Information Overload Era

We are back for the first episode of 2023! Tiffany-Ann dives in talking about information overload, short form video, and getting your bookkeeping on track.

Show Notes

We're living in the information overload era. So how can you tell who to trust with your business information? In this episode, Tiffany-Ann shares top tips for finding reliable sources of business information. 

Also talking about January bookkeeping tips:

• Hire your bookkeeper now, don't attempt to sort receipts without discussing this first.
• Quality is important in bookkeeping software!  We recommend Quickbooks Online DISCOUNT AVAILABLE HERE
• Do your bookkeeping as you go - 2023 is a fresh start to get on track! 

Listen now and learn how to cut through the noise!

Interested in Done-For-You bookkeeping services?  Check out bottcher.io

For more information about bookkeeping services go to bottcher.io

To Download the Data Driven Method go to datadrivenmethod.io

Creators & Guests

Host

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher

Entrepreneur | Founder, Bottcher Group | Host, Service Based Business Society Podcast | Author, Data Driven Method | Helping you scale your success!

What is Service Based Business Society Podcast?

Attention entrepreneurs! Are you looking for ways to scale your service-based business without sacrificing your sleep? Look no further than The Service Based Business Society Podcast, hosted by Tiffany-Ann Bottcher.

Each week, Tiffany-Ann shares valuable insights on productivity, business strategies, marketing trends, and tech secrets that you need to know in order to take your business to the next level. She firmly believes that a successful service-based business must prioritize an amazing client experience and sustainable, predictable, repeatable profit, and she'll teach you how to do just that.

But that's not all - Tiffany-Ann also invites expert guests to share their knowledge and experience with you, providing even more valuable insights on service-based business growth and sustainability. You won't want to miss a single episode!

If you're looking to create, grow, and optimize your service-based business, The Service Based Business Society Podcast is the perfect resource for you.

And don't forget to join the community on Instagram by searching for Service Based Business Society Podcast

MINDSET
Focused on helping entrepreneurs cultivate the right mindset for success in their businesses. Hosted by experts in the field, the podcast covers a range of topics related to mindset and business, including self-improvement, goal setting, visualization, and meditation. The podcast provides practical tools and strategies to help listeners develop a growth mindset, overcome limiting beliefs, and build confidence. Through inspiring interviews with successful entrepreneurs and thought leaders, the podcast shows that a positive and resilient mindset is key to achieving business success.

DATA-DRIVEN DECISION MAKING
Dedicated to equipping business leaders with the knowledge and skills they need to lead with confidence, based on data-driven insights. Hosted by experts in business leadership, the podcast covers a range of topics related to data analysis and interpretation, strategic decision-making, and effective communication. It provides practical tools and strategies for interpreting complex data sets and using them to make informed business decisions that drive growth and success. Through engaging interviews with successful business leaders and industry experts, the podcast offers valuable insights and examples of how to use data to build strong teams and drive innovation.

RELATABLE ENTREPRENEURSHIP STORIES
A great resource for aspiring entrepreneurs looking to learn from the experiences of successful business owners. Through relatable and engaging entrepreneurship stories, the podcast provides valuable insights into the challenges and opportunities that come with starting and running a business. Hosted by experienced entrepreneurs, the podcast covers a range of topics related to entrepreneurship, including idea generation, product development, marketing, and fundraising. Each episode features inspiring interviews with successful entrepreneurs, who share their personal stories and provide practical advice and tips for those looking to start and grow their own businesses.

BUSINESS TOPICS
As businesses continue to evolve, it's essential for entrepreneurs and business owners to stay informed about the latest trends and best practices in marketing, bookkeeping, technology, and innovation. The podcast is a valuable resource for anyone looking to keep up with these changes and stay ahead of the competition.

Whether you are just starting out or looking to take your business to the next level, this podcast is a great source of inspiration and guidance from real-world examples of entrepreneurship success.

Brought to you by Bottcher Group of Companies

Season: 2
Episode: 13
Title: Information overload Era

Hello, and welcome to the service based business society podcast. I'm your host, Tiffany and bochurim. At our weekly episodes, we will dive into everything you need to know about scaling your service based business without losing sleep. With my experience in creating over seven figures per month, and a passion for marketing, finance, and automation, this show will provide tangible tips and techniques for scaling your business. Let's get started.

