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A Look Back at 6 Years in Business
It’s more than a little surreal to be recording my 200th episode of the Chasing Simple podcast.
200 Episodes. 54 incredible guests. And a wonderful team who helps make this happen each and every week.
To Haylee and Megan of Gaffin Creative – thank you. This podcast would not and could not still exist if I had to edit each episode myself. You two are the real MVPs.
To Jennifer Gregson my wonderful VA. I would be completely drowned by this business without you as my right hand lady. Thank you thank you thank you for always being so top of things and forcing me to ask for help.
And to you, my listeners. Without you, there would be no podcast. Thank you to each of you that DMs me and shares your takeaways and your action steps each week. Thank you to each of you that shares about the podcast on your Instagram and tags me. And thank you to each of you that silently tune in week after week. I am beyond grateful for you most of all.
I wanted to come up with a fun and cool episode for 200, but after thinking it over for quite some time, I realized that I should just do what I do best here on Chasing Simple and get really transparent with you about my business journey to date.
So, buckle up and get ready to hear about my business journey over the last six years – the ups and downs, the false beliefs, and just how full circle everything has come.
Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
- There are a LOT of different marketing strategies out there. from content to networking to speaking, to ads, and so many more. And with so many different marketing strategies, it’s easy to find yourself hopping from one to the next – without seeing results. Especially when you see other entrepreneurs getting results from their marketing strategies, when you aren’t seeing any from your own. After hearing from listener after listener wondering WHICH marketing strategy they should focus on, I decided to create a quiz to help you narrow down which will be best for you based on your current phase of business. Head to amandawarfield.com/quiz/ to take it, learn where you should focus your marketing energy, and start seeing results from your marketing! Again, that’s amandawarfield.com/quiz/
- This episode was brought to you by my book Chasing Simple Marketing, and you can grab your own at amandawarfield.com/book/
- Episode 093: Defining Your Own Success with Haylee Gaffin
- This week’s action step: Write out your own business journey. Celebrate how far you’ve come.
- This week’s book recommendation: The Hotel Nantucket by Elin Hilderbrand
- Find me on Instagram and tell me you completed this week’s action step: @mrsamandawarfield
Did you love this episode?
Don’t forget to subscribe so that you never miss an episode! Also, if you would be willing to leave a review on Apple Podcasts, it would mean the world to me. It’s such a small thing that can make a big difference in helping me spread this message of simplicity to other overwhelmed women.
Have a comment about today’s episode, or a topic you’d like to suggest for a future episode? Shoot me an email over at hello@amandawarfield.com!
Rather Read? – Here’s the Transcript!
*Just a heads up – the provided transcript is likely to not be 100% accurate
It’s more than a little surreal to be recording my 200th episode of the Chasing Symbol podcast. 200 episodes, 54 incredible guests, and a wonderful team who helps make this happen each and every week. To Hayley and Megan of Gaffin Creative, Thank you. This podcast would not and could not still exist if I had to edit each episode myself.
You two are the real MVPs. To Jennifer, my incredible, wonderful VA, I would be completely drowned by this business without you as my right hand lady. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for always being so on top of things and for forcing me to ask for help. And to you, my listeners, Without you, there would be no podcast.
Thank you to each of you that DMs me and shares your takeaways and your action steps each week. Thank you to each of you that shares about the podcast on your Instagram and tags me. Thank you to each of you that has left a review of the podcast in Apple Podcasts or wherever it is that you listen. And thank you to each of you that silently tune in week after week.
I am beyond grateful for all of you, most of all. I wanted to come up with a fun and cool episode for 200 because it’s a big deal, but after thinking it over for quite some time, I realized that I should just do what I do best here on Chasing Simple and get really transparent with you about my business journey to date.
So, buckle up and get ready to hear about my business journey over the last six years. The ups, the downs, the false beliefs, and just how full circle everything has come. You’re listening to episode 200 of the Chasing Simple podcast, and I’m your host, Amanda Warfield. This episode was brought to you by you.
Thank you for being here today, my friend.
How do I find time to create content without overwhelming myself? Where should I even be showing up in my marketing? How do I come up with fresh content ideas? Where should I be focusing my marketing efforts? What is lead generation anyways and how do I do it? Are launches still a thing? And most importantly How do I put it all together to market my business strategically?
Can I really grow my business without spending all of my time marketing? These are some of the questions that float around in your head when you think of marketing. Welcome friend, this is Chasing Simple, where practical marketing strategy meets simplicity. I’m your host, Amanda Warfield, simplicity focused content marketing and launch strategist, speaker, educator, and author of Chasing Simple Marketing.
I traded in my classroom lesson plans for helping creative entrepreneurs sustainably fit marketing into their business without it taking over their business. So that they have time to grow their business, take time off, and live the life they dreamed about when they first decided to go out on their own.
