There was a time I tried marketing my business on social media and I can say creating content consumed a LOT all of my time.

The thing is, marketing on Facebook or Instagram is not as effective as it used to be. The rules and algorithms of these platforms are always changing and it’s challenging to figure out how to keep up with the trend.

If you’re trying to reach a broader audience to share yoga with children and families, this struggle is probably real for you too.

How to Build a Business as a Solo-preneur

As a solo-preneur, doing all the things, you know how hard it is to keep up with everything. I learned the hard way, trying and getting very miserable and stressed out.

Then I looked back on my efforts and saw:

• very little change in sales,
• minuscule growth on my social media,
• backwards momentum on my website SEO and newsletter readers.

My SEO ranking and email newsletter were hurting. Instead of building my email list, I was building my “followers” on social media, but the problem was, I couldn’t actually communicate with them unless I ran a paid ad.

Evaluate the Benefits of Social Media

I evaluated what I was doing, the time, effort, and payoff and saw I was working harder but it was not paying off in what really matters for a business, being sustainable.

As I often do, I put everything on the table to decide what was the best way forward.

At the same time, one of the business people I like, Leonie Dawson, was launching a Marketing Without Social Media course.

I paid for it right away because I loved the idea of getting off the social media hamster wheel. Then I dug into that course with passion. Truth be told, I didn’t actually finish the course the first time. Half way through, I had so many ideas for alternative marketing, I felt back on track.

Marketing Without Social Media Ideas

What did I actually learn in the course the first time?

1. The biggest takeaway for me was to invest in media that I own. This means building my own website where people can find out what my business is about.
2. Second was to start my newsletter again so people can stay connected with kids yoga and being a teacher.
3. Third was to be social outside of social media. This is building a real community and connecting with people in meaningful ways. This included doing the Monthly Check-In (now running for over a year!). You could also interview people or get interviewed by others, do joint workshops, sub for others, anything to cross promote yourself with other communities.

Insights into Marketing

I put these ideas into action, and I saw how Leonie also did this in her business, including offering to be interviewed. My colleague Claire from Ambassador Yoga and I jumped on this offer and interviewed Leonie. We really picked her brain about business!

Leonie is a self-taught marketing specialist and self-made multi-millionaire.

This self-paced course, Marketing Without Social Media begins March 1. There are a couple of live interactive zoom calls with this inspiring human, Leonie Dawson.

I will be taking the course again and would love to see you there. I want us all to become more confident with marketing so we can bring more yoga to children and families.

There are so many options that are more effective than posting on Instagram. Let’s invest our time in those!

I want to share a workbook with you that helps me plan for my business.

Every month we have a Free Monthly Check-in and this month, January 2022, we will be doing an activity from this workbook. The workbook is also part of our Mastermind: Business Planning and Curriculum Design Training in the Kids Yoga Teacher Training.

Workbook for Business Planning

The beginning of the year is a great time to reflect on the changing of the year. What happened last year and what you want for the year ahead.

My meditation teacher would warn us that if you don’t set your own vision for your life, someone else will set it for you! So if you prefer to set your own path like I do, you’ll want to take time to set your own goals.

Writing Your Goals to Create Your Life

For this reason, I journal about my goals, plans, and desired lifestyle, its a practice I was taught to do when I started meditating regularly.  When I look back through my journals I can see that everything I’ve done, including Young Yoga Masters, Ambassador Yoga and even finding my husband, were shaped by the intentions I wrote in my visioning journals.

The benefits I got from my visioning practice inspired me to start teaching a yearly workshop for Conscious Intention Setting twelve years ago.  During the pandemic this is one of the business activities I chose to drop.

So, last week I took a goal-setting workshop led by Mado from the Yoga Teacher Resource Podcast.

I’ve led these workshops myself, but I wanted a new perspective, and I was putting off doing my review for the year. So I convinced a friend to sign up for the workshop with me and we showed up with our favourite pens and paper, ready to get our yearly review accomplished.

Keys to Goal Setting

The highlight of the workshop was the reflection on the true meaning of success and how it showed up last year.

I felt so grateful for the ability to set my own schedule last year as a self-employed person.

My friend said her reflection helped her avoid a big mistake. She almost removed something from her schedule that brought her a great deal of joy last year.

In business, the pressure to get things done and “succeed” can cause us to make choices that suck the joy out of what we’re doing.

A key to setting good goals is to make sure you remain true to doing what you love to achieve true success.

I’m so grateful I reflected on 2021 before making any big decisions for 2022.

Conscious Intention Setting for Yoga Teachers: Free Workbook

The workshop got me excited to continue with my yearly goal setting and planning. The workbook I use to plan is shared in the Free Monthly Check-In for January 2022. You can get the PDF here.

Follow it to vision the year ahead for yourself personally, socially, and professionally. Below are descriptions of what’s on its pages.

Reflections on Last Year- Page 1

Reflection on last year.  You can start with positives and what went right for you in your personal, social and professional life. Or you may be drawn to look at What Didn’t Work first.  Some yogis say the mind comes up with negatives first and fastest so that you can avoid danger. You can fill this out in any order that suits you.

Then take the reflections from what went right and what could have worked out better to draw some lessons to carry forward into the new year.

Your Vision for Yourself – Page 2

Now turn your focus towards forming a vision for what you want to be this year. What you want to be will determine what you will do and what you do will lead to what you end up having in your life. This is the Be/Do/Have model for forming a vision for your life.

What You Need to Achieve Your Vision – Page 3

Once you’ve sketched out a vision for this year, you can look at what you need to bring that vision to reality. In this worksheet, you identify what you lack.  Often yoga teachers train themselves to focus on gratitude and the positives.  Allow yourself to feel what is missing when you set your vision because our lack can provide the clue to the direction we need to go.

It might be training you need, resources that are required, or relationships that need to be developed.  It might be letting go of other things to make room for what you really want.  Search your heart and apply your yogic wisdom then put what you need on paper to clarify how you feel now.

How to Spend Your Time and Maintain Balance in Your Life – Page 4

Before moving onto action steps, take some time to think about how you currently spend your time during a typical twenty-four-hour day. Ideally, how would you like to spend your time? Fill in the twenty-four-hour pie chart with estimates of what you do during a typical day and what you would like to do on an ideal day (don’t forget to include a good night’s sleep).

Turn Your Vision into Action – Page 5

Apply the insights from previous pages to add action steps you can take to build upon your vision and move it forward. Be as specific as possible in this part.

Timelines for Action – Page 6

Take the action steps sketched out on page 5 and arrange them on the timelines in a sequence that seems appropriate to you.  Is what you have written realistic?  Do you need to adjust your goals, plans, or timelines to be able to have a balanced life?

You may want to print out one or more of these pages again to update and modify your vision as you learn more about what you want and whether it is really what you thought it would be.

Let your vision be a work in progress that you return to and update as a living breathing force in your life.

Finally, congratulate yourself!

You’ve earned it. It’s not easy to take time out to think about what you love about your life, what could be improved upon, and how you might go about doing that. But taking the time to do that helps you move towards what you really want from life so you don’t keep doing the same thing over and over again out of habit.

Have a beautiful balanced new year!

Yoga Teacher Business Planning Workbook

Look Under January 2022