Owning a business can be heaven.
Freedom to call your own shots, manage your own risk, live by your values, and spit in the eye of all those nay-sayers who said you’d never be able to do it.
Owning a business can also be hell.
Endless hours, time spent on tasks you don’t enjoy and aren’t good at, financial insecurity, struggles to find customers, and the weight of responsibility that comes with ownership.
The truth is, owning a business can be both of those things on the same day.
But some business owners are good at creating more “heaven” than “hell” moments. Business is a skill, and it can be learned. Wise entrepreneurs know that they need to keep evolving … to keep upgrading, if you will.
The more you learn, the more successful and rewarding your business can be. Here are three pathways that I’ve found are important when things aren’t performing the way you want them to.
#1: Upgrade your tools
Running a business means you need to watch your bottom line. You need to think carefully about every dollar you spend, and make sure you’re spending wisely.
But this can lead a lot of business owners to make insane, business-strangling decisions for the sake of saving a few dollars a year.
When you’re running a business, you need professional-grade tools.
- You need to be serious about web security and hosting.
- You need professional site design that speaks well of you.
- You need grown-up web publishing tools, not the freebies that amateur bloggers use.
This is an unbelievable time to run a business online, because top-quality professional tools have become amazingly affordable and easy to use. But you do have to make some investment in your site. There’s no reason to overpay, but you also don’t want to nickel and dime yourself right out of any credibility.
#2: Upgrade your communication
21st-century marketing has become a complex, nuanced business. Content is what works — but it has to be content intelligently delivered, with sound strategy.
Your content and marketing need a healthy measure of both art and science — art to create something worth your prospects’ attention, and science to convert that attention to business.
Intelligent use of social media outposts, content strategy, a solid understanding of copywriting, the commitment to building a web of relationship-building content — they all work together in well-deployed modern marketing.
It’s not rocket science. But there are a lot of elements. Copyblogger exists to help keep you thinking about all those elements, and how to bring them together with a bit of style.
#3: Upgrade your mindset
The biggest difference between successful business owners and their less-successful counterparts is mindset.
The rest of it can be learned or outsourced.
Smart business owners know how to manage risk intelligently — not by taking crazy chances, but with thoughtful, informed risk-taking.
Successful business owners keep their focus on what matters most in their businesses. They know what to get obsessive about … and what they can safely dismiss.
Happy business owners know that a business should be a pathway to a more rewarding life, not a prison or a weight around their necks. They understand that the business should serve them, not the other way around.
We have some tools that can help
You probably know that Copyblogger Media has created a number of high-quality tools for you — web publishing essentials that deliver results without costing a fortune.
This year, we’ll be adding something new. It’s the most comprehensive program we’ve ever offered. And we’ll be telling you much more about it in a few weeks.
Like our software, this will be professional grade. Serious tools and education for people who are serious about online business.
Stay tuned, because we’ll be telling you much more very soon …
Reader Comments (36)
You’re absolutely right about content marketing taking art and science. Too much of one or the other can skew your whole effort. Interesting post.
Mark McGuinness will be here tomorrow weighing in more on that very topic, as it happens. 🙂
s a bit like love and marriage – you can’t have one with out the other. It’s best to have great content that’s well presented.
Mindset! For me that is the key of your success online. I think is really hard to keep yourself motivated when you are not getting the results you were expecting. But if you don’t have mental strength to overcome that obstacle you will not get anywhere. Good analysis by the way.
Thanks for sharing.
Great news and I’m looking forward with this tool you guys are talking about. I just hope you guys can provide a good tutorial video though.
I am a proud owner of every tool Copyblogger has come out with! Eagerly waiting for this new program. Thanks Copyblogger!
And thanks right back at ya, raunek! 🙂
Speaking of upgrading your tools. I noticed that you are now using Buffer as well as a list of social media sites to give readers an opportunity to share your posts. How has your experience been with Buffer? I’m concerned that readers won’t want to log into another service just to share. Why also list the social media sites at the end of your post?
Thanks again for a generally inspiring post.
To your continued success,
Blake
The Buffer button is for people who use the Buffer app already (many do). So it’s only for people who are sharing there already and logged in.
I just signed up for Buffer and I love it. It’s much easier than using Hootsuite for fast and efficient sharing. Hopefully they will add Google+.
I’m a Studiopress and Premise user who watches your sites closely to get design and functionality tips.
Thanks!
I guess I will have to wait patiently to find out what new and wonderful things Copyblogger has in store for us. I already own (and love) most of your products, so I know what ever it is, It will be great!
Exciting times! Looking forward to staying ahead of the curve with you Sonia : )
Very good read, and your enthusiasm is well placed as this is a great time to be running a business that fits well with an on-line customer base.
‘Word of Mouth’ was always applicable, but now we can see it happen, track it, analyze it, and improve on it.
The only thing I’d be tempted to touch on more is the point you make about skipping the free solutions and paying for professional tools. This is a double edged sword if you aren’t really changing your mindset and stepping up to the plate technically.