When I’m working, you can find me working with one on one clients, such as The Contract Shop and Rebecca Rice Photography on their marketing strategy and copywriting, or helping my students simplify their marketing and launches. And, when I’m not, you can find me spending time outside with my husband, Russell, reading in our hammock, watching Gamecock Sports, traveling, or forcing our cats to snuggle me.
If you feel overwhelmed by marketing, you aren’t alone. Many entrepreneurs find marketing frustrating, overwhelming, and simply an obligation. They know they need it, but they don’t enjoy how easily it can suck up their time when what they really want to be doing is the thing that they started their business to do.
Which is why I’m here, to help make marketing simple and less time consuming, so that you can spend less time on your marketing and more time growing your business and doing what you love. Each week I’ll bring you transparent conversations, actionable steps, and judgment free community to encourage and equip you.
So grab yourself a cup of coffee, or whatever your drink of choice is, and meet me here each week for love, support, practical tips, and advice on uncomplicating your marketing and business. Let’s do this entrepreneurship thing together, shall we? There are a lot of different marketing strategies out there, from content, to networking, to speaking, to ads, and so many more.
And with so many different marketing strategies, it’s easy to find yourself hopping from one to the next. Without seeing results, especially when you see other entrepreneurs getting results from their marketing strategies, when you aren’t seeing any from your own. And after hearing from listener after listener, wondering which marketing strategy they should focus on, I decided to create a quiz to help you narrow down which strategies will be best for you based on your current phase of business.
Head to amandawarfield. com slash quiz to take it. Learn where you should focus your marketing energy and start seeing results from your marketing. Again, that’s amandawarfield. com slash quiz. February 2018, which was. Six years ago was when I conceptualized starting a business. It’s when I, if you’ve heard my story, I went to Russell and said, I want to start a blog and turn it into a business.
And I don’t know how, but I really feel like this is something I need to do right now. And that was six years ago. I’m starting my seventh year. of Dreaming Up My Business Now, and it’s really fun that my 200th episode of the podcast coincides with that. And man, there’s just so much to look back on, but going all the way back to February 2018, it’s, it’s such a fun full circle moment.
Um, we were living in Washington, and I was yearning for more freedom and flexibility. In finances, but also just More importantly, in life, it felt like my schedule and Russell’s schedule was constantly conflicting. I just wanted to be able to spend more time with him, and When I started thinking about starting a blog in a business, I didn’t really know what to expect.
I didn’t have a clear picture of what that would encompass or what things would look like and I knew I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into. But the more I learned as I prepared to launch in May of that year, The more I was really convinced that I was going to have this six figure success in if not year one, definitely year two.
And I’d have thousands and thousands of followers. And I just was convinced that I would be making tons of money with my business. And that success looked like that, that that’s what success was. And I think that’s really what the root of it was, is that I was very confident in the fact that this would be a success.
One, because I’m stubborn, but two, because this was something so out of left field that I Was really feeling called to and Something so unexpected. I had never Necessarily thought I would start a business which we can go back even further and I can see the threads of the fact that really I Was an entrepreneur from a very young age But I I didn’t have that logical thought in my mind.
And so this felt so out of left field I felt so called to it and I was convinced it would be a success But you know What I realize success is now, and what I thought success was then, very different things. I was very much fed and believed the idea that six figures and working on your laptop at the beach or at the pool meant success.
And now I realize that making enough to have freedom and to not have to take my laptop to the pool or to the beach is really what success means to me. But, regardless, that’s where I thought I would be, and so I thought it’d be fun to just Let’s, let’s explore the journey of what each year looked like and where things have gone and how I ended up to where I am now.
So 2018, like I said, that’s, that’s where I started with the idea and this all came to me in February and I tried to push it away and it kept coming back up and so I talked to Russell and he was, you know, all for it and super supportive and um, I spent February, March and April learning. All I could about everything, everything I needed to do to start a blog and to Start a blog that would become a business and setting up my website and doing this and doing that and I was just doing all Of the things and I officially launched on May 1st of 2018 And then I spent the rest of the year really focusing on things like routines and time management I created my first educational offer because I always knew right off the bat that I wanted to use my skills and my love of education within this business.
And so my first offer was a workbook on routines. And I’ve shared this before. I thought it was going to be this huge launch. And I thought, you know, if I build it, they’ll come. I did all the things that everyone said. I, you know, I created it. I beta tested it. I, I got people to help with the launch, you know, did all of these things.
And When you look at the numbers, it was a huge success as far as conversion rates go, but of course my audience was teeny tiny Um, and so I felt like it was a huge failure. And so then that was, you know, end of 2018, then I started thinking Okay, well, what else can I do? Because of course my mindset was if that didn’t earn me a ton of money Then it must be the offer Right.
