Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, this is Annie
Veblen-McCarty and I'm gonna
teach you how to be effortlesslyproductive.
I've been an entrepreneur forover 20 years and I got sick and
tired of experts preaching whatbusiness and life should look
like and what I should be doingas a leader and to turn a profit
, only to find myself wastingtime, burned out, feeling
(00:22):
inauthentic and still not makingany money.
On this show, we are ditchingthe shoulds.
I'm giving you permission to dobusiness differently.
As a certified master coach, Ibelieve that everything you need
to have success and build thelife and business of your dreams
is already living on the inside.
(00:43):
I'm going to empower you tolean into what you do best, help
you see your path forwardclearly and give you the
strategy and action steps alongthe way to become effortlessly
productive.
Let's dive in.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
I am so excited you
are here Today.
We are going to be talkingabout how to choose a business
system or scaling software foryour business.
There are so many options outthere.
There are so many differentchoices, and I have people come
(01:19):
to me all the time who arehonestly overwhelmed by how many
choices there are.
They're confused.
They don't know what they need.
They don't even know where tobegin with piecing things
together.
That is why I was so excited todo this episode for you.
This has been so highlyrequested, because so many
(01:40):
people are trying to choose whatit is that they want to use.
So I am going to walk youthrough this process and
hopefully, by the end, youeither maybe have something in
mind that you've already beenlooking for, or you at least
have an approach that you cantake to start to narrow this
down.
The first thing that I haveeverybody do who comes to me
(02:05):
with this question is what areall the features that you need
for your business right now?
Think about this as your idealwish list.
If you could have anything andeverything you wanted right now,
what would that include?
And then maybe think about,five years out out, what are all
(02:25):
the other things in yourbusiness that you might want to
have in the future.
So an example of this is maybeat this moment, you do not have
online courses that people cantake.
However, that's something thatyou have been dreaming about and
thinking about and want to have.
So that would go on your listas well, and you can do this as
(02:47):
two lists.
You can do it as a now list anda future list, or you can do it
all as one, because we aregoing to look at the entirety,
the totality of all of thesethings when we start to pick the
platform that we want to use.
So think about all the thingsthat you might want to have.
Maybe you don't need a websiteright now, but you know in the
long that we want to use.
So think about all the thingsthat you might want to have.
Maybe you don't need a websiteright now, but you know in the
(03:08):
long run you want to have awebsite.
There's so many differentfeatures that are available that
are out there.
Maybe you're like I don't evenknow what automations are or how
to begin using them, but in thefuture that would be amazing to
be able to automate things inmy business without me having to
touch them, but in the futurethat would be amazing to be able
to automate things in mybusiness without me having to
touch them.
So I might not know how to useit now or how I even would use
(03:30):
it, but I know that's somethingthat I want in the future.
So make your list.
That's where we're going tostart.
Now that we have made our list,we now have to start to think
about the choice of do we wantto get little pieces of software
?
There are fantasticapplications and softwares out
(03:51):
there that do one thing really,really, really well.
For example, we can think aboutscheduling tools or calendar
tools, and there are so manydifferent options out there.
Right, we have Calendly, wehave Acuity the list could
literally go on and on.
They all work great.
So those are some things thatyou can think about.
(04:13):
However, what I have found, bothpersonally and with so many
people who come to me asking, isthat we start with one little
thing that we want.
So we're like I need a calendartool and we buy the best
calendar tool out there, asubscription to it, and we're
using it.
And then we're like, oh my gosh, and I want an email list.
(04:34):
So then we go out and find thebest email service that we can
find and it does emails really,really well.
And then we're like, okay, nowI want to have a website, so I'm
going to go find the bestwebsite host and the easiest
place to build a website.
And we have that.
And then we come to the pointwhere we're like oh, I would
(04:55):
love people to be able to optinto my emails on my website.
Well, these two pieces ofsoftware do not talk to each
other.
Maybe they do have anintegration, but a lot of the
time they don't.
Now there are ways that we canembed an email signup form onto
a website, but when these twopieces of software are not
(05:16):
connected and integrated, a lotof the time what we end up with
is we end up with having tonavigate and put the actual
computer programming coding fromone software into another
software.
And so when I'm working withclients, a lot of the time
that's where people are like Iliterally don't even know how to
(05:39):
do this.
