Your network is your net worth w/ Colleen Biggs

Your Professional Network is Your Net Worth

[00:00:00] Yvonne Heimann: And we are back with another episode of Boss Your Business where I interview my guests about how they build a business that supports their lifestyle. And what you guys missed out on is we already noted out behind the scenes of all the things that a well organized business allows you to do. But before we dive into all of that, so you actually get to hear it too, guys.

[00:00:27] Yvonne Heimann: Let me introduce you to Colleen Biggs. You are a 22-year business strategist where I also heard, um, grandchildren in the green room where I’m like, girl, you barely look like you are old enough to have kids. Oh, how do, yeah, we’ll get to all of that. Um, you empower business leaders to expand their influence, to attract the right clients and drive more profits.

[00:00:54] Yvonne Heimann: You launched over 340 businesses and you’re a sought-after [00:01:00] keynote speaker, author of five number one international bestsellers. We need to talk about that too with my book launch coming up. I wanna copy you. I’m like, girl, always master excellence, right? Copy excellent. You know what I mean? I, maybe I should have had three coffees today.

[00:01:18] Yvonne Heimann: Um, and your latest book is the, was Step Into the Spotlight to Expand Your Influence. You also the CEO and founder of Leap and you were awarded the top 10 Women Business Leaders of 2021 and the Most Inspirational Leaders in Business of 2023. Ah, you provide women with a community of entrepreneurs that take the leap daily and realize that their network is their net worth.

[00:01:49] Yvonne Heimann: Now, how big is your office? Because with all of these awards, your walls must be full.

[00:01:55] Colleen Biggs: You know, it’s so funny that you say that because the way I’ve set up [00:02:00] my office is so that the wall I look at is kind of like a shrine of my awards, if you want me to be honest. So the very first magazine I was ever on the cover of, the very first magazine I produced, I have my black belt certificate, I have my personal training certificate, I have my vision board, I have all my medals from, uh, competition and running.

[00:02:22] Colleen Biggs: So there’s like, a few things on my wall, but that’s my inspiration to not only remember what I’ve done to get here, what I’ve accomplished, but it fuels me because my vision board’s on the same wall to really what I’m looking to accomplish in the future.

[00:02:40] Yvonne Heimann: While listening to you, because the moment you said, it’s like I have it in front of me, I’m like, this makes so much more sense.

[00:02:47] Yvonne Heimann: We have the tendency to, oh yeah, this is easy now and forget all the things that we have done and learned to get here. Right? And I’m, I’m thinking in my head, I’m like, okay, I got things there. I got things [00:03:00] there. I should move my calendar from in front of me and freaking me out of all the things I need to get done to just over there where I can plan and have that wall of awesomeness and yeah, I, I think I will be redecorating my office this weekend. I love that idea because it’s like, we forget so fast all the things that we thought might be quite difficult in the past, yet we still accomplished it, isn’t it?

[00:03:27] Colleen Biggs: Yeah. You know, um, it took me, you know, three years to get a black belt and um mm-hmm.

[00:03:35] Colleen Biggs: That is something that I’ll never forget. The, the bruises, the mental capacity, the physical, the everything I worked through for that. And so my husband and I had everything in boxes and I said to him one day, you know, when I redo my office and I brought in really great furniture that I love, you know, it’s kind of like a royal blue, old seventies, like velvet, you know, and it’s just super, [00:04:00] it’s comfortable for me to sit on and it’s just a place that I, it’s, this is my space. And I think we all need a space where it’s okay to celebrate our past accomplishments. You know, to get a certificate in personal training was something I just did on a whim to see if I could pass the test, to see if I could put myself to the test, to to see if I could do it.

[00:04:24] Colleen Biggs: But then that actually became the avenue of how I was making money when I left corporate America and started to become an entrepreneur because I didn’t just come out of, you know, corporate America birthed this brand new entrepreneur making \$250,000 a year. And I think a lot of entrepreneurs forget that.

[00:04:44] Colleen Biggs: What means do you have available to you to drive income? It doesn’t matter where you’re driving the income from, how are you driving the income? And so, I was thankful that I had that available because I was able to teach fitness classes, I was able to [00:05:00] teach, you know, private clients and then I could ramp up private clients when I needed more money.

[00:05:05] Colleen Biggs: Eventually it just, you know, it was something I didn’t really enjoy doing. I think I loved working out. I just don’t wanna teach other people how to work out, if you want me to be really honest.

