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Have you thought about leaving Facebook? Or what would happen if you pulled your advertising and ditched the Facebook pixel? How are YOU getting feedback about whether or not your marketing efforts are "worth it"? All this month, I've been talking about digital privacy and online security and sharing how I researched and implemented a privacy-first marketing strategy for my business. So far, I’ve talked to Paul Jarvis on privacy-focused alternatives to Google Analytics, Jessica Robinson on how to assess your business's online security, and Kim Herrington about how focusing on SEO became a big part of my marketing effort as I focused on respect for individual data privacy. If you missed those episodes, I recommend you go give them a listen because they include a lot of background on this whole experiment and how it came about. This week, I wanted to talk about social media because social media platforms are some of the biggest offenders when it comes to data privacy issues. They track every move we make, what we say near our phones, where we go while we have them... all of it. When it came to my privacy-focused experiment, there wasn't much for me to do, other than pulling the plug on social media platforms completely. I'm not very active on any platform besides Twitter, which I use to build relationships with mostly peers and other business friends, not so much as a lead-gathering system. I also committed to not buying ads on Facebook or Instagram... but since I hadn't been doing that before, there wasn't much of a change. I also committed to not using the Facebook tracking pixel, but again, since I hadn't been using it before, there wasn't anything to remove or change there either. BUT... these ARE major marketing channels for LOTS of small businesses, and it's an important part of the decision-making process if you're thinking about your own marketing from a perspective of privacy, so I wanted to bring on someone who did go through this evaluation process and implemented their OWN experiment. Meet Nathalie Lussier. Nathalie has been making websites since she was 12 years old, so she's been living in the online world for quite a while. She's the founder of AccessAlly, which is a digital course and membership solution. And about a year ago, she took the Facebook tracking pixel off her website, and then left Instagram as a platform, both for her business and personally. Listen to the full episode to hear: How Nathalie made the decision to drop the pixel and leave Instagram What she does instead now and we talk about how to get real, actionable data while still respecting people's privacy AND holding true to her own desire not to support Facebook as a company.  The projects and ideas that I'm still working on implementing for ScaleSpark when it comes to digital privacy Learn more about Nathalie Lussier: accessally.com 30daylistbuildingchallenge.com @nathlussier on Twitter AccessAlly on Facebook Learn more about Susan: Dollars + Decisions Roundtable Twitter @thesusanboles ScaleSpark Resources:Transistor.fm (affiliate)

When I was first thinking about what privacy-focused marketing meant, I asked a few of my favorite marketing friends: if THEY were going to do privacy-focused marketing, what would they do?Universally, everyone came back with the answer of podcasting and SEO.Podcasting is one of the very few places in the world of media still without automatic digital ad insertions, for the most part. Also, podcast data tracking is not that detailed. Download or subscriber numbers are notoriously unreliable and the ability to tie downloads to an individual is relatively difficult. So, in terms of content delivery, podcasting is pretty private.This month, we've been talking about digital privacy and online security - and following along a bit with an experiment in privacy-focused marketing I decided to take on for my own business.Since podcasting was already a major part of my marketing strategy, I was already using a privacy-focused podcast hosting platform, so for my experiment, there really wasn't anything for me to change.Then we come to SEO—search engine optimization—which is the focus of THIS episode and was the next big piece that I added into my privacy-first marketing initiative. Up to this point in my business, I hadn't really paid much attention to SEO, assuming it was mostly for businesses larger than mine and that it would be something I added... someday.But, in light of trying to figure out how to still get traffic and leads, while not tracking folks or paying advertising dollars to companies that I REALLY didn't want to support like Facebook, investing in making my content more searchable and PULLING people to me just made sense. They were already searching for the content anyway... why not be the answer to their questions?To do this, I needed to find some support. I didn't have time (or honestly much of a desire) to learn the details of SEO. Enter Kim Herrington. Kim is an SEO consultant and the founder of Orsanna, a marketing agency for law firms, financial services, and other professional services.I found Kim by listening to a podcast episode where she described the work she did for Paul Jarvis (the co-founder of Fathom from 2 episodes ago). Because Paul is so committed to digital privacy, I knew that Kim would be well-acquainted with the privacy-first approach I was trying to take.Kim has been instrumental in helping me execute my privacy-focused marketing strategy and keeps me up to date on changes in the marketing and digital privacy world.Listen to the full episode to hear: What Kim’s done for me behind-the-scenes at ScaleSpark Behind the scenes of ScaleSpark's privacy-focused marketing experiment Why SEO is the perfect strategy if you're concerned with data privacy in your own marketing The big changes coming with Facebook and Instagram and data tracking that we should all know about Learn more about Kim Herrington: Follow Kim on Instagram kimberlyherrington.com kimberlyherrington.com/guide orsanna.com Learn more about Susan: Dollars + Decisions Roundtable Twitter @thesusanboles ScaleSpark Resources: Transistor.fm (affiliate)