So they've bought subscriptionsto and built out things and
they have their whole email listin four, five, seven, 10, 15
different softwares that theyare using, and now they're at a
place where they're trying toget it all to talk to each other
and work together and they arerunning into so many roadblocks
(06:02):
and issues and trouble andsomething's not working the way
that they thought it was goingto and the one company says that
it's the other company's faultand other companies like no,
it's a setup problem on theirend, and they are confused and
stuck and they don't know whereto go for help.
It can be very expensive tohire a professional to then come
(06:24):
in and try to make it all worktogether or try to fix these
issues or these hiccups that youare running into.
So that is one drawback and Ishare that also from personal
experience.
I, at the beginning of myentrepreneur journey, I hopped
from email marketing platform toemail marketing platform over
(06:44):
and over and over again andevery single time I did that I
had to move my entire email list.
The email servers had to learnthat I was sending from a
different server than I had beenbefore my open rates would drop
.
I just ran into so manydifferent things.
I also did the same withwebsites.
(07:05):
I could go on and on, like somany different things, like I
mentioned, calendars.
So I have experienced this.
Now I got to the place where Iwas sick and tired of trying to
make different softwares talk toeach other.
There is a program, an app, asoftware called Zapier
Z-A-P-I-E-R.
(07:25):
It is amazing, like for what itis designed to do.
That is designed to tiedifferent softwares together.
However, especially if you'resomebody who's not as
comfortable with tech, if you gointo Zapier and start to try to
set it up a lot of the time,that process alone can be really
frustrating.
So we also have to think aboutif these two softwares don't
(07:48):
integrate on their own, and thenI'm trying to use something
like Zapier to tie them alltogether.
Now I have another subscription.
I have another place wherehiccups might happen, where data
is getting dropped or we justforgot to set something up
properly and it's not doing whatwe expected it to do, and now
(08:08):
we're back to chasing our tailtrying to troubleshoot what is
happening here.
So I am a huge, huge proponentof all-in-one softwares for this
exact reason, because it makesthe process so much easier and
so much smoother when we havethings all together.
Now there are a ton of differentall-in-one software options out
(08:31):
there.
That is part of why I had youlist, make your wish list of all
the things that you want in asoftware system now and all the
things that you might be usingin the next five years or in the
future too.
Because when we start lookingat these all-in-one softwares,
there are certain ones thatinclude text messages, there are
(08:52):
other ones.
Certain ones that include textmessages, there are other ones
that don't include text messages.
If you want to be sending textmessages for your business or
doing text message marketing,then we need to make sure that
we are looking at all-in-onesoftwares or in software systems
that we're going to tietogether that have text message
marketing.
So that's part of why I had youmake that list at the beginning
(09:15):
, because this is going to help.
Also, when you are looking atall-in-one softwares, we are
gonna run into lots of differentsubscription options and a lot
of the time they do have a loweroption.
However, where you're going inyour business, maybe their
pricing is tied to how manyclients you have on your email
(09:37):
list.
So right now, when you're juststarting your email list and
just starting to build that partof it, it's very inexpensive.
However, when you grow youremail list to where you want it,
staying on that platformsuddenly becomes a huge monthly
cost.
There are other all-in-onesoftwares that in order to get
(09:58):
certain features, in order tohave those features turned on
and accessible, you need to paya higher subscription level.
An example of this I know aspecific software.
It is a great all-in-one.
However, if you wanna hostcourses or have a website, you
have to be at their highersubscription levels and all of a
(10:19):
sudden it goes fromsubscription amount that is
pretty run of the mill tosomething that's very, very
expensive for a lot ofentrepreneurs, especially
entrepreneurs who are justgetting started, and a lot of
those entrepreneurs want to beselling their own courses or
they want to have their ownwebsite.
So make sure that as you startto look at different software
(10:42):
systems, that you are takinginto account how their
subscription model works, whatis included in all of that, and
then also again, if you are notgoing to go the all-in-one
option, if you're going to tryto tie all of it together, make
sure that you are understandingother kind of hidden costs there
of some softwares that youmight need to make things talk
(11:05):
to each other.
