August 5, 2025 • 32 mins
Ever opened Airtable or Asana and immediately closed it because your brain just said “nope”? Been there.
In this episode, I’m joined by systems expert Rachael Mueller for a real talk on how to make your tools work for you—not overwhelm you.
We’re diving into practical strategies that actually make your life easier (not more complicated). Whether you’re drowning in post-its or juggling a million Google Docs, this convo is for you.
If your to-do list lives in your head (and you’ve got 47 birthday party RSVPs to remember), this one’s a must-listen.
In this episode of the podcast, we talk about:
- The one habit that will instantly make your brain feel lighter
- When to use automation—and when to skip it
- Why your system needs to match your personality
- What to do before you pick a new tool
- Why “comfort” systems might actually be slowing you down
…And More!
This Episode Was Made Possible By:
Riverside All-in-One Podcast & Video Platform
Visit Riverside and use the code DREA to get 15% off any Riverside individual plan. We use it to record all our podcast interviews: https://onlinedrea.com/riverside
About the Guest:
Rachael Mueller is a Virtual COO + Systems Expert, helping service-forward business owners + founders optimize and grow their businesses through sustainable systems, and take back control of their time.
After transforming her first business in 2015 from a burnout black hole into a streamlined success, she never looked back! And has helped countless clients do the same behind the scenes.
When she’s not helping visionary entrepreneurs banish overwhelm, you can find her in the kitchen whipping up a new recipe, or traveling the globe with her partner. She’s also a firm believer that there is never "too much" guacamole, and that life is better after petting a furry friend.
Website: https://heyrachael.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hey.rachael
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heyrachael
Go to the show notes for all the resources mentioned in this episode: https://onlinedrea.com/369
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
If you ever opened up your favorite project management tool, mine
is Asana and Airtable. And then you start crying and then you close it
immediately because you're completely overwhelmed. Well, this. This episode is for you, my
friends. We're going to be talking about a love for
systems and tools and how do we make our businesses
feel more streamlined without feeling like we're adding more to
(00:23):
our plates. I have the amazing Rachel Mueller on the show
today to talk with us all about that. But first, a word
from our spons. Riverside is the all in one
podcast recording and editing tool that I use for this right here
show. I use it to edit not only the audio and the video, it is
like Chef's kiss, magical, making the entire process
(00:45):
so, so easy. Plus, I love their
magic AI clips. Their little AI
robot in the background pulls out the most impactful moments
of the episodes without me having to comb through and do it myself.
Resizes them for social media. So those vertical videos you see on
Tikt and reels, those all come from Magic AI inside of
(01:07):
Riverside. It's literally one click. It spits out 10 clips.
I picked the best one and away I go. Saves me so much time. If
you want to get on the Riverside train, check it out today, the links in
the show notes and make sure to use my code DREA D R E A
at checkout to get 15% off your membership.
Welcome to episode number 369 of the Mindful Marketing
(01:29):
Podcast. Rachel, I'm so excited to have you here today.
Here. Thank you for having me. Yes. We were just talking before
the show about how systems, tools and tech is
a big question that we often get on the podcast, especially
with our theme of approaching things mindfully, so
doing less, not more. So let's start though,
(01:52):
at the beginning of you and your story. Give us the
elevator style journey of your
path towards being a systems expert. Yeah, so
it's I think, a very typical entrepreneurial
journey in that I did something, I learned a lot and I thought this could
be better. So my partner and I started our first business together
(02:15):
in 2015 and it was a real estate investment
company. We were buying and selling property and there were a lot of moving parts,
as you can imagine. And we were managing everything manually by ourselves
and got to this point where almost daily
I was having like a two year old tantrum style tantrum on the couch,
feeling so incredibly overwhelmed and I thought this, there
(02:37):
has to be a better way. Like, this is not working. I've always found myself
a very organized person. I collected notebooks And I, you know, do all
these organizational things. But it wasn't until we actually jumped into
finding the right tools and systems and we started implementing a CRM project
management tool. Like all of these things that actually helped make things feel
so much easier and more streamlined. And life got a whole lot
(02:59):
easier because I didn't feel like I was scrambling every single day trying to figure
out what am I doing, who needs what, checking my inbox for my to do
list to respond to things, and being very reactionary, it definitely
swapped that mindset for me and put me in much more control of what was
going on. And that was amazing. And then come
2019, we started to shift a little bit, realized we kind of wanted to
(03:21):
move away from that business pandemic hit. People were starting
new businesses, people were working from home. There was a lot of
things happening, and it felt like the perfect opportunity for me to slip in. And
I didn't know what it looked like. As any business when you start kind of
is where it's like, let me just figure this out as I go. But I
knew that I wanted to show up and help people and let them have that
(03:41):
same experience that I did of making their life feel so much easier.
Yes, 100%. I had the same thing happen to me with actually
one of my clients. We used to put all of our client work in a
spreadsheet, really Google sheet. And I had it new client
come in and they were like, this is not working for us. We can't give
feedback appropriately in this tool. Can we find
(04:02):
a better way? And that's when I landed on airtable and it was like,
oh my gosh, my life has completely changed now. I'm an airtable
like lover. I can't go a day without using that
thing. And so it came from
necessity. Right. We all have those moment where we're like, okay, this
is not working. But I want to talk more
(04:24):
about the step before the tool. You know, when we're sitting in that moment where
we're like, gosh, this isn't working. How do we start thinking about
the systems or the things behind the tools
to. To actually build in an easeful path and not
just adding more complexity into our lives, what are the questions we should think about
before we get into the tools of it all? Yeah, for sure. So, I mean,
(04:47):
like you said before, there is even the tools and understanding what the solution is,
you got to figure out where your problem is. Right. And where. What is it
you're actually trying to sol. Chances are that if you have we'll
say thrown the proverbial spaghetti at the wall, which is trying this new
tool and oh, this new thing is going to solve all my problems. But it
doesn't work. And it's because you're not actually figuring out what the real problem is.
And so my suggestion is always starting with auditing your time,
(05:09):
figuring out what is actually the bottleneck. Is it
that you are losing leads in your inbox, you're not getting back to
people fast enough. That is suffering. Your marketing is suffering because of it. You're
not getting enough referrals because the client experience isn't great or you're dropping
balls or whatever that looks like. Cool. You probably need
a project manager or excuse me, you probably need a client management tool
(05:31):
that's going to help with streamlining that process. Sending out
tasteful automations to keep people moving forward even when you
aren't in front of the computer. If it's a busy season or whatever, that looks
like making it that much easier for them and for you from a
lead management, scheduling and onboarding, making it all
so much easier. Cool. On the flip side, if it
(05:53):
is, you feel pretty good about your client experience, but it also feels like when
you actually jump into doing the work for people or even your day to day
work, you have no idea what you're doing. Your schedule feels like a mess. You're
kind of just guessing and trying to figure out what should I be doing today?
What feels like the most important fire that I need to put out right
now? Chances are you probably are keeping a lot in your head
(06:14):
and need some kind of central tool database to hold
it all. So you're not having 100 Google random docs for this
and notes in your iPhone and post it here in that notebook by
your bed and gathering everything and putting it in one central place that you can
then have accountability for that due date, be able to move
things forward. That is also a very helpful step. And I think the
(06:36):
two very much go hand in hand. Like you kind of need both in
your business. But I think it's also very important to recognize before you
again, just start doing all the things. What is it that's actually
needing the most attention? Right. Then get that set up, then
move on to the next piece, then the next piece, then the next piece.
