Janine Explains It All — Shopkeep Q&A on Shopkeep Q&A on Etsy fees, inventory budgets, email marketing, mental health, hiring & more

This week, we’re wrapping up our series on resources with a shopkeep Q&A! You don't want to miss this extra juicy episode where Janine answers your questions about money, marketing & mental health. Spoiler alert! Here are the questions we answer—

• What do I do about these Etsy fees?!
• How the hell do I figure out my open-to-buy?
• Where do I start when all my metrics are low?
• How do I actually leverage my email list?
• When can I afford to hire someone? And how do I figure out what they’ll do?!
• What should I do when something horrible is happening in the world & I have to market my products??

Be sure to tune in to the end of the episode for Janine’s #1 tip for how to grow your retail shop! And don’t forget to check out the new resources we made for you this spring—

• Take our Sustainable Sales Strategy Quiz!
• Join The Library— our new space for indie retailers to access resources and tools that support their shops ✌️

 ✨ Thanks for listening to the Retail for the Rest of Us archive! There's tons of great advice in this episode, but you may hear about resources that no longer exist or find broken links in our show notes. Please head to feelgoodretail.com/podcast for our up-to-date offerings!  

Transcript

0:27

Music. Hey everyone welcome to retail for the rest of us welcome back happy to have you here having to be chatting with you. If I sound like I'm whispering. I might just be doing that I am recording this podcast a little bit later than usual and my day. Because there is a new member of the feel-good retail team. And that number is my new puppy his name is Flapjack he is the cutest anjel on planet Earth but I am truly terrified to wake him up, because he's a puppy it's hard to get them to calm down so I am recording this pod from my couch, not my usual flow not my usual time and that kind of feels really appropriate because today's episode is closing out our series about being resource and examining some of the ways that resource plays a part in retail especially Indie retailers because, when we talk about resources as I said on the introduction to this season when we think about that I think the. Clearest first thing to pop into our minds is money right and that's certainly part of it I don't want to Discount that at all, but I think when you're a small business or a solo operator or even have a small team, it's not just the money that makes a difference it's the energetic capacity of you and your team, how nourished you feel how excited and creative and curious you feel. How much spaciousness you have your lead times things like your analytics your platforms all those things can be looked at through the lens of resource and how they help. Resource and nourish your business and so this season or these last few episodes we have. About a couple of different angles, we talked about analytics as self-care a topic that I feel deeply passionate about, how to examine your marketing numbers, and the results of your effort with a strategic lens and how that can help you. Fight decision fatigue and prioritize what direction to move in, we interviewed my amazing bookkeeper I just wanted to say bookkeeper to the Stars bookkeeper to the shopkeepers Jackie Gala all about, how a bookkeeper or an accountant can be your business's BFF and why it's so important to keep track of where your money is going so that you can be more efficient and find that clarity. We talked about marketing and the different ways that you can build momentum off of Instagram specifically and that episode we talked about keywords collaborations and connections and how you can really Leverage the resources that are at your fingertips to get out there without relying on you know it the dreaded algorithm. And lastly on our last and most recent episode we talk to Nora Wolf the founder of wolf PR and wolf craft about, what press even is so in my mind although I guess I could fall under the umbrella of marketing I really thought about that as like your visibility and how comfortable you are pitching yourself, your resource being your story right like what you have to say about your business and why it exists. Laura hosted an incredible free workshop for our community if you were not able to attend that replay is available inside of the library as part of our seasonal stack for spring, the workshop itself was about building brand awareness using holiday gift guides, and there was a ton of actionable clarifying information in that Workshop about why you guys are important how does sort of like, dip your toe in the world of getting comfortable with pitching yourself and your business to Publications and also just preparing your business to be ready to pitch we talked about things like photography functionality of your website and nor answered some really great questions from individuals like you so, if you're interested in that replay along with a bunch of other resources you can join the library it is our communal space for Indie retailers to get access to resources, for five dollars a month and it's an awesome way to support this shell and support feel good retail if you get value out of, this is we create so hope to see you in there so this is actually our last episode of. The season quote-unquote we are making some changes to retail for the rest of us that I'm so excited about those details are going to come out soon but just because this is, Big Air quotes our last episode doesn't mean I'm going to leave you high and dry in fact we're going to be back with four mini episodes starting next week which I'll tell you a little bit more about at the end of this episode but. Get pumped it's going to be great we're going back to being a weekly show which I'm very very thrilled about thank you to my amazing podcast producer Amelia who has really helped me hold my vision for what the show should be and will be and can be and also has you know held space for my, creative brain to just kind of like Explorer so I hope you've enjoyed this season I hope that, you feel resource by the resources that we're creating and I'm really excited to tell you more about that. But today I really want to close out our series about. Resource and so like I said we've examined quite a bit this season we've looked at it from a lot of different angles and with that has meant that I've gotten a ton of questions from you, I've put pulls up on Instagram I've received emails I've gotten DM's we have, multiple opportunities for people to submit questions so I wanted to take this kind of last, peace and do a little Q&A about some of the things that were coming up repeatedly through this series not just because we were talking about resource but just what is happening in the world of small business and this like new reality we're living in and I think it just felt like it was a really good