The email that helps you start a business by keeping things simple.

This week:

Words to Live by: What a good day to be proud of all the progress you have made.

Challenge: create a dopamine list. The last few weeks have been tough going in our house with my husband working 7 days a week whilst he navigates his business through a period of growth. Deadlines are tight and demands are coming in thick and fast. The only round is through and we both know that so although he is around, he is working and missing a lot of time with our children. This week we’ve had some brilliant weather and spent a lot of time out on Loch Lomond and I know my husband has felt like he has been missing out. On Sunday we came home late and our house was filled with the smell of Christmas. Confused, I asked him why and he replied, “Christmas candles are on my dopamine list. It’s a list of things that will make me happy even when I’m doing something really really difficult. Nothing big, but if I can’t be outside in the sun, then I want to feel like it’s cold and it’s Christmas.”

Genius. I love this idea so much I thought I’d share it with you - creating a list of small things that give you that kick of happiness when you are going through a big challenge. So what would be on your dopamine list?

ICYMI Content:

• What to do when no one is buying on Instagram

• How to find a business idea and decide on a niche on TikTok

Update:

This week I set myself a new challenge - to show up consistently for Instagram and see what happens in 30 days. Yes, yes, I know, I love a challenge.

I find it much easier to stick to a goal if I break things up into smaller sprints so for the next 30 days my sprint focus is on Instagram. I’ll be trying it all, reels, carousels, stories… and of course I’ll share any learnings with you here and also on TikTok.

I’ve been sitting on Instagram for far too long, and if I’m honest, I’ve been sabotaging myself with excuses because I’m afraid of putting myself out there on another platform. It requires a new strategy, completely different content to Tiktok and a whole lot of work. Growth is slow, I still have under 1,000 followers but I’m committing to the cause and getting out of my own way.

Mo Gawdat interviewing Zoe Blaskey on parenting, guilt and matrescence on Slo Mo

The psychology of self sabotage on That Psychology Podcast

Keely Hodgkinson on building a gold medal mindset (recorded before she won gold in Paris!) on the High Performance Podcast

Improving your money mindset with Dr Frankie Jackson Spence and Laura Ann Moore on Vision of Health

Attracting luck and maintaining balance with Jesse Itzler in the Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway

You can listen to this week’s picks plus new recommendations every week on my podcast playlist.

Good To Know

Keeping on top of what is going on in the world of starting a business is overwhelming. Let’s keep it simple. Here’s what you need to know this week:

Deliveroo recorded their first ever profits: Sky News

Why you should care - Deliveroo was founded in 2013, have raised billions in investment, make billions in revenue each year and are only now starting to turn a profit. Bigger is not always better.

Google are rolling out a new AI note taking feature for google meet events: Tech Radar

Why you should care - this free noting taking extension is likely to quickly make other similar paid offerings on the market redundant. A lesson in building a defensible moat around what you do and ensuring you keep moving forward and innovating.

It’s been a big week for Google as new trend insights and forecasting is released: Social Media Today

Why you should care - use these feature to search trending topics and create more engaging and relevant blog posts and social media content.

Polite ways to say:

sorry I’m not doing that for free

As someone who gets a lot of requests for calls, feedback, coffee meetings and opportunities to promote products and businesses to my audience, I know how difficult it can be to handle the topic of being paid. Like me, I’m sure you never want it to seem as though you are big headed, unhelpful or ungrateful, but at the same time you need to know your worth.

If this is something you struggle with too, this week I shared on Instagram my template replies to requests.

Here they are:

1. Thank you so much for reaching out and for thinking of me. I’d love to be involved in this project - can you please confirm the budget you have available and a brief for the scope of work and I will come back to you asap with a proposal and my rates.

2. Hello! Thank you for reaching out! I don’t usually reply to specific questions like this in my DMs as I would need a lot more context in order to help you and give the best answer. I have a few slots for 1:1 sessions over the next few weeks so if you’d like to chat more here’s the link to find a time that works best for you >

3. This sounds like a great opportunity! Before we discuss further can you please confirm this is paid?

4. Thank you so much for reaching out. Unfortunately at the moment I don’t have the capacity to take on any unpaid work or projects and I’d need to spend a lot of time working on this in order to do the best job/ work with you on this. I’ll let you know if anything changes and if I happen to think of anything that I think will help you I’ll be sure to send it over.

Have a great week ahead & remember to keep it simple.

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