Yes. Oh my gosh. This reminds me of when I
(06:58):
moved from handwriting my notes to typing them in a Google Doc. Like it
does feel like a very simple decision, but I got to
the point where I was sitting there staring at my chicken scratch. Going,
what did I even write here? What does this even
say? You can't even understand your own shorthand. Yeah, right.
(07:18):
And so I feel like sometimes we go with what
we know because we think it's easier at the time, but when in
reality there are things that can help improve that entire
process. And even now I record all of my client calls
because there's so much information in there that I can't gather at the
time with notes. There are so many tools that I use in that
(07:40):
process as well. You know, recording the call, taking the transcript,
putting into AI and going, know, what's the summary? What's the lessons
learned? What are my follow up questions? You know, there's, there's so many tools that
can help improve my entire client process, but you kind of have to think
a little bit about that. And I know that this
thought process takes time. And so I feel like the biggest
(08:02):
roadblock to a lot of business owners is like, okay, so I'm overwhelmed
right now. How in the heck do I now have time to then sit down
and think about a system? So cool, cool, cool, cool.
Yeah. How do we help that problem? Yeah, it's a really
good question. I think that it's twofold. So one, what you were just describing
to me, it also very much feels like a comfort zone thing. Right?
(08:26):
We stick with what we know because it's comfortable and it's easy and learning something
new takes time. And figuring that out. And when you are already feeling
so overwhelmed trying to do something different, it's so
difficult. Right, because it takes you three times as long and you don't know what
you're doing and you're going to mess up and it's two steps back, one step
forward kind of feeling. But that being said, said,
(08:46):
I think that if you are able to
take a moment to really assess what needs your
attention and then break it down into bite sized
pieces. So earlier I said, okay, you need a client management tool
or you need a project management tool. Great. We're not talking about
sitting down and setting up the entire thing on Monday.
(09:09):
We're saying that, okay, you have decided that, you
know what the biggest thing for me is that my leads are getting lost in
my inbox. I'm not responding to people in time. It really sucks because
I feel like I'm not getting as many bookings as I could. Tool,
yes, you need a CRM. That tool is going to help you. Like Dubsado,
Honeybook, Moxbe. There's so many awesome things out there, but maybe the very
(09:31):
first thing, and the only thing that you do is you set up a new
contact form that you embed on your website. That is the exact same
contact form that you had on Squarespace, but now it's connected with your
CRM. So when somebody fills it out, it drops them in there with all their
information. You get notified and maybe we create a
really easy one step automation that just sends them an email
(09:53):
saying thanks, we got it, we'll get back to you in
X amount of time. Okay, cool. Now your leads
aren't getting lost anymore. Now that's going to start to feel a lot easier. What's
the next step? The next piece of that step by step process for you
getting them on the phone? Okay, well if we are
emailing back and forth and at some point that conversation
(10:15):
thread becomes so long and so convoluted because we can't find a time because
of time zones and this and that. Cool. Now we need a scheduler. Let's set
up your scheduler and let's just have one schedule type for that new lead
discovery call and get that going. Then let's move on to the next piece. And
before you know it, you've made it to the end of your process and everything
is feeling so much easier. But if we look at it in that bite sized
(10:37):
piece, it feels so much easier to jump into than
feeling like you got to conquer all of it and you know, all or nothing
essentially. If I don't start using my entire tool perfectly by the end of next
week, I'm just going to keep doing things the way that I'm doing them because
it's comfortable and it's safe and it's easy. Yeah, I mean honestly, we
live in the age of information overload. Right. We can
(10:57):
literally go to YouTube and find the solutions to our
problems, but at some point we have to start implementing them. And I feel like
that that's your advice works so perfectly there, which is like just start
somewhere, start small, don't try to do everything today because then
you'll get really overwhelmed. Is there any like particular
thing that you've seen, like a commonality with small business owners or
(11:19):
solopreneurs entrepreneurs where you go just do this one
thing and you'll have a difference, like a quick. Win,
probably brain dumping. I find that
99% of the people that I work with, unless we're coming in and
were auditing like their system that they've been using for a while and we're just
judging it up, very good chance that you are keeping
(11:41):
way Too much in your head. Like way too much. Like without even realizing
it. Not even just like business stuff, but personal stuff where it's like,
okay, when you wake up in the morning, I gotta go to the grocery store
today and then I'm recording that podcast episode and oh, I gotta pick up that
birthday present for Rachel and I got an rsvp. Like even all that
personal stuff, if you're just, if it's swirling around in your head, there's a very
(12:02):
good chance that that is weighing so heavily on you.
And I have worked with very successful business owners that are doing
really great things in their business and they're just keeping all their to
do's in their head. Or they wake up and they grab their phone and they
jot down those thoughts and then they forget to look at it and they jump
into the fires of the day and it just starts to feel a little chaotic.
(12:23):
And so I always recommend the first place to start is if you're
keeping things in your head, getting them out, writing them down,
using your project management tool, whatever that looks like, making a
concrete list so that you then free your mind and you're no longer
thinking like, don't forget that. Remember this, whatever that looks like. Waking up
at 2am in a panic because you forgot to do that thing again, it just
(12:45):
makes things feel so much easier. And then it also makes it so much easier
to move on to all the other pieces that we talked about because you're no
longer just juggling it in your brain, it's somewhere tangible that you can look and
say like, okay, these are the things that I need to prioritize. Everything
else that can wait. Yeah. Oh, brain dumping. I love
this. I feel like I forgot what that feels like because I'm so
(13:06):
reliant on my calendar, my asana, literally, if it's not my Google calendar, I
don't know what's happening. I don't know thousand percent. I completely forgot
about it the second it went in there. And so I just have that,
that system already in place. But when you don't, it
is, it's a very heavy feeling. Is there a frequency we should brain
dump like daily or how do you recomm to do this?
(13:28):
Yeah, so I mean, whatever works for you for sure. Like the
goal is not to find like whatever my process is. If it doesn't work for
you, you're not going to do it. And consistency is the key with trying to
implement any of these new habits. Right. But for me, the easiest
thing is I keep post its in Literally every room
and space of the house. I'm looking for them right now because I went around
(13:48):
this morning and I gathered all of my post its and I do this
almost daily where if my brain is feeling extra heavy and I've shut my
computer down for the day, I will write all my thoughts down. And then in
the I walk around and I gather them and then I put them in ClickUp
and I put them in their proper place and I give them a due date
or I do them right away, whatever that looked like. And that helps so
(14:09):
much so that even if I wake up in the middle of the night I
chicken scratch something on the post it and then I can fall back asleep and
I'm not having to sit there going okay, don't forget that, go back to sleep.
Don't forget that, go back to sleep. And it's just a very, very toxic cycle
for your brain. And so I think that the goal should be that getting
to the point of what you described where you don't have to think about
it, where you put it in, you put it where it belongs, you do the
(14:31):
thing, you schedule the appointment, whatever it looks like and then you move on to
the next thing. And so if there's something that's preventing you from doing that because
you are ping ponging in your brain from thing to thing, then you need to
sit down and write some stuff down. Yeah, a hundred percent. I
feel like it's, it's especially now in the world we live, it's so digital.
Like we have so many tools available to us, it
(14:52):
just makes sense to use them. I've started using them a lot too in my
personal life. Like I've got a three year old and a one year old now.
