Welcome to episode 448 of Hit the Mic with The Stacey Harris. I’m, of course, The Stacey Harris, host of this show, social media strategist and trainer and, of course, CEO of the digital marketing agency Uncommonly More. I’m going to get a little sharesy today because I want to really demonstrate how having a plan and having a strategy and building these pieces out, is an act of self-care for me and my business.
So to start with, I want to kind of flashback to the very first week of April. I had an amazing, amazing time at a retreat with my coach and my mastermind in Tulum, Mexico. It was a wonderful, amazing, crazy, just everything I needed week. I come back, the second week of April, back in my office, back in the swing of things and I was experiencing some growing pains. That’s kind of the best way I can describe them. I was really moving through what I wanted next and some changes that I wanted to make and a little bit of frustration that I didn’t come back and everything was just already changed while I was in Mexico. Because that’s always what I want to happen, it’s never what actually happens.
And so I spent a little time being frustrated by that and trying to find my way out on my own. And I, over the course of the rest of April and into the beginning of May, I was getting more and more and more and more frustrated that things weren’t changing, really, that things weren’t already changed, that my business hadn’t already made the shift. I was a little bit frustrated with this podcast and what was happening here. I was frustrated with how my offerings looked and the things I wanted to do.
And it was leaning into also having some frustrations and some scarcity around if what I wanted to be possible, was actually possible. If I could do the things, that I was designing my business. And the reality was that, as I am now and as I was then, just a few weeks ago really, isn’t who I need to be and who I am as I move forward. And I was really running into my own resistance to the growth that I’m doing to achieve that next checkbox for me. I don’t like next level because I don’t think there’s sort of some ultimate level, but sort of the next evolution of who I am as a business owner and what these businesses look like and the impact I want to have, really. And really stepping into owning the impact I want to have, on not just a small scale within my circle, but really, really, really big impacts in the world.
And so I was running into a lot of resistance. And I was isolating, I was isolating hard. And luckily, my amazing coach pulled me out and was like, what the heck is happening, what’s going on, let’s figure out a way through this, which I’m so, so grateful for. And this is why we have coaches and this is why we have masterminds, this is why we have support systems. Use them if you’re feeling any of this is really resonating with you right now. Use your resources. If you don’t think you have any resources DM me, I will help you find resources.
Having a strategy vs not having a strategy.
But it was a matter of figuring out, sort of, like who I needed to be. But let’s take a step back let’s sort of look at everything objectively. Uncommonly More, my agency has a strategy. And the Uncommonly More team executes that strategy. Really, right now, the bulk of what the Uncommonly More forward-facing social marketing is, is a proof of concept. It’s a, hey, this is what we do, this is what it looks like. We are not currently getting Uncommonly More clients through Instagram. We’re getting them currently, in this six-month-old baby, through people who know me, relationships, referrals to me. But that marketing is still ticking away. And if you looked at any of that marketing, at any point during this several week period, you’d have had no idea that there was anything going on with me, because there’s a plan and there’s a team that executes it.
Now, if you look at The Stacey Harris, there were a couple of photos, and I’m actually, I have got my phone in my hand and I’m pulling up my Instagram, because I want to be really, really honest about this. There was a photo I took while I was in Mexico, the day I got to Mexico. And there was a photo that went up the Friday I got back. There was a photo that went up a few days later, promoting the April Backstage LIVE day. There was a photo that went up April 26th. So there was nothing between April 9th and April 26th. And then that was the last photo that went up before just last week. I’m recording this the Tuesday before you guys hear it on Thursday, because I wanted to have this conversation with you.
There’s nothing. Radio silence. If I look at my archive for my stories, I posted a few things here and there. Very little of it was my face and even the things that were my face, were a still photo of my face and text. Even less of it was me actually talking on video. If you look at my other social channels, like Facebook and LinkedIn and Twitter, the only stuff that went out on LinkedIn and Twitter was recycled stuff. The stuff that I’d have to make the effort to have [stop 00:06:17] it, really. A couple of things went up here and there on Facebook. Basically, just hey, there’s a new episode of the podcast, go listen. Even the tone of the content I shared is different, because I was working through some stuff, because I had not done the work to put a strategy in place and have my team support me so that I could have this blip, because we all have these blips. So that I could have this valley, because we all have these valleys.
And that is why I then, a couple of weeks ago, recommitted to getting really strategic with what I’m doing with The Stacey Harris. A, I had to reconnect with, like, genuinely, what the heck I’m doing with The Stacey Harris? What is the point of this podcast, of this side of my business, of this brand as a whole? What impact is it going to have? What is my mission with this space? And I had to really step into being the disruptor that I would like to be in this space, even if it pisses you off, which was hard for me. Which is funny because I’m not what most people would consider a people pleaser, even kind of.