This month on the podcast, I'm talking about privacy and security. Those are actually two different aspects of overall cybersecurity. I really love the definition of these two from the Fathom analytics blog about the difference between digital privacy and online security (I'll link to it in the show notes). It says: Digital privacy protects our personal information and data so that it's not unnecessarily exposed. This means that your information is protected before it’s known.Online security protects and secures our personal information and data when it needs to be exposed. If our personal information needs to be known, it's done as safely as possible. Last week, I talked to Paul Jarvis, the author of that blog post and co-founder of Fathom, a privacy-focused analytics company. We talked a LOT about digital privacy and how to ONLY collect information that does really needs to be known.This week, I want to talk about the other side of the coin: security. Jessica Robinson is an outsourced Chief Information Security Officer, founder, and CEO of PurePoint International and an expert in data security, cyber risk, and privacy. PurePoint International provides cybersecurity consulting and training for financial services, insurance, and other middle-market global companies with $100M-$500M in revenue. Listen to the full episode to hear: Where cybersecurity risks might live in your business How to assess the risk of a data breach in your own business What steps to take to shore up the security of your business and keep both your AND your clients' information safe The biggest concerns around digital privacy and online security for small business owners Learn more about Jessica Robinson: the-purepoint.com Follow PurePoint on Twitter Other resources from this episodeWhat’s the difference between digital privacy and online security?Learn more about Susan: Dollars & Decisions Roundtable Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

Last summer, I started really thinking about values. What values do I have that I want to make sure I'm building into the DNA of my business? When it came right down to it, I realized that my core value—the one I wanted to make sure lived in every essence of my business—was safety.  The work I do with clients requires trust and vulnerability. It’s intimate. Money is a touchy, uncomfortable subject for most of us, especially when we're talking in specific numbers. There's SO much shame and guilt and inadequacy for most of us when it comes to handling our finances. Talking about what's not working behind the scenes in your business requires you to admit that everything isn't perfect. And that can’t happen if people don’t feel safe—both in the real, physical world and psychologically. So, I asked myself: if I want to build a company with the core value of safety, how do I actually go about doing that?In the last seven months or so, I embarked on this experiment in privacy-focused marketing and data security. It’s been a big part of every marketing and operational decision I’ve made. All this month, we’re talking about privacy and security on the podcast. It'll be part behind-the-scenes with me sharing some of the actual steps I've taken and how I thought through these decisions for myself. I’ll also be interviewing some of the experts that helped me educate myself along the way. One of the first things I did was remove Google Analytics from my website and replaced it with a tool called Fathom. It’s a really simple, lightweight privacy-first alternative to Google Analytics. My guest today is one of the founders of Fathom, Paul Jarvis. Paul and his cofounder, Jack Ellis, are two of my go-to experts on both digital privacy AND on the logistics of how to build that ethos into the DNA of your company. It's a core value for them as well, so they have to navigate the balance of promoting, marketing, and growing a company while still staying true to keeping data secure and while being respectful of individual's data AND transparent about what they're doing. Listen to the full episode to hear: Why we should care about data privacy—even when we have nothing to hide Balancing privacy with marketing and promoting needs of a growing company while still keeping everyone’s data private Why I decided to swap Google Analytics for Fathom My background in Security Forces for the Air Force and how that informs my approach to safety and security in my business Learn more about Paul Jarvis: Fathom pjrvs.com Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

