Braid Blog
Underselling Ourselves When We Feel Undefined
May 15, 2013 Tara

What to say about the Braid Workshop? We brought together a fine group of creative entrepreneurs on an unusually cold spring Saturday a few weeks ago, including web developers, graphic designers, photographers, videographers, and still-trying-to-definers. 

One thread that ran through that productive day, is while everyone there was about their creative business – the day felt very personal.  Many of these creatives work solo, or with just one partner. So like most workshops and gatherings geared for a very particular “tribe” like this, it really becomes a cool way to come together and see the same stuff we’re all going through together.

And of all the “stuff” we’re dealing with, the big one that became apparent through the selling-yourself exercises and personal-branding conversations was this: all of us do way too much, with very fuzzy boundaries around what we are providing. So the not-so-stellar side effect of all this vision and not a lot of definition – is we creative, entrepreneurial, women (yes we were all gals that day) tend to overdeliver and overplease. While we undershare, undersell (and undercharge) on what we actually do.

Braid Workshop Takeaways A

What rises to the top when a group of creative entrepreneurs start talking about sharing themselves and selling what they do? Kathleen and I had some very specific sharing/selling lessons, exercises and takeaways that made up the main content and activities of our workshop. But I wanted to also share some conversational frustrations that bubbled up the day-of, that might feel familiar to you, too, with some takeaways that might help – or at least help you not feel so alone in these struggles.

“I believe in the impossible and I don’t have any boundaries. So I struggle telling people exactly what I do. I do a lot. But you don’t want to sound like a hyphen.”

Frustration: You Have An Unclear Professional Title
“You don’t want to sound like a hyphen.” What a great quote of the day from one of our group.  When you do a lot of different things, it can get hard to define what you actually do. That’s not such a big deal, unless it means you make it difficult to charge for what you do. 

Recommendation: It’s Okay if You Have a Clear Offering
Kathleen and I struggle with the title, ourselves. Our business cards have no titles, because we do wear a lot of hats. But when we’re engaging with clients, we have very clear boundaries, and structured ways to buy our products or hire us for our one-on-one services.

Braid Workshop Takeaways B

“I used to sell product. Now I see where I can really help other women creative entrepreneurs. But I don’t know how or if they can pay me.”

“I struggle with pricing, and even find myself giving away a lot of my strategy, direction and advice for free.”

Frustration: Selling Expertise When it Feels Undervalued
This is not only a selling struggle, it’s also a struggle to maintain control in your client relationships  – as a valued expert. “Why can’t they just understand how much experience and point-of-view and strategy I bring into this project and not only respect my advice  – but pay for it?” Sound like a question you’ve asked yourself?

Recommendation: So Show It... Don’t Just “Tell It” While You Sell It
Now ask yourself this. Are you actually showing clients (and those interested in becoming one) how you deliver that expertise in a visual, step-by-step, concrete way? I mean as visual as you would show a product or a portfolio? People are visual. They need more than talk, bullets and outlines. They need... well, they need pictures. It has to feel real.  

If you can create a series of pictures with minimal to no copy, and talk someone through how you work and consult like a mini-slide show (think on an iPad for instance) then you stop selling, and you start explaining in a very concrete way. This also holds you accountable to actually having a method and sticking to it. Which in turn makes you more of an expert every time you repeat these steps you’ve so vividly shared. It’s a win-win for upping the actual, as well as perceived, value of your expertise.

Braid Workshop Takeaways C

“I haven’t drummed up buzz around my business, because I think my personal peeps don’t want to hear about my business stuff or vision. Bombarding people with my products makes me feel like a used car salesman. So I undershare on the business side, and overshare on the personal side to make up for it. But I feel like I could sell better if I could share better.”

Frustration: Sharing Business Content and Why Should They Care?
When it comes to sharing content, Kathleen and I call this “sharing your gifts of knowledge” – this is the stuff you give away for free, through your blog or talks or conversations. That’s great if you are already doing it on your businesses blog, like this Braid blog here. But what about talking business in more personal platforms, like a personal blog, or in casual conversation?

Recommendation: Think More Behind-The-Scenes not Business Talk
Sharing (and showing) the stuff you know about should either be really helpful and useful, or it should feel like a peek behind-the-scenes. Showing people pictures or telling small, very specific stories about a creative project you got really excited about, or how you gather your materials and inspiration, is also a great way to inject a little more business talk into your personal world – where a lot of business ends up happening for us “out there on our own” entrepreneurs who depend on the people we know, and the relationships we make, to help our business grow, too.

Braid Workshop Takeaways D

“Other people tell me not to share myself online, like it’s bad from my business.”

“I have a personal blog, but it’s all over the place with different interests. I don’t really connect it to my business.”

“I do live a very colorful life, but for my personal brand, that’s in a very refined, measured way.”