Nobody told me about the birthday situation. There's so many birthdays,
there are so many birthdays and you gotta get gifts for all the little
friends for the birthdays and it's a lot and I like
religiously put them in my Google calendar now because otherwise I don't know they're gonna
(15:14):
happen. And so it's been so, so helpful. But you mentioned
ClickUp and I'm curious about this because I feel
like people who like their tool love it. I'm an airtable girly, I like
asana. There's notion people out there to love it. ClickUp
person, tell me what you like. About ClickUp for sure. So I'll back
up also before I jump into getting the nerdiness of ClickUp because I could
(15:36):
talk about ClickUp literally all day like If Click up go down, my whole life
goes down with it. Like everything, everything about me is in ClickUp. But I will
say that for me it was about finding the right tool. And I,
for our first business, I was using a completely different platform that like barely exists
now. And then I swapped for this for hey, Rachel. When I first got started
I was using Trello and then I did try using Asana and then I was
working in a client's Asana and then I we used airtable
(15:59):
for personal stuff for years, for travel planning and creating spreadsheets
kind of that way. And like, I've tried all the things but I never found
one that felt like it was like my catch all for everything until I found
ClickUp. And that's really what it feels like for me, is that I can do
everything that I was doing in three different platforms all in one. But
also it just makes sense for me. Like, you know, sometimes when you log into
(16:21):
something and you're like, I don't know, I just need to find this thing. I
don't know where to click. Like, the menu feels complicated and I don't know what
I'm doing and it feels overwhelming. It's not the tool for you.
Like, there's no amount of training that's going to help you figure it out. Like
you might learn and be able to follow step by step. Like, okay, I go
here and here and here. But if it doesn't feel good, if you don't feel
excited about logging into it, if it doesn't fit your vibe that day,
(16:44):
you're not going to use it. And then what's the point, right? So like I
can sit here and spew about like all the things that I love, but you
got to find the right platform for you. And I think that the biggest
thing for me of, I feel like nowadays especially it's kind of like a ClickUp
versus Asana versus notion conversation. And I think it's really
about that, about finding what feels good for you. For me, Asana
(17:05):
felt almost too simple. Like I wanted to be able to do a little bit
more as far as like the views and the automations and that kind of thing.
And I also really didn't love the hierarchy in Asana
and how it worked with like the project situation and that kind of
setup versus Notion where you literally open up
a blank screen and you have to figure out what you're designing.
(17:26):
No, that I, I am a recovering perfectionist. I would
spend a thousand hours trying to create something before I even started using
it. And that's why there are so many people out there that are in Notion
Template, because it's very difficult to start from a blank screen.
And so for me, ClickUp was just this beautiful marriage of
all the things into one place that just made it. It just
(17:47):
connected. It just connected with my brain. Yes, 100%, you
are speaking my language. Because I feel like. So I say the same thing
about, like, social media scheduling tools. So many of them
out there, and people are always like, which one you recommend? And I can tell
you which one I recommend. However, if you log in and you go, my
brain does not understand this language, then you're. You're not going to get, like, you're
(18:08):
not going to get it. So, yeah, I like that. And I feel like that's
why I liked airtable over Notion, because I did open an ocean thing one
time and I actually have. I purchased templates for Notion. Yeah, there
you go. I'm going to learn this. It's too flexible. It feels
like designing a WordPress website from scratch. Like, I know you
could technically get a better, highly more customized
(18:30):
website, but, like, give me a squarespace, give me a wix any day,
because then you can just drag and drop. I don't need all the fancy stuff.
So, yeah, I totally understand that with ClickUp. Okay,
so talk to me more about ClickUp. Specifically. What's your favorite
way to use it as a system or tool in your marketing?
Ooh, in my marketing. Okay, so I love using ClickUp for my
(18:52):
content planning. I have a content plan space
and folder where I'm able to gather all of my ideas
and thoughts. So I have lists for all of my platforms, my email list, my
blog, my Instagram, et cetera. But then I have a central calendar view
where I can see it all laid out like a content planner, like a social
media planner, and be able to plan everything from there. My
(19:15):
favorite feature of ClickUp, though, is the little bit of customization that you can do
with, like, your status colors and making them your brand colors and making them pretty
and making it a fun place to want to go, adding your emojis and your
icons and all the things and like, really getting down to, like,
the very specifics. So it's very clear of, like, okay, on this day
I'm posting this Instagram thing and it's a reel and I need. Still need
(19:37):
a caption for it. But then on the next day I'm posting this and it's
a carousel and those need hashtags or this is still a work in progress. Or
whatever it looks like. And so you can get very specific with the organization of
it. And that makes it feel so much easier to go from just having
like all of these content ideas in your phone to then
actually having something tangible that you're getting across the finish line and saying
(19:58):
like, okay, looking at it at the calendar, I'm scheduling
this for this day. Working backwards. Let's start working on it.
Yeah. So how frequently are you putting ideas in there? Is it
like a monthly weekly thing. Or it's probably by
like several times a week that like I'll think of something or if like I'm
on socials, I get an idea for something and I jot it down, but then
(20:21):
actually like putting it somewhere on the calendar
where it's like, okay, that wasn't just an idea. This is actually something that I
want to do probably weekly to like every couple weeks.
I'm like really mapping out what that actually looks like. Okay, and
are you attaching like images and videos and stuff in there too or is it
just text? Sometimes, yeah. So if I have someone that's
(20:42):
helping me, like, so I have an assistant that helps with marketing stuff like
scheduling emails and working on blog posts and that kind of thing.
And so sometimes we need visuals for that, so we'll add those in. Or if
it's something like a video kind of thing that's
getting edited, maybe that gets uploaded there to work through the approval process.
But generally speaking, like I try and get as much in there as I can
(21:05):
and then when it's like tangible ready to go, that's when I drop it
into my actual like social media planner grid. I use
planoly still for me that works. And so dropping it in so I can see
like visually, like how does this all line up with everything and make it very
easy to go from there to my phone? I know there are extensions
and add ons and tools where you can like schedule stuff directly to your
(21:27):
socials from ClickUp, but I, I don't like auto posting
stuff. I definitely still like the handholding of it and getting it across the finish
line. So that process worked for me. Yeah, I mean, especially now,
like I find that I kind of have to do a temperature check
before I post stuff online because the world is like so wild right
now. You don't want to post it, like have something automatically go out and you're
(21:49):
like, oh no, things are on fire. So yep, that was a horrible time to
share that. Yes, totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. I love this
content planning in ClickUp. It's, it's exactly how I do an
airtable as well. So for those of you listening, if you tried
Airtable and you're like, my brain didn't like this, try ClickUp.