The choices we make about how to earn, save and spend our money all ultimately come down to how we think and feel about money - and work.And whether or not you're "successful" with your financial choices is all a matter of your perspective. That’s why understanding and thinking about how you define success has a lot to do with whether or not you're satisfied—or feel successful—with your finances.If you live in the US, you live in a capitalist society that equates accumulation of money with success. The default assumption is that more money is better and that success is accumulating as much money as you possibly can. But examining that definition of success and figuring out if that's YOUR definition of success can be really powerful when it comes to handling your own finances - and can help shape your priorities and values that help define your own financial choices. That's a lot of what my guest today does with his clients. Meet Brian Plain. Brian is an Investment Advisor Representative with Gradient Advisors, LLC an SEC Registered Investment Advisory firm located in Arden Hills, Minnesota. Brian helps clients figure out what to do with their finances and helps them figure out a plan to meet their financial goals. A lot of that work means really examining what success means, what enough means and recognizing that, even with a good financial plan, as soon as you walk out the door with your plan, it'll change. But that doesn't mean you failed. Listen to the full episode to hear: How to examine your financial values and create your OWN definition of success and failure when it comes to your financial decisions What does "success" look like when it comes to managing your money? How to incorporate what we really care about into our financial choices Learn more about Brian Plain: Brian’s blog The Reframing Failure Blog Post brianplain.com Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

I think there are three different stages when it comes to your business and your personal finances: pre-enough, enough, and post-enough.And at each stage, you'll have different priorities, weigh different choices, and view your world in very different ways. These definitions are mine and I think everyone will probably interpret the idea of pre-enough, enough, or post-enough in their own terms—but here's how I tend to think about it. Pre-enough is that stage when you may have a decent business, but you haven't hit that level of revenue where you're covering your costs and comfortably paying yourself what you need to be able to support your personal financial needs. In this stage, you're usually taking whatever work comes your way. It can be a difficult place where you are lacking in both time AND money because you're just trying to do whatever you can to get to that enough benchmark. Enough is where you have... enough. Your costs are covered, both business and personal. You're paying yourself and your team enough. You have enough to start building up some cash reserves and the choices and decisions you're making become a lot more about is this WORTH it for me? Is this client someone I WANT to work with? Is this the kind of work I want to be doing? Is this choice worth my time or energy? It's about using your resources effectively -- and the kinds of choices you make. Eventually, you might find yourself in the land of post-enough. Where your questions might be: what do I DO with all of this money?!? Where am I supposed to put it? And how do I use it responsibly? I wanted to explore this idea of pre-enough and post-enough by trying to follow someone's journey through these stages and beyond… to look at the choices they made, what helped them breakthrough that "enough" ceiling, and how their perspective changed in each of the different stages.Meet Rita Barry. Rita is a certified measurement marketer. She founded her company, a boutique digital marketing optimization consultancy based in the Canadian Rocky Mountains, in 2009. Rita Barry & Co. is a relationship-driven company focused on metrics, and they help select 6 to 8 figure female-led businesses take control of their numbers so they can transform their marketing campaigns and drive more sales.Rita deals with numbers and measuring success all day long and this journey to and through enough has been one she's spent a LOT of time thinking about. Listen to the full episode to hear: Step-by-step through the journey to (and past) enough What enough means to Rita What it looked like pre-enough and what she did to break through and past enough How her goals and what she was concerned about changed throughout her journey What she does, now that revenue benchmarks don't mean quite as much. Learn more about Rita Barry: ritabarry.co/breaktheceiling @ritabarryco on Instagram Connect with Rita on LinkedIn Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

What's YOUR earliest memory of money? Mine is going with my parents to open my own bank account at our local credit union. A lot of our experiences with and stories around money come from our childhood: how we saw money handled and what we got told about money, to name a few.And that stuff sticks with you. All of us have a completely unique and individual relationship to money that's influenced by not JUST those factors, but also the impact of every decision (good or bad) we've made with our own money and the impact of every decision (good and bad) we've seen OTHER people make with THEIR money.Your relationship with and access to money is impacted by your societal class, your demographics, and your generational wealth (or lack thereof). It's also influenced by the society you live in -- and if you're in the US, at least, that means a capitalist society. One where power and money are often interchangeable and where the depth of inequality is stunning -- and only getting more dramatic. Some of the workaround examining our relationship to our money also needs to examine how the system we live in impacts that relationship. Because it DOES. Once we understand that, we can start thinking about our relationship to money in a much broader view -- and we can start considering using our businesses as a means to start evening out some of that inequality. My guest today spends a lot of time thinking about, talking about, and teaching this work. Bear Hebert is a radical life coach, social justice educator, and anti-capitalist business consultant. In work and in life, Bear actively looks at the intersections of power and privilege and will ask you to do the same, pushing both you and your business in the direction of more liberated moments. Their current offerings include Anti-Capitalist Business Consulting and their online course, Freely: An Anti-Capitalist Guide To Pricing Your Work.Listen to the full episode to hear: The value of doing money mindset work How your relationship to money affects just about every area of your business, including a deep dive on pricing How Bear approaches making their services more accessible  And what accessible actually MEANS in the first place... Learn more about Bear Hebert: bearcoaches.com Anti-Capitalist Business Consulting Freely: An Anti-Capitalist Guide To Pricing Your Work  Follow Bear on Instagram Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