[00:05:19] Yvonne Heimann: I’m working on the habit of liking to work out. Oh, yeah. I might have over done my legwork workout on Monday and I’m still sore.

[00:05:27] Yvonne Heimann: Yeah. Didn’t even feel that. Um, what I love though, and what I wanted to just quickly come back for the audience is guys, did you hear what she was talking about when you talked about putting together your office? And that’s one of the things that, that I tell a lot of my audience and in my community where it’s like, guys, you wanna feel comfortable. You wanna step into the person we already know you are and you want to be you potentially not see yet, [00:06:00] where, what popped in my head when you were explaining of how you really made your office space comfortable and luxurious and, and yours, was when I realized that having fancy coffee at home is my luxury. I’m a sucker when it comes to coffee, yet, I had a simple machine for the longest time.

[00:06:23] Yvonne Heimann: It’s like, yeah, I did the job, cool, but it wasn’t anything special. And it’s this, those little things that we can implement, little or big things that anybody can implement right now for you to step into the person you wanna be.

[00:06:39] Colleen Biggs: I don’t understand why we, um, go through life not rewarding ourselves on a regular basis.

[00:06:50] Colleen Biggs: I’ll hear someone say to me, when I get this work done, then I’ll go and, you know, play or do whatever, and I’m like, if you want the fancy [00:07:00] coffee and if, if coffee Fridays is your thing, go get the coffee and spend the time and enjoy it, then go do your work. Like, we’re not children anymore. We don’t have to do the chores and then get the reward afterwards.

[00:07:12] Colleen Biggs: And I, I feel like that’s such an archaic way of thinking and that’s how our public schools are, right? Mm-hmm. The archaic way of thinking, which is, you know, schools were created for us to work in factories. Plain and simple. That’s what it was creating. Nothing’s changed since then.

[00:07:29] Colleen Biggs: So if you’re not planning on working in a factory, most people aren’t, then you know, it does, it, it doesn’t make sense to me why you would continue going to college and all these other schools and keep getting more and more degrees. And unless you’re a doctor or an engineer, you have to have a, uh, specific type of training to do your craft.

[00:07:50] Colleen Biggs: Right. Entrepreneurs, business administration in college is not gonna give you anything you need to learn how to be an entrepreneur. You need to be binging [00:08:00] podcasts like this, you know?

[00:08:01] Yvonne Heimann: And how often does it actually happen that when we do quote spoil ourself, which I just say, I’m like, it’s living life, it’s, I wanna do this right.

[00:08:13] Yvonne Heimann: It actually comes back around that we do accomplish what we want to accomplish because we did the thing we wanted to do. Same with me. It’s like I was told San Diego, too expensive. Why would you move to San Diego? Guess what? I moved to San Diego and it actually elevated my business, so I’m like, just do the thing now.

[00:08:33] Yvonne Heimann: We don’t, we don’t know how long we gonna be around, so stop moving it out.

[00:08:37] Colleen Biggs: That’s right. That’s the thing. And I, I think that’s really kind of a theme of your podcast, like how do you design your life so that you’re able to live your life and you’re not a slave to your business, right? You wanna design your life to where you’re not a slave to your kids.

[00:08:56] Colleen Biggs: You wanna design your life to where you’re not a slave to your community or your [00:09:00] neighbors, right? So how do we design our life to where we’re not a slave to those things? And I mean, automation’s key for one. Yeah. But because you’re only one person, and then you might multiply yourself through multiple contractors that you hire and people that are on your team like you and I have done.

[00:09:18] Colleen Biggs: But when it comes down to it, automation is key. What is working for you when you’re out having a good time with your family? You know what, what is working in the background? You want someone to be buying, you want, you know, dollar signs to be clicking when you’re at a wedding. That’s, that’s about, that’s how we build it.

[00:09:37] Yvonne Heimann: There’s nothing about us sitting out having a nice dinner. I’m, I’m one of those foodies, I love enjoying food. And by dessert, I’m one of those people. I am attached to my phone. It’s just me. So after I took my, my evening off and I enjoyed my dinner, I do do one of those, check my phone things and it’s like, oh look, somebody [00:10:00] else signed up for Startup Your ClickUp. Awesome.