It may be the alternative that you need to get things
(22:11):
planned. And the other thing that I like about using tools like this instead of
planning in your scheduling tool, is that you're able
to actually sort and reuse that content
a whole lot easier. You know, you can
source content from previous months, years even,
and repurpose it in other ways. So I'm curious about your process to
(22:34):
this. How are you using content repurposing
inside of ClickUp? Yeah, so I, I've gone
through many iterations of it over the years trying to find a process that
works. And I would say generally speaking it's really
easy and ClickUp to like duplicate a task. So like, let's say that like you
have this like blog post that you shared on this day. You can
(22:56):
easily then add that into your Instagram list and say,
okay, we're going to take this little snippet and make carousel of it kind of
thing. Or you can also get really deep with the automations
inside ClickUp and like, let's say that something in one place like
your blog post. Now you can get an automation alert task that
says, great, this blog posted. It's time to make your Pinterest pins and
(23:18):
share that to Pinterest and create this from that and share it on
socials and then schedule it in the email newsletter. So you send out your
blog, like there's a lot that you can do there, but without going
like too deep and nerdy into it, which I know you and I very much
could, I think that it's just all about like finding, finding the
flow that like feels really easy to maintain. Like that's the thing for me. I
(23:39):
think that like when I tried to make it overly complicated, I stopped using
it because it was so rigid that like there was no flexibility in
it to like figure out. Like, well, if I set this up and I am
cross posting the content to every single platform but this post, I
don't want to, but my automation is telling me I need to. And it's created
four tasks for me. Like that starts to get too messy and complicated and I
(24:02):
think that's when things can start to feel like overwhelming past the point of
helpful. Okay, you put into words something that I've been struggling with with
Airtable for a while too. No, because I have a friend who's like
an Airtable. Like. Like, she does everything with Airtable.
And she was showing me her automations for, like, podcast guest booking and
how, like, she just, you know, toggles it from, like, you
(24:24):
know, pending to booked. And it's like emailing the person out some stuff. It's
like attaching all these things. And I'm like, but what if. What if you want
to toggle it but those things aren't ready yet and then your automations are all
broken? Like, yeah, that's what I think when I. When I see, like, it's too
automated for me in my process. I love that for her, and I like that
she could do that. But for me, I need a little manual, like some
(24:45):
checklists in there so that things are like automatically going wild. Yeah,
there's nothing wrong with templates over automating everything. In fact, I'm
very much like you were. Like, I'm not a fan of automating everything. I
find that an overly automated experience can actually do the opposite for you
sometimes. Like, exactly like what you're describing. But a good template.
Yes. That makes it so easy for you to be able to get
(25:08):
things across the finish line so you're not just staring at a blank screen every
single time. Yeah. I feel like this leads into one of the questions
I had, which is about the difference between systems and tools, because it
feels like sometimes people get so reliant on the tool
itself without really thinking about the entire pro, like, the client
experience. Like you talked about, like, the client doesn't care if you
(25:29):
manually had to edit that email or if it went out automatically. Right.
Like, they don't care. They just want the email. And so I feel like sometimes
we get too, I don't know, we get too far in the
tech. But can you talk a little bit about that from your experience? Like, this
difference between systems and tools and how do we decide what is automated
and what isn't? Totally. So the way that I like to think about it
(25:50):
is basically a system is something that takes a manual
process and it turns it into something that is repeatable,
automatable, delegatable, etc. So whether
that means that you are taking your process and you're putting it into a tool,
like a CRM or asana or ClickUp to do the thing. Cool.
Or is it just that you're mapping out what that process looks like
(26:12):
for how things work and you now have your steps? One,
two, three. Maybe they're all manual steps, but it's a very clear way that
you do it every single time. And you're creating a system out of
that where it's now, you know, when you do this thing, this happens, and when
you do this step, this happens. And then you can start to pepper in some
things like templates. If you're doing the same thing every single time, if it's repeatable
(26:34):
sitting down, let's use your podcast as an example. If you are
sitting down every time that you need to record with somebody and you're saying, okay,
so we need to, for this recording, get their headshot and their bio,
and I need to look up questions and I need to do this research, and
then you're going to forget something. Right. But if you have that template, that
checklist that you can refer to every single time, but then manually
(26:55):
do the pieces to fill in the dots, that's going to feel like a much
cleaner, easier process than having to do it, you know, the other way every single
time. Yeah, a hundred. I love all of this. I really do, because
I, I feel like I got this question a lot when I was doing a
lot of mentoring for social media managers and
freelancers. And I used dubsado for years, and then I switched
(27:16):
to moxie. And yes, both of those tools have a ton of
automations. I wasn't using all of them. I was using more of their
templates and the automations because there are a few. Like, if someone
fills out a form, then, yeah, I want to send them, thank you and be
like, I'll follow up. But when someone hits accept on a
proposal, I like to do a. A customized email. Like,
(27:37):
I don't want them to get something automated. They just gave me thousands of dollars.
So, yeah, I got a template for it to help me, but I'm going to
be very specific and layer in things that we talked about,
things that they're excited about into that email so that it is a
personalized experience. It's not just another templated response.
Right. So I do feel like some of these automations,
(27:59):
especially for a lot of us who have smaller businesses, which is a lot of
people listening, right? We're not like, you know, top 100 companies
over here. We are, you know, usually, you know, under
10 million, let's say, in business a year. And so when I think about
companies that are that size, it's like, even if we
have one person on our team or we have 20, it's like
(28:21):
sometimes a lot of the work we're doing is still highly personalized. Like, that
is actually our superpower over the mega companies. And so, yeah, we use
the tools to help us. But we don't want to like strip away the humanity
of it. All. Right, Absolutely. And I think a lot of times when people hear
automations, they're worried that it's going to sound like cold or robotic. And like,
especially now we think of like, like I think the, the conversation
(28:42):
around the M Dash and Chat GPT is the perfect example where it's like, everyone
assumes that if you use an EM dash Chat GPT wrote it right where
I think that there is definitely a way that you can insert your personality into
these things, making the templates or the automated else
feel down more like you. And also, there's nothing
wrong with like being on the nose about it. If you're sending out
(29:04):
a payment reminder, let's say not you, your tool, sending out a payment reminder,
there's nothing wrong with saying, hey, this is a friendly automated reminder.
Any questions, hit reply. Or if somebody fills out your
form and you want to make sure that they're, let's say they
fill it out on a Friday, but you're not logging back into your inbox on
Monday. So you want to make sure they know I got it. We're good. It's
(29:25):
off your plate. I'm on it. You can send a quick hey, we got it.
Thank you. I'll get back to you soon with next steps and all that good
stuff. Just wanted to let you know it's not lost in my inbox,
that kind of thing. That can all be very helpful to carry
that experience across the finish line and not lose the
humanity and the touch and the secret sauce of you and how you work
(29:46):
with your people. Yeah, 110%. I love
this. Okay, so, so I know that there are people listening who are
going, okay, now I'm ClickUp curious and I know you have a
resource for them. So tell us a little bit about your ClickUp Repeat. Yeah,
I created this tool a while back because I found that
just like any tool, when you log in and you don't know where to start,
(30:07):
it can feel very overwhelming. And so I made just a little
free list that you can use to start brain dumping all of your
things in your head, whether that is your client project or your personal,
whatever that looks like, just getting it out and starting to put it somewhere that's
very tangible and then you can expand on that from there. But it makes it
very easy for you to be able to get started using the tool. I love
(30:28):
this so much. I'll get this free resource in the show notes online.
Drea.com 3, 6, 9. Rachel, thank you
so much. Where else can people connect with you online? Thank you. This was so
much fun. I feel like you and I could chat for literally hours about all
of these things. I think that we've been on our best behavior keeping it under
30. So I am on Instagram.
(30:49):
Feel free to go find me. I'm sure you're linked to this, but I'm at.
Hey, Dot. Rachel. Rachel's R A B H A E L. Thank you, mom and
dad. And you can find me there if you have. If you listen
to this and you got to this point, you're like, cool. Maybe I want ClickUp.
Maybe I want Asana. Maybe I need devoto. Maybe I need Moxie. I don't know.
