for anyone who creates audio or video content. But honestly, that's not all. Searchie's new AI powered transcription and captioning tool makes it easy to create accessible content that everyone can get access to. And with their customizable player, you can embed your videos and your podcasts on your website or social media channels in a way that looks and feels so professional. So if you are ready to take your video or your podcast content to the next level, head on over to BonnieCristine.com resources and just give Searchie a try. It's incredible. I think you're going to love it and I can't wait to see how it revolutionizes the way you create content.

If you are like me, struggling to really figure out how you build in rituals to your own audience and the way that you show up, you might start thinking about the other people that you interact with, the other businesses or artists or designers that you follow, and see what kind of rituals you have grown accustomed to and love. Maybe it's a weekly email. I actually have to come back and talk about that one. Maybe it's a sign on. Maybe it's like a live session on Instagram every week or something like that. But it's something that you've grown known to expect and you would miss it if it were to go away. And then I would love for you to think about three rituals that you could build into your business, something that your audience can learn to expect from you. Even the fact that this podcast releases every Tuesday and Thursday, it's expected, right? You know that you expect it. It has become a ritual. Meaning I know if I skip a week, I'll hear from you. And I love that and it motivates me never to skip a week. Okay, so I mentioned weekly newsletters. We have for the first time started a weekly newsletter. We are so excited about it. It's been months and months in the works and it is brand new and so incredibly fun. So we're doing two weekly newsletters. Well, they're actually two different options and they're both bi weekly, which means every other week. So if you sign up for both, you get one email a week, but one is very specific for surface pattern designers and the other is very specific for creative entrepreneurs. Now the one for creative entrepreneurs, not specific to the surface design industry as well, but also is applicable. So if you're a surface designer, you're probably going to want both. If, if you're not a surface designer, you're probably just going to want the creative entrepreneurship one. You can go check these out over@bonniecristine.com newsletters and again, there's two. So the pattern design one is called Secrets of the the Pattern Press. And it is full of so many resources, tools, techniques, mysteries unfolded for surface designers. The other one is called Beneath the Surface. Do you get it? It's like all the things that go on in the business under the surface it is entrepreneurial insights for the professional creative. So we're talking about marketing, we're talking about entrepreneurial specific news and resources. Tons of information here coming at you on a bi weekly basis. Now, did you know that bi weekly means either twice a week or every other week? That really bothers me. And so in this context, it is every other week. So if you sign up for both, you'll get one email a week. I would love for you to go dive into it. We're really excited to roll it out again. That's bonniecristine.com newsletters. All right, my friends, create the beauty that you want to see come alive in the world. And remember, there's room for you.