But you and I have been together a while. I mean, this is Episode 448 of this show. I didn’t want to do anything that would mess that up, but also I’d been in such massive resistance to building or, really, executing the same strategy I’d been using over and over and over and over for a couple of years now. Rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat. Because there was something a little more disruptery, and that’s a word, we’re going with it, that I wanted to do. And so I had to own that. I had to step into that. And I did. It took a little break from the show. It took that stepping back from social.
But because of the overall strategy, I had built for my business, I knew where some of the landmarks were and so it was really easy for me to put together a plan and start working it. I could identify, hey, this thing is happening, this is not me, this is not who I am, here’s what I need to do. And a big part of that was leaning on my support system. Leaning on my coach who made me check in with her daily for two weeks, and I’m past the two weeks now I think, and still checking in nearly daily. Because I don’t want to slip back and I’m still in uncomfortable territory. I’m saying this to you from not the middle, but not all the way out either. Okay? Just transparency.
So I leaned on my system. I leaned on my supports.
I found the people that I needed to help keep me from sliding back. I also did the things I know I need to do to support myself mentally, to keep me at my best. That meant the ocean. That meant movement. That meant space and time, which is something that I … When I go into resistance, I isolate and I work a lot. I work a lot. Because it’s easy for me to hide in my work. I can’t possibly have anything wrong, I’m working all the time. That’s great, productive. I’m achieving things. That’s not, generally, actually a positive. And so I stopped, I identified and I figured out what works for me. So I started resting more, built in some time off, built in some breaks, spent a lot of time walking the beach. It’s a big part for me.
And then some of the little stuff. I am somebody who always has a bottle of champagne in the fridge, because you never know when you’re going to need to celebrate life. And one of the things I often do is I will preemptively celebrate. I will grab the champagne and we will toast to whatever is about to happen. It’s amazing the energetic shift that happens when I do that. And so we did little things like that. And I say we because it’s not just me, it’s my community, it’s my family, it’s all the people in my life. Right?
And then I went back to work. And when I say I went back to work, I mean, I went back to my strategy. Like I said, I have my big picture strategy. I know where my landmarks are, as I talk about during Backstage LIVE. I know the things, the boxes I need to check to meet my financial goals. I knew I had another Backstage LIVE event coming up here in June, we’ve got it going on next week. And I went, okay, I’m essentially going to do a mini version of Backstage LIVE. And I DIY-ed my own little Backstage LIVE and I ran through all the things we do during that day.
I looked at who I was talking to, I looked at what I wanted to sell them, I looked at what that meant I needed to do and I built myself list and I started doing it. I started recording podcast episodes. I started building social posts. And we’ve had content going out almost daily for the last week. And because we’re in a launch period, ahead of Backstage LIVE, we have content going out almost daily for the next week, because I know that this content will speak directly to the people who I want to be joining us in Backstage LIVE.
In fact, I shared a really, kind of icky, like it felt weird to post … Not icky, like it was gross to you guys, but it felt very revealing to share it, about faux marketing and this idea that we’re going through the motions of marketing without actually doing the work, because that’s what I’ve been doing. I had been zombieing 00:12:40 my way through this stuff, pretending, doing the things I needed to do to make myself feel like I was doing what I needed to do.
And I caught myself, thank goodness. Mostly because I was, literally, pushed out of it by my coach, but I caught myself even as I started to slide into those habits in the last few days, where it’d be like, oh, well, I could just say this. No, I could say what I actually mean. And that’s what more of this podcast is. That’s what the episode, we talked about Myspace, was about this. It was about me not pretending to market. It was about me owning who I wanted to be and what I wanted to say in this space. When we talk about results, when we talk about all of the things we’ve talked about in these last few weeks, that conversation I had with Racheal Cook where we’re talking about perfectionism. Like, I wanted to have some more honest conversations with you guys and I’m not letting myself back out from that. But I’m able to stay in the room with that because I have the support of this plan.
And I just did another version of it for my Q3.
So I re-did planning I had already done, so that I could do it through these new filters. I could do it through these new lenses, maybe less filters. So that I was in alignment with who I wanted to be talking to and what I wanted to be saying to you guys, but also so that I have someplace to land on those days where I’m like, I don’t know, this feels weird, I just want to go hide in my work. Because that’s where I hide, I hide in doing. And so instead of that, I have some doing that I can do that’s also going to move me forward. It’s also going to move the needle in my business. It’s going to move those revenue and those profit numbers, which are critical because, I mean, love you, but this podcast isn’t for funsies, it’s to drive traffic to whatever the next thing is.
