How to deal with Dry Spells

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Hello and good evening. I'm Katie McManus, business strategist and money mindset coach, coming to you live on the Facebooks, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram. Hello, everyone. Coming to you live. I want to talk about a really important topic right now, because I know this is happening for a lot of business owners, and that is dry spells. Okay? If you're having a dry spell in your business, I want to be the first to tell you it's okay. It happens to the best of us, okay? I know it feels scary because you cannot predict where your next bit of business is coming from. And also, it happens to everyone, okay? There is not a single business owner out there in the world who has not experienced dry spells from time to time. Now, there are ways to not experience them as often, but there's no way you can completely keep yourself from experiencing them. You don't have control over the economy. You don't have control over people's emotions. What's going on in the world. I mean, especially these days, you have no control and you never did. Let's. Let's be real. It's like control is an illusion. The only thing you have control over is how you're reacting to the current situation and what you're spending your time on, what you're putting your energy into. Okay? So I'm going to be going through the five things that you need to be doing to keep yourself in the game to make this dry spell move along so you can start getting more clients. And I'm going to be talking through, like, some real actionable stuff that you can. You can do along the way. If you have any questions, you know, or if you just need me to say again that this is normal and it happens and you're not alone and you're. You're not screwing up your business, then, you know, please put in the comments, and I will do that. Also, small little thing. It's funny. I've gotten a lot of people saying that they watch this and they think that this is my podcast. This actually is not my podcast. This is just my live show. So I go live on social media fairly often. I do different spurts of, like, 30 days in a row. I'm doing one of those right now. Stay two. And I also have a podcast, but that is a completely separate thing. It is edited. It is very professionally done by my producer, Neil Valeo, who is like a godsend he's an amazing human being and you want to start a podcast. I cannot recommend him more. But this is just my life, so this is really just off the cuff. I don't plan these. I also really don't plan my podcast episodes. But anyway, this is just me putting stuff in the world. So if you want to actually listen to my podcast, then you want to go to ww.weeniecast.com and that is W E E N I E C a s t weeniecast.com and you can check out all of our episodes. We recently just hit our year anniversary, which is super exciting. Okay, so back to the topic of dry spells. How do you deal with them? How do you overcome them? How do you keep your brain from freaking the fuck out when they happen? And I want to name that. This happens in my business too, okay? It happens for all of us. There's not a single business out there in the world who hasn't experienced a dry spell, okay? If you're in one right now, my heart goes out to you. I know it's stressful. I know it's scary. I know it makes you question and every single frickin decision you have ever made in your life. And also, I want you to take a big deep breath with me right now, okay? You're fine. Your business will be fine. If changes need to be made to your business, you have people in your world you can turn to. Hello. So let's dive in, shall we? Okay, so number one, if you are in a dry spell and you are lacking for clients and income, this is when you don't. Sorry, I have a hair just tickling my nose. This is where you don't just double down on your marketing, you triple down. You quadruple down. Okay? Whatever it is you can do to get yourself out there in front of people, you're gonna go and do. I don't. Oh, God. I almost yanked my earring out of my ear. Ow. Anyway, you're gonna be posting on social media. You can go live. I want you networking. I want you doing virtual networking and in person, whatever you're comfortable with. Coffee chats. I don't always recommend them, but honestly, if you are just feeling like you're just lacking an influx of new people, talking to a bunch of people with no pressure on either side is going to be so, so helpful for you right now. What a lot of people think that they should be doing when they hit a dry spells, like, oh, cool, things have slowed down. Cool. Let me work on the back end. Of my business. Let me clean up some stuff in the scenes. And friends, this is one of the worst things you could do right now, okay? Yes, yes, that stuff does need to happen, but it cannot be the sole focus of what you're working on right now, okay? People cannot give you their money and hire you if they don't know that you exist. All right? So your job right now is to make sure that everyone and their mother and their mother's mother and their neighbors knows that you exist. And not only that, they know how you are helpful to people, all right? Because we want your ideal clients to discover you, and we want everyone in your world to be able to refer business to you. Okay? So triple, quadruple down into your marketing. I know it's going to feel like it's excessive and you're doing a lot of it, but it's the name of the game. If you want to get through this dry spell as fast as possible, the best way to do that is to make sure everyone knows what you're up to. My. My side note for my. My followers and people who