Hello, everybody, we are back happy 2023 I hope you had a truly wonderful holiday time whether you celebrate Christmas or anything different. Hopefully you had some time to unwind, have a little family time and a little downtime. It's always such a reflective time of year. And so as I was preparing for this year's first episode, I really got to thinking, you know, what is super relevant in January. And I think a lot of it comes from reflecting on the previous year, deciding what changes you're going to implement this year, prioritizing different changes and the information overload that happens at this time of year. And I think actually, you know, number one, we are in the information era, you can get information on how to do just about anything in 30 seconds or less, you know, between short form video content, which really has changed the video game. You know, you have platforms like Tiktok Instagram reels, YouTube shorts, Pinterest idea pins, have found a way to share incredible information in 62nd clip, you know, I mean, and I know that um, you know, tick tock, you've got some longer stuff and like there's each platform is a little bit different. But typically, around the 6o second mark, people share, you know, whether it's home renovation tips, business tips, fitness, how to fix your hormones. You know, I was looking today at this, you know, video clip on this, this family who upgraded to having two washers and two dryers, and you know, all of the issues that came with that.

You know, 10 years ago, that kind of information would not have been as readily available, you can go and have this like video step by step of so many different things, you know, in the last few months, aside from business, of course, but you know, I've done Christmas decor, Christmas side dishes, different home things, different ways of folding your laundry, all of these things with just this different, you know, 60 second video clips. But here's what I've also learned. I share a funny story because my daughter found this YouTube video on this incredible rainbow colored popcorn. And I was skeptical of this rainbow colored popcorn, but some popcorn and some Skittles, why not let her try you know, I really do try to teach my kids to be fairly independent in the kitchen. And if they want to learn things and try things and help and whatever, I'm all for it. So anyway, we find this video, she finds this video on YouTube, and she wants to make this popcorn. The video shows that you're going to take the Skittles and you're going to put them in the pan and you're going to heat them up and stir and stir and stir until they're like this rainbow color. And then you're going to add in the popcorn. And the popcorn is going to pop. Basically plus it's going to be this rainbow Skittle flavored popcorn. Well, when you take a whole bunch of rainbow colored Skittles and you pour them in a pan and you heat them and store them and eat them and store them. It really just means, if you think back to like, when you were mixing crayons, and you mixed all the colors, you always end up with brown. And so sure enough, we had this sticky tar like brown substance impossible to get out of the front end once it was cool. And the popcorn was disgusting. And whatever.

Lesson learned, what did she say? She says, Well, it just shows you really can't believe everything online. And I was like, yep, that's exactly what it shows. So I mean, now we didn't get the rainbow popcorn, but we definitely learned something. So all was not lost. But even if you're trying not trying, didn't you know make rainbow colored popcorn or do any home renovations or whatever.

From a strictly business perspective, I see tons of completely incorrect business advice online, a lot of it like tax advice, where people will say, Hey, if you do XY and Z blah, blah, blah, you can, you know, get ABC and it's amazing. Okay, first of all, where did this person learn this information? Are they qualified tax professionals? Are they qualified tax professionals in your country? It's different, you know, this Internet bank of information is global. So you know, is this relevant in one country or is this relevant in all the countries And so, you know, I just as we're heading into this new year, and we're implementing, and we're integrating, and we're growing, and we're doing all of these things, it's important to have a trusted source of information. I mean, and you're here on this podcast, great source of information, that I always encourage you to really take any piece of information, whether it's podcasts, whether it's a video, Facebook group, or a book and decide which parts of it you want to implement in your business, which parts of it are relevant to your operations? How does it fit in with information you're already receiving? Because, you know, it's always interesting. It's always interesting when people are receiving information that conflicts from too many sources. So if you've hired a business coach or business consultant, or you have someone on your team that does operations or anything like that, and then you hire someone else to do some of those same duties, oftentimes, you get theories. And what ends up happening when you're doing half of one and half of the other is that neither work. So instead of, you know, when I'm if you're bringing someone on, you're following some information, obviously, this person hopefully has some track record. And you know, if you've said something like, Hey, okay, well, this is working for this person, and all the other businesses they're working on or whatnot. And now you kind of implement, well, you can't really then say, Hey, you said this would work, and it's not working. Okay. But you're not following the process. They're doing some of the process. And so, you know, it's interesting.
-I was working for a client quite some time ago. And, you know, maybe for about three, four months, I'm working with this client on a weekly basis, getting some operations and bookkeeping stuff sorted out. And they had a partner who decided they also wanted to be a part of the solution. And they hired a coach from Upwork. And so now, you know, I get this email that says, hey, you know, my partner has hired this business coach, yada, yada, yada. And so my first question, of course, is, okay, great. A, when can we connect? And, you know, everybody gets on the same page, and B, What are the segregation of duties? What am I responsible for? Or what is this business consultant for? Are we supposed to be working quite closely together? What am I, you know, what decisions Am I responsible for, because it's very important to have clarity. And the end result was that through some of these meetings and whatnot, the business partner learned that most of what they'd hired this person to do was already being done, they were not up to speed on, you know, what we had been working on in the last few months. So while we were already implementing solutions, they were so worried about the initial problems. And so when it was determined that, hey, we actually have this under control, we're moving things forward, we're going ahead, it was then determined, hey, I don't know that we need this other business. And so we didn't end up working together. But I think it's important in this situation, to communicate upfront, get on the same page. Because anytime that you have some confused people, or a lack of understanding of expectations, lack of understanding on who is responsible for what, you can create issues that never need to be there.

