Finola Howard 0:02
I'm Finola Howard, Business Growth strategist with a joyful heart and your host of the your truth shared podcast, I believe that every business has a story to tell, because that's how the market decides whether to buy or not, and your story has to resonate with who you are and with the people you want to serve, and this podcast is about helping you reach the market in a way that feels right to you. So if you're an entrepreneur with a dream you want to make real, then this is the podcast for you, because great marketing is your truth shared. I'm returning to my bold declaration in Episode 112 and I'm answering the question that everyone has been asking me, how exactly are you going to do that? Finola, this episode is my answer. It's the actions I'm taking as a direct result of my million euro declaration. It's how I'll shape both myself and my business for this next leap, I expect there will be changes to this as we progress, but for now, this is the direction I'm taking. I hope you'll join me
Finola Howard 1:09
in my last solo episode. That's episode 112 I made a public declaration I'm building a 1 million euro turnover business. And since then, there's been one question that keeps coming up from listeners, from peers, and even that little voice in my own head. How exactly are you going to do that? Finola, well, this episode is where I begin to answer that question. So let's start with the declaration itself. Okay, saying that out loud pushed me outside of my comfort zone. It felt like pushing the publish button on my book all over again, and you realize when you release it out there, that it has moved beyond your sphere of control. You have no power whatsoever over who listens, who finds out that this is your big goal, and most of all, how people will react. Your old insecurities show up as did mine. So it's who am I to say that? Do I deserve this goal? Do I deserve to say this? And that was an interesting one. I have to say the idea of deserving your own goals, and I'll have to dig into that in my journaling later, but I will share it in the newsletter. But here's the truth, making that declaration was freeing. It became even a spiritual moment, a personal act of power, a manifestation, if you will. It doesn't really matter what your belief system is. When you say something out loud, give it a deadline and commit to it. Something shifts. You step into it. You have no choice. You've just burned the boats. And even if you don't fully believe your own declaration, yet, the act of saying it starts the process of believing it. And I know I'm starting to believe it all a little bit more too. So let's be clear about this, okay, this whole thing, this whole journey that I'm about to take, or have already started taking, isn't about ego. It isn't about the flashy numbers or needing validation. This is actually about purpose. And yes, people have said to me, sure, wouldn't 800k be grand Finola, and that is such an Irish thing to say, isn't it? But here's the thing, if I had set an 800k as the goal, they probably would have said, Sure, 600k would be good. Would do wouldn't it? Our limits, whether self imposed or culturally encouraged, are something I'm choosing to move beyond. This isn't about the money for its own sake. It's also not just about proving the ideas. In my book, what if Joy was how you measured success and the money proved you right, although that is a factor, it's about the assumption I've heard too many people make, in particular women, that money has to be sacrificed in order to have joy and you couldn't possibly achieve both, could you? But clearly, I believe you can achieve both joy and money. So I'm asking you, what do you believe? People ask me all the time, if you won the lotto, Finola, would you give up your business? And interestingly, that question has always rankled with me, and the reason it rankled is the reason for this big, hairy, audacious goal, as they used to call it in the corporate world. I do want to improve that embedding joy as a method and compass for success is a way of ensuring you achieve both joy and financial freedom. 1 million is a big number that delivers that freedom. It's not a big number in every context, but it's big enough to not be ignored that when asked, How did you do it, or when I will be asked, How did you do it, this is me future pacing, and I answer. Easy, I embedded joy as a key performance indicator in the business that forces people to challenge the assumption that hustle, pain and burnout are both the obvious and the assumed costs and route to success. But I believe it's time to normalize joy instead of pain as a route to success, and I intend to prove it. So let's get into the how. First I have to prepare me before I even look the business. So physically, mobility is my first priority. Some of you have known that I had foot surgery and then a knee injury, and walking actually became quite challenging for me, and that matters. It matters because you need energy and a clear head to make a million having part of my brain focused on the pain on my feet is not what my brain should be focused on. And let's face it, there's no joy in pain, at least not for me. Anyway, I've other physical related goals, but this is the loudest one for now and for most goal setting. Though, regardless of the aspect of your business or life that it's in, I always look at what's loudest first. What I mean by