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Hands up if you are a “old” millennial like me, you know that like 35-ish age where we just made it in.
We are the kids who’ve watched the internet evolve from the very early stages {remember those AOL days?} to where we are today.
We’ve also observed Its evolution in business as well. I started my business back in 2011, and back then, it was so different than it is now. Everyone was so much more engaged with your content and there were no such thing as algorithms or Facebook Ads—and everyone was able to see your content.
It was a whole different world.
Seeing this evolution means that we’ve also noticed certain trends and phases that happen with a business. For instance, I’ve seen so many amazing women resist business automation in their business because they did not want to lose the heart of what they started their business for.
They want to feel more connected to their audience—and I completely get this because we’ve made a big mistake in the online space; after all, we’re all humans on social media, right?
As humans, we tend to live in the extremes by default. So if you think of a pendulum and It’s going to swing all the way to one side or swing all the way to the other, and that tends to be how we live until we can find that middle ground.
Until we can get it to swing to the middle, we tend to have high highs and low lows and we tend to be attracted to that. We need to have a very intentional decision to achieve that middle balance.
This tends to be the reason why a lot of diets are more of those fad diets where It’s like, “Oh my God, I was so perfect for two weeks.” –A perfect example of the pendulum swinging one way. Then, all of a sudden, you think “forget this, pass me the chips.” As the pendulum swings the other way.
The real success happens in that happy medium and we have to be aware that you’re on the pendulum swing in order to actually get to that medium; and like I said, we need to be very intentional about this.
This happy medium is how you can achieve long-term results. It’s the only way you can really succeed at any area of life— or business because, well, business is no different.
Automation in business
Over the past 3-4 years, we’ve seen a very big pendulum shift and that is in automation. This has been shown in everything from automating your sales, your social, your team, your emails—basically automating all the things.
It made sense though because before that the pendulum swung the other way where everyone was doing all the things and wearing all the hats.
They were trying to show up on all the platforms and trying to do so much as just one person. This lead to huge spikes in burnout as Entrepreneurs were just crumbling under the pressure of having everything on the weight of their own shoulders.
So, automation came in as the solution to that big swing in the pendulum. It basically promised to fix all of this for you by allowing you to automate and take back your time. This would be great except that humans were behind it.
The problem with over-automating in business
So what happened? Automation swung the pendulum all the other way.
People got too reliant on automation; and what started to happen is, although we all got our time back, we no longer felt connected to our audiences. We lost touch with what was going on, like we weren’t even in it. We stopped feeling the excitement.
This is because it got way too extreme and people didn’t know how to find the happy medium. The only two options were to either completely automate everything or get one-on-one reliant, serve all the people, do all the things, and show up on all the platforms.
People decided they were against business automation and went back to what they were doing and creating the same problem that was never truly solved.
The overwhelm and burnout is still very much prevalent in business today and It’s the very reason why Freedom Driven Success exists—to help you find that middle ground again.
Creating customized experiences
So, what is that middle that allows you to have everything? Right now, we are in a huge shift where people have realized they’ve over-automated all the things, but also don’t want to be burnt out.
The middle is what becomes customized experiences. This is where the heart of your business actually is as you continue to scale.
So if you’ve been afraid of scaling because more people means you’re going to lose what you love, customize experiences, are what you are going to want to start implementing no matter where you’re at.
So if you’re wondering why you keep seeing so many live events going on in the online space right now, It’s because It’s a customized experience. It’s because people are hardwired for connection—this hasn’t changed and It’s why you need to find that middle ground of how you can connect with your audience.
You need to figure out how you can be the best “you” that you can be while still putting systems in place, automating certain pieces, and being there for other pieces.
This middle ground is going to be that customized experience. Now someone reading this might say, “Oh, I’m not trying to throw an event, I have zero interest in doing that.” In which case I get it, for instance, I don’t enjoy throwing parties at my house and being a hostess—It’s just not me, It’s overwhelming and stresses me out.
However, the great thing about that for us is that there are a million different ways to give the same customized experience without it being an event. So don’t let that be the thing that holds you back.
Or if you’re cool with having an event, great, keep it simple and let it grow from there.
I want to give you a couple of different options that are budget friendly and that are both simple and complex so that you can pull what’s best for you—and some are going to be so freaking easy, you’ll wonder why you didn’t think of them in the first place.