So when we're, you know, on a less formal arrangement, if you are working through different advice online, you know, and you think, Oh, that's a great idea, I'm going to implement that. And oh, that's a great idea and to implement that. And, oh, that's a great idea. Oftentimes, you can get a little bit down the rabbit hole with each of these items. And so some have you going in opposite directions, it's diluting your progress. It's diluting your ability to follow through on something you've already invested time, energy and money into implementing. Now, that's not to say there's not some absolutely incredible information out there. But what I do encourage you to do is to make a couple of notes, you know, whether that's to save the actual video or make a couple of notes as to what the, you know, idea or factors about, come back to it and decide how it fits into your business? Is it an opposite or alternative to something you're already doing? Is it complementary to what you're already doing? Because if something is complementary, if it only assists what you already have, or that's a little bit of an easier decision to me than something that is opposite or an alternative to what you're already doing, you implemented something in the first place. So if you have a plan, or like, Hey, this is what we're doing. And then you're scrolling tick tock, and they're like, Oh, don't do that. Go here. And then you think, oh, okay, yeah. And you go back the other way, and you see another video and they're like, oh, other way and you're backing how much time, energy, money goes on in the circles, it's important to explore and keep an open mind. But just keeping an open mind and exploring ideas does not mean implementing those ideas, implementing too many contradictory ideas, truly dilutes any possibility of progress. It has you going in circles, it has you getting frustrated, and the end result is never work could have been

At this time of year, I really say, hey, you know, when it comes to mindset, you know, lots of different snippets, because everybody says things a little bit differently. Everyone has different ideas and alternatives. And that's awesome. But when it comes to business operations, systems, axes, legal, all of these different things, number one, be sure to fact check. Number two, be sure that it's complementary to your initial plan, does this fit in with your business strategy? Or does it not.

I was working with a client recently, who I've been working with for quite some time. And they have very specific brand messaging. Fantastic. A lot of time energy thought has been put into the brand messaging and may have some alternative copy website copy written by someone who was really looking to prove themselves and you know, great opportunity for them to do so. But I took one look at the copy and I knew right away, it wasn't a brand fit. It didn't you could tell it was completely different from any other copy for the business. Is that a good thing? Maybe it's always good to try new things. But will it fit in with the current campaigns? Can it be plugged into everything else that's already currently ongoing? No, definitely not has a different vibe, you would never be able to use that website copy with existing email copy. It's not congruent. It's very different. And so you know, it's always interesting. When you get going in these opposite different directions, it always comes back to and I know I beat this Tiffany in Yes, I know, I harp on this a little. But it comes down to the objective.

You know, when you're making decisions, or you feel super passionate about something in your business, what is the objective of the decision, you know, to add something to take something away? Is it affecting your brand messaging, your brand personality? Why are you super passionate about it? Does it serve, there's nothing worse than someone being super passionate about something in their business? That's clearly not working? You say, I would like to get to this end result. And then we look at all of the systems and websites and whatnot. And then we think, Okay, well, it's not working. So we want to change things when implementing new solutions. And those No, no, we can't change anything, nothing can be changed. Okay, well, if we don't change anything, we can't really change the end result. And so, you know, sometimes we need to evaluate those decisions. So how does it all tied together? Well, it means that we, as I said, are in this information era, but just because it's online doesn't mean that it's correct. We want to be fact checking that information, does it align with our current business strategy? Is it complementary to what we're already doing? And then taking that step further and saying, Does it support our business objectives for this year, this quarter, this month? It's kind of a funny time of year where everyone is back to foot on the gas pedal.