Send me a message. I'm more than happy to help point you in the right
direction. I think there's a lot of noise, especially if you're an online business owner
(31:11):
in the online social base. And it's hard to find someone that you can go
to and ask questions without it feeling like it's just going to be a
pitch and they're going to ask you to jump on a sales call. Call. I'm
not going to do that. Let's chat. Let me help point you in the right
direction. Feel free to send me a message. Okay? Y' all
take advantage of this once in a lifetime opportunity
(31:31):
and just to talk to someone too, because I do feel like a YouTube video
can only get you so far. So very generous of you, Rachel. Thank
you so much for being on the show today. Thank you. Appreciate it. This was
so much fun. Hey, and thank you, dear listener, for tuning in to another
episode of the Mindful Marketing PO Podcast. If you like this conversation,
you're going to love the conversations inside of the Mindful Marketing
(31:52):
Lab. We talk about marketing, we talk about
what's your system, we talk about our different tools. And y' all
already know mine is airtable. So if you're air table friendly,
I have all the air table templates for you, but you gotta join in the
lab to get them. Head on over to onlinendra.com
lab to join us today. I have another episode for you
(32:14):
next Tuesday. I'll see you then. Bye for now.
If you ever opened up your favorite project management tool, mine
is Asana and Airtable. And then you start crying and then you close it
immediately because you're completely overwhelmed. Well, this. This episode is for you, my
friends. We're going to be talking about a love for
systems and tools and how do we make our businesses
feel more streamlined without feeling like we're adding more to
(00:23):
our plates. I have the amazing Rachel Mueller on the show
today to talk with us all about that. But first, a word
from our spons. Riverside is the all in one
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(00:45):
so, so easy. Plus, I love their
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Resizes them for social media. So those vertical videos you see on
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(01:07):
Riverside. It's literally one click. It spits out 10 clips.
I picked the best one and away I go. Saves me so much time. If
you want to get on the Riverside train, check it out today, the links in
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at checkout to get 15% off your membership.
Welcome to episode number 369 of the Mindful Marketing
(01:29):
Podcast. Rachel, I'm so excited to have you here today.
Here. Thank you for having me. Yes. We were just talking before
the show about how systems, tools and tech is
a big question that we often get on the podcast, especially
with our theme of approaching things mindfully, so
doing less, not more. So let's start though,
(01:52):
at the beginning of you and your story. Give us the
elevator style journey of your
path towards being a systems expert. Yeah, so
it's I think, a very typical entrepreneurial
journey in that I did something, I learned a lot and I thought this could
be better. So my partner and I started our first business together
(02:15):
in 2015 and it was a real estate investment
company. We were buying and selling property and there were a lot of moving parts,
as you can imagine. And we were managing everything manually by ourselves
and got to this point where almost daily
I was having like a two year old tantrum style tantrum on the couch,
feeling so incredibly overwhelmed and I thought this, there
(02:37):
has to be a better way. Like, this is not working. I've always found myself
a very organized person. I collected notebooks And I, you know, do all
these organizational things. But it wasn't until we actually jumped into
finding the right tools and systems and we started implementing a CRM project
management tool. Like all of these things that actually helped make things feel
so much easier and more streamlined. And life got a whole lot
(02:59):
easier because I didn't feel like I was scrambling every single day trying to figure
out what am I doing, who needs what, checking my inbox for my to do
list to respond to things, and being very reactionary, it definitely
swapped that mindset for me and put me in much more control of what was
going on. And that was amazing. And then come
2019, we started to shift a little bit, realized we kind of wanted to
(03:21):
move away from that business pandemic hit. People were starting
new businesses, people were working from home. There was a lot of
things happening, and it felt like the perfect opportunity for me to slip in. And
I didn't know what it looked like. As any business when you start kind of
is where it's like, let me just figure this out as I go. But I
knew that I wanted to show up and help people and let them have that
(03:41):
same experience that I did of making their life feel so much easier.
Yes, 100%. I had the same thing happen to me with actually
one of my clients. We used to put all of our client work in a
spreadsheet, really Google sheet. And I had it new client
come in and they were like, this is not working for us. We can't give
feedback appropriately in this tool. Can we find
(04:02):
a better way? And that's when I landed on airtable and it was like,
oh my gosh, my life has completely changed now. I'm an airtable
like lover. I can't go a day without using that
thing. And so it came from
necessity. Right. We all have those moment where we're like, okay, this
is not working. But I want to talk more
(04:24):
about the step before the tool. You know, when we're sitting in that moment where
we're like, gosh, this isn't working. How do we start thinking about
the systems or the things behind the tools
to. To actually build in an easeful path and not
just adding more complexity into our lives, what are the questions we should think about
before we get into the tools of it all? Yeah, for sure. So, I mean,
(04:47):
like you said before, there is even the tools and understanding what the solution is,
you got to figure out where your problem is. Right. And where. What is it
you're actually trying to sol. Chances are that if you have we'll
say thrown the proverbial spaghetti at the wall, which is trying this new
tool and oh, this new thing is going to solve all my problems. But it
doesn't work. And it's because you're not actually figuring out what the real problem is.
And so my suggestion is always starting with auditing your time,
(05:09):
figuring out what is actually the bottleneck. Is it
that you are losing leads in your inbox, you're not getting back to
people fast enough. That is suffering. Your marketing is suffering because of it. You're
not getting enough referrals because the client experience isn't great or you're dropping
balls or whatever that looks like. Cool. You probably need
a project manager or excuse me, you probably need a client management tool
(05:31):
that's going to help with streamlining that process. Sending out
tasteful automations to keep people moving forward even when you
aren't in front of the computer. If it's a busy season or whatever, that looks
like making it that much easier for them and for you from a
lead management, scheduling and onboarding, making it all
so much easier. Cool. On the flip side, if it
(05:53):
is, you feel pretty good about your client experience, but it also feels like when
you actually jump into doing the work for people or even your day to day
work, you have no idea what you're doing. Your schedule feels like a mess. You're
kind of just guessing and trying to figure out what should I be doing today?
What feels like the most important fire that I need to put out right
now? Chances are you probably are keeping a lot in your head
(06:14):
and need some kind of central tool database to hold
it all. So you're not having 100 Google random docs for this
and notes in your iPhone and post it here in that notebook by
your bed and gathering everything and putting it in one central place that you can
then have accountability for that due date, be able to move
things forward. That is also a very helpful step. And I think the
(06:36):
two very much go hand in hand. Like you kind of need both in
your business. But I think it's also very important to recognize before you
again, just start doing all the things. What is it that's actually
needing the most attention? Right. Then get that set up, then
move on to the next piece, then the next piece, then the next piece.
Yes. Oh my gosh. This reminds me of when I
(06:58):
moved from handwriting my notes to typing them in a Google Doc. Like it
does feel like a very simple decision, but I got to
the point where I was sitting there staring at my chicken scratch. Going,
what did I even write here? What does this even
say? You can't even understand your own shorthand. Yeah, right.
(07:18):
And so I feel like sometimes we go with what
we know because we think it's easier at the time, but when in
reality there are things that can help improve that entire
process. And even now I record all of my client calls
because there's so much information in there that I can't gather at the
time with notes. There are so many tools that I use in that
(07:40):
process as well. You know, recording the call, taking the transcript,
putting into AI and going, know, what's the summary? What's the lessons
learned? What are my follow up questions? You know, there's, there's so many tools that
can help improve my entire client process, but you kind of have to think
a little bit about that. And I know that this
thought process takes time. And so I feel like the biggest
(08:02):
roadblock to a lot of business owners is like, okay, so I'm overwhelmed
right now. How in the heck do I now have time to then sit down
and think about a system? So cool, cool, cool, cool.
