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*Formerly known as Solopreneur: The One-Person Business Podcast*
Welcome to The Aspiring Solopreneur, the weekly podcast that dives deep into the world of solopreneurship. Join us as we bring you insightful interviews with industry experts and successful solopreneurs who have mastered the art of running their own businesses.
Are you a solopreneur looking for guidance on how to attract clients? Or maybe you're searching for ways to stay motivated and overcome the challenges of working alone. Perhaps you're even struggling with the intricacies of taxes and financial management. No matter what obstacles you face, The Aspiring Solopreneur Podcast is here to provide you with the knowledge, inspiration, and practical advice you need.
In each episode, our hosts, Joe Rando and Carly Ries, sit down with a diverse range of guests, including seasoned solopreneurs, marketing gurus, financial experts, and productivity specialists. Together, they unpack the secrets to solo success, sharing their personal stories, strategies, and actionable tips.
Learn from those who have paved the way before you, as they reveal their tried-and-true methods for growing their company of one.
Being a solopreneur is awesome but it’s not easy. It's hard to get noticed. Most business advice is for bigger companies, and you're all alone...until now. LifeStarr's SoloSuite Intro gives you free education, community, and tools to build a thriving one-person business. So, if you are lacking direction, having a hard time generating leads, or are having trouble keeping up with everything you have to do, or even just lonely running a company of one, be sure to check out LifeStarr Intro!
Access LifeStarr Intro: https://www.lifestarr.com/lifestarr-intro-for-solopreneurs
What if saying no could actually lead to more success, not less? Imagine turning down a million dollar deal or walking away from high paying clients because they just didn't align with your goals. Sounds crazy. Right? But for solopreneurs, mastering the power of no is a game changer.
Carly Ries:In this episode, we break down why saying no is essential for building a business that fits your life and not the other way around. From avoiding burnout to attracting the right clients at the right rates, we're sharing hard earned lessons that will make you rethink the opportunities you accept. So get ready. This conversation might just change the way you do business. You're listening to The Aspiring Solopreneur, the podcast podcast for those just taking the bold step or even just thinking about taking that step into the world of solo entrepreneurship.
Carly Ries:My name is Carly Ries, and my cohost Joe Rando and I are your guides to navigating this crazy but awesome journey as a company of one. We take pride in being part of LifeStarr, a digital hub dedicated to all aspects of solopreneurship that has empowered and educated countless solopreneurs looking to build a business that resonates with their life's ambitions. We help people work to live, not live to work. And if you're looking for a get rich quick scheme, this is not the show for you. So if you're eager to gain valuable insights from industry experts on running a business the right way the first time around, or want to learn from the missteps of solopreneurs who paved the way before you, then stick around.
Carly Ries:We've got your back because flying solo in business doesn't mean you're alone.
Joe Rando:So, Carly, I think I might have told you this story before, but, in my last company, we had an opportunity to close a deal for a million dollars, and we turned it down. And the reason why, there were two reasons. The first was that it wasn't recurring revenue. It was a one time payment, not a single payment, but they were gonna pay us over time, but it was one time. And then we were focused on recurring revenue.
Joe Rando:We wanted to build a business with kind of a subscription model. So it didn't match that. And while we could do it, technically we had the skills to do it. It wasn't gonna be a project that moved our company ahead in any way strategically. In fact, it was gonna distract us from our core business.
Joe Rando:So we actually walked away from it and said no to a million dollars.
Carly Ries:But you stuck to your goals or what you were more aligned with. Joe, I had a horror story for not saying no, and that was when I first went out on my own as a solopreneur. I was saying yes to everything because I didn't have that steady paycheck anymore. It was all up to me to make, my income. And so if anybody had a project, it was kind of one of those, yes, and I'll figure it out.
Carly Ries:Yes, and I'll figure it out type things. I've said this before, it was arguably the most amount of money I was ever making, but also the the most miserable I have ever been from a professional standpoint. And it's because, yeah, I was making a a good living, but I was missing out on milestone moments. I was sacrificing nights and weekends. And I just kinda realized, like, as great as it was financially, it took such a huge toll on my personal life, and it just wasn't worth it to me in the end.
Carly Ries:And that's when I discovered the power of no through trial and error. And realizing by saying no to people, I was able to open the door for the types of clients I want to work with, for the pay the rate that I wanna set. And so I had some lower months financially, but then I had bigger months than I had when I was saying yes to everything because I was saying the rates where I should be and choosing my clients wisely.
Joe Rando:Probably a lot more dollars per hour, I would bet, if you were being strategic like that.
Carly Ries:Yes. It was such a game changer, and we always talk about going back to your why and niching down. And I feel like if you can combine those two things, you can be really strong with the power of no. Because if you niche down to the type of audience that you want, both from what they do and what services or product you're offering, but also the type of people you want to work with, and also know who you are and the type of lifestyle you want. Let's say you're a mom that wants to work from eight to three every day because you wanna be there for drop offs and pickups, then you need to be able to use the power of no to create that schedule for yourself.
Carly Ries:It may seem scary at first, and it will be scary because you're turning people down. Nobody likes saying no. I mean, I don't like saying no to people at least, but it just opens so many doors. And so when people first take that leap into solopreneurship, I do not want them to be afraid to say no and to actually embrace that power.
Joe Rando:Starting with a set of goals and a set of criteria, obviously.
Carly Ries:Oh, absolutely.