time to touch base and. Dive into some of the things that are on your mind so. The way I kind of organized this I'm going to say in advance that most of these questions I am going to paraphrase when I started organizing my notes for this episode, there were some pretty clear through lines that came through and some repeating themes and just based on me not wanting this to be a two-hour long podcast I limited it to six questions. Three categories so two questions for each category and those categories are money marketing and mental health so we're going to talk a little bit about those three areas of resource and answer, two questions of each that felt like they were the most frequently asked or the other questions felt connected to that question itself so I'm really excited to dive in before we do that I just want to remind you again that this season one of the things we created for you is quiz of a where to start when you're building your sustainable sales strategy so when we think about resource and we think about using resource we want to make sure that there's like an equitable give-and-take or that the relationship between our resource, and what we need that resource to create, we want to make sure that at some point there's an equilibrium and so that's where the idea of a sustainable sales strategy comes in, where there's something that you're doing that is constantly and consistently fueling your business refilling that cup right. And so the three areas of a sustainable sales strategy falls into building an audience, creating context for that audience around your brand and offering an amazing experience. Kind of what retail is right all of those things combined all of the time. That being said there are different seasons for different areas of your business to be growing and thriving getting the focus, and so if you have been listening to these episodes or if you're totally new to the show and you're like, I don't know where to start or you're feeling overwhelmed this quiz is super quick I think I was in type form earlier I think it says it takes like two minutes to fill out super easy just like multiple choice questions and we will give you suggestions on which of those three areas to start as well as 11 ideas of how to. Get going right how to like take that area and really run with it and so. I loved it we've had dozens and dozens of people take this quiz everyone has had really interesting things to say I've seen some really cool projects like, give away some interesting collaborations so cool opportunities to be like hosting community events that grew their reach just all sorts of things that like aren't, on Instagram and that actually give you a feeling of control right whether you have control or not. Laughing about that to myself because again, carry on my couch sleeping puppy that I'm like low-key Whispering not to wake up so I don't feel very in control right now but maybe I never was. Anyways that quizzes great you can go to take that on our website super easy it's www.fema.gov / quiz, easy and you'll find out where you can start building your sustainable sales strategy ASAP. So without further Ado let's hop into your questions. Music. Okay so let's start with the most obvious resource money. Great money money money money rules everything around me More Money More Problems so question number one. And this is a Hot Topic based on the season that we've been in the last few months if you're listening to this in the future. Hello but this episode is being recorded like mid-may of 2022 and so there has been a lot going on in the world of etsy so, Etsy for those of you who are unfamiliar somehow is basically a handmade Marketplace or a Marketplace that's online it's not entirely handmade anymore it started handmade vintage now it's really expanded there's a lot of other businesses on there like dropshipping and things like that. Anyways recently at Sea changed its fee structure and is charging the small businesses who operate on their platform this is a very. Just want to interrupt myself to say this is a very very very like high-level look at what is happening with that see I don't want to get too too into the specifics of reporting or things like that but I just want to give you context around this question. Essentially at the is Raising its fees for the vendors that sell on their site. And not only raising like their transaction fee is but there's all sorts of things where they are really making a lot of money and cutting into profits very very significantly, for Indie retailers or makers or creative entrepreneurs on that website, and it feels really bad especially because they're showing record profits and it's just not, a good feeling and it really has made a lot of makers. Question whether they want to be on Etsy how they could get off it if they decided they didn't want to be on there anymore and really like wrestle with this question of like what does. Ecommerce Indie e-commerce look like. Post at see if there is a post at Sea so the question that I've been getting a lot is I'm on Etsy now. It's a huge source of revenue for my business. But it's cutting into my profits either it's cutting into my profits or I don't feel good about being on there anymore so what do I do. And this is a tricky question right because there's like the very strategic. High-level piece of it and then there's the emotional piece right and I don't feel like it's dissimilar to how a lot of us feel about Instagram. Where we were like promised the world right we were promised this place or we could just go and everything like all the tech would be built out for us there would be. Hundreds of thousands of users a month probably Millions at this point of users a month. We would have SEO built-in we would be like supporting this Greater Community of small makers and retailers there was this like ideal of etsy that I think we a lot of people in the creative product space have kind of been. Morning in a way and so that is one piece right it kind of feels like Instagram, do you see what I mean like where there was kind of this promise if we got used to a certain way of using those platforms and then the rules change, and all of a sudden the people who have. Created the content or the product that has made these platforms. Possible and not only possible but like interesting at all are the ones who are, being punished for lack of a better word or who are kind of being cut out of a deal they're getting the raw end of a bad deal. So that just feels bad. Let's be frank that just feels bad and it's really hard to. Disc how the weight that that puts on retailers and makers. When you've gotten used to running your business a certain way pivoting feels really uncomfortable change is really uncomfortable and I think that all of us. Whether you're a business owner or not have been asked of many many times to. Change and pivot over especially the last few years and so having