Yeah. How do we help that problem? Yeah, it's a really
good question. I think that it's twofold. So one, what you were just describing
to me, it also very much feels like a comfort zone thing. Right?
(08:26):
We stick with what we know because it's comfortable and it's easy and learning something
new takes time. And figuring that out. And when you are already feeling
so overwhelmed trying to do something different, it's so
difficult. Right, because it takes you three times as long and you don't know what
you're doing and you're going to mess up and it's two steps back, one step
forward kind of feeling. But that being said, said,
(08:46):
I think that if you are able to
take a moment to really assess what needs your
attention and then break it down into bite sized
pieces. So earlier I said, okay, you need a client management tool
or you need a project management tool. Great. We're not talking about
sitting down and setting up the entire thing on Monday.
(09:09):
We're saying that, okay, you have decided that, you
know what the biggest thing for me is that my leads are getting lost in
my inbox. I'm not responding to people in time. It really sucks because
I feel like I'm not getting as many bookings as I could. Tool,
yes, you need a CRM. That tool is going to help you. Like Dubsado,
Honeybook, Moxbe. There's so many awesome things out there, but maybe the very
(09:31):
first thing, and the only thing that you do is you set up a new
contact form that you embed on your website. That is the exact same
contact form that you had on Squarespace, but now it's connected with your
CRM. So when somebody fills it out, it drops them in there with all their
information. You get notified and maybe we create a
really easy one step automation that just sends them an email
(09:53):
saying thanks, we got it, we'll get back to you in
X amount of time. Okay, cool. Now your leads
aren't getting lost anymore. Now that's going to start to feel a lot easier. What's
the next step? The next piece of that step by step process for you
getting them on the phone? Okay, well if we are
emailing back and forth and at some point that conversation
(10:15):
thread becomes so long and so convoluted because we can't find a time because
of time zones and this and that. Cool. Now we need a scheduler. Let's set
up your scheduler and let's just have one schedule type for that new lead
discovery call and get that going. Then let's move on to the next piece. And
before you know it, you've made it to the end of your process and everything
is feeling so much easier. But if we look at it in that bite sized
(10:37):
piece, it feels so much easier to jump into than
feeling like you got to conquer all of it and you know, all or nothing
essentially. If I don't start using my entire tool perfectly by the end of next
week, I'm just going to keep doing things the way that I'm doing them because
it's comfortable and it's safe and it's easy. Yeah, I mean honestly, we
live in the age of information overload. Right. We can
(10:57):
literally go to YouTube and find the solutions to our
problems, but at some point we have to start implementing them. And I feel like
that that's your advice works so perfectly there, which is like just start
somewhere, start small, don't try to do everything today because then
you'll get really overwhelmed. Is there any like particular
thing that you've seen, like a commonality with small business owners or
(11:19):
solopreneurs entrepreneurs where you go just do this one
thing and you'll have a difference, like a quick. Win,
probably brain dumping. I find that
99% of the people that I work with, unless we're coming in and
were auditing like their system that they've been using for a while and we're just
judging it up, very good chance that you are keeping
(11:41):
way Too much in your head. Like way too much. Like without even realizing
it. Not even just like business stuff, but personal stuff where it's like,
okay, when you wake up in the morning, I gotta go to the grocery store
today and then I'm recording that podcast episode and oh, I gotta pick up that
birthday present for Rachel and I got an rsvp. Like even all that
personal stuff, if you're just, if it's swirling around in your head, there's a very
(12:02):
good chance that that is weighing so heavily on you.
And I have worked with very successful business owners that are doing
really great things in their business and they're just keeping all their to
do's in their head. Or they wake up and they grab their phone and they
jot down those thoughts and then they forget to look at it and they jump
into the fires of the day and it just starts to feel a little chaotic.
(12:23):
And so I always recommend the first place to start is if you're
keeping things in your head, getting them out, writing them down,
using your project management tool, whatever that looks like, making a
concrete list so that you then free your mind and you're no longer
thinking like, don't forget that. Remember this, whatever that looks like. Waking up
at 2am in a panic because you forgot to do that thing again, it just
(12:45):
makes things feel so much easier. And then it also makes it so much easier
to move on to all the other pieces that we talked about because you're no
longer just juggling it in your brain, it's somewhere tangible that you can look and
say like, okay, these are the things that I need to prioritize. Everything
else that can wait. Yeah. Oh, brain dumping. I love
this. I feel like I forgot what that feels like because I'm so
(13:06):
reliant on my calendar, my asana, literally, if it's not my Google calendar, I
don't know what's happening. I don't know thousand percent. I completely forgot
about it the second it went in there. And so I just have that,
that system already in place. But when you don't, it
is, it's a very heavy feeling. Is there a frequency we should brain
dump like daily or how do you recomm to do this?
(13:28):
Yeah, so I mean, whatever works for you for sure. Like the
goal is not to find like whatever my process is. If it doesn't work for
you, you're not going to do it. And consistency is the key with trying to
implement any of these new habits. Right. But for me, the easiest
thing is I keep post its in Literally every room
and space of the house. I'm looking for them right now because I went around
(13:48):
this morning and I gathered all of my post its and I do this
almost daily where if my brain is feeling extra heavy and I've shut my
computer down for the day, I will write all my thoughts down. And then in
the I walk around and I gather them and then I put them in ClickUp
and I put them in their proper place and I give them a due date
or I do them right away, whatever that looked like. And that helps so
(14:09):
much so that even if I wake up in the middle of the night I
chicken scratch something on the post it and then I can fall back asleep and
I'm not having to sit there going okay, don't forget that, go back to sleep.
Don't forget that, go back to sleep. And it's just a very, very toxic cycle
for your brain. And so I think that the goal should be that getting
to the point of what you described where you don't have to think about
it, where you put it in, you put it where it belongs, you do the
(14:31):
thing, you schedule the appointment, whatever it looks like and then you move on to
the next thing. And so if there's something that's preventing you from doing that because
you are ping ponging in your brain from thing to thing, then you need to
sit down and write some stuff down. Yeah, a hundred percent. I
feel like it's, it's especially now in the world we live, it's so digital.
Like we have so many tools available to us, it
(14:52):
just makes sense to use them. I've started using them a lot too in my
personal life. Like I've got a three year old and a one year old now.
Nobody told me about the birthday situation. There's so many birthdays,
there are so many birthdays and you gotta get gifts for all the little
friends for the birthdays and it's a lot and I like
religiously put them in my Google calendar now because otherwise I don't know they're gonna
(15:14):
happen. And so it's been so, so helpful. But you mentioned
ClickUp and I'm curious about this because I feel
like people who like their tool love it. I'm an airtable girly, I like
asana. There's notion people out there to love it. ClickUp
person, tell me what you like. About ClickUp for sure. So I'll back
up also before I jump into getting the nerdiness of ClickUp because I could
(15:36):
talk about ClickUp literally all day like If Click up go down, my whole life
goes down with it. Like everything, everything about me is in ClickUp. But I will
say that for me it was about finding the right tool. And I,
for our first business, I was using a completely different platform that like barely exists
now. And then I swapped for this for hey, Rachel. When I first got started
I was using Trello and then I did try using Asana and then I was
working in a client's Asana and then I we used airtable
(15:59):
for personal stuff for years, for travel planning and creating spreadsheets
kind of that way. And like, I've tried all the things but I never found
one that felt like it was like my catch all for everything until I found
ClickUp. And that's really what it feels like for me, is that I can do
everything that I was doing in three different platforms all in one. But
also it just makes sense for me. Like, you know, sometimes when you log into
(16:21):
something and you're like, I don't know, I just need to find this thing. I
don't know where to click. Like, the menu feels complicated and I don't know what
I'm doing and it feels overwhelming. It's not the tool for you.