that is what's screaming at you for attention, and go there first. The rest will follow. So I've already actioned this. I had to. It was just too loud not to I started working with a wonderful local yoga teacher who comes to my home weekly. Now I know I found the right teacher here. She's someone who believes in treating the body as a whole and who understands different healing modalities. She'll speak in a language that I understand and that will also help my healing. I've already done two sessions, and I feel the benefits already. Although I'm a little bit sore today, I have to admit, so we're focusing on my feet first in every session, and as we strengthen the feet, we will move up through the rest of the body to release whatever else is being held in my body. The idea of being able to walk is something that resonates deeply with me from so many different perspectives, physically and otherwise, because growth is about movement. It's about expansion. It's about moving freely. And when you can't move freely, your world gets smaller. And I intend to move freely in the world, and that's just how it is. The next step is about developing the mindset of a million euro business owner. It's interesting that this is the next step. That's the impact pain can have on where you focus your attention. It's why pain management had to come first, and with that challenge in hand now it's about asking every day what needs to happen to get the result I want, and taking responsibility for driving that. This is about owning outcomes, successes and setbacks, and there will be both. It's about taking full ownership, no waiting for perfect conditions. The time is now. This is also about letting go of the things that don't align with this goal. So it's about acting in alignment with who I'm becoming, not who I was, not even who I am. I asked myself this, what would the million euro me do right now and in this situation, and allow that to frame my decision making going forward? Interestingly, as I was working on this script, the phrase I might have used before was, what would the future me do right now? But it just seemed too obscure and too capable of escape. You know, it's gonna hide in there, so I had to ground even more. So there was no wiggle room. So I refined the phrase and said, What would the million euro me do right now? And that's inescapable, and my thinking has to shift to embrace that, and it is shifting. It shifts really fast when you start to decide to do these things. So I'm asking you now, what is there a phrase that you can coin that will speak to your next level steps? I'd love you to share them with me, because that might help me too, and it might help others. So please do that. Share it with me. Okay, so let's go back to my question, what would the million euro me do right now? Okay, I have a lot of stuff in my head about this, stuff that makes sense to me, but this allows me to frame it so I know I'd make sure I had the right business model that was capable of achieving that turnover in such a short space of time. It's a definite move away from the time for money trap, and I'm anxious to go there. I'd surround myself with people who've done it before or on a similar path to me, who think differently to me, or who can raise my game in a way I haven't figured out yet I need to be around people who stretch me, and hopefully I can do the same in return for them. These journeys are always about collaboration and always best in community. It helps the journey go easier, go smoother, and you tend to avoid pitfalls because someone else will show them to you.
Finola Howard 9:59
I pay. Attention to any limiting beliefs I have around money, in particular, to move from enough, which I sense is my current state, into abundance, without apology, I like that one. I'd invest in my own growth, whether it's my mobility, like I already have my mindset, which I'm working on, and also have invested in my skill set. Again, I'm investing in that too, or my network. Again, I'm also investing in that, but I've upped the ante on all of these, and I'm mindful to keep aware of the return on investment in each of those areas, because if it's not working in one, I need to move to the next one, because I'm on a deadline. I'd also guard my own energy levels. Boundaries are strategy, not selfishness. This is the real juggle game. I've got to guard my time, energy and creative bandwidth. So saying no is part of saying yes to this vision. Once I've mind set in place, start talking about, let's talk about preparing the business. So that's me, mobility, mindset, all that stuff, mindset, we've broken down a bit. Now let's talk about preparing the business. Okay? So firstly, the business model, one to one work will not get me to a million. It just won't get me the spaciousness I seek. There are decisions I need to make here. I need to set a date for when I stop taking new one to one clients I've always chewed and froed with this one. The rationale being that this type of work keeps me at the cutting edge. It keeps me close to my target customer. And there is truth in that. However, there's another truth that has just gotten so much louder for me now this work, which is so very alluring because of how emotionally rewarding it is, is actually keeping me from achieving my own dreams by actually achieving my million euro turnover, I will serve my clients far more effectively than continuing to attract