You're not a spreadsheet and you're not a calculator. You're a person with experiences, feelings, and history. But when most of us think about managing money, we think about it like it's math. We expect to make decisions about money like a calculator. But managing your money is actually more like figuring out psychology than math. Human beings don't make decisions like a calculator. We make decisions emotionally—and that includes financial ones. Learning how to manage your money well is part skill, sure. But a whole lot more is about examining your own relationship with money and dealing with all that baggage you're bringing to the table.How you think about money, the choices you make with your own money, and the relationship you have with it is ultimately impacted by a lot of stuff BESIDES just those decisions. It's influenced by what you learned about money as a kid. It's influenced by your reactions to previous decisions you've made with your money - both good and bad. We all have a completely unique and individual relationship to money that's influenced by all those factors. By examining that relationship, we can understand WHY we do the things we do and think the way we think, identify those influences -- and ultimately be able to make more conscious choices about what we do with our money.All this month we're going to examine the psychology behind money and why we think the way we do about it. To kick us off, I want to talk about buying things because that's where most of us start thinking about money. What should we buy? Or even SHOULD we buy something? We're bombarded with messages every day that encourage us to buy, buy, buy. Sometimes we even get told that it's patriotic. But WHY do we buy what we buy? That's what I want to know. And, as it happens, I know someone who LOVES geeking out on buying and marketing psychology. Meet Margo Aaron. She's a psychological researcher, turned marketer and the founder of That Seems Important, which is quite possibly my favorite blog in existence. She also co-hosts "Hillary and Margo Yell at Websites", an award-winning show about marketing and teaches writing and marketing to business owners. When I want to nerd out on the psychology behind marketing, Margo is my go-to. Listen to the full episode to hear: How shopping was INVENTED (yes, I said invented!) Why we buy things we WANT instead of only things we need How to ethically use the power of psychology for good in your marketing Learn more about Margo Aaron: thatseemsimportant.com  Marketing Masterclass: The Art and Science Of Getting People To Care on Skillshare Why We Buy Things We Don’t Need on Medium Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

What if you could change the way you price your services and double your revenue without bringing on any new clients or changing anything about HOW you work with your clients? Oh, yes, it’s possible!Sometimes, just switching up how you're pricing your services can have a dramatic effect on your overall profitability—and I don't just mean raising your prices—but reimagining how those prices are structured in the first place.We've been talking this month about creative strategies around pricing or packaging your services. And as part of that exploration, I wanted to re-air an interview that I did with Lacey Sites from a Lit Up Life in 2019. Lacey is a business mentor and success coach for high-performing women entrepreneurs and she created a unique revenue sharing pricing structure that allowed her to scale her one-on-one coaching business and dramatically grow her profits without bringing on a single new client. This unique model allowed Lacey to double down on her investment in each client, reap the rewards when their work with her pays off—and it also creates a pricing structure that builds trust and represents the true long-term partnership she wants to build with each client.This episode originally aired in December of 2019. It's been one of the most listened-to episodes ever and I think that's because it creates a model that allows you to genuinely grow and scale a service business without having to give up the close 1-1 client relationship. Listen to the full episode to hear: Increasing revenue without increasing work by using a revenue or profit-sharing model The logistics of actually creating a revenue-sharing model How a revenue-sharing model requires Lacey to filter her clients more carefully  The impact that shifting to this pricing model had on Lacey’s business Learn more about Lacey Sites: alituplife.com LITerally Podcast With Lacey Sites @alituplife in Instagram @A Lit Up Life on Facebook Facebook Group: The Lit Up and Loaded Entrepreneur Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