are watching, who I know are really consistent at posting to social media, but they tend to keep it not salesy, not markety. Like, they don't make a really clear call to action. You need to get over that. You need to put on your. Your big person, your adult pants, and you need to get over whatever it is that is holding you back from marketing your stuff. Not aggressively, but assertively. Right? Because here's the thing. No one's going to know that you're accepting clients unless you tell them. All right? And you talking about, you know, how you learn something in your life and how you use it with your clients today. It's a beautiful post. It's a lovely post. It's a great way for people to get to know you better. However, if you're trying to get clients, you need to put an ask in there, okay? You need to instruct them that, hey, I have some spots available in my coaching program. Come and be a part of it. I can help you, whatever. Or, you know, I have. I have time available in my consulting business. Or, you know, we have time available to do legal audits. Whatever your business is, you can use this time to drive traffic to it, okay? But you have to drive traffic to it. Okay? Not going to happen on its own. All right? So that is, number one, you want to triple, quadruple down into your marketing. If anyone has a question on any of this, please put in the chat. Okay? Number two, this one, everyone is like, really? Really, I should do that? Like, I shouldn't be working all the time. You need to have some fun. You need to have some fun. You need to get connected to whatever it is that grounds you and makes you feel like you're in your purpose, okay? When we get into, like, our fear minds, our shadow selves, and we try to do work from there and we try to promote our businesses, it does not go well, all right? You have to be connected to the light inside. Okay? I know it sounds super woo, but it's true. That rhymed. Anyway, you have to come at it from a lightness, and the only way you can do that is if you are doing things in your life that have lightness. Okay? So I don't care if this is you going out on a Saturday night. I don't care if this is you going to museum or an art opening. Maybe you're getting a slip and slide and setting it up in the park and just having fun with all the other grownups who are having a very nostalgic day. Hopefully no one gets hurt. And there are no tiny rocks because we all know the slip and slides. That's the worst thing that can happen. There's a tiny rock under the plastic thing. You need to have fun, okay? You need to also be in your purpose. Okay? So if there's any way that you can give back. I had a mentor once who was. He always talked about how we have, like this flywheel of income, you know, like financial income that we want to get spinning, but sometimes, like, to get that flywheel going, we have to have the energetic income flywheel going, right? So I never recommend this. Like, I never recommend for you to give away your sessions or samples of your work. But if you're not having any energetic income in your business, and you are starting to forget what it is that you do and how special it is and how talented you are, it's going to be really hard to sell what you do, right? So maybe you're going. If you're a lawyer, maybe you're going to legal aid and you're volunteering some time. If you are consultant, maybe you're offering to help out some past employers, you know, just, you know, letting them pick your brains on stuff. If you're a coach, then maybe you are donating some sessions to maybe local teachers who are, you know, struggling or nurses or, you know, people in unions. Whatever. You are giving something of yourself into a community to pay it forward. But you're also getting that energetic income Back. Okay. Okay. That's really helpful. You know, no one wants to hang out with someone who's a Debbie Downer. No one wants to be around someone who's, like, also, like, really crunchy and, like, you can feel like they're needy and they want your money, right? When you're trying to get clients, that can be a big turn off, and it's an energetic thing. You really. The only way for you to make sure that you don't have that is for you to make sure that you're in your good energy. Okay? Number four. Okay. This is a hard one for people, right? Because when so much stuff is outside of our control and. Hello. Hi, Taylor. Good to see you. When there's so much stuff outside of our control and we're in a dry spell and, like, we're working really hard and we can't seem to bring the business in or get more clients, and it just feels like we're spinning our wheels and nothing we do matters. It is so easy to feel like you're stuck, like you're trapped. But let me tell you, you are not. You have so much choice in this moment, okay? And the thing that is going to make or break you is if you choose to be in choice, like, that is going to be the thing that lets you get through this, right? You have so many choices as to how you can show up every single day. You have so many choices as to how you can make money. All right? I want to remind you, if you're in the beginning stages of your business or even in the later stages of your business, there's no shame here. If you're in a dry spell and you need some money, there are a lot of other things that you could do for money, okay? And I say that knowing where some of your minds will be going with that, okay? Get your mind out of the gutter. I mean, full permission to sell pictures of your feet if you want to, but that's a choice you get to make, okay? There's nothing wrong with getting a side job at Starbucks or waiting tables or maybe doing some consulting