Frustration: Sharing Personal Content and How Much is Too Much?
First, off, typically people who are telling us not to share too much online, maybe don’t understand the power of a personal brand, and how that really can flow into your business when you are a creative entrepreneur. Kathleen and I always say, you are not a robot. People want to buy from people.

Recommendation: How Much Is Truly Up To You, You’re The Boss, Right?
Owning your own business, as a creative, means that people expect you to be a creative, memorable, person. That means you can live-out-loud as much as you want – but only if that’s what you are really like in person. Because the flip-side of that, is if you are more conservative, and share less, then find a way to inject that more refined (yet still colorful) personal brand into how you talk about yourself and your business.  

It’s worth noting, just because you have a personal blog, doesn’t mean it has to overlap your business or business site, unless it’s a logical fit. If you like to blog about cooking, but you own a photography business, then keep the personal blog, personal. However, be sure the personal side of you (not the robot side) shows up to your business, too.  Bring some of that personal “spice” over into your tone of voice and style in your business site, blog, and brand.

Braid Workshop Takeaways E

“I have to just revel in who I am and what I love. And give people permission to not like me – or what I’m selling.”

Frustration: Trying to Appeal to Everyone (Overpleasing)
Being everything to everyone will wear you out with self-doubt and scattered focus. If your services seem like they are only for people who appreciate: quality, unique, creativity, authenticity – uh, that’s everyone.

Recommendation: Stop Doing That... Now
Get more specific, and get okay with letting go of the big crowd, for the smaller one who “gets it” and wants what you really do... more. This is hard in the beginning of a business, because you need the clients to gain the confidence and funds to keep going. That’s okay if you know how you want to narrow in (sooner rather than later). It’s also hard as you start to really grow. Because then your appeal starts to widen out on it’s own, and that feels great too. “I’m popular! People love this!” Kathleen and I are always trying to say, “okay, that’s awesome, but how can we get more specific, how can we stop doing x and y and only do z... even if that means not everyone will like it?”

For example, Kathleen and I are noodling what the next iteration of bringing this “sharing you while selling what you do” blended content to a group will look like. Is it a workshop again? Is it in more than one city? Or does it become an online offering any of you can access, like a future Braid ECourse or EBook?  We’re letting that percolate.  We know it’s going to be for creative entrepreneurs. But we may get more narrow, yet. Stay tuned, as we all keep figuring all this “stuff” out together.

Do you undersell your expertise? Do you overshare or undershare your personal brand? Do you overdeliver and overplease with your time and services? Let us know on Facebook.

In meantime, if you couldn’t attend our Braid Workshop, but are a creative entrepreneur (or aspiring-to-be) interested in blogging, or just bringing your personal brand more into your business, our Braid Ecourse: Personal Branding, Blending Who You Are With What You Do, is open for registration for $75, until May 24th, and is in session from May 24th through June 2nd.

Braid Workshops
Traveling And Working As A Creative Entrepreneur
May 02, 2013 Kathleen

When I worked as an art director at my nine-to-five job at an ad agency I would leave for a week of vacation with no concerns about work. (I was never what you would describe as a workaholic.) Tara, as a very important creative director, had the same policy – upper management and her team of designers and art directors, myself included, were given strict instructions to not call her while she was out of the office. Work was work, and vacation was vacation. The two shall remain separate and never meet. 

Tara and I have found many creatives work for themselves because travel is a priority – they insist on the flexibility to be able to set their own schedule and take time off without permission from upper management. But now I'm exploring the question of whether us creative entrepreneurs, myself included, have the flexibility (and balance) to travel and work – at the same time.

KEEPING WORK AND TRAVEL SEPARATE
During my first year of self-employment, back in the Fall of 2010, I took advantage of unlimited time off to trek through the Nepal Himalayas of Nepal. I used that adventure as an opportunity to completely unplug and find my breath in a new uncertain world of entrepreneurship. But it was cool, because 4 months into freelancing, doing mostly project work, I was able to completely clear my plate before departing for the other side of the world for a month. I also still maintained the philosophy that work and travel were like oil and water – never to mix.

I was chasing the same kind of unplugged adventure last summer when I went on a trek through the High Tatras mountains of Slovakia and Poland with my husband, Jeremy. I gave myself strict rules in hope to recreate my Nepal experience: no blogging, no emailing, no texting, no planning or even thinking about work. But the difference was Braid was just 6 months old and Tara and I were just starting to settle into our business vision of working solely with other creative entrepreneurs. We weren't only doing project work and branding identities for other creatives but also honing our own method, developing ecourses, and truly embracing our expertise. I was attached to my work because for the first time ever my work had a higher purpose. Forcing myself to unplug from it all for three whole weeks while backpacking in Eastern Europe felt a bit forced and unnatural. 