That is my recommendation onhow to start to determine do you
want an all-in-one, do you wantto try to piece things together
and then, when we are selectingdifferent softwares, making
sure that we are looking at whatis included and not just what
our cost is right now, in thisvery moment of where we are in
(11:27):
our business, but what our costmight be once we implement all
of these things, once we growthat email list, once we are at
the place that we are going inthe next five to 10 years.
That is a very important thingto take into consideration.
Another thing to start to thinkabout and look at as you start
to narrow your choices down,because you might end up where
(11:50):
you're like okay, I do want anall-in-one.
I have found these fewall-in-ones that have all the
options that I want.
How do I decide between them?
A big determining factor is howintuitive the interface is for
you, how easy it is for you tolearn.
A lot of places have freetrials.
(12:11):
I highly recommend, once you'venarrowed down to just a couple,
go in and grab a free trial andget in there and try to build
some things yourself.
Look at how it's organized,look at how all the features tie
together.
Does it make sense to you?
Is it easy to use?
Is it logically laid out?
Can you understand how yourlanding pages tie into your
(12:36):
forms, tie into an eventregistration, all of those
things.
So go actually use it and see.
Another thing to think about wealso have our price implication
as well.
We want to look at that priceand again, not just that monthly
price where we are right now,the monthly price of where we
are going to end up.
I also want you to look at thesupport that is available.
(13:00):
Is there support in the countrythat you are in?
Is there support 24-7?
Do they have a knowledge basethat you can look through?
Let's say you are buildingsomething at 3 am and there is
no live human to talk to.
Do they have some walkthroughsthat really help you figure that
(13:20):
out?
How fast is the supportresponse?
So we want to be looking at allof this.
What the training is.
Is that training included or isthat training cost extra?
And who it is that will beproviding that support for us?
Also, who are the people usingthat software and doing
trainings around that software?
(13:42):
Is that somebody that it iseasy for you to learn from, or
is it somebody where you don'treally connect with their way of
teaching?
Does that platform even haveanybody out there training on
how to set it up.
Make sure that you are lookingat the support options, at the
knowledge-based resources, atthe walkthroughs, at all of that
(14:03):
when you are starting to makethese decisions.
Does it have a getting startedcourse that paces you through?
When you are literally movingto this platform or just getting
started with it?
What's your first step?
What's your next step?
What order should you do thingsin?
Also think about, too, withthese software systems.
Let's say you do have a contactlist.
(14:25):
You have an email list alreadyor a text list.
Will they import that for you?
Is there support in helping youmove what you do have into that
platform and helping you getstarted setting things up?
So I want you to think aboutall of these pieces as you go to
choose a software platform.
Now, if you are looking for anall-in-one software platform,
(14:49):
those of you who are my creativeand spiritual entrepreneurs,
those of you who are coaches,those of you who are healers I
actually have my own softwareplatform that I absolutely love.
This is not saying you have touse it.
There are so many amazingoptions out there in the
marketplace, but I have designedthis software platform to be an
(15:12):
all in one that is inclusive ofeverything for a very
affordable monthly cost,especially compared to some of
the other prices out there, andit is literally set up and
designed for coaches andcreative entrepreneurs.
It is called Coach OS, so ifyou do want to look into that or
do the free trial just to playaround with it, you can go to
(15:34):
coachossoftwarecom and check itout, grab that free trial.
Maybe you put that into the mixof one of the platforms that
you are going to experiment withor take a look at.
And again, if you havesomething that you absolutely
love already and is workinggreat for you, stick with it.
Stick with it.
(15:55):
I have found that one of thebiggest expenditures of time and
energy in my business wasjumping softwares, was having to
move my list from one thing toanother, having to learn a new
platform.
So if you have something thatyou love and you were happy with
, I highly recommend juststaying there.
Don't move unless you have areason to move.
(16:15):
However, again, if you arelooking at different options or
you're like I am just lost and Idon't even know where to begin,
definitely check out my CoachOS software.
I can't wait to hear how thingsgo for you with selecting your
software platform or maybeyou're looking at a new one.
I know there are a lot ofpeople I've talked to recently
(16:36):
who are not happy with the onethey have and they're looking
for some other options to moveto.
So if that is you, good luckwith that process.
Definitely drop in the commentsif you have any questions or
feedback or input on yoursoftware or the process of
choosing one or the process ofmoving from one to another.
I hope you have a beautiful dayand I will catch you on the
(17:00):
next episode of EffortlesslyProductive.