new business that traps me in a time for money cycle. My clients want to know how to do what I'm doing now. They want to know the nuances of the path I'm taking so they can learn not just from each success, but from every misstep I take. Yeah, interesting and yes, the data has already confirmed it. For me, the amount of people who have reached out with their own big goals since I made this declaration has confirmed that I'm on the right path. I'm delighted that so many are taking their own journey alongside mine. That's really nice, and it's a powerful space to be in. So if I'm not doing one to one, I'm productizing. I've been productizing for years for myself and for others. I've spent years helping people shape their offers in a way that productizes what they do. It makes sense for positioning, because you become known for the tangible as opposed to the intangible offer, that thing that that you don't quite know how to articulate and that always has a direct impact on revenue. When it's tangible and productized, it's easier to sell and easier to promote. It always results in increased turnover if you market it right. So as I move towards a more one to many model, I have a number of group and evergreen training programs that I need to pay more attention to. They've always been successful, but I know I haven't maximized their potential, not remotely. And that immediately moves into my growth plan. This is the way I can effectively create space for my own scaling plans to leverage what I've already built, you don't have to reinvent the wheel. Remember the offerings that I know work and I know the market needs. I reached out to a mentor of mine in Canada to take a look at my entire product suite, including the ones I planned to build, and I asked the question, tell me what you see, I don't know to even ask about yet, and that's always a really powerful question, but it can only be asked to people who know how to answer it. She was one of those people, and is one of those people. She helped me shift my thinking about the revenue potential of each and how I could experiment to test each idea as I went and again, that's in my growth plan now. So next for me, the next obvious step for me, because obviously I am going to start with what I already know, my already in my skill set, and I need to expand from there, but I need to fix what I already know needs fixing. So for me, the next step is about paying attention to my systems, to my business systems, because when you systemize, you create space for expansion. You get to leverage what has already been built, and that means you get to be more consistent with your content. And I know I need to do that. You get to measure also which pieces of your content are performing better, and that means driving potential customers into your ecosystem. An ecosystem that's better has better built funnels that help you acquire more leads and the right leads that convert in increasing regularity, so you sell more and you make more money. You onboard better. Better for greater retention, you upsell better with the next offering that brings your customer onto the next stage of the journey. That is actually a process that's regardless of industry, not just the industry I'm in. So that's worth paying attention to, and that's all about growing the business. And this is something I need to finish in the business. I know I have leaks in my system, and it's time I fixed them. I just got too comfortable, and that's what happens, I think. So this will create the space and the revenue to fund a war chest for my own expansion, because I know I will need a war chest. So have a think about this in your business. What are the systems that would create space for your expansion, and I share the system, the systems as I build them in the joyful million newsletter. So do make sure to subscribe. Next is visibility and positioning. Okay? These two together. I talk about these two together because they're so inextricably linked. Your positioning defines how you'll tell your story, the story you believe in. And clearly, my story has just been tweaked, or, more accurately, it's just clicked in a more deeper, more aligned way. For me, I'm digging into it and committing more fully to the idea that using joy as a commercial business tool is the only way to grow your business purposefully, sustainably and in alignment with who you are. And I'm committed to proving this with this exercise over the next two years, and I need to tell that story in a way that resonates with as big an audience as my imagination will allow, and hopefully as my limits fall away that will grow. Knowing that actually made me already reach out to get featured on a national radio show, and they've already said yes. So I think it's a story that has a little bit of resonance in the marketplace, and that action that I took already just in making that decision, just gives you an indication of the power of deciding on what you need to get what you want. And I'll continue in that vein and plan my visibility strategy around this story. And what I've discovered already is that the more decisions you make, the more movement happens. So it's good to share that with you here. Lastly, product development. Here's an interesting one for you. Many, many years ago, I had the idea for a product that would help people learn how to think about marketing and growth more strategically, because invariably, they