Joe Rando:You know, that you have to kinda know what you wanna say yes to and say no to the other stuff. and the other thing is there are people out there that will just try to engage you, people asking for favors, oh, check this out, can you do that. And, my wife, I don't know where she heard it somewhere, but it's a really good saying. She said, if you don't focus on achieving your goals, someone else will happily enlist you to in achieving theirs.
Carly Ries:That's deep.
Joe Rando:And, yeah, it's like you really have to think that way because you can get whipsawed. If you have a talent and a skill people need. There are a lot of people that are happy to have you help them. They're not necessarily gonna write a check. But Yeah. so let's talk about some of the things that you should say no to, right?
Joe Rando:One of the things that I find is the stuff that's urgent, it's urgent, but it's not important. Right? I mean, you got these things that come at you and it's like, oh my god, it has to be done tomorrow, but what difference is the world gonna be and your world gonna be if it doesn't happen? And there's a lot of that stuff that comes at me at least,
Carly Ries:Joe, what was George's analogy that we were talking about yesterday? He had the perfect analogy for the difference between urgent and important. Do you remember?
Joe Rando:Oh, he said that, important was your highest paying client needs something and urgent was do you have a due date for something tomorrow?
Carly Ries:Okay.
Joe Rando:And some things are urgent and important, and that's where you should be putting a lot of your time. And then there are the other things that are important, but not urgent, like, fixing up your website to reflect your current business. Right? It's like nobody's, gonna be yelling at you for being late. But if your website isn't telling your story, it's probably not a good thing. so it's really important even though it's not urgent, on the calendar, so to speak.
Carly Ries:Yeah. Absolutely. Well, the other thing is we talk about saying no to projects and clients and things like that. But I think you have to also say no to the skill sets that you provide. So in marketing, when I was saying yes to everything, that included me saying, yeah, I can handle your PPC, paid per click.
Carly Ries:Yeah. I can do your social posts. Yeah. I can do this. I am not great at PPC.
Carly Ries:I don't enjoy doing social, but I was saying yes to all of it because they were gonna pay me to do it. So I was like, well, yeah. I'll figure it out. And then that figuring it out takes time that you're not probably accounting for in your hourly or your retainer or anything like that. And you just had to and so finally I was like, no.
Carly Ries:I don't wanna learn more about PPC. I don't wanna be working on social media. And so it's not just saying no to the other people, but it's saying no to you and saying no to what you should be focusing on because otherwise you'll just spread yourself too thin.
Joe Rando:And you might make money, like you said, but you don't make a life. And, really, if we're solopreneurs, we're doing something because we want something beyond just money. So it's probably never been a good idea to just do everything that anybody asks you to do. So,
Joe Rando:What do we take away from this? What are some things we can do or to give people to do to try to fix this? I mean, one thing would be to just go look at your business and say, what are three things in your business that you should start saying no to? You know, are there three things? But if there are, what are they?
Joe Rando:And, identify those things. And then I think one of the other things that maybe you can help with is it's hard, like you said, for people to say no sometimes. I mean, how did you get past that? You know, because I'm a little more inclined. at this point in my life, I've kind of learned to say no. I was very much somebody that never wanted to say no when I was young, but it's been a lot of years that I've been going, I'm not doing that. So maybe you can give some advice because I don't remember what I did.
Carly Ries:Yeah. I'd love to say I'm a recovering people pleaser. I am a very active and nowhere near recovery people pleaser. It's something that I know I need to work on, but saying no is very uncomfortable for me. But I have to get back to my why.
Carly Ries:And I have burned the candle at both ends. I have, everything you probably shouldn't do from a burnout standpoint. And during that phase, I got so low from a burnout standpoint. I was just so exhausted and was only working, and it just wasn't worth it. So I think don't wanna say hit rock bottom, but I was at such a low career wise from a motivation standpoint and all of that that I knew what that feels like.
Carly Ries:I don't wanna feel that again. And it makes the no's a lot easier once you realize how much you could actually be working.
Joe Rando:Yeah. And you know, you don't want people to hit rock bottom. I mean, from my perspective, I think that it's just a matter of keeping those goals in mind. And once you, like I said, with that last company, you know, this company was actually offering us a million dollars.
Joe Rando:And it's like, how do you say no to that? Because you say, where am I, where do I want to be in two or three years? You know, we had a vision for who we wanted to be. What is important to us? And the answer was never yes to what they were offering.
Joe Rando:so if you can keep that stuff in mind, what am I trying to do? What are my goals? What do I want? What don't I want? It makes it easier to kinda just politely say no, I'm sorry.
Joe Rando:I'm not the right person for this. You know, maybe try to find somebody to refer them to, something like that. It just makes you feel a little better, but really important.
Carly Ries:Well, Joe, ask me if you think we should continue, with this episode.
Joe Rando:No.
Carly Ries:No. We're gonna let people get back to their day. Alright.
Carly Ries:Listeners, this is a great sound bite. Thank you so much for tuning in. As always, we would love that five star review. We would love for you to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform, including YouTube, and we'll see you next time on The Aspiring Ssolopreneur.
Closing:You may be going solo in business, but that doesn't mean you're alone. In fact, millions of people are in your shoes, running a one person business and figuring it out as they go. So why not connect with them and learn from each other's successes and failures? At LifeStarr, we're creating a one person business community where you can go to meet and get advice from other solopreneurs. Be sure to join in on the conversations at community.lifestarr.com.