In today’s episode of the podcast I share insights from my personal challenges in gardening and how these experiences mirror the overwhelm many people feel with their marketing. It’s not uncommon for entrepreneurs and businesses to struggle navigating all the different strategies, tools, and advice out there. 

I’m unpacking six key insights that will offer clarity and direction so you can ditch the overwhelm and start seeing results through your marketing efforts. 

We’ll talk about setting clear marketing goals, choosing the right content that aligns with those goals, and the importance of staying focused and avoiding distractions. 

Marketing is something that I’m naturally good at and I’m going to give you real actionable advice that is going to help you see progress in your business and make your marketing strategies more efficient while cutting down on the stress and overwhelm. 

So, if you’re ready to tackle your marketing overwhelm head-on, hit play now and let’s dive in!

Key Takeaways:

• Define Your Goals:

• Identify your specific marketing goals and what you aim to accomplish.
• Consider the next 90 days and establish a clear vision for your marketing efforts.
• Understand how your goals tie into overall business growth and revenue targets.

• Filter Your Content:

• Choose content that aligns with your goals and supports your marketing objectives.
• Prioritize consuming relevant material that can genuinely move the needle for your business.
• Embrace the ability to save or bookmark content for future reference without losing focus.

• Develop a Focused Mindset:

• Avoid information overload by staying intentional with your actions and consumption.
• Successful entrepreneurs are open to change and are not bound by past strategies.
• Being agile and willing to pivot is essential for sustainability and growth.

• Focus on Overlooked Areas of Marketing:

• Pay attention to areas of marketing that are often overlooked or underutilized.
• Build a routine that incorporates learning and implementing marketing strategies consistently.
• Trust in your ability to make informed decisions and adapt your strategies as needed.
  

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Tired of inconsistent revenue & marketing strategies that leave you overwhelmed? Apply & book a call to see how we can help: http://helpmystrategy.com

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READ THE EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Emily Hirsh

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the podcast. Happy Week. I will be in Costa Rica when this episode comes out. I’m gonna leave you with a cliffhanger on that. I will share the story maybe soon, but I actually won’t be doing Iowa and Costa Rica, but I’m still going to Costa Rica and there’s a story behind it and it’s not a bad story or anything. It’s actually really funny, but I’m gonna leave you with that cliffhanger. I’m gonna tell you in the next few episodes. Just not this one. 

Today’s episode, I was inspired to record this episode because I have been getting super into gardening and like the homestead lifestyle. And I’ve been planting, we did a whole, we did a whole garden way too late in the summer. It worked out. It was great until I went on a trip and then the aphids killed it. But we built, we just finished building a 20 by 30 huge greenhouse on our property and then we’re redoing the garden area. So I’m gonna do round two with a really big fall garden. I think I got like 40 different things to plant because, you know, I don’t do things halfway. So we’re going all out and with that, I’ve been a lot more intentional with it. Like the last time I planted, I just kind of like planted in our garden that we already have. And so I, I’ve just been a lot more intentional with like what we’re buying and is it the right, you know, season for it and having to get the soil and, and composting like, oh my God, learning composting was very confusing to me. It’s actually a lot of composting. So with all that, I was going through this one day with my husband and I was like, I’m overwhelmed like you start reading these books and it’s like you should plant, you know, this vegetable next to this plant because they’ll be good companion plants. And this one doesn’t, you know, carrots don’t like a lot of fertilizer, but, you know, the other ones do and then they all need different amounts of water and there’s like so many different things you can do. Like there’s just so many directions you can go and so much advice and books and things out there and it’s not like an easy do this, do this, do this and you’ll have a successful garden. I think it is more simple than a lot of people make it anyways. I was sitting there and I was talking to him and I was like, oh my gosh. I bet this is how people feel about marketing. I bet they feel like there’s a bunch of options and a bunch of ways they could go and they just want someone to tell them like, do this, do this, do this and of course I live and breathe marketing and it is something that comes really natural to me. So do this do this do this is like in my head, right? It’s obvious to me and I know it’s not obvious to everybody, but I had this kind of connection where I was like, oh, this is how people feel about marketing. There’s so many different people you can follow. There’s so many books, podcasts, youtube videos, things you can watch, there’s so many directions you could go and everywhere you look, there’s like a little bit different advice and it’s all like pieced together and then it becomes overwhelming and you get kind of like paralysis because you’re overthinking it. So I 100% have been experiencing that with my garden. And so I wanted to do a podcast about that because I think that any time we’re trying to optimize and refine something new, it is an opportunity for feeling a lot of overwhelm. And I think that is what a lot of people experience with marketing. 