Remember when you would apply for a job and then right after they’d say, send a handwritten note as well and most people would think “who does that??” THAT is why you do it. Because most people won’t think of that as we go through this.
Budget friendly options to help you find that happy medium
Happy Mail
After all, who doesn’t enjoy receiving a good piece of mail that isn’t a bill or takeout flyer? Here you are getting mail from someone who is making you smile and YOU can be that person for your audience. Whether a passive or leveraged offer, or a one-on-one session, the possibilities are endless.
There are several ways you can send someone mail:
- Handwritten. Simply go to the store, get a $5 box of really cute cards and send a handwritten note to someone in your audience or someone who just purchased something from you or someone on social media (If there’s a PO Box for them). Let’s not forget It’s the little things that matter the most. We get so caught up with the systems and automation that handwritten items definitely stand out. I personally LOVE handwritten notes and get super emotional and geeky when I read it.
- Postable. If you’ve never used postable before, you need to check it out. Through their platform, you can set up postcards and envelopes to go out to your clients and colleagues with a personalized touch. We use these right now for our clients to courses members where they get a really cute welcome card to make them feel appreciated. It’s also pretty affordable to use for your business.
- Greetabl. This is a gifting platform we use quite frequently. Now this one can be a bit pricey with most gifts ranging from $10-$50 per item. Their gift boxes include a wide variety of things like candies, personal care products, and other novelty items. It’s a fun and unique way to send gifts out to your “people”. Sometimes, I go through and pull names/addresses of past/current customers and send them something from their. This helps me keep my heart in my business and still keep those personal relationships going.
DM love bomb
So the second thing that I love doing behind the scenes is what I call the “DM love bomb”. There are people right now that are following you and people you are following. I do this with both.
Regardless of whether or not these are people who are my peers, or potential clients or buyers, everyone is on the same page for me.
As I see their posts, if I see someone who’s been stepping out of their comfort zone lately or has just shared something that was really good or made me think of something, I will send them a message privately and just say, you know what, I’ve been seeing this and I say what I appreciate about it and that’s it. Then I’m done. No trying to sell them on anything.
The whole point of it is to let them know I see them, think they’re doing awesome, and tell them to keep it up. If it turns into a conversation and we’re just chatting beyond that, that’s fine but again, It’s just a way to keep your heart in the business and let people know you see them.
Same thing goes with people following you on platforms such as Instagram for instance, where It’s easier to pull up a list of people who are following you and it can be something as simple as complimenting their recent picture of their lunch. Anything to just make someone’s day!
So if you are someone who is automating your social posts, you can still make this part personal.
Public shout out.
Doing a public shout out to someone who is rocking something what you teach or as a listener or viewer, it can help you give people the recognition they deserve for being awesome. This can be done by sharing their content or simply telling people to go check them out {either through a post or story}.
Find reasons to celebrate them, help them feel more confident, and congratulate them for showing up and getting results.
Gifts.
Everyone’s a little different so this one could vary but for me personally, I am an absolute sucker for creating homemade gifts for people. I just absolutely love it.
I enjoy going to Michael’s and creating things which isn’t too surprising since I was an art major in school. But if you’re not much into creating, you can always purchase things like flowers or chocolates as gifts.
This is why services such as Greetabl come in handy because you can customize the gifts so they’re more personal without you having to actually create it yourself. This helps me keep my heart in my business.
Hosting an event.
There are a lot of options for events and at the end of the day, it really depends on how you like to work best. Here are a couple of ideas:
- Pop up event. If you have an audience in a certain area that you happen to be traveling to, you could host a pop-up event. Simply send out a mass message asking who will be in the area and who’d be interested to meet up. It’s a great way to connect and see the people who are within your audience.
- Hosting an event for peers. This is great for fellow colleagues/clients who each have a different area of expertise. It allows everyone to come together, hang out, and share ideas with one another. I myself began hosting retreats for the women in The Collective as well as peers to create more connected experiences.
Business automation can be a great thing
Hopefully by now, you understand that automation can be a great thing as long as you’re finding other ways to stay connected to your audience in the process.
It’s important to find that balance and it will allow you to scale and automate without losing the heart in your business.
So with that said, I’d love to connect with all of you, please visit my Instagram page and let me know which one of these things you’d like to try with your audience; or if you already are, let me know which one you are doing.
Although we are in an ever-evolving society and social media world, the world absolutely wants to hear from you; and this is how we keep that middle ground!
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