that happen again especially when it comes to like the way that your business makes money, is really scary and so I've talked to a lot. Of people dozens of people who are currently on Etsy or who use Etsy at least in some capacity for their business and my gut. Is to move right get your own website set up a Shopify say. Get to a platform where you own your data you know clearly what the transaction fees are you understand what's going on and you can start building your own. Traffic in your own audience it doesn't necessarily mean that you need to pull the plug on Etsy like tomorrow. Because that might be really scary too because there's like two pieces right there's. There's not it's not as black and white as. I think I wish it was right because I had see innately has a lot of traffic right if you're looking for a handmade gift I know for me personally. He is like one of the first places I go or if I'm looking for something for my home or if I'm looking for something specific like they have incredible search capability there so many users on there you can get reviews it's a trusted like payment platform, there's all sorts of things about Etsy that do make it a valuable platform. However there's also a lot of things that don't because. I at least for me personally I like to know where my money is going especially by money in my business and I want to be able to kind of like direct the strategy, so let's say I know this is something that people talk about with that see all the time is that like occasionally they will. Offer a free shipping situation or they'll like ask you to Discount something or ask you to offer free shipping too, get more sales that's coming out of your pocket and it's also like continuing to like put money into at these pocket right like they're just feels like feels like a bad love triangle. And so my advice is just not necessarily to pull the plug completely because your business might be in the position where right now, what's most effective for your sustainable sales strategy is to build awareness around your brand, and to build awareness around your brand and around your product having those kind of like built-in eyeballs, to be able to build a platform build a profile on a platform that already has traffic is, smoother and maybe like a lower lift energetically. Time-wise creatively if you're not someone who like likes Tech it's very straightforward. So that could be really valuable that being said. I have also helped retailers start to Pivot away from Etsy and it's really challenging to get customer data not like Impossible by any means but like it's really hard to like export you can't really export like your email address is like of the people who've purchased from you so again you have to think about that like. Direct audience right at see technically. Doesn't own those profiles necessarily but you don't have easy access to them, either and so I think getting to a point where you're utilizing Etsy to build awareness and build up your brand and get your products out there is awesome but make sure you're utilizing tools outside of that, just as let's call it an insurance policy, I am a huge fan I've said it many times and I will say it many more I'm a huge fan of Shopify I think it's very very user-friendly it's growing significantly it can really. Grow with your business which I think is incredibly valuable and again. I don't want to say it's a known quantity because it might not be either. But at least the power is in your hands for the decision-making and again they can coexist I know tons and tons and tons of makers who have both a Nazi profile and. Shopify site or their own e-commerce site just because. They want their Instagram to push to their or their email list to push to the site that they make more money on. I think that's part and so that would be my advice if it's feeling, more than just annoying like if it's feeling like Etsy is fully taking advantage of you or that you are like an employee of etsy basically because of how much money they're getting off of your labor. Do move quickly right do you get to that fancy footwork and here's the thing. If you're only making after you know the cost of goods to actually make the product that you're selling plus all of the fees if you're really only making like a 20 or 30 percent margin. If you moved to. Your own website like a Shopify and we're making a 50% margin you wouldn't have to make many more sales to be making this to be taking home the same amount of money. See what I mean like let's say you're making. I don't know a thousand dollars a month on Etsy. And that is like your that's your net so. Thousand dollars is twenty percent that means we're at like five thousand dollars in sales from Etsy and you're taking home a thousand dollars a month. You'd only have to make two thousand dollars a month in sales to get the same.$1000 take home if your margins were 50% I want to bet that you could probably make that happen. So just something to consider this is where I love the analytic side of things because it helps put into perspective for someone like me and I assume many of you who, is creative and can feel a little bit like I could see it both ways I think the numbers can kind of clarify like what would feel more easeful what would feel more joyful what would make you feel more empowered, so that's my hot take on Etsy as of this moment in the future maybe you're like what even is at sea. Makers just like burned it down and started their own amazing. Commune on the internet that would be great I hope that's what happened the second question that we have about money. Did you see one I'm going to try to be quick the question that I get a lot is how the hell. What in the hell how in the hell do I create an open to buy budget or a buying budget overall. And this is a really God it's complicated right there is a formula. That exists that you can use to get an open to write budget so for those of you who are listening open-to-buys how much money do I have available to buy inventory for the store based on, my Revenue goals based on the inventory we already have based on the markdowns the discounts the returns the things that I anticipate and, it's really no joke right like putting this together is not a walk in the park I'll say. So an open to buy is essentially like. The difference between how much inventory you need versus how much inventory you have right so everyone knows that if you have a sales goal of 20,000 dollars this month. And you only have. Fifteen thousand dollars worth of inventory it's going to be really hard to get that cool right can't sell what you don't have so the calculation I'm just going to say it we can put it in the show notes do but it's just. I want to say it so that you understand so it's your planned sales your sales goal. Plus your anticipated markdowns plus your anticipated end-of-month inventory.