Free tools are a bit of an illusion, when something breaks there’s so many free users that the software tends to fix itself, and quickly. However when a paid tool starts having issues it’s much harder to get free help/have people review your efforts and help out.
So when you step up your game to separate yourself from the pack you really must be thinking like a professional and get rid of this notion of surfing along for free somehow hoping to stand out from the me-too’s that you are competing with.
That’s true to some extent. It’s really a matter of accepting that if we’re going to do business, we need to step up and handle ourselves professionally.
#0 : Upgrade your network. Learn to be of service and useful to people who’s work you admire, love and want to be like. Build on great ideas. Figure out ‘no brainer’ offers for these people. People you have reverence for. Then, you can be around, learn from and help folks that are doing amazing things.
Shitty people and amazing people make people around them like them. Pick your people, and plan it all the way to the end.
Oddly enough, that’s next week’s post. 😉
Studio Press: For Realtors, just not the boofy haired ones. ;-).
It seems to me that, when building a business, it is easy to get hung up in what others are doing. Too many entrepreneurs believe that everything has to be perfect in order to be successful. However, as you’ve shown, things don’t have to be perfect but they do have to conductive to your business.
Being lean, optimized and efficient is more important than being perfect.
What a perfect timing for this post. We are in the process of upgrading our clients 🙂 We are moving from a kind of bad niche to a better one and we are upgrading the tools, the way we communicate internally and externally, etc.
Thanks for the article!
Upgrading clients is a major one!
Yes being in business and doing business can be a challenge. Copyblogger and the various members have some great tools. (I know, have invested thousands of dollars in products and services with members of the copyblogger team and authors). The one thing though that I know about business is that unless you work to your own vision and purpose and stay true to your values and standards, you may build what others consider a successful business but you will suffer. It’s all mindset stuff. The thieves of your success are mostly in your mind and until you deal with them, you will never truly enjoy your magnificence. Useful info Sonia. Thanks for everything you do
The mindset piece is key. I can “work hard” all day and all night but if I’m not working on the right things I should have just watched cartoons all day. We must know what to do when and what not to spend time on or worry about. Prioritizing, above all, makes all the difference.
The whole point is to always be open to change. If you are not, there’s no reason why you should continue on with your business. Anyone knows that this industry is an ever-evolving one. If you’re not up to keeping up with the changes, you’d have more hell than heaven on earth.
Nice article again, Sonia!
By the way, I shared this on the IM Social Networking site, Kingged.com 🙂
http://www.kingged.com/how-to-upgrade-your-online-business-for-more-money-success-and-enjoyment/#comment-8982
Being in business and doing business are two completely different things!
Upgrade mindset. Yes. This is the key that will decide your success or your failure in online world. You need to work hard, be dedicated on what you are doing and should have clear vision as to what you are supposed to achieve in the next few months. These things should be all clear in the mind else you won’t be even able to taste the success.
Very interesting, Sonia.
I already use the Genesis framework and Premise from Copyblogger media. Eagerly waiting for the upcoming products.
Well, since you already sell websites, membersite programs and an seo tool, plus a member site to learn all about content marketing, and since you seem to be stressing mindset in the article, I bet it is going tobe a teaching program. Which would teach hard core online marketing – changing people’s ‘moneymindset.’
Right?
Well, since you already sell websites, membersite programs and an seo tool, plus a member site to learn all about content marketing, and since you seem to be stressing mindset in the article, I bet it is going to be a teaching program. Which would teach hard core online marketing – changing people’s ‘moneymindset.’
Right?
Added to the importance of having a professional Website design is the need to have high quality software; I see so many Websites that end up costing a fortune to maintain as someone decided to use low quality software.
If you’re using WordPress make absolutely sure that you only use Plugins and Themes recommended by, or listed on wordpress.org.
P.S. I run StudioPress on my own Website consulting Website and love it!
Well said! Owning a business can be a great challenge but also very rewarding for anyone who survives all the initial setbacks.
As a web developer I think its imperative for businesses to upgrade their tools! Some need to stop trying to cut corners to save money and consider tools as investments. I’m glad someone agrees, great read.
Very good article.
I love the point about how “Successful business owners keep their focus on what matters most in their businesses”. It is imperative to focus on the right things and not be distracted by shiny new things.
I embrace that philosophy as I strive to grow and learn something new each day.
Best Regard & I wish you continued success.
Honestly, getting traffic to a site is not difficult. The problem is, most people don’t understand the steps they need to take. Once you understand the necessary steps to take, it becomes so easy!
Yea, and the problem is finding the correct info for those steps you need to take. There is so much conflicting infomation online its like “good freakin luck” to most folks.
Thanks for sharing
Romona
Hey Sonia, I think mindset is the most important of all. I have known people with all the techniques and tactics they anyone could handle but none of them were effective until the minset was also upgraded. I read an interesting idea the other day that said “We cannot solve problems on the same level that they were created on”. I really believe this. Thanks for helping people learn and grow in this business. I like what you are doing here. 🙂
Kent
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