Imagine your ideal way of working with a client. For me, it's working ALL in on a single project. I'm someone who likes going 100% or 0%. I'm either all in or I want to shut my brain completely off. What does it look like for you?This month, we've been talking about creative offerings and pricing strategies this month and thinking generally about how we offer and price our services. I talked to Kate Strathmann in Episode 59 about using pricing strategies to create more equitable businesses. I also talked with Rob Howard in Episode 60 about how to create offerings that build recurring revenue and strengthen relationships, even in an industry that's traditionally very project-oriented. Today, I'm talking to Hunter Niland Welling, my business’ Chief Marketing Officer. She is a marketing consultant and coach for women growing high-end service-based businesses. I wanted to bring Hunter on the podcast because she has a way of working with her clients that, when I experienced it as a client, was so effective that I actually shifted my OWN work with my 1:1 clients to the same model. Hunter has created what I like to call Recurring Intensives. It is a PERFECT model for folks like Hunter and me who REALLY like to go all in and work in an intensive style while building long-term relationships with their clients and creating recurring revenue. If you're unfamiliar with intensives or intensive-style offerings—which you might also hear referred to as VIP days or a Buy-My-Day kind of offering—they are short, very dedicated time blocks that are normally used to implement a specific project.What Hunter and I do is create one of these VIP days every month for our clients. Each month, we spend an entire day dedicated to a single client. This format works well for us because we get to work in a way that feels right for us but it also benefits the client because they get to see results immediately without wasting a ton of time in meetings. For the client, it's short and sweet and then the results show up that same day.If you want to get a better idea of some different intensive formats, take a listen to Episode 12 where I talked to Ashley Gartland and Hailey Thomas about the different ways they've implemented intensive-style offerings in their businesses.Listen to the full episode to hear: How to combine intensive-style offerings with recurring revenue How Hunter developed intensives as the right model for her and her clients The kind of impact she's seen on both her business AND her clients as a result of implementing recurring intensives Learn more about Hunter Welling: theagenshe.club @theagenshe on Instagram Listeners can get a free 12-month membership in The AgenShe Club, using code BREAKTHECEILING or simply use this link to claim your discount! Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

When you think about the relationships you build with your clients, what does that look like? Are you setting it up from the very first touchpoint to be a long-term relationship? Or do you approach it as a one-and-done kind of thing?Neither is better than the other—but your business values influence your business model, rippling out into how you build relationships, do your work, and create your legacy. Last week, I talked with Kate Strathmann about using pricing strategies to move towards creating more equitable businesses. We talked about making sure that you’re using strategies that make sense for YOUR business and how the pricing strategies you choose are one way to build your values into the DNA of your business. Your values SHOULD be a part of your pricing and business model choices from day one and my guest today has really taken that idea to heart. Meet Rob Howard, the founder and CEO of Howard Development & Consulting, the web development firm that creative agencies trust when every pixel matters. One of Rob’s core values is building relationships—and not just ANY relationships. To him, long term relationships with both his clients and with his team are essential to business. He treats clients as friends—folks he’s going to be working with for 5 or 10 years, at least. And several of his team members have been with him for a decade.Rob’s created some pretty unique offerings that reflect that value and we’re going to talk all about it today on the podcast.Listen to the full episode to hear: Why Rob has something that he calls an Assurance Plan which is a hybrid retainer that allows him to continue to work with his web design clients long term Why Rob offers a 30-day satisfaction guarantee on his work The logistics behind Rob’s offerings and how these are just a few of the ways that he infuses relationship-building into every aspect of his agency  How to create offerings that embody your company values Details on crafting ALL your services around a long-term recurring relationship model Learn more about Rob Howard: The Agency Owner's Guide to Hiring Web Developers Connect with Rob on LinkedIn Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

