The Floral CEO

  📍 Hello flower friends. This is Jen and you are listening to the Floral CEO podcast, and I've heard from several florists lately that things like they feel like a lack of momentum in their business. They feel like, you know, they're just kind of, their energy is just not what they want it to be. I wanna talk about things that suck your business energy, and in particular seven things that are sucking your business energy.

Dry it. I feel like energy is so much of a business and we give no credit for that. If you are not operating at your best self, if you are running on empty, if you are. Like giving your business the leftovers. There is no way in my mind that this is going to be an effective strategy for you to build a business.

You need to have energy. That energy goes into your consults. That energy goes into your ordering and planning. That energy goes into making it all beautiful. And if you are sucked dry. Things are not going to move in the direction that you need them to go. To have a substantial business that can help give you freedom, can help change your life, and so if you want to actually change, these are some of the things that I have seen make a huge difference and an impact not only in myself.

In making an energy shift, and I know I have gone through periods where like I felt like I was on fire, like everything was going so good. I just, oh my God. Like the business momentum, the clients, the, it's like a domino effect when you have good energy. You are going to start attracting so much more in your business.

So first thing is I would love for you to check in on where you feel like your energy level is towards your business. How do you feel your business energy is? How do you feel like your overall energy is on a scale of one to 10? Are you a six? Are you a five? Are you expecting the results of like a nine or 10?

What are you really giving towards your business? All right, so some of these things that could be sucking you dry in your business, all your energy. First one is the comparison trap. If you were on Instagram making yourself feel like absolute shit, that is going to suck your energy out. That is going to deflate your balloon.

You want to interact with social media in a way that is giving, that puts yourself out there, but not that literally just like makes you feel like I not as good as that person. I'm not good as that. Look how creative this person is. Look at all these jobs this person is getting. Oh my God, look at the budget that wedding had.

Like that isn't helpful. Or I've even had people that like somebody in their market, like copies everything. How would that feel? Here's this person who is just copying your shit like that. Doesn't feel good either. So a couple things to do is for one. Go in and while you're scrolling through Instagram, focus on is this, am I taking or am I giving?

Because if you're just consuming and you're not actually adding value, you are wasting time probably on social media. So how can you add value when you go into social media? If there are people that kind of continuously trigger you in a negative way, I would maybe just unfollow them or mute them so that if they come to your page and all of a sudden they're like, why did they unfollow me?

Like, who fucking cares? You need to create space for you to feel good when you're going on those platforms. The next thing is limiting your time. I literally in the bathtub is kind of my social media time where I am relaxing and just calming down. Uh, I normally have small humans asking something of me and I'm like, can I have just a couple minutes to myself?

But I take those minutes. To go in and look at things on Instagram to thoughtfully go in and comment on people's posts to thoughtfully go in and reply to posts myself. And so are you doing that? Are you just going in and looking at a bunch of pictures or looking at a bunch of funny reels? That is not adding value, that is consuming.

So change the narrative to how can I add value, even if adding value to me is me coming up with the inspiration, uh, the upcoming workshop, I have a whole file saved, like a whole folder. I. Saved of all of these images that are really speaking to me. And I love that inspiration. I love this. So it's a conduit for me to come up with and develop concepts.

It doesn't need to be like, oh my God, how do they do that? I couldn't do that. I never let Instagram make me feel that way. So stop it's not helpful. You also wanna make sure that if you are spending an exorbitant amount of time in social media, that is also not helpful. So how can you ration or limit your consumption?

And if you need to check, go into your settings and you can check your screen time. In most devices, you will sometimes just be shocked on how much time. It can just rack up very quickly. And so if you are one of those people that are like, I don't have enough time. I'm not getting enough done, but then you're spending three hours a day on social media, I think I know where your time is.

It is just. Mindlessly scrolling, and that is a dopamine hit like going on Instagram and looking is conditioned. They have engineers that are just trying to make you get sucked into the vortex. If you're a Facebook person, same thing. They're trying to suck you in, so you need to. Step back and be like, how can I limit my consumption?

On Apple products you can put, time limits of 15 minutes, 20 minutes, whatever it is, and you actually have to purposefully unlock it if you want to go by beyond that. So that could be one way. Um, I know that there's these new block devices that basically lock you out of all social media. For a certain amount of time, so that could be another thing.

If somebody sends you a message and you are only checking Instagram once a day, they will live. If you don't get back to them till the next day or whatever, like they will live. The world is fine. I live my life on do not disturb. My phone is literally on do not disturb. I want peace. I do not want interruption.

I wanna be present. And if somebody dies, like I will figure it out later. Like they will leave me a message, something will happen. I mean, my parents are gone. I would know if something happened to my husband or my children. 'cause I'm usually with them. All of those things, like we worry so much that we need to live in reactivity to everybody else, and I just don't do that.

I opt out. All right. The next thing, if you have no playbooks, no systems in place for your business, like this is how I handle leads, this is how I handle making proposals. This is my system for this, and you are ad hoking everything. It is not going to. Feel good because you are constantly taking duct tape and duct taping your boat to go down the river.