So I have basically six things that I think will help if you easily get overwhelmed with marketing that I am using myself going through this process. And also let me just note, it’s incredible to explore something new. I think so often we continue to do things that we know how to do that we’re comfortable doing that. We know the outcome and we, you know, stay in that kind of zone, but you don’t grow that way. Right. You’re not gonna, you’re not gonna, going to be able to figure out the better parts if you just keep doing the same exact thing or you don’t try something that’s gonna make you uncomfortable or you’re afraid of failure, afraid of trying. So these are the six things that I think might help. The first thing is getting clear on your goal and what you’re trying to accomplish. So when we look at marketing and we look at, OK, we could go a lot of places for different advice. You could read books, you could join a program, you could listen to a podcast like mine, you can watch youtube videos, you can buy a course like you name it. You could do those things before you do any of those things, even before you consume my podcast or you read a book on marketing. I think it’s important to identify your goal. What are you trying to solve right now? What are you trying to accomplish if we were to look at the next 90 days? What do you want that to look like and make sure that the material and the support that you get and the, and what you consume is going to support that. So that comes down to being really intentional. And if we’re not intentional, that’s kind of what leads to overwhelm because if we’re not intentional with our actions and we’re not intentional with our consumption that it is for a bigger purpose and a bigger goal, then we don’t really know what we’re doing. And that’s when we feel like we’re really spinning our wheels. So the first thing to do is get clear on that goal. And I would say, are you clear right now on a next 90 day goal? If I was to ask you, what do you want your marketing to do for you in the next 90 days? What would that answer be? And do you know, is it a, is it a revenue goal? Is it a lead generation goal? Is it launching an offer? Is it launching a new funnel? Is it launching a new product? Is it redoing a website? And then why do you think that goal is gonna move the bigger needle? Like if you’re saying, oh, I wanna launch a website? Ok. Why can you back that up with an argument about why that’s gonna help you get to your revenue goal or whatever your, you know, overall growth goals are. So getting clear on your goal and what you’re trying to accomplish that will help you filter out and consume content based on that because you might listen to a podcast episode of mine. For example, let’s say you’re a regular listener, you’re listening to my podcast and you hear an episode that’s like that is really good advice, but it’s not going to move the needle to what I want to do right now because I’m clear on my goal, I’m clear on my next 90 days. So I’m gonna just kind of bookmark that and come back to it because it might be relevant to me eventually or I’ll probably put out podcasts that maybe aren’t as relevant to you and then you have the filter to not jump all around and implement everything I say because that’s the thing with content, right? It’s not created for one person directly, it’s created for an audience. So number two is making sure that you only consume content that’s going to help you accomplish your goal. Or at least if you end up consuming content that’s maybe separate from your goal. You have the ability to say, OK, I’m, I’m gonna save this and come back to it, but it’s not gonna shift my focus or my priorities or anything right now. So making sure that once you have your goal, you set yourself up for success by consuming the right content as it relates to what you want to accomplish and your goal. The third thing is this overall, I would recommend across the board in many different categories. Limit your consumption to only a few key people. So I started following, it’s funny, I’ve done this twice. Now, as soon as I got into crossfit, I followed, like every, every top professional female crossfit athlete. And then now that I got into gardening, I went and followed a handful of profiles, related to gardening and homesteading. And what I did was I followed a, a few key, like I followed, probably, like, I don’t know, 10 accounts that I found and then I actually ended up unfollowing the ones that I wasn’t really getting a lot of value from and it doesn’t mean that their content is bad. It just, it wasn’t helping me with what I want to do right now. Like there was one that I followed that had just like a ton of Amazon affiliate links. She was an influencer and she wasn’t really like giving advice and tips. She was just saying like, buy this product, buy this product. And so I unfollowed that because that’s just noise. So I think that if you are trying to improve a certain subject, your business, your marketing, your health, your leadership, personal development, like if there’s something you’re working on, you need to limit the amount of people you take advice from because everybody is going to have a different perspective, a different experience, they’re gonna bring something different to the table, which is a good thing and why I wouldn’t necessarily say, ok, just listen to one person out the gate, let them prove themselves first. But you really probably don’t want more than three core people that you really consume from. There’s only a few people that I consistently consume content from as it relates to business because there’s a lot of noise out there and I don’t need the noise. So I like to limit to about three people as it relates to certain subjects. And so business marketing, whatever I’m trying to improve. So I found the few accounts that I felt like, OK, this is what I’m looking for, this is going to help me improve and you know, kind of meet my goals that I’m clear on and what I’m trying to work on. And so I’m gonna basically only consume content from them. Now, in order for me to find that I had to follow and, and find more than one source and then narrow it down. So that’s number three, number four is once you start consuming, once you start learning and immersing yourself in it, and this can also be in the form of, let’s say a course or a program that you’re in whatever you’re you’re doing to get yourself the information and the strategies and the tactics you