One new skill to benefit your business

Confession time!

What's the one thing you're putting off doing?

The one thing you've either decided you can't do, or a thing that gets in the way of more business success or ease? 

We all have something. Usually our main excuses for not doing something connected to our business are 'no time' or 'no money'. But really they're just the lazy excuses. Most marketing activities don't cost a great deal and we manage to make time for the things we prioritise. 

There's normally something else that we need to master in order to move forward. 

People say things like 'I'm no good with technology' but that's often not really the issue. You no-longer need to be a technical whizz-kid to be good at social media, build a website, or set up online booking. The online services are really straight-forward to use. It's more that you think you won't be able to do something so you've not bothered trying. Or given up very quickly. 

What's really holding you back? 

For most of us there's a skill we need to learn. It's rarely something hard, and or anything that takes a lot of learning. The hardest step is setting an intention and getting started. Then we need to practise, again and again. We tell children to do this, but don't do it as much in adulthood. 

The two things I hear most often from business owners are that they need to get better at coming up with more ideas for social media, blogs etc (I have a workshop on that soon so get in touch if you want more details)) and creating a mailing list and sending out effective mailings (I can help with this too!). Perhaps one of these is your issue or maybe you have something completely different? 

My own 'hurdle' is video. For years I've said I'm rubbish at photography. I'm not exactly good at it now but by simply taking a lot more photos and standing still long enough for them to be in focus, I do end up with some I can use.

Now I know I need to take more videos. I almost enrolled on a course, thinking I needed to know more about the technical aspects of video. It was really more procrastination. I'm not interested in the technical aspects. And I also know that 'authentic' works just as well, or better, than 'slick'. So really the only thing stopping me is practice. 

The answer is obviously very simple. I have to stop procrastinating, stand still now and then and take more videos. I could do a course. I could read more, but essentially I just need to try. 

Some tough love

So my New Year 'tough love' question to you is: what are you procrastinating? What are you avoiding learning or doing?

And most importantly, when are you going to start? 

If you really do need to learn to do something marketing-related, rather than just getting started and practising, let me know and I'll see if I can suggest a short course or another way to get started.