- your planned beginning of the month inventory right so. Basically how much do you think you're going to sell are there going to be any markdowns or discounts or anything like that and then. Really like how much inventory is there right and how much inventory is there left at the end of the month so. There are formulas out there however I think the reason this question always comes up is because like they don't always feel totally right you know like this. Calculation there's a lot that this doesn't take into consideration like how quickly you'd like to grow if your sales goal is actually realistic how much money is in your bank account if you're buying the right kind of inventory, what the demand is for certain product like there is a lot that calculations and formulas just don't. Can't take into account right it's not an algorithm it's just a math equation. And so it can helpful can be helpful to calculate like an open to buy for rolling orders or restocks it can also be really useful to set budgets before you go to like a huge show or on a buying trip or before your like placing a, order with your manufacturer. That being said I recommend using these kind of formulas as like a tool to learn and sort of like test your own assumptions before you apply it. So this the biggest problem. I mean Inventory management is one of the biggest problems I think in independent small business retail business because, if you don't have enough you can't sell enough and if you have too much you don't have any cash right and it's just sitting there and it's wasted money and odds are you know we don't all, we don't have a 100% hit rate right like we, there are some dogs there are some dogs sometimes there's amazing like sleepers but there are also some things that you're like, I thought that was going to be really cool and it actually sucks nobody wants it and so some of these formulas it's like I've worked on this with clients the number it will spit out it's like ridiculous right like it'll be like oh you have 20 thousand dollars to spend open-to-buys this month and it's like, but, look around look around your space look around your studio your store your back office. Do you feel like you have enough product does the store look empty is there stuff to talk about do you have the things that people are asking for, you know I think that there is like an intuitive piece of the analytics puzzle that is often really really I mean. Often that is missed completely by sort of mainstream. You know kind of like this is how you do retail right because, you might not need to spend 20,000 dollars you might need permission to do a 5,000-dollar restock or something but if there's product that hasn't gotten its spotlight or you know that you still feel really excited about or that seasonally appropriate like by all means, so what you got that being said I know that it's really important to cash flow and to buying to like know what you're buying and have the permission slip right we all want to just get the assignment and so. It's really just a matter of getting comfortable with the idea of looking at. How much inventory you have at the beginning of the month. How much inventory you have left at the end of the month and how much inventory you brought in during the month right during the month how much came and went. And start to notice even over the first couple of months what feels like a comfortable level this is going to change throughout your year, as we all know they're high busy seasons and there are low slow seasons and so that number changes the numbers individually of like how much product comes in and how much product goes out are going to change probably pretty drastically but in terms of what number feels like a comfortable amount of inventory to be converting people or people are coming in, they're finding something to buy they're finding a couple of things to buy and they're buying them right like that's that's kind of the first test of inventory, and so the two numbers that I actually think are a little bit more helpful or inventory to sales ratio. Which our inventory to sales ratio is the relationship between your inventory value and your total sales so basically you take your average inventory,/ your net sales, and that is the number that you're going to get in the number that you're going to get is the amount of dollars in inventory that it takes to make one dollar in sales. So this calculation is actually I think really amazing at giving you a sense of how effective your being with your buying dollars and with your floor or storage space so the lower. The inventory to sales ratio is the more efficient your being. So the longer period of time you look at it the lower the ratio is going to be looking at it month-over-month can be helpful in terms of planning Peaks and valleys throughout the year. Looking at a quarter to quarter or year to year will be a better judgement of your general efficiency in terms of buying. Especially if you make any significant changes to your inventory at any point, this is a number we look at with clients if they are starting to like lean a little bit heavier into one category or another or if there's like you know a new introduction of a category or something that takes up a lot of floor space etc etc there's a lot of reasons you'd compare these two things but to be. If I were to psychoanalyze if I were to be a little armchair expert over here. I would say that most of the time when someone is wondering about an open to buy first of all make sure you're talking to your financial professional a bookkeeper or someone regularly about your balance sheet about your profit and loss right. Get the clarity on the money. But in terms of setting and open-to-buys like for small businesses it's I don't think necessary it's more important that you have a sense of your inventory to sales ratio to understand your efficiency, because if you're doing you're buying intuitively, and you're doing it based on like how full the store is and maybe some reports that you're pulling of like what was selling last year or what are people asking for excetera ETC I actually think that like it's probably more of a confidence boost, to know am I being efficient rather than getting a formula to spit out a number that like. Doesn't take into consideration all those things I listed at the beginning right. That's how we get into trouble buying too much stuff so if you want to do the formula and if you want to track it amazing. If you want to look at an open to buy great I would just say start tracking your inventory value on the first of every month. See the peaks of valleys notice the Peaks and valleys notice how it feels in store and get comfortable with looking at your inventory to sales ratio. So those are money questions they're juicy ones clearly I've already been around only on for a little while the second bucket that we're answering questions in today is about marketing. So the first question, that I get a lot is