December's, you know, everything kind of slows down in December, we touched on that just before Christmas, the last episode of 2022. But now we're back in 2023. And well, it feels a little bit funny at the beginning of the year, because everybody's been off, everyone's a little bit behind. You know, I was even listening to the radio this afternoon, when I was going to pick my kids up from school and the two radio DJs. We're talking about how, hey, it's our first day back, I kind of forget what I'm supposed to be doing here. Like the music will be great, just like normal, but oh my goodness, we are really feeling the break today. And it just made me think like, Hey, thanks for being super honest. But it does feel kind of funny. You know, like when you're especially if you've had any kind of vacation time away from the holidays, you know, you sit down and you look at your emails, or you're looking at your social media comments, or your business tasks, whatever it is, you're gonna like, whoa, take me back to the beach, or Whoa, like, where's the holidays? And it's, it's that time to really reflect and say, Okay, it's time to sit down, buckle up, get to work and decide, does this fit with the current objectives? You know, does this align with the current strategy for this here? And this is when you're saying, Hey, I don't really have any objective or strategy for this year yet. Well, now's the time to do it. I mean, you're technically a little late, but you know, better late than ever, you know, do you have your budget done? Do you have your strategy done? Do you know your plan for 2023? Take the time now to reflect. I can decide what success looks like for you? What do you want to accomplish this year? And whether or not you like to journal or you like to do a vision board or you like to list it out somehow, like, however, aligns with you because everybody's different. However, you know, you can really understand where you want to go, follow those steps, follow that process through and decide what you need to be doing now in order to get where you want to go?

And if it does, something doesn't align, drop it. Nobody says you have to do any part of your business forever. Not you're not married to any one decision, I was working through some business decisions for someone this week. They were like, well, but maybe in the future, yes, maybe in the future, you might need to make a change. But right now, this direction, this direction, this decision might serve your business best. That doesn't mean you have to do it for the next 30 years. That means that you might want to do it now. And there's like What if I change my mind later, then you change your mind later, it's fine, you are running your business, you can make those decisions, you can make the decisions, what works and what doesn't. And so if it is supporting your current business objectives, and if you are ready to add in the effort, the energy, you have the fund the knowledge, all these pieces, when all of these things come together, that's when you can really create that progress when you can move things ahead when you can hit those objectives.

So January is also the time to be catching up on your bookkeeping, if you are not already there. One of the things we really see within our agency this time of year is the incoming requests for bookkeeping, because people have not done their bookkeeping from last year. And they know that now is the time to be getting it all cleaned up so that they can file with their accountant. And so you know, don't leave this to the last minute.
And here are a couple of tips I have for you. If you're going to be working with a bookkeeper, don't wait until you have all of your receipts sorted. I have seen months and months and months wasted where entrepreneurs have said, Hey, I'm going to just organize my receipts and then I'll get them to you. And then we can get the books done. Here's the thing, unless you've asked your bookkeeper, how they would like your receipts organized. Typically, whatever way you organize them is going to be a waste of time. So let's not do that, when it comes to things like that, ask the questions first, you're better off to get it done than think you need to do a number of steps that you don't really know before you get things done from there invest in quality bookkeeping system lately on my, you know, video short form video, a lot of times I'm seeing these new or free bookkeeping programs that are recommended. And while some of them can be okay, some of them are also not great. And a lot of systems say that they also do bookkeeping, you know they do their CRM plus do they do bookkeeping, they are a project management system. And they do bookkeeping. Very rarely does the bookkeeping that goes on in any of these systems actually constitute real bookkeeping. And so if you're going to be working with an accountant, or anyone who is really knowledgeable about bookkeeping, have them look at your systems before you get started. Especially if you're going to be doing a lot of the entry work yourself, you want to make sure that you're entering it correctly, so that all of the data that you're going to be using for your taxes or your end or whatever is going to be usable.

And my third tip when it comes to bookkeeping is to keep up with it. Don't leave it all to the end. You know, obviously we can't change what has already been done. But 2023 is a brand new year and so even if you are a habitual last minute bookkeeper from before, now is the year to get that started instead of ongoing bookkeeping services. So our agency does have a couple of openings left for the beginning of the year. If you're behind on your bookkeeping and in need of some support in this area, whether that is a consult to set you up for success on how to do your bookkeeping, or if you prefer an ongoing done for your service. We do offer these as well. So you can access all of the information about either of those options on our website at Bottcher, B o t t c h e r.io.

Well, we are all out of time for today. If you guys have not joined the service based business society Facebook community, make sure you head on over to Facebook and we can continue the conversation. Be sure to also follow the show by going to any podcast app and searching surface based business society. Click subscribe, click the fifth star and leave us a written review. Have a great week and we will see you soon