Control Your Shop When It's Running Your Life

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Okay, you’ve done it. You’ve created a shop. You’re getting sales. This is finally working. But damn, where did all your time go?!? You could be hitting this wall and still be part-timing your shop while working another job. Maybe you’re not even there yet and you have very little orders coming in, but you feel overwhelmed with your shop and your sales aren’t cutting it for the time you’re spending. Or possibly this is your full-time gig that’s taking up 80 hours a week and you feel like your drowning. Regardless if you feel like you’re not drowning but just looking for some tips to not get to this point - I’m here to help!

I hit this point about three times so far in the five years of working from home. Each time I was a different example that I just shared, but each time it happened it was due to business growth. My life felt like I was failing it, but I was making money and business is a hustle and hustle should be hard right? WRONG. When the actual eff did we as a society romanticize the feeling of being burned out and tired and how on earth did ‘the grind’ become good in business? This is a STUPID mentality and if you have this you should kick it to the curb real quick. You got into this business to do what YOU want, right? You started this business to make some money, right? You wanted financial freedom, right? You wanted to schedule your own workdays, right? THEN WHY DO WE THINK OVERWORKING, HUSTLE ‘TIL YOU DIE MENTALITY AND ALWAYS WORKING IS A GOOD THING? It’s not. And I’m guessing you feel that way too if you're here reading this. So at least WE are on the same page!

SO WHAT DO I DO ABOUT IT?

Let’s be clear, you are running your business. You own it. You’re in charge. So whatever you say goes, right? Okay. If you feel overwhelmed by your business it means that you are running yourself. Ouch. I know I suck, but it’s true. Your business can only do what you tell it to. So if you’re bursting at the seams with orders you implemented something that made more orders come, did you implement a quicker, better or faster way to fill your orders? No? It’s okay - things happen. But do you get where I’m going with this? Okay, good… So here are some things to try to get back on track and RUN your business efficiently and effectively.

AUTOMATION

Do you wish there could be two of you? That’s sort of what automation is like! Basically automation is done in the form of schedulers and trigger services that you set and forget! Here are some ways to implement automation into your business.

-You can use programs like Later or Planoly to schedule Instagram and Facebook or even use Tailwind to schedule Pinterest posts. They all have free versions, but the paid options lets you have a ton of more options and more things to schedule at a time! At the very least you can schedule Facebook posts through Facebook page’s publishing scheduler. You could also use a program called IFTTT which is a trigger service that you set up that can take a post you put on Instagram and repost the same thing, automatically every time to Facebook, Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter and more. You will need to set up each action to happen, however - but you only have to do it once or until you change your password. Also, setting up Mailchimp and sending monthly emails are a great way to hone in on having subscribers and guaranteeing that info is getting to your MVPs without emailing or messaging them individually. I was spending an hour each day posting to my social pages, pinning, commenting and more and now I sit and schedule a whole month at a time and it takes about five hours for the month.

-If you’re spending a lot of time bookkeeping maybe Quickbooks is for you! If you have an Etsy shop, sign up through there under “Finances” because they always have some sort of coupon code going. I like my finance strategy so I have no done this, but many shop friends have.

-Create emails that send to your customers after they buy. If you haven’t already set this up for sure. This will automatically send your customers info on when to expect their order and more which will cut down on them emailing you - thus saving you time.

-Get a drop shipper. This may be a really hard pill to swallow for some, but if your business is getting so large and you either have to hire a lot of help or buy expensive quicker equipment paying someone else to do your order fulfillment for you may be better. you may make less at first per item, but since you aren’t spending the time making your items you’ll have time for more which is a fair trade-off. I recommend Printful and Printify and if you want to know more about dropshipping click HERE.

HIRE HELP

This is a scary thought, yes, but in the long run, this is a lot of people’s best business decisions. Essentially your business is your baby and you’re hiring a baby sitter!

-Get a VA. That’s shorthand for a virtual assistant. You can find them online or hire one from a place like Upwork. They do a variety of tasks, but all remotely so they never come to your office. You can have them answer all emails, respond to shop messages, handle your social media schedulers, create graphics, etc. However, be clear with what you want from them, accept their pricing and working schedule and be sure to get reviews or recommendations.

-Hire in house help. This is where you need to differentiate between an employee and an independent contractor so you can be sure you are hiring someone legally and you can talk this over with your CPA or business coach/ mentor. But hiring someone to assemble orders, work beside you, work while on your vacation, etc could save your business.

-Outsource cooking, cleaning, childcare, shopping and more. This may seem strange but bear with me. If you are making a decent amount hourly maybe your LIFE is actually what needs the outsourcing. Say in a week you spend 14 hours prepping breakfast, lunch and dinner everyday for you or your family, 6 hours doing laundry, 4 hours cleaning, 10 hours picking up your kids or taking them places and 4 hours grocery shopping - that’s 38 hours. Yes, you’re maybe a parent or head of your household and this is maybe the “real job you signed up for” but will your family suffer if you pay $25 for Instacart or Prime Now to get your groceries for you? Will they suffer if a cleaning service cleans the house for $100 a week? Will they suffer if they had more quality time to spend with you as a mother’s helper or babysitter watched them while you worked? NO. I don’t have kids and use grocery delivery services weekly because I make more hourly working than paying a company $25 to shop for me for three hours. If you’re in the same boat outsourcing may be the thing for you!

RAISE YOUR PRICES

Okay, yes I know this REALLY doesn’t make sense but, again, bear with me. If you make about $100 profit a week and you work ten hours a week, that means you’re making $10/hr. Now do that math for yourself. Are you happy with your numbers? No? Yes? If not raising your prices, even minimally, can make a huge deal. Say you raise ALL of your prices by $.50. This year you make 1000 sales. That’s $500 extra that you made by making your time more valuable. However, you should make sure your items are priced appropriately too.

CREATE A WORK SCHEDULE AND STICK WITH IT

“But Melissa! I didn’t want a schedule - that’s why I started this business!” Well, yeah, but a business needs a schedule and disciplined workers. This schedule can be pretty relaxed, but I recommend not starting it that way. I set mine up easily. You can use scheduling apps to keep track of your time or just have a better idea of your time by creating working hours.

FOCUS

-Stick with what is making money. Does 2% of your shop traffic come from Instagram and 30% comes from Pinterest? Stop spending time on Instagram and move to Pinterest. Are you spending HOURS making your graphics and marketing materials perfect? Do you get hundreds of guaranteed sales from them immediately? Probably not. Stop spending that much time. Done is better than perfect. Focus solely on what is making you money and when you have time do the rest.

-Stop effing around. Are you on your phone’s social media half the workday? Do you take personal calls and chat for a while? Nope. Knock it off. Create work hours and turn your phone on do not disturb so you can focus on your work. This may not be your phone for you. Maybe you need to not binge tv and work. Get a Spotify account and listen to music instead.

STOP SELLING

-Do you have a product that is such a headache to create, make, ship or has a lot of problems? It may even be a best seller but is money worth your sanity? Probably not. Stop selling it or find a different way to sell it, like dropshipping.

-Close up shop. This is really hard to say, but if you are so overrun, burnt out and tried everything, maybe this shop life isn’t for you. Put your shop on vacation mode and fulfill the orders you currently have. Either close up shop completely and try something new or completely reinvent the way you do business with YOU in mind and reopen when ready.