based on our retails magic numbers so if you listen to the analytics or self-care episode or the date with your data episode which is in season two, you will know that I am a freak a leak for numbers, and the three numbers I suggest that retailers look at in addition to just like Top Line total sales are your traffic numbers how many people visit you whether walk that means walking in your door or coming to your website. How many of those people convert so what's your conversion rate how many people of 100 people who walk into a store your store. Out of 100 people who walk into your store how many of them by that's your conversion rate and your average order value on average how much are they spending. So those three numbers together are going to add up essentially your traffic X your conversion rate, X your average order value is going to give you your total sales and so that's how we kind of start to build sales goals, but if you're running your numbers you're running your analytics and you're like wait all of these are low what do you do. Great because something we talk about is like that's a great way to help you focus right if you look at the numbers and you're like man my average order value looks pretty good, my traffic number is looking pretty healthy but I'm noticing my conversion rate is lower than it was this time last year then you know to focus on your conversion rate you can merchandize you can have an event, you can do a pop-up you can do like a bundling deal you can work on your customer service like right you can kind of see where I'm going here once you can pinpoint, see the problem you can create an amazing solution however if you're looking at all of the numbers and you're like. One of those look good where do you start and it by mind it's very clear that. In my mind it's always traffic right start to drive more traffic. And see what happens right because that's the Top If you think of it like a funnel sales funnel that is the top of the funnel right you can't sell to people who aren't there, right it is not an if they build it if you build it they will come situation you have to drive interest to your website or to your physical brick-and-mortar location where do your pop-up or to your Market or wherever you are. So I always think if you're not happy with any of the numbers and you want them all to grow start with traffic because you're going to see okay if I get if I'm driving traffic. What happens then right because if you have a small pool it's kind of the same thing with like any kind of like pulling. There's a certain point where it just doesn't make sense to. Take data of a group of 10 people and say that it's representative of 10,000 people, great so work on traffic first driving interest driving eyeballs driving foot traffic to your products and see, is that where is my conversion rate going if I'm driving more people and they're the right people is that conversion rate Rising. Alongside it right are they related if not I always suggest then go to conversion rate right if you're like Hey we're getting a lot of traffic, but the conversion rates too low then move on right as you can kind of imagine it you can't see me but it's like making like a kind of like a pinching motion with my fingers too. Illustrate a funnel so start with traffic then it goes to conversion rate because you can't convert people who aren't there right so I always think that building awareness, driving interest getting in front of more people having more conversations not only is that going to like, reflect well on your numbers but it's also going to give you even more insight into the questions that people have what people are looking for what messages resonate with, your users your customers thousand easy one not easy but start with traffic, the second marketing question that we have is in my notes I just want you to know I wrote I am not leveraging my email list and then in all caps help, that's something we hear a lot right so we hear a lot that, any retailers have so many email addresses they have a newsletter signup they have a little like email list sign-up sheet at their cash wrap they have collected all sorts of emails and yet they are not communicating with their email list so, Don't Panic right panicking is only going to make you, I want to email them even less it's going to make you put it off and put it off and put it off so what you're going to do is you're going to. Commit. To maybe one email a month to start it's only 12 emails a year you can totally do it I feel like you're going to like it so you'll probably end up doing more than that but just. Start slow what a month. And the first one you're going to send is like hey it's been a while right here's what we've been up to. You don't want to come in hot with a super sale via email if you have been. Kind of like crickets on your email list you want to make sure that you are kind of reintroducing yourself maybe you're reminding people how they got on your list maybe you're sending them like a little gift being like hey like. I can't believe that goes to do you here is ten percent off we're going to start sending these monthly newsletters just to let you know what we're up to like be a human right, I don't think you can go wrong right I don't think you can go wrong when you're a little bit up front a little cheeky a little honest. I will say again armchair expert here that oftentimes the question is not like how do I send an email right or like they know what I'm going to say I'm going to say like if you're not leveraging your email list and you want, because I think you should but I think you should just send an email and then all of a sudden look at that you're leveraging it but I think the worry there is like actually more about like the rejection of potentially seeing a lot of unsubscribes. And let me just tell you. Unsubscribes are super normal I am subscribed from things all the time because my inbox is crazy. And it's never personal I don't think I've ever seen anything or has been like. I hate this person and I never want to see them again, unsubscribe it's really just a matter of like this isn't serving me anymore or like I'm not interested in this product anymore or I'm not getting value from this and that's okay right because if they don't even want to receive an email from you odds are they're not going to want to buy your product, and that's not always the case some people just really don't like email that's totally cool if you want to follow on Instagram if you still want to support the brand amazing, but if you don't want me in your inbox like I don't want to be there right kind of like going to a party you're like. If someone at the last minute was like yeah you should totally just tag along like you should come to this party. Nearly did you ask the host and they're like no no you should come though it's like no I don't want to do that alright like that makes me feel weird