Work / Travel Quote

BLENDING WORK AND TRAVEL 
Last summer Tara went on a couple beach vacations and surprised herself when she felt the desire to check her emails and maybe even do a little bit of copywriting or brainstorming. She had a routine that involved going for a coffee run with her laptop first thing in the morning and after an hour or two of work she'd dedicate the rest of her day to vacation. She shared with me that it made her feel surprisingly productive. It also helped alleviate some of that dreaded "I gotta go back to work" feeling you get after vacation. (Yup, even when you're your own boss you still get inklings of that work-dread feeling. We love what we do for a living but I'd be lying if I said we didn't love lying on the beach – or trekking through the Himalayas – even more.) 

So this last week I went on my first of many summer vacations to Tulum Mexico. You can read about my picture-perfect adventures of swimming in a murky cenote and exploring the Mayan jungle here. Every morning I woke with the sun, wrote my morning pages, and downed 2 liters of water. In the afternoons I would lay on the beach and listen as Claire, a Braid client and friend, would read aloud from a book on Indian mythology. I would wear my favorite scarf as a shirt and would eat whole roasted fish for dinner every night. We sipped on cold white wine and made friends with locals and other travelers alike. But at the same time, and for the first time ever, I was attempting to kinda sorta work during my tropical time off. 

Every morning after yoga by the beach and a dip in the ocean I would eat a green smoothie, check my email, and work on a blog post in the hotel lobby – which subsequently was the only place I could plug my laptop in for electricity and get a somewhat unreliable wi-fi connection. I was committed to writing a blog post (it is a dream that blogging is a part of my job description) and would check my email to schedule life coaching for creatives and respond to client's needs. Some days I spent up to 3 hours working. Other days, maybe only 30 minutes. With an ecourse launch and our first real-life workshop coming up there were a few wrinkles to be ironed and fires to put out. But somehow, the distance from home made me feel a little less stressed, a bit more objective, and somewhat detached (in a zen way) about things that would usually have me all in a tizzy. I'm sure the ocean breeze and tropical sun didn't hurt either. And of course I'm lucky to have Tara, Kristin, Liz, and our Braid ECourse developer Emily holding down the fort in my absence. Even so, the little bit of work I could put in every day kept me feeling productive and connected to the job I love. 

MAINTAINING A WORK / TRAVEL BALANCE
I'm constantly emphasizing the importance for creative entrepreneurs to blend (and balance) who they are with what they do in order to create a dream job for themselves. I also love a routine to stay balanced. I fantasize about a day when I'm completely location independent, traveling the world, and able to work from anywhere. But I know that even as glamorous as that seems it probably comes with its own set of challenges to be navigated. So merging work and travel is a bit of an experiment in practicing what I preach, and leaning into my dream life, as I move into my summer vacations.

Work / Travel Balance

Here are some tips for work / travel balance based on my most recent kinda working vacation: 
• Set the expectation with your coworkers and clients that you will have limited availability while you're out on vacation. I told my team that my phone would be off, but that I would try to check my email when I could. If they heard from me it was a pleasant surprise and I never felt guilty when I chose not to work. 

• Let people know where you're going. I shared my travel plans with my dream customers in our wrap-up meetings and set my email auto-responder to let potential clients know that I would be kicking it in Tulum for a week. It makes my being "out of the office" response relatable and warm – and it was often received with enthusiasm with just a hint of jealousy. 

• Don't plan to do too much. Prior to this trip, I ambitiously had the idea to redesign our Braid website while on vacation. I'm really not sure what I was thinking. Knocking out a blog post and trying to maintain a zero inbox was plenty. 

• Find a time to work. While on vacation I would work at the hottest point of the day – between noon and 3PM when I wouldn't want to be out and about anyway. For Tara it was early in the morning before her kids would demand her attention. It might not be your typical work schedule, but setting a few rules for your temporary mini-routine, will keep you from dividing your attention from the fun you're supposed to be having. 

• Establish some boundaries. I couldn't help but check my email on my phone any time I could take advantage of the limited wi-fi. But when you're having a candle-lit dinner of a whole roasted fish under a full moon it's time to put the work away. I tried to keep the bulk of my work contained to a couple hours at the lobby juice bar.

• Do what you want. Sometimes that might mean working over kite surfing. Other times it may mean ditching the laptop for a Jeep and the jungle. 

We want to hear from you. Do you like to keep work and travel separate? What are some of your tips for maintaining a good work / travel balance? Let us know on Facebook. 

If you want to learn more about blending who you are and what you do check out our Personal Branding ECourse now open for registration. It's $75 (though, if you sign up for our Letters for Creative Entrepreneurs we typically send out exclusive discount codes) and will be in session from May 24 - June 2nd. In this course you'll learn how to identify and define your personal brand, blend the personal with the professional, and how to share your brand online and off.