that's outside of what you're doing in your business. There's nothing wrong with that. Okay? You get to be in choice here, though. And the only way you're going to get through this, this part of your business this season where you're struggling is if you remember that you have access to so much stuff coming your way. You get to choose what you want to focus on. And I'm not saying you have to pick to get some. Some waitressing shifts or some serving shifts. Okay, I'm not saying that at all, but I'm saying what the difference it'll make to your brain when you give yourself. This is a business trust. Yes, exactly. Hi, Taylor. The mindset shift. When you show yourself that you have so many options, that the world is just offering you all these opportunities for money to come to you. That's. That's the mindset that will allow for you to find clients. Okay, it sounds silly, you know, just having on your wall. Like, I'll be totally honest, during the pandemic in the first couple months, I panicked. I lost a lot of clients. In the beginning of the pandemic, a lot of coaches did. And the one thing that helped me get through was just knowing in the back of my mind that if I really needed to, I could sell pictures of my feet. Like, just like, okay, that's an option. And I. I didn't do it. You cannot find pictures of my feet anywhere. Unless, like, you're on my Instagram and just happens that I'm barefoot in a picture. God, I can't believe I just shared that. Anyway, but it helped me. It really did help me, like, get over that fear. Fear of, oh, my God, this is never going to work. Right? And just knowing that I have this choice, knowing that there are a lot of ways that I could bring money in, help me reset my, like, fear scale so I could be fully invested in working my business in. In promoting it and being proactive with it, in having really clean energy when I talk to potential clients. Okay? So know that you have so many choices here. Okay? And I know. I know when you're looking at your bank balance and you're seeing it just go down and down and down and down, and you are, you know, doing everything you feel like you can in your business, and it's not making a difference. I know. It's so easy to feel like. Like the walls are closing in on you and you don't have any other options. But, babe, you do. You have so many options. Always. Okay? And if you ever feel any differently, then you know who to turn to. I'm right here. I'll remind you. And they won't push you to do anything weird. I promise. Anyway, number five. Okay? So you're gonna stay. You're gonna triple down on your market. I'm just gonna review. Triple down on your marketing. You're gonna have some fun. Stay connected to your purpose. You're gonna name which. Oh, did I jump one? I totally jumped One. I totally switched. I totally skipped number three. Number three. We're gonna go back. Number three. You have to name what you want. You have to name what you want. This is actually my favorite one. This is a trick that I used to do in sales. So at the beginning of the day, every single day, in every single sales job I've ever had, I would do this very advanced technological thing where I take a post it note and I would put four or five or ten squares on it. And this was depending on what my focus was that day. This is how many sales appointments I wanted to book or how many sales I wanted to make. Okay. And as I would go through my day, I would X them off. But here's just like a small thing that you can do every single day where you're giving yourself something to focus on. Something that is visual that, like, you're going to interact with all day, but it keeps reminding you, no, no, don't get distracted here. You still need three more. You don't get distracted. You still need three more. Oh, can you go to Eventbrite? And can you do, like a virtual networking thing this afternoon? Because you have nothing on. Yeah. Cool. Maybe you can fill in one of these boxes. Maybe there's someone in that networking group who needs to book a call with you. Right? There's always more things that you can do in your business. Always. All right. I give you this technology. It is. It is mind blowing. Every time I do this, even in my business, it makes a huge difference. You have to name what it is that you want. Right? Because so often, so often, like, we're just sitting here and we're like, oh, God, everything's not going my way. I don't know. Like, I just want a client. I just want something. Instead of really, really being specific about how many clients you want and how much money you want them to pay you and how long you want to work with them. If you don't know that, then the next person who comes in the door. This is making you feel relief. Oh, good. I'm so glad that's what it's meant to do. The next person who comes in the door is going to be confused as fuck. Right? Because a confused buyer doesn't buy. And if you don't know what it is that you're wanting to enroll them into, if you don't know what you're selling, you're going to create confusion. Okay? So you have to name what it is that you want. And there's nothing wrong with going on and saying hey everyone. I have three spots open in my one on one coaching or I have an opening in my consulting starting next month for four months. Who needs X, Y and Z solved in their business? You know, there's nothing wrong with that. If you're an attorney, you know, naming that you have availability for five business audits or estate planning audits over the next month. Absolutely, go and do that. People will not know that you are for for hire and that you have availability unless you tell them, okay, you have to get out there and you