That was that was definitely where my mindset was. It’s got to be the offer if you build it They’ll come if it’s a great thing so 2019 I spent the basically the entire year focusing on capsule wardrobes and I built out my first course and Again, when I launched it that summer, it was a great success by the conversion rates But again, my audience was small And, so even though I felt good about that launch, I also didn’t at the same time.
Like, I was excited because I had pulled off what I felt like was a major launch, and I was excited because I You know, I sold like courses and people went through the course and told me like I had great feedback from it So that felt good. But what didn’t feel good was that I only made like two thousand three thousand dollars that year total Which you know again in hindsight, obviously it makes so much sense But now I know a lot more than I did then and so I was like, well Maybe what I should actually focus on is time management.
And so 2019 was the year that we left Washington, Russell got out of the military, and we moved back to South Carolina at the very end of 2019. And at that time, at the very, very end of 2019, in December, I decided I was going to start offering. One on one time management coaching and so that was when I very first started offering that and I was specifically talking to other business owners with this whereas before my audience had been Basically anyone it wasn’t specific to business.
It wasn’t specific to I didn’t have an audience necessarily It was just literally anyone who wanted to get a little bit more organized and feel less overwhelmed and wanted to simplify and then This time management. I was like, you know what I’m gonna focus specifically on business owners. I have spent the last two summers being full time in my business and in between during the school year running this as a side hustle and As of the move I was officially full time with the business again, not because I was making money was not at all but because Of the timing of the move, we didn’t move until the very end of August, so we got to South Carolina like mid September because we took our time and drove across the country and explored and all of that.
And at that point, the school year had started. As a teacher, I wasn’t finding. a lead teacher position at that point, and we had decided that it was a good opportunity for me to give the blog a chance, to give the business a chance, and try to see if I could grow it full time, because Frankly, if you’re not a lead teacher at a preschool, um, you’re making minimum wage.
And minimum wage in South Carolina is and was 7. 25 an hour and we just kind of thought, you know what, that’s not, it’s not that much money and we can get by on Russell’s income. So we took the chance and we took that dive. And so I started focusing more on time management for business owners. Then 2020 rolls around and in January, again, this is four or five months later, I and Russell are stressing about the fact that I’m not seeing movement and growth in the business.
And, you know, in hindsight, of course I was seeing it, but we didn’t feel like it was moving fast enough. And so I got a job. I became a floater for a preschool and I also signed up to be on their substitute list and that was end of January, early February of 2020. And then we all know what happened very shortly after that.
So, um, with the pandemic, I was forced back into full time entrepreneurship essentially. And yeah, it It really forced me to keep going with what I was doing to not give up, and by accident, things took off in 2020, so two years after I had started. So by accident, things took off. I posted on Instagram. You know, just a random post that I threw out there about how I batched out a month’s worth of content in just one week, and it got a ton of traction.
And then I thought, huh, I’ve never had anything get this much attention, so let me post about it again. And so I did, and it once again got a ton of attention. And I thought, hmm. This, this could be something and so I continued to talk about batching and I created a course on content batching, content batching bootcamp.
I still have it today. It’s my best selling course by far. And that’s it. At the time, I was really insistent that I was simply focusing on time management and systems when it came to batching, which is essentially what batching is. It’s, it’s a system that you create and a way to manage your time and your resources and your mental capacity for content creation.
But as I taught it, because I taught it live the first three times as I taught it, and I launched it one after another, after another, I kept getting questions about content strategy. And I realized, oh, I, I know this stuff. This is, this is something that I know. And I, I do understand it. And so the more I got asked about it, the more I talked about it and throughout the end of 2020 and into the beginning of 2021, I realized, huh.
Um, I can’t help people with their marketing strategy. And so I started taking on strategy clients at the end of 2021 for 2022. And I spent 2022 really serving those clients well and really fine tuning and perfecting how it is that I create my own strategies and how I create those strategies for clients.
Learning what my process was and what I believed about marketing. And I also, in 2022, was the first time I spoke on stages. I spoke at a handful of conferences and events that year. Focused on building funnels on the back end of my business, so that I could have not just launch launches, but also evergreen promotions.
So I had the launch promotion and evergreen promotions together. But, I spent a lot of time in 2022. Wondering what I was doing wrong. I still was not making all that much money. So, 2022 was the year that I was finally bringing home what I made as a preschool teacher. But, that was what, 1, 2, 3, 4 years into my business.
I was finally bringing home what I made as a preschool teacher. Not much, not a lot, not a lot at all. So, I spent a lot of time wondering what I was doing wrong. I felt like I have the knowledge, I know what I’m doing, I understand business strategy, I’ve got funnels, I’ve got launches, I’ve got this, I’ve got that.