Like, there's no amount of training that's going to help you figure it out. Like
you might learn and be able to follow step by step. Like, okay, I go
here and here and here. But if it doesn't feel good, if you don't feel
excited about logging into it, if it doesn't fit your vibe that day,
(16:44):
you're not going to use it. And then what's the point, right? So like I
can sit here and spew about like all the things that I love, but you
got to find the right platform for you. And I think that the biggest
thing for me of, I feel like nowadays especially it's kind of like a ClickUp
versus Asana versus notion conversation. And I think it's really
about that, about finding what feels good for you. For me, Asana
(17:05):
felt almost too simple. Like I wanted to be able to do a little bit
more as far as like the views and the automations and that kind of thing.
And I also really didn't love the hierarchy in Asana
and how it worked with like the project situation and that kind of
setup versus Notion where you literally open up
a blank screen and you have to figure out what you're designing.
(17:26):
No, that I, I am a recovering perfectionist. I would
spend a thousand hours trying to create something before I even started using
it. And that's why there are so many people out there that are in Notion
Template, because it's very difficult to start from a blank screen.
And so for me, ClickUp was just this beautiful marriage of
all the things into one place that just made it. It just
(17:47):
connected. It just connected with my brain. Yes, 100%, you
are speaking my language. Because I feel like. So I say the same thing
about, like, social media scheduling tools. So many of them
out there, and people are always like, which one you recommend? And I can tell
you which one I recommend. However, if you log in and you go, my
brain does not understand this language, then you're. You're not going to get, like, you're
(18:08):
not going to get it. So, yeah, I like that. And I feel like that's
why I liked airtable over Notion, because I did open an ocean thing one
time and I actually have. I purchased templates for Notion. Yeah, there
you go. I'm going to learn this. It's too flexible. It feels
like designing a WordPress website from scratch. Like, I know you
could technically get a better, highly more customized
(18:30):
website, but, like, give me a squarespace, give me a wix any day,
because then you can just drag and drop. I don't need all the fancy stuff.
So, yeah, I totally understand that with ClickUp. Okay,
so talk to me more about ClickUp. Specifically. What's your favorite
way to use it as a system or tool in your marketing?
Ooh, in my marketing. Okay, so I love using ClickUp for my
(18:52):
content planning. I have a content plan space
and folder where I'm able to gather all of my ideas
and thoughts. So I have lists for all of my platforms, my email list, my
blog, my Instagram, et cetera. But then I have a central calendar view
where I can see it all laid out like a content planner, like a social
media planner, and be able to plan everything from there. My
(19:15):
favorite feature of ClickUp, though, is the little bit of customization that you can do
with, like, your status colors and making them your brand colors and making them pretty
and making it a fun place to want to go, adding your emojis and your
icons and all the things and like, really getting down to, like,
the very specifics. So it's very clear of, like, okay, on this day
I'm posting this Instagram thing and it's a reel and I need. Still need
(19:37):
a caption for it. But then on the next day I'm posting this and it's
a carousel and those need hashtags or this is still a work in progress. Or
whatever it looks like. And so you can get very specific with the organization of
it. And that makes it feel so much easier to go from just having
like all of these content ideas in your phone to then
actually having something tangible that you're getting across the finish line and saying
(19:58):
like, okay, looking at it at the calendar, I'm scheduling
this for this day. Working backwards. Let's start working on it.
Yeah. So how frequently are you putting ideas in there? Is it
like a monthly weekly thing. Or it's probably by
like several times a week that like I'll think of something or if like I'm
on socials, I get an idea for something and I jot it down, but then
(20:21):
actually like putting it somewhere on the calendar
where it's like, okay, that wasn't just an idea. This is actually something that I
want to do probably weekly to like every couple weeks.
I'm like really mapping out what that actually looks like. Okay, and
are you attaching like images and videos and stuff in there too or is it
just text? Sometimes, yeah. So if I have someone that's
(20:42):
helping me, like, so I have an assistant that helps with marketing stuff like
scheduling emails and working on blog posts and that kind of thing.
And so sometimes we need visuals for that, so we'll add those in. Or if
it's something like a video kind of thing that's
getting edited, maybe that gets uploaded there to work through the approval process.
But generally speaking, like I try and get as much in there as I can
(21:05):
and then when it's like tangible ready to go, that's when I drop it
into my actual like social media planner grid. I use
planoly still for me that works. And so dropping it in so I can see
like visually, like how does this all line up with everything and make it very
easy to go from there to my phone? I know there are extensions
and add ons and tools where you can like schedule stuff directly to your
(21:27):
socials from ClickUp, but I, I don't like auto posting
stuff. I definitely still like the handholding of it and getting it across the finish
line. So that process worked for me. Yeah, I mean, especially now,
like I find that I kind of have to do a temperature check
before I post stuff online because the world is like so wild right
now. You don't want to post it, like have something automatically go out and you're
(21:49):
like, oh no, things are on fire. So yep, that was a horrible time to
share that. Yes, totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. I love this
content planning in ClickUp. It's, it's exactly how I do an
airtable as well. So for those of you listening, if you tried
Airtable and you're like, my brain didn't like this, try ClickUp.
It may be the alternative that you need to get things
(22:11):
planned. And the other thing that I like about using tools like this instead of
planning in your scheduling tool, is that you're able
to actually sort and reuse that content
a whole lot easier. You know, you can
source content from previous months, years even,
and repurpose it in other ways. So I'm curious about your process to
(22:34):
this. How are you using content repurposing
inside of ClickUp? Yeah, so I, I've gone
through many iterations of it over the years trying to find a process that
works. And I would say generally speaking it's really
easy and ClickUp to like duplicate a task. So like, let's say that like you
have this like blog post that you shared on this day. You can
(22:56):
easily then add that into your Instagram list and say,
okay, we're going to take this little snippet and make carousel of it kind of
thing. Or you can also get really deep with the automations
inside ClickUp and like, let's say that something in one place like
your blog post. Now you can get an automation alert task that
says, great, this blog posted. It's time to make your Pinterest pins and
(23:18):
share that to Pinterest and create this from that and share it on
socials and then schedule it in the email newsletter. So you send out your
blog, like there's a lot that you can do there, but without going
like too deep and nerdy into it, which I know you and I very much
could, I think that it's just all about like finding, finding the
flow that like feels really easy to maintain. Like that's the thing for me. I
(23:39):
think that like when I tried to make it overly complicated, I stopped using
it because it was so rigid that like there was no flexibility in
it to like figure out. Like, well, if I set this up and I am
cross posting the content to every single platform but this post, I
don't want to, but my automation is telling me I need to. And it's created
four tasks for me. Like that starts to get too messy and complicated and I
(24:02):
think that's when things can start to feel like overwhelming past the point of
helpful. Okay, you put into words something that I've been struggling with with
Airtable for a while too. No, because I have a friend who's like
an Airtable. Like. Like, she does everything with Airtable.
