The phone rang at 4.30 last Monday afternoon and it was a colleague of mine that I had spoken to earlier in the day.

“Deb, I just wanted to check in and see how you are feeling. When we spoke this morning, you didn’t sound too good and I was concerned.”

I said that I was fine, but really I was feeling totally wiped out! It was school holidays and I had been in bed for most of the weekend with a virus, but had woken up Monday morning, knowing that I needed to be up and ready to go. On top of this, my two-year-old daughter, Giaan, had woken up and I knew she had another chest infection coming on – the second within three weeks!

So, as you sometimes do, I raided the medicine cupboard that morning, took G to the doctor and got on with the day. When my colleague called the second time, I began to realise that I wasn’t actually feeling the best, but I knew I had a solid week booked with both family and business commitments. I couldn’t let anyone down!

As the evening wore on and I tried to concentrate on some work I needed to complete, I began to realise that Tuesday may in fact need to be a day of rest. But it was the second Tuesday of the month and I was was very much looking forward to this particular Tuesday. You see, I had spent the most part of the previous month re-designing my Business Building Blocks Membership and the first new and improved webinar was happening the next day, and I didn’t want to let anyone down.

Can you see what I was doing? I was so caught up on making sure that I didn’t let anyone down, that I realised by not canceling the webinar I actually would be letting everyone down. It took me most of the evening to come to the realisation that I needed to cancel the webinar and my other appointments for the day.

And that sometimes, Life Happens!

In relation to business, once I made the decision, I realised that I could do two things.

Firstly, I could beat myself up for canceling Tuesday and allow myself to sit in negative self-talk. This would probably of sounded like: “This is so unprofessional, what will my members think?” “Can’t believe that I canceled, really you’re not that sick.”; “What will my colleagues think?”. Etc, etc, etc.

Or

Secondly, I could acknowledge that Life Happens & I was not feeling the best, that my throat was sore and the level of concentration I needed for my members was not going to be there. That it was okay to cancel Tuesday, take care of myself, and my family. That I didn’t need to put this pressure on myself to be all things to all people.

I chose to do the later. I contacted all my members with an email letting them know what was happening, and then made a conscious decision to accept that life does happen and it is okay.

The reason I wanted to share this with you, is to let you know that there are those times when it is okay to let go and say “Life Happens". Be honest with what is happening for you right at that moment and know that those within your community will support you, as the members of my community did. It’s a great lesson that we can give others.

So the next time “Life Happens” for you, don’t go down the road of beating yourself up. Choose to acknowledge what is happening for you right now and ask yourself what you need to do to support YOU. Tweet

How important is it for your business to continue to grow consistently and constantly? How committed are you to making sure your business is capable and able to meet the needs of your market and thrive no matter what economic climate you are facing? What actions do you take to make sure your business stays in the black not the red?

When I begin to work with you, you are at the point where you are ready to take your commitment, focus and investment into your business to the next level. You realise that in order for your business to grow you need to take action that is going to make a real difference. This is when I step in and show you what this action needs to be.

As part of this process, some of the areas we work on are getting clear on what products you offer and what benefits and results this brings to your clients. We then use this information to develop what I call is your ‘Marketing Campaign’.

In your marketing campaign we identify what the key channels are that you can use to expand your business. There are many different key channels that you can use, and today I want to look at one of these key channels, and that is joint ventures. Joint Venture in it simpliest form is to enter a business agreement with another.

There are some of you, who jump at this thought, knowing instinctively that this is a great way to increase profit. But there are some, who for whatever reason, just don’t want to go down this path at all, as you just don’t like the concept of joint ventures. That’s fine as joint ventures can be a sticky creature, but really, if implemented correctly, it adds to your business rather than takes away.

I personally love joint ventures, and the relationships that I have formed from these ventures have always been supportive, productive, and longstanding. It’s not about what I can get, but more about what we can do together that supports our mutual business growth.

To help you select your future joint-venture partners, here are the strategies suggested in *Changing the Channel:

a) Look for strong partners – businesses that have significant skills and/or resources that you lack.
b) Make sure that your contribution to the deal is equal to your partner’s. An unbalanced partnership is not good for either party.
c) Avoid partners that you don’t trust.
d) If possible, limit the scope of the venture in the beginning and extend it as trust increases.
e) Make agreements simple, but put them in writing.
f) To avoid costly misunderstandings after the venture has begun, idenfity the value of each partner’s contributions at the outset.
g) In determining the value of those contributions, remember that fairness is not an exact number, but a range. Try to be flexible – and favour partners who demonstrate the same flexibility.
h) Establish clear protocols at the beginning for amending or unwinding the relationship if it fails to meet expectations.
i) Goodwill is essential for success. Goodwill means that you want your partner to benefit from the relationship as much as you do.
As I mentioned earlier, the idea is about developing strong, financially rewarding, and long-term relationships. You want these relationships to grow and be as painless as possible.

Now, before reaching this place, there are a number of factors you will need to put in place, and one in particular is not to reach out before you have your idea or product ready. If you contact a joint venture partner too early, you may in fact damage the relationship before you begin. But that is a whole seperate article in itself!

So if you are interested in pursuing this with me, please send an email to admin@debpilgrim.com with 'Joint Venture' in the subject line. I look forward to hearing from you.

"Changing the Channel - 12 Easy Ways to Make Millions for Your Business" by Michael Masterson & MaryEllen Tribby
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I’ve been doing more running over the past few months and have inflamed an old back injury. So when it really starts to hinder me, off I go to my fabulous physiotherapist and she works her magic. During the course of our conversation, (well actually it was more like her reading me the riot act about over-running!), I mentioned to her that I need to go back to my lpilates studio to work on my core strength. I was surprised when she told me that they actually had an alliance with a pilates studio only a few streets away.

Now I’ve been visiting these guys for the past few years, so was surprised to hear that they had this alliance. It’s a great idea and I think a perfect compliment for their physiotherapy business. What I found interesting was that as a client of their business, I haven’t yet heard about this additional service they were providing.

It made me wonder how many other businesses have great products and services out there, and are losing thousands of dollars because their clients don’t know about them.

Do you have a product now that isn’t being used to its full capacity? Do you have a service that your clients don’t really know about? If so, ask yourself the following questions, so that your products and services aren’t losing you money:

1) What are you currently doing to make people aware of your service/product?

2) Have you developed a strategy to support the launch and implementation of the product?

3) Does your marketing campaign include all multi-channels of marketing or just the ones you are comfortable using?

4) Are you speaking the language of your clients and potential clients, so that they see and hear about the benefits your new products will provide them?

5) Are you telling them specifically what solutions this product will fix for them?

If you are not getting the return you thought your new product/service would provide, then one of the best investments you can give yourself right now is to work through the questions above. Identify what you need to do differently to put your product/service out there in the eyes of the public. Not promoting your services effectively and efficiently is bad for your business. Your clients want to know about all your products and services, as they have emotionally and financially invested in you thus far. Why would you want them to go somewhere else, when you may be able to solve their current challenge? Tweet