Braid At Life & Work, Creative Business Visioning
When Your Creative Business Finally Feels Real
April 25, 2013 Tara

Kathleen and I spent last weekend way up on a hilltop in the Austin hill country in the home of artist Alyson Fox, at a workshop hosted by The Jealous Curator. Well, Kathleen will tell you, the “jealous” part worked – at least at first arrival (hint: it had a lot to do with being in a glass house an artist designed and built up on a hilltop).  But as we talked and asked and answered and laughed (and maybe cried a little, just a little) with this group of women designers, painters, authors, bloggers and photographers, the question that kept coming up around this circle of working creatives had a lot less to do with wishing we had created something jealousy-worthy, and instead was this – when do you finally feel like a “real” artist? What does it take to get to that place where you say, “okay, this is really what I do now, and who I am, and how I make a living?”

Is it when someone buys that first piece of work? Is it when you can afford to rent a studio that’s not in your home?  Is it when you have your first show? Or you first show not in your own town? Or you first show in a big city?  Is it when your design is picked up by a brand? When your work is published? The funny thing is, even as some of these “markers” of what makes it feel “real,” had been reached by some in the group already, they all had new making-it-real feelings that they hadn’t reached either. Like a mirage in a desert, feeling like you’ve finally arrived and/or become accomplished, is all shimmery and beckoning, and just keeps freaking moving farther ahead as you keep moving ahead, too.  

If you are in business for yourself, selling your talents or your creative products, you may not consider yourself an “artist” (apparently even artists have a really hard time giving themselves this title, as well) – but you can at least embrace the fact that you are a creative entrepreneur. And chances are, you are asking yourself a very similar question all the time. When does my business that I’ve created for myself, that I stuck my neck out for, that I frankly had a really hard time explaining to my friends, family, former coworkers – when does this business finally feel “real?” So I’ve listed just a few of these “make-it-real-markers” that I have thought myself, that I have heard from plenty of our creative clients, and that I really don’t have the answers for either! But see if any of them ring a bell (or conjure up a shimmery mirage) for you.

What's Going To Make Your Creative Business Feel Real

What is it going to take, for you to finally feel like what you do is real, and that the business you’ve created – is really real, too?

Is it the physical space where you work?
- finally, an office in your home with a door?
- or a backyard shedworking studio?
- a membership at a coworking space?
- a one room studio in the city you rent?
- an office space you design and build out?
- or is it simply being able to afford that new laptop and work from anywhere?

Is it the freedom to do what you want?
- to spend more time with your kids during the week?
- to stop commuting and take long hikes instead?
- to pursue a passion project?
- to be geographically independent and travel throughout the year?
- being able to take a sabbatical? or a whole year?

Is it the financial sustainability and stability?
- to be able to pay yourself a regular “salary?”
- to be able to hire an assistant?
- to be able to hire a staff?
- the ability to invest in redoing your website the way you want it?
- the knowledge that you could solely support yourself (without help)?

Or is it people just finally knowing about you?
- getting people (you don’t know) wanting to hire you because someone told them about you?
- getting comments on your blog (that aren’t your mom)?
- getting 100 “Likes” on your business Facebook page? 1,000? 10,000?
- getting sponsors who pay you to blog?
- being featured in a publication you admire?
- being asked to speak at a talk? a conference?
- getting a show? publishing a book?
- feeling a little (or a lot) famous for who you are, and what you do?

Okay, so these lists above are probably pushing a few of your “yes! that’s what it will take for me to feel legit!” buttons. But, there are probably some of your own unique ones, too. For Kathleen, it may be coaching a creative client in a video session from a completely different country, while wearing yoga pants. For me it’s getting through a full “tax” year, and everything is still possible and still standing, house, family (and our family vacation).  It’s also hearing a pretty famous client of ours saying how much she respected us sticking-to-our guns with our own Braid process and how much she got out of that process in the end.  I get emotional about our process, Kathleen likes travel and working from anywhere (wearing anything or hardly anything). You have your own thing.  And I really believe, that moment when someone else really “gets” your thing (and paid for it, yes, but also really got meaning from it), is one of the greatest markers of making it real.

What makes it all finally feel real for you? It can be small, silly, or huge! Sometimes just remembering that you were even reaching for a marker in the first place, makes it more real (before you decide you now want more). Tell us on Facebook.  

And thanks to the Jealous Curator for the workshop and all the revelations! You can see more pictures and takeaways at Kathleen’s blog here.

Our Braid Workshop: Sharing YOU and Selling What You DO is still open for registration. It’s $250, and on May 4 in Oklahoma City. Learn more and register here.

And our Braid ECourses are always open for enrollment. The Personal Branding Braid ECourse actually starts tomorrow, so today is your last day to register for this session. You can go do that for $75 here.

Braid At Life & Work, Creative Business Visioning