like I want the permission to be in someone's space and if they're not feeling it anymore unsubscribing is like a great thing to do for both of us most of the time email service providers are. Charging based on the number of subscribers you have anyways so someone's like not interested in hearing from you or they're not going to open, email let alone click something and buy something or a gauge or respond to you or forward it to a friend then like cool. Wishing you nothing but the best love that for you or love that boundary or setting. Try to reframe the relationship with the unsubscribe again maybe that's not the specific question I wanted to answer but I think that like leveraging an email list is really, straightforward the best thing to do is just be transparent and decide whether you want to just say like hey what's up. As a reminder this is who we are this is how you got on this list I in our welcome email we make it very clear what we're about and we put the unsubscribe link like very, front and center like if that's not what you're about if you're not into like. Swear words and, pop culture references and anti-capitalist beliefs and hitting on Jeff Bezos and occasionally like hot takes and tough truths about running a small business then. Probably not your people and that's totally okay I hope you find that but I don't need. I am also refraining my relationship right I am trying to get to a place where I don't feel like I need to please everyone. And that's really hard but we're doing it and so I think the best thing you can do is just say like hey remember me here we are. I'm going to be back soon and actually come back soon right don't be scared rip the Band-Aid send the email and tell me about it, I want to hear I want to cheer on your email list I love email so much you guys okay last section is about mental health it's no surprise. The last few years have been really tough on small businesses and mental health is one of the most important resources I think any. Entrepreneur, can consider when running their business right we're not doing if you alert my company is called feel good retail I want everyone to feel as good as possible running their retail shop there product-based business, so you know I had to do a couple of questions just about like mental health and mental capacity number one. I get this question regularly when I talk about delegation is I am a solopreneur or I a solo operator how do I know when it's time to hire. And where am I just being inefficient with my time such a good question so my personal favorite way to prepare to hire. Is to Notice start noticing even if you don't even feel, even if you're not feeling super like burnt out or flat out or overwhelmed it's probably that's probably the good time to start start keeping a list, I used to have one of my phone of all the things that you could easily delegate that like don't have to be you right and that doesn't mean you're going to hire for all of them but just start to notice during your week when you're shipping boxes or scheduling meetings or reordering supplies or, sweeping the stoop like start to notice and keep a list of like what are the things that, don't necessarily have to be the one doing and that doesn't mean you're going to delegate them but it's possible that you could write because, there are certain things that like only you can do at this point right, you may be able to grow you may find the perfect higher you may be able to delegate way more in the future but there are probably some things like maybe designing product or doing the buying or. Managing customer relationships or things like that that like really feel critical to you and that also are like inside of. Your unique expertise those are things that you're probably not going to give away right so start to make a list of the other things that you could. And I think you'll be surprised how many things there are. And again that doesn't mean you're hiring like a huge team of people to take off every single piece of work but I do think having a sense of like what you could delegate and being able to. Book at the list and group them into certain categories ago this is the marketing tasks this is an admin tasks this is X Y Zed you could very easily. Get a sense of like what things are most draining to you and maybe that's your first hire right. The second thing about getting ready to hire in this is pulled from the book profit first but I did this when I was hiring Liza and it really really felt helpful for me because as we've covered a couple times this season I am a little stressed about money. Who is it what show me a small business owner who is not stressed about money and I will show you. And Incredibly well-adjusted human but before I hired lies a full time I was in the practice for about maybe, two or three months of every time every other week, when I assumed there would be a pay cycle I would take what I thought that salary was going to be and I would put it in a separate account. So I just had a savings account linked to my business checking and you know every two weeks I would go in I do my bills for the business every two weeks and I would take that money, but I had it budgeted or in my mind what her salary would be, and I would put it away into the savings I could still touch it I had no job offer for her yet I didn't even have a job description yet but I knew I wanted someone at a level. Lets her level right I didn't want someone entry-level I wanted someone who came with expertise who I was pretty confident could just hit the ground running. And that was really helpful because it showed me where the business needed to grow in order for me to make that decision comfortably it. Also showed me that it was possible sooner that I think just thinking about it what if right like I didn't there was no time. In those few weeks or those few months that I thought to myself like I don't have the money to put this away like I had it it's just the investment and that's scary, and then by the time she started I had this nice little Nest Egg to get her rolling right and know that, in that onboarding. When you are doing a lot of training and there isn't a lot of action happening for a new employee which you shouldn't expect, right training is a real thing onboarding is a real thing I had that kind of like money squirreled away so it didn't feel like. As tight as it could have so if you're looking to hire I would highly recommend those things starting to make a list of the things you think you could delegate or would be interested in delegating and start putting aside, just whatever you're budgeting for that higher for a couple of months see how it feels. When it comes to being a in efficient with your time I am a big fan of batching and grouping similar activities so. It's not always possible and it definitely doesn't happen for like the full day but for me I do my best work personally in the morning