And she was showing me her automations for, like, podcast guest booking and
how, like, she just, you know, toggles it from, like, you
(24:24):
know, pending to booked. And it's like emailing the person out some stuff. It's
like attaching all these things. And I'm like, but what if. What if you want
to toggle it but those things aren't ready yet and then your automations are all
broken? Like, yeah, that's what I think when I. When I see, like, it's too
automated for me in my process. I love that for her, and I like that
she could do that. But for me, I need a little manual, like some
(24:45):
checklists in there so that things are like automatically going wild. Yeah,
there's nothing wrong with templates over automating everything. In fact, I'm
very much like you were. Like, I'm not a fan of automating everything. I
find that an overly automated experience can actually do the opposite for you
sometimes. Like, exactly like what you're describing. But a good template.
Yes. That makes it so easy for you to be able to get
(25:08):
things across the finish line so you're not just staring at a blank screen every
single time. Yeah. I feel like this leads into one of the questions
I had, which is about the difference between systems and tools, because it
feels like sometimes people get so reliant on the tool
itself without really thinking about the entire pro, like, the client
experience. Like you talked about, like, the client doesn't care if you
(25:29):
manually had to edit that email or if it went out automatically. Right.
Like, they don't care. They just want the email. And so I feel like sometimes
we get too, I don't know, we get too far in the
tech. But can you talk a little bit about that from your experience? Like, this
difference between systems and tools and how do we decide what is automated
and what isn't? Totally. So the way that I like to think about it
(25:50):
is basically a system is something that takes a manual
process and it turns it into something that is repeatable,
automatable, delegatable, etc. So whether
that means that you are taking your process and you're putting it into a tool,
like a CRM or asana or ClickUp to do the thing. Cool.
Or is it just that you're mapping out what that process looks like
(26:12):
for how things work and you now have your steps? One,
two, three. Maybe they're all manual steps, but it's a very clear way that
you do it every single time. And you're creating a system out of
that where it's now, you know, when you do this thing, this happens, and when
you do this step, this happens. And then you can start to pepper in some
things like templates. If you're doing the same thing every single time, if it's repeatable
(26:34):
sitting down, let's use your podcast as an example. If you are
sitting down every time that you need to record with somebody and you're saying, okay,
so we need to, for this recording, get their headshot and their bio,
and I need to look up questions and I need to do this research, and
then you're going to forget something. Right. But if you have that template, that
checklist that you can refer to every single time, but then manually
(26:55):
do the pieces to fill in the dots, that's going to feel like a much
cleaner, easier process than having to do it, you know, the other way every single
time. Yeah, a hundred. I love all of this. I really do, because
I, I feel like I got this question a lot when I was doing a
lot of mentoring for social media managers and
freelancers. And I used dubsado for years, and then I switched
(27:16):
to moxie. And yes, both of those tools have a ton of
automations. I wasn't using all of them. I was using more of their
templates and the automations because there are a few. Like, if someone
fills out a form, then, yeah, I want to send them, thank you and be
like, I'll follow up. But when someone hits accept on a
proposal, I like to do a. A customized email. Like,
(27:37):
I don't want them to get something automated. They just gave me thousands of dollars.
So, yeah, I got a template for it to help me, but I'm going to
be very specific and layer in things that we talked about,
things that they're excited about into that email so that it is a
personalized experience. It's not just another templated response.
Right. So I do feel like some of these automations,
(27:59):
especially for a lot of us who have smaller businesses, which is a lot of
people listening, right? We're not like, you know, top 100 companies
over here. We are, you know, usually, you know, under
10 million, let's say, in business a year. And so when I think about
companies that are that size, it's like, even if we
have one person on our team or we have 20, it's like
(28:21):
sometimes a lot of the work we're doing is still highly personalized. Like, that
is actually our superpower over the mega companies. And so, yeah, we use
the tools to help us. But we don't want to like strip away the humanity
of it. All. Right, Absolutely. And I think a lot of times when people hear
automations, they're worried that it's going to sound like cold or robotic. And like,
especially now we think of like, like I think the, the conversation
(28:42):
around the M Dash and Chat GPT is the perfect example where it's like, everyone
assumes that if you use an EM dash Chat GPT wrote it right where
I think that there is definitely a way that you can insert your personality into
these things, making the templates or the automated else
feel down more like you. And also, there's nothing
wrong with like being on the nose about it. If you're sending out
(29:04):
a payment reminder, let's say not you, your tool, sending out a payment reminder,
there's nothing wrong with saying, hey, this is a friendly automated reminder.
Any questions, hit reply. Or if somebody fills out your
form and you want to make sure that they're, let's say they
fill it out on a Friday, but you're not logging back into your inbox on
Monday. So you want to make sure they know I got it. We're good. It's
(29:25):
off your plate. I'm on it. You can send a quick hey, we got it.
Thank you. I'll get back to you soon with next steps and all that good
stuff. Just wanted to let you know it's not lost in my inbox,
that kind of thing. That can all be very helpful to carry
that experience across the finish line and not lose the
humanity and the touch and the secret sauce of you and how you work
(29:46):
with your people. Yeah, 110%. I love
this. Okay, so, so I know that there are people listening who are
going, okay, now I'm ClickUp curious and I know you have a
resource for them. So tell us a little bit about your ClickUp Repeat. Yeah,
I created this tool a while back because I found that
just like any tool, when you log in and you don't know where to start,
(30:07):
it can feel very overwhelming. And so I made just a little
free list that you can use to start brain dumping all of your
things in your head, whether that is your client project or your personal,
whatever that looks like, just getting it out and starting to put it somewhere that's
very tangible and then you can expand on that from there. But it makes it
very easy for you to be able to get started using the tool. I love
(30:28):
this so much. I'll get this free resource in the show notes online.
Drea.com 3, 6, 9. Rachel, thank you
so much. Where else can people connect with you online? Thank you. This was so
much fun. I feel like you and I could chat for literally hours about all
of these things. I think that we've been on our best behavior keeping it under
30. So I am on Instagram.
(30:49):
Feel free to go find me. I'm sure you're linked to this, but I'm at.
Hey, Dot. Rachel. Rachel's R A B H A E L. Thank you, mom and
dad. And you can find me there if you have. If you listen
to this and you got to this point, you're like, cool. Maybe I want ClickUp.
Maybe I want Asana. Maybe I need devoto. Maybe I need Moxie. I don't know.
Send me a message. I'm more than happy to help point you in the right
direction. I think there's a lot of noise, especially if you're an online business owner
(31:11):
in the online social base. And it's hard to find someone that you can go
to and ask questions without it feeling like it's just going to be a
pitch and they're going to ask you to jump on a sales call. Call. I'm
not going to do that. Let's chat. Let me help point you in the right
direction. Feel free to send me a message. Okay? Y' all
take advantage of this once in a lifetime opportunity
(31:31):
and just to talk to someone too, because I do feel like a YouTube video
can only get you so far. So very generous of you, Rachel. Thank
you so much for being on the show today. Thank you. Appreciate it. This was
so much fun. Hey, and thank you, dear listener, for tuning in to another
episode of the Mindful Marketing PO Podcast. If you like this conversation,
you're going to love the conversations inside of the Mindful Marketing
(31:52):
Lab. We talk about marketing, we talk about
what's your system, we talk about our different tools. And y' all
already know mine is airtable. So if you're air table friendly,
I have all the air table templates for you, but you gotta join in the
lab to get them. Head on over to onlinendra.com
lab to join us today. I have another episode for you
(32:14):
next Tuesday. I'll see you then. Bye for now.
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