have to name what it is that you want. Okay? Okay, so that's three. And then number four was you have to stay in choice. Number five feels super woo when I. It's going to feel super woo when I say it. But I want you to really practice this. You have to focus on abundance in other areas of your life, okay? We are not complicated people or species. We have this belief that we can compartmentalize the different parts of our lives. Bullshit. Bullshit. That is the biggest lie you've ever been told about how the human psyche works. It does not work that way, okay? How we do one thing is how we do everything, okay? It's one of the reasons why when I work with clients on their relationship with money and like they get better at asking for what they want money wise, like coincidence, their sex life gets better, right? Because if they were afraid of asking for what they wanted in their money, they're probably also afraid of asking for what they wanted in the bedroom, right? When they get better at asking for what they want in one area of their life, it translates across the board, okay? Now if you're in your business and you're feeling super scarce and you're looking at your bank account getting, you know, emptier and emptier and you're freaking out and like, you know, you have clients completing and don't have more coming in and, and all this stuff like you are putting yourself in major scarcity be right? You are focusing on the lack of everything that you want and not what you have already, right? So this can be as simple as like making a list of all the clothes that you have and how abundant that is. Like if you are a shoe person, make a list of all the shoes and your favorite shoes, right? Focusing on abundance, like doing a gratitude practice, even just writing three things that you're grateful for every single morning and every single evening can be a game changer. You know, you can focus on the business that you've gotten in the past. You know, you can really be Grateful for the money that has come in. There's so much that you can be grateful, and therefore. And there's so much abundance that is already in your life. If you have adhd, which, I mean, I know a lot of you do, because I do too, and I talk about it a lot. I know you have, like, weird collections. Okay, Like, I have a book collection and I have a yarn collection. And what other weird collections do I have? Like, I used to, like, like these little tiny, like, old medicine bottles that were just stained glass. Do you. Have you guys ever seen those? Like, you buy them in antique shops? I started collecting them and then everyone started collecting them and then, you know, they're gone. But I used to have a ton of those. Like, whatever it is that you. You have an abundance, just start paying attention to that. Start noticing the things that you have in abundance. If you have a ton of friends, like, be grateful for the abundance in friends that you have, right? If you know you have. If. I mean, it could really be anything, Anything that you have in plenty, be grateful for it. Focus in on it. Because here's what happens when you focus in on abundance in one area, you start focusing on the abundance in other areas. And what we focus on grows. I just recorded a podcast this morning with Neil all about how people with ADHD need to manifest differently, right? We need to be able to see the things that we are calling in. We need to be able to focus in on them, right? If. If we're in scarcity, we can't focus and we're only focusing on scarcity. But if we're really, like, training our brain to look at the abundance, then that's what we're going to focus on. And what we focus on grows. Okay? So if you want to focus on the three clients you have, when you need 10, focus on those three clients. Be so grateful for those three clients, okay? Tell them that you're so happy to work with them. Be. Be really, really kind to yourself as you go through this process, though, because it is hard. I'm saying this like it's simple and easy, and it might be a little simple, but it's not easy. What you're going through, you're doing one of the hardest things that you're ever going to do in your life. If you're growing a business and you've been a super brave human and you know there are just going to be seasons in your business that require more bravery than others, this is one of them. Anyway. If you have any questions, if you're struggling with a dry spell and if you feel like there is just something that you're doing that is wrong and you can't figure out what it is, then I want you to book a call with me. You can do it if you're watching on Instagram, you can do it in my bio. If you're on any of the other places, you can DM me and I will give you a link. And just remember to be kind to yourself. Just remember to be kind to yourself. You are doing everything that you can. And if you're not doing everything that you can, this is your wake up call. This is a little fire under your butt to get out there and go get to work. Ok? All right, everyone. Taylor and everyone else who is watching, whoever you were, thank you so much for being here. I hope you got a ton out of it and I hope this made you feel a ton of relief for whatever it is that's going on in your Life. I'm Katie McManus, business strategist and money mindset coach. I will be going live every day for the next 28 days. Today was day two of a 30 day challenge I'm giving myself. So stay tuned and if there are any topics that you want me to go live on that you need a little boost on, then please DM me. I'm always open to crowdsourcing ideas to go live on. Anyway, hope you're having an amazing night and I will see you all tomorrow. Bye.