and so I try not to schedule meetings before like 10 or 11 a.m. And I really try to work try being the key word here doesn't always happen I've been trying to work between like eight and ten or. I'm 11 just on like a specific group of tasks so sometimes that's one task and it's like hey you need to outline the podcast, early outline and record the podcast right let's say that's what activity, so sometimes it's that one thing and other times it's like hey I've got a bunch of financial stuff I need to do so I'm just going to do it in these two hours so that I can just be like in financial mode because I think that the inefficiency comes from when we tried it, go from like a creative conversation to a technical conversation to like whatever maybe we have to call like. Cyrus or something and. Then we have to like manage our employee rate there's like all of these things happening and we're wearing so many hats that sometimes the. Jumping between different mindsets I think is what at least for me feels really exhausting so I always try to recommend I know in the shop. If you're in a physical shop it's super hard to anticipate what the day is going to be like, and I think that that's why I got in the habit of doing these kind of like chunks of time almost like before work quote unquote or during a time where I was. I knew for a fact it would be very unlikely that someone wins would interrupt be because I would just be able to put my head down for like 2 hours and really get through like I'm gonna wear my CEO hat or I'm going to wear my like, Financial hat and I'm going to do all of those things as opposed to like, mixing it all together all the time I don't know if that makes sense but that's something that really helps me in terms of like where I'm being inefficient and. Again especially as it relates to like. Am I burning myself out and I need to delegate or am I just being inefficient right like there's. A lot of emotion tied up in both of those things right there's like our need to be productive there's like just a sense that we know what we're doing like in efficiencies. Always at least for me feel like a very like a failure to be efficient and that feels bad. But I also think that like the hiring thing also brings up like a lot of scarcity or fear or confusion all those things so it's a it's a really tricky spot to be in and I. Sincerely empathize and sympathize with this question because I feel it too but I would say overall just like preparing yourself getting as prepared as possible being as realistic about like the expectation and the vision as possible before you start. Interviewing is critical and I think in terms of like deciding if you really do need. Even to decide between part-time or full-time support it's really helpful to kind of get yourself into a place where you have like a system. That works for you even if it's flexible right like like I just said sometimes I take meetings attend sometimes I don't take meetings, until noon right because it'll depend on the tasks that I'm trying to get done or what mine said I have to be in, and allowing myself to space to like be really focused on not necessarily one task but one type of task has been. Just game-changing for me the last question from our mental health section is. What should I do when something horrible is happening in the world. And I have to Market my products I sympathize with this a lot too. I'm going to try to keep my answer short and sweet because I could certainly talk about this for a long long time. I think it's important to. Talk with your community about the things you care about especially when the rights of your fellow human beings are being. Taken away. Right now in May of 2022 we're talking about Roe versus Wade potentially being abolished by the Supreme Court. That's kind of how this question has been coming up for these last few months but. Kind of feels like every season there's another travesty that those of us who are running small businesses are trying to navigate, and it's really challenging because we're human beings who are individually responsible. For businesses. Not a board meeting there's not like a chain of command there is not a protocol or a process there's just our gut feeling. And when our hearts are broken it's really hard to show up online and try to sell stuff it's really hard to show up online. And I don't know that I have an amazing answer for this aside from. This is why it's so important to bake your values in your mission and your. Morals in some ways your beliefs into the business in whatever way. That looks for you because I think when your customers or your audience or your community members. I know you and know what you care about the. I need to react to every new cycle. Becomes less intense it becomes duller. Not because you care less but because you don't have to perform your opinion. And maybe that sounds harsh maybe it's because I'm recording this late at night I can't think of a better way to say it but like if your customer is no way you stand for. Then you don't always have to be standing up. You don't always have to be raising your hand you don't always have to be shouting you can say what you need to say and you can take action and whatever way feels most. Integrity for you and most right for that situation but. You don't always have to be convincing if it's already baked in its baked into an integrated into and woven into the DNA of your business then. The pressure isn't there as much. And I think that without that pressure to show up and perform our feelings about these horrible things that happen in the world. And that we do to each other I think without that pressure there you actually give yourself space to like feel how you feel about it. I know for me like being totally candid the abortion issue is a really a really tough one for me. I believe very very very strongly in a woman's right to choose and. You know I showed up I posted a few things I posted things that I felt like we're relevant to my audience which is Indie retailers, and so I was trying to help navigate how to have conversations how to share things how to be political why it's okay to be political. But honestly I need in my own space like I didn't have the capacity to be available to other people during that time so I didn't, I couldn't say much because I had to like be there for myself first. And like maybe in some ways that looked like I wasn't paying attention but like I think anyone who knows us and knows feel good retail like knows or could assume how I felt about it. You know feel good retail is all about freedom and creating freedom for Indie retailers and creative entrepreneurs who want a new way of being in business. And I mean bodily autonomy is like. The ultimate and also most basic Freedom so that's. Hard right I didn't want to be on the internet I didn't want to make reels I didn't want to talk about retail I also didn't want to talk about the news