Kick Monday’s Ass: commit schmommit (Jan 10, 2022)

It’s time to Kick Monday’s Ass…

We’re 10 whole days into 2022… has your life changed yet?

OK, I’m being bit of an asshole over new year’s resolutions, I get it.

My frustration isn’t at the resolutions themselves… having a goal is great, as is aspiring to improve!

My struggle is with how we go about deciding to change… by simply imagining the end results. And yes, there’s merit to having a vision – because without one, any road will get you there.

But planning is key. Even better, making a plan that incorporates the inevitable lack of motivation or fall from the wagon.

This is something my life coach has been doing with me when we’re working on something I’m struggling with or resisting.

“Is there something you want to commit to this week?” he’ll ask.

“I want to re-commit to writing in the morning,” I reply.

“Great,” he says. “How many days do you want to commit to? What time are you aiming for?”

“I’ll go for Friday and Saturday morning at 9 am,” I tell him, confident that this is a promise to myself I finally won’t break.

“Awesome,” he says. “What are you going to write about?”

“I’ve got a couple articles I want to bang out – about Christmas adventures and my year in review,” I respond.

“Excellent. What will you do if something gets in the way… say your alarm doesn’t go off, or you get a bad night’s sleep? How will you recover?”

That last bit right there? That’s the secret sauce.

That’s the piece that allows me to be an imperfect human being who can occasionally fall short but still strive for better.

Every time I commit to something, he walks me through this process. You’d think it’d be second nature by now, but it’s something I still struggle with to the point that I need to focus on it every week or lapse into old, comfortable (and not very helpful) patterns.

So now that we’re ten days in, my challenge to you is to commit (or re-commit) to a personal or professional goal. When you do it, ask yourself:

  • how many days am I committing to this?
  • what time am I blocking out for this on those days?
  • how am I going to do it/what will I need to do to fulfill that commitment?
  • what will I do if something distracts me or derails my plans?

Your future self will thank you.

Last week on the podcast…

The climb to becoming the “guru” or the “go-to” can seem like an unscalable mountain. After 16 years in business and working with thousands of entrepreneurs, my guest Mícheál O’Neill has made that climb.

The key to his success? He didn’t wait to be anointed an expert… he took calculated steps forward, focused on establishing his expertise at each step along the way. This episode is full of gems to transform your mindset to become an expert (hint: you’ve already got expertise in at least a couple things just by surviving this long).

If you’ve been struggling with how to be the expert with your business, click here to listen to this one.

Section 42: Life, The Universe, and Everything…

Turns out a pretty drastic acclimation has to happen in your body when you move from humid, swampy Houston directly to the cold, mildly snowy desert/mountains of Santa Fe.

Also, snow in the desert is kinda wild. I like it. And my apartment comes with a real-life hobbit hole. I REALLY like that.

This weekend I got to meet up with local friend Liz Farr (https://farrcommunications.com/) for some awesome beer and a mind-bending trek through an immersive art house called Meow Wolf. I went face-first into an interdimensional dryer, and it was intense (click here to see it on my Insta).

In addition to hydrating about 5x as hard as I’m used to, I’m also adjusting to flying solo for food again. I tell you, having a pastry chef (or any kind of chef) for a mom = total spoiling.

Cooking for one sucks. I’m about to go back on my all-sandwich-with-occasional-restaurant-trips diet. Brace yourself for more food pics on all my social channels. Except today, because even though I’m eating a delightful quiche and spinach salad as I write this, dumbass here forgot to bring her phone.

It was tasty… you’ll have to trust me.

Marketing Minute…

So you have a new promotion coming up. Assuming you’ve got the four Ps (product, pricing, positioning, and people) all worked out… now what?

Every strong campaign starts with knowing what you want your people, your potential customers to do next.

Do you want them to sign up? Hit reply? Click to read? Buy now? Forward this to someone?

Each marketing piece you create should have one very clear priority that drives them to take an action.

Then you have to figure out how to inspire them to do the thing you want them to do, and you do that by figuring out two key pieces of info:

  • where they were just before they saw this marketing piece
  • what they’ll see next after they’ve taken the action you want them to

Every piece I create, I ask myself those two questions. That helps me understand whether I need landing pages, or downloads, or follow-up emails that drip out the info they need.

This is how, step by step, I build out complex multi-channel promos… but you can use it for a new product rollout, a welcome sequence, or any other marketing piece you’re working on.

This is where empathy and imagination can be your secret superpowers.

Clearly visualize yourself as the skeptical consumer. Pretend you’re seeing everything for the first time, with zero context or background info…

When you can do this and truly understand your potential customer’s perspective, then you’ll see the gaps in the messaging and be able to fill them before they cause confusion for your people.

On repeat this week…

One of my words for 2022 is “joy”. To celebrate a year of commitment to joy, I bring you Feeling Good by the one and only Nina Simone.

Rock on,
Angie
___________

Stars when you shine
You know how I feel
Scent of the pine
You know how I feel

Oh, freedom is mine
And I know how I feel

It’s a new dawn
It’s a new day
It’s a new life
For me
And I’m feeling good

 

kickass-angie

ANGIE COLEE

If you’re an aspiring freelancer who’s working up the courage to leave the day job… good news! I’m sharing all the things I WISH I’d known before making the leap so that hopefully your journey goes a little more smoothly than mine.

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