And so having that landing spot, being able to do that work and align my doing with something that had an impact, with my impact, was self care in a way that isn’t pedicures and isn’t therapy and isn’t facials and isn’t, you know, meditation, it isn’t all these important, wonderful things, but it is very critical self care for me as a business owner and for me as an entrepreneur. I took some time to do the thing that I teach you guys to do all the time, and I did it for myself and it was the most wonderful gift I could give myself.
And that’s why I really challenge you, if you feel at all like this faux marketing thing is punching you in the gut, where you’re like, oh wait, yeah, maybe I did kind of phone that launch in. Or, oh yeah, maybe I am moving through, like, pretending to grow my email list or pretending to do content that is just, kind of, good enough. If you’re feeling that, I want you to reconnect with two things. Why are you doing this? What is the impact you want to have? What is your mission? That has been so valuable for me to reconnect with and I’m so, so grateful to Tara Newman, who is my coach and who runs The BRAVE Society, for really talking a lot about this mission piece.
And then stepping into building an action plan and a strategy, when I feel good, that can support me and be something I can work through. Even when I don’t feel great, even when I’m in the valley instead of at the peak, even when I’m in those down times, I have a piece to lean on, to support me, to get going. I can schedule things and create things when I’m feeling great, so that when I have these times where I do want to isolate, because I’m somebody who does occasionally needs to withdraw a little bit, it doesn’t impact my business the way me taking four or five weeks and completely phoning it in did, and we’ll continue.
I’m a big proponent that the marketing, or the results you’re getting right now, from the marketing you did three to six months ago. So I’m going to feel that time off for a little while now. And so I’m making every effort right now to make sure I can bounce back from that quickly. And that means doing this work so that I’m not continuing to extend any bump that I get from phoning it in. And I own that, that was my issue and my choice.
And so I want to make sure that you have the support piece for you.
That you have this self-care, this business self-care built in. And build the strategy. And that’s why we have Backstage LIVE, and we’re coming together again next week for it. I highly, highly recommend you join us. If you have not joined us for Backstage LIVE before, it is a full day event. We’re doing it virtual in June so that you can build your marketing plan, your 90-day marketing strategy. And here’s the great thing, this is rinse and repeat. This is something you can do over and over and over again.
And that’s when I love, Erica Courdea, who’s a speaker and a writer, she left a testimonial, she joined us for the last virtual Backstage. And she said, “Backstage LIVE created a blueprint that I can use to create ease in my business over and over again. But doing it with Stacey is where the magic happens. She sees where you can get the most out of your marketing without working constantly. And by creating a plan, you take the guesswork out of what to do each day. She breaks it down in a way that makes sense and simplifies how you share your message to make an impact. This is how you invest in your business.”
The most important part of that for me though, is, “Backstage LIVE created a blueprint that I can use to create ease in my business over and over again.” You’re literally going to get a workbook that you can work through each and every quarter to build this plan. I’m doing a version of this workbook, for me, as I go into June and I do my 2020 planning. It’s all the same questions, I’m just applying it to a longer timeframe. And then I will break it down into those quarters as we move closer to next year, where we get deeper into the content stuff.
I want you to have that too, so that you can navigate these times, so that you can navigate those peaks and valleys that happen in your business, because they happen to all of us. I don’t want you to think that I have this all figured out so it never happens to me, but I also don’t want you to think that there’s not a solution, because there is a solution. Being able to lean in … Literally, I use this workbook to get myself out of this and to rebuild what I needed to build. I’m using it again as I roll out my Q3 stuff again.
I want you to have that same tool, so make sure you join us. You can go over to the website, thestaceyharris.com/backstagelive, to grab your seat for the June 6th event. If you would rather do this in person, we have a September event happening here in Southern California. If you’d rather do this one on one, send me a message and we’ll figure that out. I don’t want you to use those things as an excuse. Find the way to do this work that works for you. Because this work is again, your entrepreneurial self-care, so find a way to get it done. All right?
All right. I will now put the soapbox away and I will bring this episode to a close. I hope to see you next week for Backstage LIVE. I hope to hear from you. I’ve been loving getting your DMs. We got a ton of DMs last week, after last week’s show, and I really, really loved it, talking about the pink hair and the personal brand and all of that. That was definitely part of … I put that strategy together and I was like, okay, so what is the thing that I actually need to say, that I actually want to talk about? I also found out that so many of you also love Jem and the Holograms, I which I’m super excited about. Because generally speaking, people are like, who are you talking about, what is that? Which is just not okay.
So thank you for listening, thank you for being a part of this community. I’m truly grateful that you’re here. So I will see you at Backstage LIVE and, of course, we’ll be here together again next week for Episode 449. Have a great rest of your week.
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