Why am I not farther ahead? Why do I feel like Something’s missing. Spoiler alert! What I was missing was relationships, and early in 2022, I did a lot better job of building those relationships, and I spent 2022 spending a lot of time building relationships, and I cannot tell you the difference that it ended up making in my business.
In 2023, I launched my book, which, you know, most of you probably know, if you listened to the introduction of this episode, you know, I launched my book. I started writing it in 2022. And when I launched the book in 2023, it had all, like, there was so much success. And I’m still just honored beyond words for that.
But it all is because. I’ve built relationships and I spent so much time intentionally building relationships and people were happy to spend 20 ordering a book and to share about it on Instagram and say, Hey, I know her and she wrote a book. And so all of that happened, you know, leading up to July, 20, 23, things were.
A huge success, 2023, every year in business has gotten just better and better. And so, 2023 felt very successful for me as a business owner. In 2022, I launched My shop and so in 2023, I spent a lot of time Doing even more with the funnels on the back end of my business so that things sell evergreen a whole lot easier So that when people come in at one point, there’s you know This entire ladder for them and there’s three different ladders and I could share about all that another episode But basically I was really Flexing out the foundations of my business and then in July, which if you’ve listened to my episode from beginning this year about my 2024 goals, you know, that things took a drastic turn in the year and life has just been constant since then.
And now that full circle moment, um, I ended 2023. back in Washington, living in Washington again, and working part time, which it’s such a nice full circle moment because when I was working part time before I felt like I had to and I so desperately wanted to build this six figure business because I wanted to be successful and I wanted this freedom and now I’ve come to realize I don’t, I still, to this day, we’re in year seven of business now.
I have not hit six figures. I could hit it this year, but I’m not even counting on it, honestly. Yet, I feel so successful. I’m going to be the breadwinner for our family for a large chunk of this year. I’m working part time not because I have to, but because I I really want to because I enjoy that part time job and because it’s something that I feel really passionate about and that is such a difference maker and that is the exact freedom and flexibility that I really wanted when I started my business.
And so man, it’s been such a journey and it’s, it’s made me emotional, um, to sit here and think about how full circle it has become in the last six years. So. What I want to encourage you to do this week, your action step, write out your own business journey. Celebrate how far you’ve come. If you feel like sharing about how far you’ve come, please send me a DM.
I’d love to celebrate you and I also just want to really encourage you to To think about what success means to you, there’s another podcast episode I will link to it in the show notes where Hayley Gaffin came on and we talked about this previously So you can listen to that if you haven’t already.
It’s been a while since it came out So maybe you should free listen, but yeah, write out what your journey looks like take the time to celebrate it and really sit down and think about what success means to you because Often the reason we started our businesses What we envision success being isn’t what it actually is, but the heart and the root of what we think success is.
Was there from the beginning, if that makes sense? I don’t know, maybe that’s really convoluted, but basically it’s just kind of amazing to sit back and think about. So, okay, I’m gonna stop rambling. Thank you for letting me share that with you and just enjoy this full circle moment for episode 200 of the Chasing Civil Podcast.
I am so grateful that you’re here. Whether you, this is the first episode you’ve listened to, or if this is the 200th episode that you’ve listened to, I am beyond grateful for you. I wouldn’t be able to keep. running this podcast without the listeners. So thank you. for tuning in as often as you do. And I’m just incredibly grateful for you.
Your book recommendation for this week is The Hotel Nantucket by Elin Hildebrand. Uh, she is often recommended by me. I love her work. I will link this one in the show notes as well. But basically it’s got, it’s got some historical drama kind of. Sort of mixed into it, which is a fun twist on what she normally does, but it’s, it’s about a hotel, and this hotel is, has rumors to be haunted, and there’s some things, you know, some, some drama and some mysteries that you’re trying to figure out, and yet it still has her typical flair, so.
It was a really fun, I don’t want to say deviation of what she normally writes because it was still similar, but she, she added some extra things this time around that I thought was really fun. So, The Hotel Nantucket by Elin Hildebrand. And until next time, my friend, thank you for being here. I hope that you’ll go out and uncomplicate your marketing and business.
Thank you so much for joining me here today, friend. You can find this episode show notes as well as all of the resources you need to simplify your marketing over at amandawarfield. com. If you liked what you heard here today, be sure to subscribe to the podcast so that you never miss an episode. And if you could take a moment to leave a rating and review, it would truly mean the world to me.
Ratings and reviews are the number one way that you can support a podcast. And ensure that it sticks around for many more episodes to come. I’ll see you next time, now go out and uncomplicate your marketing and business.
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