You need to make sure that you have systems in place and if you have no idea what that even means, that's a bigger problem. You need to have systems in your business to be scalable, especially if you're working full-time. If you're a mom, if you are, you have a spouse. Like all these things take time.

So you need to optimize your time. And in the floral CEO Mastermind, we talk about systems. We optimize systems. We, we dig into like how something is not working for you. So if that is the case. Floral, CEO Mastermind and the huge library of courses that you get included could be a huge resource. All my templates are in there from proposals to portfolios, to um, brochures for onboarding.

Like all the things. You should have a process that just is easy, and if you don't, I'm here to help. When you do not have systems, it is a very high energy drain. It also creates an uneven customer experience, which could result into poor ratings on all of the different you know, wedding websites.

They could say that, you know, it was difficult to understand, um, you know, what's next? Whatever. You just need to cut that out, have systems in place. If you need help, go check out the floral ceo.com/mastermind. Again, that's floral c.com/mastermind. It is like an amazing tool for you. All right, third one.

People pleasing and overcommitting. I see this so often in the wedding industry and especially with cultural weddings. It's like, no problem. No problem, no problem. It's a problem. I literally was handed a picture and asked by a decorator who had people pleased and overpromised. How, how do you do this?

Let, let's do this, this drapery swoops, because they assumed I knew how to do it because I work with another very experienced decorator and like that person should have just said, no, this is what I can do. I see it all the time with people just kind of winning it and punting it. Going into a situation where they have no idea how to make something, and then they do not have a coach to help them figure it out, which is again in the floral CEO Mastermind, like if you are winging things for one, that is stressful, super stressful.

But if you are so worried about pleasing everyone else, you often deprioritize yourself. And when you deprioritize yourself. Like that's taking a little bit of the joy, that's taking a little bit of your energy, that's taking a little bit of your profits usually because you're overdelivering. So just stop.

Make sure when you're doing it and you're any decision, you're just like, does this, am I over promising and going to under deliver? Am I trying to people please anybody? It just doesn't need to be that way. 📍 All right. Decision fatigue. Are you taking forever to make any decision in your business?

Let's just say you wanna add a la carte flowers. 'cause I have seen this cycle a million times with different Floris I've coached. You want to do this thing, but it's like failure to launch, failure to push things forward. I have so many things to do. How could I come up with all these things? I've done so many episodes on productivity and how to get.

Your big goals accomplished but it is chipping away that is going to help you be successful. And so make micro decisions. If you have a really tough time making bigger decisions, like, okay, I'm thinking about launching an a la carte flowers, what would that look like? Okay, I'd have to do this, this, this, this.

Okay. Could you start with just coming up with color palettes that you like? Five color palettes? That's it. That is step one on your way to a la carte. Floral program in your your business. Okay, step two, I'm gonna decide what items that I actually want to carry, or I'm gonna do research on other florists in my market that have an a la carte program.

I'm going to go in and research pricing. I'm gonna go build some base recipes, like all of these are little micro decisions, micro tasks, to make this very, very easy. All right, then the next one. You are operating without any clear goals. A lot of time people tell me their goals are, I just wanna do more flowers.

I just wanna make more money. How are you gonna do that? Okay, you did how many weddings? And I actually was just doing this with a one-on-one coaching client. You did how many weddings with X amount. I actually was even talking to a videographer. They were like, I wanna, I wanna like increase my average.

I'm like, do you offer proposal or engagement videos? Because who wouldn't want a video when they've booked you a proposal video that you just tagged along when their photographer did their shots? Super easy. So if you don't have this clear goal. You could be just stuck in like, busy means success, which it doesn't.

But if you're working on all these, I'm gonna go and tweak my logo again. I'm gonna go refresh this page on my website again. I'm gonna go and find some planners and. I found 'em, but then I don't take action on that. So stop just with the busy work. Figure out what is my game plan like in my business, my game plan is that I want to do X amount of weddings.

I wanna have X amount of revenue, which means I need to have X amount of an average wedding. I know I wanna do X amount of silk flower business. I want to know x amount of a la carte. All of those things like are clearly defined. If I just said, I want to make, I wanna have $350,000, or if I just went and said, I want to pay myself a hundred thousand dollars, like serious breakdown 'cause it's not clear enough, you need to be so clear so that you have an executable vision of how you're getting there.

All right, then, are you in this process? Feeling like you are strung out on Adderall, you are like just so wrecked. You are so everything, everything feels tough. Everything feels hard. You just can't function. You have such low energy because you are neglecting taking care of yourself. You are neglecting your personal self.

And as someone who goes hard, plays hard and works very hard I know how that can be. But as I've gotten older, I've really realized the importance that burnout is not a badge of honor. That building ri rituals in to recharge my creativity, to recharge my battery. Is so important and how I can create my like calendar to support this life of me taking care of myself, like by working out and doing those things like that is so important to make sure that you can calendar it in and if you can't, like you're not gonna do it.