I just didn't want to talk I needed to hold space for myself first and that's okay too, but I think that I was I didn't feel as panicked because I feel like I've made my values pretty clear. So that's just a personal anecdote but I hope that that helps for anyone who feels like they are in this cause to reaction because. I hate to say it but I just don't think that like the news is going to get better. I think we're in a really troubling place and I think that there's always going to be something that is infuriating and upsetting and fills us with rage and confuses us and breaks our hearts, maybe not always maybe don't consistently but they come and they go. And I think that having to react and respond and perform and show up Super Hyper specifically to each individual instance, will be necessary sometimes but is also going to put you in a position where. The line gets blurry and I think it's just important to just be loud and proud and clear about the things that your business stands for because. Again then it's that is fair, there's no denying it and there's no question right there's no like oh I should check their story to see if they spoke out about x y z right just like oh I think that I know how they feel. That's my two cents my ten cents if you will so because I don't want to leave you on that heavy note, especially considering it was the mental health question section I want to answer another question one last bonus, I feel like I get a lot and that is going to lead us into our mini series that's coming for the month of June. That question is what is your number one tip for Indie retailers who are looking to grow. What do you think what do you think I'm going to say you're probably likely vo yes I love clay View and I love email and I will never shut up about it but I want to zoom even further out than that. And I want to talk about building community. I want to talk about how you go from someone who is brand-new to your business never heard of you before doesn't follow you on Instagram. Maybe their friend recommended them to you maybe they found you like at a market or another vendor something get an introduction. How do you win them over how do you fall in love with your customers and how do you get them to fall in love with you, and all of that is through building incredibly compassionate creative authentic relationships and I think that there's a very, structured way to do that so that you don't have to do it one by one by one I have talked about this. In workshops before maybe not on the podcast about how my first real. Full-time role in retail I was managing a high-end luxury business we did not have e-commerce we did not have a website we did not do any marketing. I was literally doing one to one client telling writing thank you notes making phone calls writing emails like I was like 24 years old selling. Goods that you know I still think about this day probably you know. Have a few regrets of things I didn't buy we all do that but I think about myself as like this 23 year old. Managing this beautiful shop selling beautiful beautiful things I loved the people who shopped there I loved the clients so much and it's because I like really build relationships with them, and doing it 121 was really inefficient for a couple of reasons it was inefficient because. All day every day I was either client telling or I was working with a client and so it was a busy day I wasn't setting myself up for Success the next day, right. So if it was busy and I couldn't be making my phone calls and couldn't be sending my emails and couldn't be writing my thank-you notes then I wouldn't be getting the traffic that I needed. A couple of days. That's not efficient it also wasn't efficient because it become became very like reliant on me so. If I wasn't there one day if I was at one of the other shops and someone was at the shop that I was mainly at. And a customer who I had reached out to came in, there was all of this miscomi misunderstanding right like what did she email you about we don't have that anymore I don't you know, I think if you are brick and mortar shop owner or if you're just the the founder of a business and you build relationships with people. I'm sure many of you have had the experience where someone comes in and is like hey is Janine here today. And your sales associate is like no she is today offer no she's at our other location or no she's crying in the bathroom or whatever. And that person's like okay I'll just come back like a knife to the heart because a likely. The other person is just as capable and just as amazing of a salesperson but there's all of this data and all of this information that's just like lost. And so there's a lot of inefficiency there and I what got me really excited about retail was the fact that it was like salesman sales which I love because I'm like a little bit competitive and I like I just like it I love product I love connecting people with the products that they are excited about, and also I really like. Talking to people you know I would consider myself an introvert I really do like being in service and so I fell in love with retail in that way right so. All of this is to say my number one tip for retailers just starting out is focus on the relationships focus on getting them to fall in love with you not just because of you and not just because of the product because of like what the business is the stories you're telling the ways you're pulling them in the ways your, kind of growing this like symbiotic relationship as opposed to one where it's just like, transactional and so for the weeks in June we're going to be talking about the four stages of building, Community especially in retail and some of the tips and tricks that I have for each stage, I am so excited this is like definitely something I've been wanting to do for a long time and it's also going to lead into something else that is very very very exciting, but if you want to hear about that you're going to have to tune in next week for the first episode. Of our series on community building for retailers until then cheers to feeling good thanks for being here I love you so much. Retail for the rest of us is a podcast by feel-good retail if you'd like to learn more about how we can help you scale and grow your shop in a way that. You can visit us at feel good retail.com the show is produced by softer Sound Studio and if you'd like to support our independently run woman powered podcast, you can leave us a 5-star review take a screenshot share it to social media tell your shop BFFs or join our retail resource Library a communal space for Indie retailers to access resources and tools that will support their shopkeep, for just five dollars a month you can not only support the show but get access to an archive of our most popular resources and exclusive seasonal content we'd love to see you in there in the meantime thanks for listening cheers to feeling good.