What kinds of changes are you thinking about for next year? Are you making a pivot? Focusing on taking a break? Diving deep into improving at your craft? Maybe you're thinking about raising your prices?One of the changes that you might be considering is a shift in your business model, or how you package your services—or even how you price them. The decision about how to price, package, or accept payment for your services can be a bit of a challenge, especially in a service business where the choices are limitless. Those decisions say a lot about your business: who you want to work with, how you want to engage with them, and what your values as a company are.The strategies and psychology behind pricing your services can affect the behavior of your potential clients. It can serve as a filter to make sure you're bringing in the RIGHT clients or customers. Low prices aren't going to attract enterprise clients. Likewise, super high prices are going to be a barrier to entry for small businesses or individuals looking to work with you. You can use your pricing to create exclusivity—BUT, you can also use your pricing to create access and to start moving towards using your business to create more social and economic justice. My guest today is Kate Strathmann. Kate is the owner and director of Wanderwell, a consulting and bookkeeping practice that grows thriving small businesses while investigating new models for being in business. Wanderwell integrates financial expertise with an empathic, vision-forward approach, and leads with the belief that businesses can help create a new paradigm that centers people, community, and the environment. Kate spends a lot of time exploring new techniques and strategies to create more equitable businesses and works with business owners to start thinking about how to implement them in their own business.Listen to the full episode to hear: The different pricing strategies you might consider using, like sliding scale or pay what you wish pricing models When these strategies make sense, and when a different strategy might be a better option Some of the pitfalls that Kate's seen come up as folks start to implement some of these strategies (and how to avoid them) Learn more about Kate: Wanderwellconsulting.com Follow Kate on Instagram Follow Wanderwell on LinkedIn Learn more about Susan: Dollars + Decisions Roundtable Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

On the podcast lately, we've been talking about how to manage change, how to become more resilient, and how to develop our skills in these areas—both personally and as leaders—so that our businesses can weather storms and so our team can stay calm, relaxed and supported. I talked to Elatia Abate in Episode 54 about what it MEANS to be resilient and how much of a role mindset plays in our ability to be resilient. In the last episode with Lauren Caselli, you can see how that played out for her in real-life this year in how she both weathered a HUGE business change and how she dealt with the loss of the business she had spent almost a decade building. Today I’m going to talk about the OTHER end of that change spectrum. What happens when things go BOOM and you have to figure out how to manage that boom in your business at a time when your personal situation might actually mean that you have less time than ever to spend in or on your business?Today’s guest is Alethea Cheng Fitzpatrick. Alethea is the Principal and Founder of Co-Creating Inclusion, a diversity, equity, and inclusion firm with a focus on shifting culture and driving equity through strategic consulting, leadership and team development, workshop facilitation, and business integration. Alethea’s mission is to help people, teams, and organizations create culture transformation through inclusion and belonging in order to co-create the conditions where all can thrive and do their best and most fulfilling work.Alethea is also the mom of 2 kids, 8 and 11-year-old boys, in Brooklyn. And, like a lot of us, she’s now running a business and being the main parent, at home, dealing with virtual school for both kids—all while her business has seen unprecedented growth this year.Listen to the full episode to hear: What 2020 has looked like for Alethea and how she’s figuring out how to balance business and homeschooling her kids—and how she’s being conscious about taking care of her own needs, too What techniques and systems she’s put into place to try and cope with all the changes that this year has brought How Alethea’s day-to-day looks as she manages having the capacity to work less but having MORE business than ever How to balance business and life when they're both changing Learn more about Alethea: cocreatinginclusion.com Connect with Alethea on LinkedIn Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark Resources mentioned in this episodeWhite Supremacy Characteristics by Tema Okun

What happens when the worst-case scenario becomes reality? Every business owner I know has that nightmare that runs through the back of their head... What if it all just stops? What if no one needs my services and suddenly no one needs what I'm selling? What do I do then? For a lot of business owners, this has been the year where they had to figure out what the answer to those questions was. How do you manage that change? Do you shut down? Do you pivot? When everything stops, how do you decide what to do next? How do you actually get through that and lead your business through change? Or make the decision to actually close? Today, I'm talking to Lauren Caselli. Lauren was on the show back in March in Episode 25. I talked to her about cash flow planning in a crisis right as the shutdown was really starting to take effect and Lauren's event planning business was heavily affected. Lauren's been through a MASSIVE change this year, so I wanted to bring her back on the show to talk about how she's been managing the impact on her business. Lauren Caselli helps womxn and gender non-binary folx get paid like the expert that they are. Lauren used to run an event planning business for tech, and after her best year ever in 2019, was ready to give 2020 a run for its money. Sadly, the opposite happened, but out of breakdowns come breakthroughs. She is the founder of the Boss Lady Bash, a now laid-to-rest community of female entrepreneurs in Montana, and is working on launching The Money Club that helps womxn make strategic choices with the well-earned money that they're making. Listen to the full episode to hear: How Lauren’s cash flow management skills gave her the time she needed to make strategic decisions instead of reacting out of panic Making a HUGE pivot in your business and how to stay resilient Processing grief as a business skill An update on what Lauren decided to do about her business this year  Learn more about Lauren: laurencaselli.com Follow Lauren on Twitter Follow Lauren on Instagram Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