don't even still to this day, I had a call with a client today who said, Finola, I need you to talk to the owner of this business I'm working with, because they really don't get why positioning is so important, and I really need them to do that, or I can't generate leads. So this is something that has always been of great interest to me, and it's why I developed my first in person and ultimately online program, get strategic, get results. I could see the blocks that were in the way of real growth, and I could see the aha moments when clients saw how everything clicked together. When it clicked their businesses grew. They trusted themselves more about the decisions they made in their businesses, and they took more calculated risks that ultimately paid off because they were, in fact, calculate it. So now we're at a critical juncture in the marketing and business growth space. Again, AI is changing everything, and it's a good thing. Yes, we've got to pay attention, but when you're talking about business growth, you have to pay attention to the marketplace anyway. So for me, the advent of AI and micro tools means I can take those ideas and put them on steroids. Ai, means that the ideas I had all those years ago, which weren't possible then, as far, are far more accessible now. And this is one of my chosen growth levers, which I will go into over time. I've already invested in tools and training to help me flesh this all out. I know that with ease of entering this marketplace, there will be competition. I'm okay with that, though, because I'm going to pay attention to it, and I will iterate, and I will make it better than I ever imagined it would be, ultimately with the customer in mind, ultimately with you in mind, because I want to make it easier, definitely, for small businesses to succeed. Too many businesses are stuck, and I've heard too many stories of people going down the wrong track, and I'd love to help prevent that. That's another one of my reasons for doing this. So for now, I've got to create space in my diary to build these products out and change my overall business model I had to do with my book. So I'll do it for this now too. Can't I'm reminded of something I say to clients all the time, you can't grow unless you give yourself space to grow. So I'm giving my space self space to grow. The next thing for me is
Finola Howard 19:57
trust. Then Do? Do? Then trust. That's a phrase I coined in my first book. I like saying that my first book, because, you know, this is all about writing the second book. This is the book I'm writing as I do this, which will be the companion to my first book. Okay, anyway, that's the phrase trust. Then Do, do, then trust. It's a phrase I coined in my first book, because belief takes action to bring it to life. Your first leap is done in trust, like my declaration in Episode 112 because, and I love this quote by Ralph bloom, in each life, there comes at least one moment which, if recognized and seized, transforms the course of that life forever. Rely, therefore, on radical trust, even though the moment may call for you to leap empty handed into the void. This is the space between the known and the unknown. From where you are now to where you want to go does require that kind of trust, but I don't believe it's ever empty handed, you bring everything you've learned up until now with you, and I'm bringing everything I've learned with me second leap in this process to take action on the assumption that the first leap worked or fit or felt right, and that's back to what would the million euro me do right now, I'm finding that simple phrase is removing any blocks that make me hesitate or hesitant right now. So I know I just need to keep doing it and keep saying that to myself. After all, if you don't trust your own vision for the future, then what hope have you got? And I am really learning that here. So here I am at the very beginning of something bold and beautiful, not in the messy middle yet, but standing fully in the decision to build a joyful values led million euro business. And I'm inviting you to come with me. If you're curious about what this really takes, the mindset shifts, the business moves, the honest reflections. Then make sure you're subscribed to the joyful million newsletter. That's where I share the real time behind the scenes, the numbers, the experiments, the tools I'm using and the lessons I learn as they happen. And if you're ready to step into your own next level, the doors to soar are now open. This is where we do the deeper work together with support, with community structure and strategy, and of course, don't miss an episode. Do subscribe to your truth shared wherever you listen to podcasts. Let's build something extraordinary and do it with joy, courage and truth. Thank you for listening. Well, that's all from me for this week. I hope you enjoyed that episode. Reach out and let me know your thoughts and where you are on your own business growth journey. And do click on the link in the show notes if you'd like to join me in my first million Thank you for listening to your truth shared. If you enjoyed this episode, please do rate and review it in your favorite app at love the podcast.com/your. Truth shared. It really does help spread the word and helps me to continue to invest in this podcast. Thank you for sharing this time with Me. You.
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