How many books on business have you read? You know, I'm sure that no book will ever be able to give you the same experience as actually doing it and learning for yourself. My motto was and still is - give it a go and see what happens. All I wanted was to make a difference locally and help more people experience Donegal, so I gave it a go and very much against all the advice I got I followed my heart and it worked. Over 800 people have visited this hidden corner of Northwest Ireland for our spectacular adventure and unique culture since mng started. Although I've ran events that nobody has shown up to and others where over a 100 have shown up, I'm grateful for it all. The good, the bad and the ugly. Because of trying do something to help, other business owners started asking me what was working and if I could I help them. So I gave it a go and began working one on one with small businesses and found that I love that I love that.
Me with Jeff Ward - Savvy navigator at Be the Change Florida 2015
I've now trained as a business coach and have a practise of private clients from all over the world that I connect with from my desk in An Crannog, Gaoth Dobhair. Now my business is 20% events and tours and 80% helping other businesses to create strategic easy to follow plans to find more customers and make more money. I love business. I love the learning, the challenge, the creativity, I love the self development and how much I learn from the people I meet and get to work with. I invested everything back into learning as much as I could about business, but business in a way that made sense to me and I really had to go searching for that. I went to the states three different times last year to intensive business training retreats and to network and learn. The pic to the left is an event I attended in 2015 - it changed my business and my life. This year the same event have invited me - mngDonegal - to be on the stage for the success panel to talk about how I've progressed in the last 12 months. In Las Vegas!! In front of 100's of other women entrepreneurs!! Pinch me will you? A year ago I still wasn't really paying myself and I know thats how it is for a lot of business owners, we're the last to get paid, but we need to be first. In the last year thats all changed dramatically, I have clarity and complete control.
You've heard that business is simple, well it is, the complicated part is keeping it simple and I've become obsessed with keeping it simple and I want to share with you how I do that.
So here's three of my secrets to keeping it simple:
1- Plan for tomorrow not the next three years. Take it one day at time. If you don't get it right day to day, you have no chance of reaching your goals. Three and five year plans are all and well and good but they don't pay you now. I plan no further than 3 months at a time - I learned that the hard way and its a much simpler way. If you take care of tomorrow, you bring money into your business at a faster pace and thats what you need to do in the beginning because if you're not making money, you're not in business, and if you're not in business then you must ask yourself - is this a hobby? If its hobby that's ok but if its a hobby that you're hoping will pay you, thats a problem you need to deal with now. Plan today for tomorrow. What are you going to do to bring money in to your business tomorrow? Ask yourself now. Grab a pen. Its Sunday, plan for tomorrow.
2- Get specific - so that you make more money with less effort. I wasn't being specific. I said I wanted to pay myself but I didn't know how much. Its like saying I want more customers - but to be specific - I want three new contracts a month. When I started getting specific my business started to grow and change almost immediately. Specificity is the mother of success and profit. It's like saying - I want to to be happy, but to be specific you would love to find someone to marry and have children with. See the difference? I have to find new business - to be specific - I must make 5 sales calls a day so I can bring in at least one new client, contract etc. Can you see how this works? I wish I knew that when I was starting out. It has without a doubt transformed my business. What can you do be more specific? Make a list. Try it out.
3- Don't talk about what you do - your customers don't care about what 'you do' they care about you make possible for them! Your customers don't understand what you do, they understand their own problems and you need to get in front of 'their' problems and offer solutions. This realisation was huge for me and such a simple thing too. When you talk about what you make possible people are suddenly more interested in what you're saying because you're talking about what they want and need so they naturally see you as the solution to their problem. "I'm a business coach, I look at the problems in your business and work with you take a new approach etc etc - thats what I do - versus - I help people people double their client base and their time off' - thats what I make possible for people with business coaching. Can you see what I mean? Next time you're at a networking event, give it a go. Honestly people's interest will through the roof!
Thats just a snippet there's so much more I can share and if you want more I'm combining everything I've learned since walking out on my job in London to move home to Donegal 4 years ago, with mng's events and tours, my 15 years of sales and marketing and all I've learned in business into a one of a kind business retreat called - Gnó le Croí in Donegal. Business with heart and thats exactly what mng is - a business with heart. Gift yourself and your business the opportunity to come and join me and other business owners from all over Ireland for a magical day and a half business building workshops - we'll be chilling but into business at the same time and its in the most inspirational place on the planet. And leave feeling inspired, energized with a whole new perspective and ways to approach that will make a difference days and weeks after the event. I want people to walk away and say "Wow, I can't believe how much I've learned I'm going to find new customers now!". The way I see it, if women are making money the world will be a better place. This is part of my mission.
Click here for more info. And go do something to bring a new client in to your business today.
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