What would happen if you had to step away from your business for a few weeks? A few months? Would everything come crashing to a halt? Or would there be a clear path forward for someone else to pick up the baton and keep your business going?Being resilient means being able to bounce back from adversity, to pivot and reset after a change. But you only become truly resilient if you examine where your risks are. Where could hiccups happen? What could go wrong? And then you figure out a plan for how to handle that scenario if it really does happen. We do this all the time with cash flow projections and with strategic planning in our businesses. But we very rarely plan for what happens in the absolute worst-case scenario of you not being able to run your business. As a business owner, YOU are a risk. YOU built your business and most likely, it depends on you in some form or fashion to keep going. Even if you have a staff or other people that do a lot of the day-to-day work, they still look to you for direction. If you suddenly aren't there anymore, what happens?That's what contingency planning is all about: making a plan for what happens to your business (and your personal business) if you need to step away for a while or you just flat out can’t run the business.My guest on this episode, Mary Beth Simon, is an expert in planning for contingencies. Mary Beth is the founder of Niche Partnership Consulting where she helps business owners create plans for transitions and crisis. Mary Beth helps business owners teach those who depend on them so that they're prepared to step in if something happens and to minimize the suffering and prevent someone from experiencing added pain and struggle during already difficult times.Listen to the full episode to hear: Who should be creating contingency plans and what it looks like in the real world when you have to execute your plan How important your preparation is when it comes to ensuring your business can survive a big change  Tips for planning for a worst-case scenario  How being prepared for crisis helps you be resilient in your business and personal life  Learn more about Mary Beth Simon: Free Contingency Planning Kit Connect with Mary Beth Simon on LinkedIn Follow Niche Partnership Consulting on Facebook Learn more about Susan: Be Your Own CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

As founders and business owners, we tend to build businesses that reflect us. Our strengths become the strengths of our business. And, yep, our weaknesses become the weaknesses of the business… because we’re the ones who are building it. That’s why investing in developing skills to strengthen how we personally deal with change creates a huge impact on how we approach leading our businesses through change. If you listened to the episode with Elatia Abate, you know that the ability to be resilient and flexible in the face of change IS a skill and a mindset that you can work on. You can't control the change (because change is inevitable!)—but you can control how you react to it. On today’s episode, I’m talking with Melody Wilding. Melody is a former therapist turned leadership and executive coach for smart, sensitive high-achievers who are tired of getting in their own way.Melody is a licensed social worker and a former researcher at Rutgers University. She is also a professor of Human Behavior at Hunter College and she has a group coaching program all about building resilience.Listen to the full episode to hear: How Melody uses systems and structures to help minimize stress, build resilience and manage change in her life and business Why being kind to yourself and empathetic to your team is a HUGE part of effectively managing a rapidly changing environment How to accept that during intense change, your bandwidth is a LOT smaller than it was Techniques and systems to building personal and business resilience in your own life How to find the right structures that minimize your mental load so you can take care of you and your team Learn more about Melody: The 5-Minute Inner Critic Makeover The Haven: A Home for Sensitive High Achievers Connect with Melody on LinkedIn Follow Melody on Instagram Follow Melody on Twitter Follow Melody on Facebook Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