If you can't calendar in taking care of yourself, it's just not gonna happen. It doesn't happen magically. You need to create space to take care of yourself, and that could be a weekend off every month. That could be. I mean, getting a pedicure, getting a manicure, getting a massage, getting a chiropractic visit, getting your well, checked, done, getting, you know, your medicine picked up at your pharmacy, whatever it is, whatever self-care looks to you, looks like to you.

To me, it's like I am, my neck feels good because I've been a couple car accidents, so like my neck is really feeling janky. Like I, I know I'm not taking care of myself. I know I haven't got a massage. I have, I've been overworking. I have, you know, just been being hard on my body and on and on. So like, that's just not a good plan.

So how can you make a better plan? All right. And then the last one, and you guys have heard me talk about this before, but as someone who has hires business coaches myself, I want to surround myself with people who are doing the things that I want to do. So if you have not invested in a coach or in a mentor, in some capacity, you are selling yourself short.

Because you are expounding a ton of energy and likely spinning your wheels without a clear path, without a clear action plan, without the resources that could get you to the finish line faster. And I understand a coach costs money because I've invested, well over $75,000 in coaching and. It has only made me a better, each time I've learned something that has brought me to a little bit higher level.

And if you are that person who has been stuck, you've been on the hamster wheel and haven't been able to get off, it might be time for you to hire a coach. And if it's not me, like there's other business coaches, or maybe you need a life coach. Which that's why I got certified as a life coach because I do think the two are so intertwined.

If you have a life problem, you likely have a business problem. You want to make sure that you're putting your best foot forward. We only have so much time, we only have so much resources, and if we're doing it in a way that's completely inefficient, this is gonna take so much longer. Plus you're gonna burn through clients.

You're gonna burn through resources, you're gonna burn through a potential relationship with a planner. You're gonna burn through your energy. You're gonna lose some of your sparkle because what you're doing isn't working and that feels like shit. Stop participating in the craziness and, and if it's.

Even if you start religiously, like, I'm gonna work on myself for whatever hours per week, and that could be reading books, podcasts, I feel like a coach in that direct interaction is definitely the fastest way to moving in the direction of growing your business. But if that's not in a budget, start with things that are free.

I know that I've, I know what actually spending money you get invested in making this work. You start kicking up everything a couple notches, and that's where you get momentum. That's where the dominoes start to fall when you get excitement, when you have somebody keeping you up accountable. In the floral CEO Mastermind, we have an accountability check-in on Mondays.

What do you wanna accomplish this week? Did you accomplish the things last week? And it's a way to help you hold yourself accountable to doing the things in your business that move you forward. Because life happens, busyness happens. It's really easy to slide these things under the rug and just say, I'll get to them when I get to them.

And then in three years when you're like, shit, I haven't done any of those things. My business isn't where I want it to be. I'm gonna go have to get a day job, I'm gonna have to do all these things that don't feel good or in alignment because I didn't do the work. And honestly, you aren't gonna be as introspective probably that as that you're going to be like, this business didn't work and it, 'cause it's really easy to blame outside sources than it is to look within and I want.

Amazing things for you. I know what happens when you do the work. Like I have not only seen it for myself. I have a, a girl that was in the Mastermind for a while that just rejoined because she just wants the guidance, the coaching, 'cause she knows that that gets her to the next level. So she came back after she was in the mastermind for an extended time because she has a new set of issues, a new set of like, things that she's trying to learn.

Uh, she's trying to get to a new level. I am always trying to reach for a new level of myself, physically, mentally, I. Emotionally with my husband, with my children in my business, in my partnerships, in my relationships and friendships. Like I'm never okay with how things are now. 'cause I know that with some magical tweak, it could always be better.

You never know when that next thing is going to just be amazing. I hope these seven things are something you can reflect on because reflection and taking space to really reflect is where growth happens. So if you a honestly ask your yourself, am I stuck in a comparison trap? Do I spend time comparing myself to others all the time?

How does that make me feel? Is this something that is productive? Is this something that I wanna continue doing? Check in with your systems. Do I have actual actionable systems that if I brought someone to the business that they could just take, do without me having to like completely go crazy explaining it.

Is there an executable system then? Are you running around people pleasing and promising, over committing, doing too much and then not creating any space? For you to actually try to grow your business, are you just worried about like, I need to do these $5 centerpieces? You know, like I totally bent over backwards to figure out the stupidest shit in my younger business years and it's just not worth it.

Are you still riddled with decision fatigue? What are things that you really wanna do but haven't pulled the trigger or haven't moved forward for some reason? Are you operating your, your business with clear goals? In the floral CEO Mastermind, we lay out annual goal planning, quarterly planning exercises.

So are you doing that? Are you neglecting your personal energy, your self-care, your rest? Are you recharging your batteries? And then lastly, have you ever. Invested in a coach to bring yourself to the next level. A mentor, what are you doing to grow? Are you doing anything? Thank you so much for listening, flower Friends.

I hope this episode was helpful. And if you need help, I'm serious. Like I got you. The girls in the Mastermind, we got you. We want big things. I want big things for you. So go check out floral ceo.com/mastermind. Thank you so much, flower friends, and you have an amazing flower filled week. 📍