need. I highly recommend making a list or taking notes so that you understand and comprehend it. There’s some saying out there that you won’t really know something until you can teach it. And that’s really true. So if you want to really understand something in your business or you want to really understand how to do something, get to the point where you could teach somebody else. It, and I’m definitely not saying that about your marketing, but let’s say that you’re, you’re in a place in your business where you’re like, I can’t hire social media help. So I have to do this myself. OK? So that’s number one should be a temporary thing. Number two, if that was, if I was in that boat, I would go look at examples or learn from those three key people. And then I would myself take notes and create kind of a strategy based on what I saw and what I learned and I would write that down because if you’re just consuming via video or audio and you don’t actually write or speak it out, you won’t retain it very well. So that’s, that’s the next thing now that may not be necessary. If you go the route of hiring experts in the case of my garden, it was because I wasn’t gonna hire someone to come build my compost. So I needed to figure out how to do it. So I watched a 25 minute video and then I listed the steps and then I told it to my husband and as I was telling it to my husband, I figured out that a couple of places where I didn’t know what to do. And I went back and I figured out what they were. And so I was able to then get the steps to try it. And so then the fifth thing is being willing to try a bunch of things and failing because how do we all learn the best? I say this when I train new team members, I say this, you know, for myself, for people in marketing, especially content creators, we learn the best by doing by actually executing. If you want to get better at creating video, create a bunch of video. If you wanna get better at showing up on social media and creating content, show up more, create more content, get the feedback, do it. If you want to get better at marketing and you’re the one who’s going to do it, you need to just go do it. And so the compost is an example like I’m gonna mess it up. I mean, if you guys have tried to do compost like it, I’m telling you, it’s more complicated than you think. Like you’ve gotta get the ratios right? It’s got heat up to 100 and 30 degrees inside of the pile. Like I don’t know, but I know I’m gonna mess it up and I know I’m gonna figure it out along the way and the only way I’m gonna learn and figure out what I could do better is by doing it. And I’m sure each season my garden and my gardening and all the things is gonna get better. Same thing in your marketing, especially with content creation and like your funnels and your email strategy and your messaging and all the things you put out there, you are going to get better as you go. And the only way to do it is to start doing it, to get the funnel live, to get the posts on social media, going to write the copy. If you have to do it, to record the videos to do the webinar to practice the pitch, just do it because you’re gonna fail and then you’re gonna get better. There’s no way that you can do something and get worse. Like you really can’t if you do something I feel like and you have the awareness to look at it and go OK? What went well, what could go better? It’s just gonna improve. And then the last thing is hiring experts or getting tools that you need. So for example, in my compost, I had to get a like an expensive thermometer thing because you gotta get the temperature right? And that’s a big part of it. So I paid, you know, 100 and $20 or whatever for this long thermometer that has to go in there. Now, I don’t need to hire an expert to do the compost. But with marketing, hire the experts, like if you identify and you say, I don’t want to do this component of my marketing. I am not willing to commit the amount of effort it would take to learn how to do it, then start to do it fail, doing it, learn from that and then try again, which that’s the case with a lot of, you know, paid ads, building a funnel, the tech, the copy all those components that if you identify and you’re clear on your goals and, and knowing, you know, I don’t actually want to have to figure all this out myself to do it all myself and go through that process, then hire the experts and know very clearly where the priority is in hiring the experts. Because we all, no matter what stage we’re at, we all have a limited budget, right? We don’t have none of us have unlimited budget to be hiring whatever. And whenever we want, like even once you start making a good amount of revenue, you still have to be aware of your budget and make smart decisions with that. And so you can choose where you hire. But if you are clear on your goal first and then you’re clear on what you do and don’t want to put your time into understanding how much more time it takes to do it yourself and fail and do it again and try again. Then you can also prioritize where you want to get support and hire the experts. Hire the tools, bring in the support that matters the most and saves you the most amount of time and gets you to that result faster. So those are my takeaways. As I was working through this. I was like, oh, this is exactly how people must feel with marketing. It’s how I feel right now with gardening and especially the compost because it was just like, really overwhelming. And then every video you watch, there’s like a different strategy to it. And so I watched a couple and then I found the one for me and then I, I figured it out. So we’ll see, we’ll see how it goes. I’m sure it won’t work at first and then it will. All right, you guys, I hope you found this helpful and I hope it created some clarity in a place where you might feel overwhelmed, some shifts and changes. You can potentially make a lot of it is just us looking at what’s in front of us, taking a step back and going, oh, here’s the answer. It’s been there the whole time. We can adjust, we can change this, we can try this, we can get help here. It’s never as hard and crazy as we sometimes feel in those moments of overwhelm. There’s always a solution. It’s not usually as bad as you think it is. And yeah, staying in that state of overwhelm doesn’t usually get you to your end result. So supporting yourself and getting out of that and making progress and in momentum should be the priority. All right guys, talk to you on Thursday.