Change is hard. There's no real way around that. It's disruptive, it breaks your flow and it takes time and resources to react to and manage changes as they happen. And yet, you and your business won't flourish without some change. Being able to manage and adapt to change in a rapidly changing environment is one of the hallmarks of being resilient. But for most people, change means unknown and scary. Our brains evolved to analyze and to predict—or try to!—what’s going to happen next. As humans, we’re hardwired to hate uncertainty. So, theoretically, the more "known" you can make the change before it happens, the more comfortable people will be with it.But, right now... we're living in a world where there's no real way to make the change known. This is change that no one is really sure how to manage or when the pace of change will slow. As overused as the phrase has become this year, it's unprecedented. NO one has a model for how to deal with everything 2020 has thrown at us.  So... how DO we go about building up those change management muscles? How do we make ourselves and our business stronger and better able to weather this ever-changing environment? Meet Elatia Abate. She is an entrepreneur, educator, and future-forward strategist. She partners with organizations that range in size from Fortune 500 to early-stage start-ups to help leaders make sense of the ever-growing disruption in our world and channel that disruption into tangible results. And she has a line on her website that I just love. It says, "change is unpredictable. But we can still be ready." Listen to the full episode to hear: How resilience and change management are intertwined What does the future of work/future of business look like NOW? Strategies to exist and thrive in a constantly changing environment  What Elatia learned from her personal experiment in resiliency Learn more about Elatia: elatiaabate.com  Connect with Elatia on LinkedIn Follow Elatia on Instagram Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

What happens when you FULLY commit to something in your business? What happens when you are completely, totally, 100% all-in? This month we’re talking all about no-code tools and today’s guest, Layla Pomper, has taken her commitment to ClickUp—an extremely flexible no-code project management platform—to the next level. You can use no-code tools like ClickUp to streamline and automate your internal processes and enhance your communication with clients. You can also build digital products, help your students learn more effectively, and add to diversity your revenue streams. Some of the no-code tools out there are so flexible and so capable that you can actually run your entire business, pretty much end-to-end on them.  Well, Layla is ALL IN with ClickUp. She uses it to bring in new clients by using it as her opt-in and as the topic of her YouTube channel. She uses it to communicate and manage her one-on-one clients. She uses it to manage her own team and all of ProcessDriven's operations. She even now has a small group learning program all about how to use ClickUp more effectively. She went all in… and it's paid BIG dividends for her business and her clients. Listen to the full episode to hear: How Layla’s using ClickUp EVERYWHERE in her business The impact she's seen by systemizing everything using ClickUp How to use no-code templates and tools as an opt-in and marketing tool How to get the most out of the no-code tools you're using in your business Learn more about Layla: ProcessDriven ClickingUp Community ProcessDriven Collective  Subscribe to Layla on YouTube Follow Layla on Facebook Follow Layla on Instagram Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark

The landscape of software is changing: no longer do you need to know how to code to build what you need. Now, building software has been democratized. No-code tools allow you to build your own software which means you can build custom products, services and tools on your own without having to spend piles of money developing custom software.There are lots of ways you can use this technology to benefit your business: you can streamline and automate internal processes, you can build tools and resources to diversify your revenue streams, and you can even use these tools to market your business and bring in new clients. Oftentimes when we think about a product-based business, we think about physical products or about maybe a software-as-a-service business, but there are SO many more ways that you can harness no-code tools to build your own apps, resources, and tools. This month, we're talking about how you can harness these no-code tools to increase your operational capacity, attract new clients, add new evergreen revenue streams—and ultimately grow your business. Last week, I talked to Jason Staats about using no-code tools internally to automate and scale processes and to improve client communication. This week, we're talking about using no-code tools to actually build your own custom software products. My guest today is the queen of this. Brittany Berger is the founder of Work Brighter, a digital media company that helps productive unicorns go beyond working smarter to a version of productivity that makes room for “unproductive” things like rest, self-care, and fun.She builds all kinds of no-code tools and resources and sells them and she uses them in a LOT of different ways. We'll talk about this more in detail during the episode, but Brittany sells the tools individually as stand-alone products. They make up a good chunk of the value proposition behind her community, the Work Brighter Clubhouse, and she uses them to help folks who take her courses implement faster and easier.Listen to the full episode to hear: How Brittany’s business is structured around no-code tools How she comes up with ideas for new no-code products What her development process looks like to build and refine these products How to use no-code to build products and additional revenue streams  How to use no-code tools and resources to add value to a community or course Learn more about Brittany: Work Brighter Work Brighter Clubhouse Follow Brittany on Instagram Productive Unicorns Group on Facebook Follow Brittany on Twitter Learn more about Susan: Think Like A CFO Scalespark Action Plan ScaleSpark