[00:10:02] Yvonne Heimann: Sweet, nice. And you know, they’re taken care of. There’s an email funnel running that greets them, that has a cute little video in it. It’s like you don’t have to lose your personality in automations. We have so much video. We have gifts and all the things where you can keep it personal.

[00:10:22] Yvonne Heimann: So we already talked about kind of what your path was coming here. What does business and life look like for you right now?

What it’s like to live a “diversified” business life

[00:10:34] Colleen Biggs: Yeah. So, um, my husband owns a business. I own a business. We own a business together. We also own properties, houses, uh, land. Uh, and so my business life is very diversified in a lot of different areas. We have investments in some other start, like very fast rising, quick startup investments. And then we also have kind of the lagging, [00:11:00] slower, um, investments, you know, that will be there. Uh, we’re never retiring, so I don’t know when that money is actually gonna come back to me, but maybe when I’m dead.

On retirement

[00:11:11] Colleen Biggs: Who knows? Someone asked us the other day, when, when do you plan on retiring? And this is what I don’t like about financial planners. When are you gonna retire? They want you to stack everything up for that day or whatever that year is that you’re retiring. And my husband and I said, especially because we pulled into an RV park to just go check out some other RV parks.

[00:11:32] Colleen Biggs: And we saw a lot of elderly people that were retired in this RV park and it kind of shocked us for a moment cuz my husband and I are 51 and 61. So it shocked us for a moment to think like, is this what happens when people retire? Cause this is not what’s gonna happen to us. And we both looked at each other and we said, yeah, when you retire, you expire because all of them have nothing to do now.

[00:11:55] Colleen Biggs: Like I could tell by their activities, they really didn’t have a [00:12:00] life that they were living that excited them anymore. Did that make sense? Yeah. So, my design of my businesses excites me. I travel because I create programs, so I have to travel, like I have, I run a mastermind as an example. This mastermind has five to six women in it every year, cuz I don’t like a bigger number than that. So that’s what I said. That’s all I want. And it’s a lot easier to find a six bedroom house when you’re renting a big house than anything above six bedrooms, very hard to find. Right? I can go to any city and get a six bedroom house. So. I want to pluck myself outta my day-to-day life, my business.

[00:12:44] Colleen Biggs: I need to get away and clear my head, and I want to go back to the days when my girlfriends and I would get away when we were raising kids and all of, we just exited life to, to talk about how to become better versions of [00:13:00] ourselves. Yeah. To to plan how to be a better mom, to work through our problems, to role play when one of us might be getting a divorce or is dating someone new.

[00:13:08] Colleen Biggs: You know what I’m saying? We did these things on a beach. Hanging out as friends. We talked about life. They got me through life. We do the same thing in a mastermind. Yeah. You talk about your business, you talk about your struggles, you talk about your finances, you ask for resources. They give you advice.

[00:13:27] Colleen Biggs: These are women that are going to show you your blind spots, whether you wanna see them or not. And you go, oh crap, I didn’t even notice that. You guys are totally right. And then, boom, you have your answer to change course, and I’ve done this year after year in my mastermind. But on, on top of that, you not only walk out there feeling like a boss, cuz I just achieved so much in my business in one session of a day. We literally will sit in our pajamas from sunup to sundown and just [00:14:00] work on business through whatever, coffee, you know, order in whatever. And then at the end of the day, we’re all like, man, do I feel accomplished? Yeah. The next day we go play. We rent, you know, we go out and we charter sailboats, we go do fun excursions, you know, we eat really good food at really nice restaurants and we play and then we set goals on Sunday before we go home.

[00:14:24] Colleen Biggs: That’s steps to achieve to get to that bigger change that we said we were just gonna do. And then we meet once a month on, on Zoom to stay accountable. I created it that way because that’s what I wanted. I wanted to travel. I wanted to do a mastermind, and other ladies are like, that’s brilliant, but they don’t wanna create it.

[00:14:45] Colleen Biggs: They just wanna pay and go.

[00:14:47] Yvonne Heimann: Yeah. And it’s like that, that, that you have those different values and personalities where it’s like, yeah, cool. I can do that, but I don’t want to. There there is personalities where it’s like, I, [00:15:00] I don’t wanna deal with finding the right AirBnb, managing people, keeping them accountable, making sure doing all the things.

[00:15:07] Yvonne Heimann: I just wanna give you my money.

[00:15:10] Colleen Biggs: And lemme go get the experience.

[00:15:13] Yvonne Heimann: Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

[00:15:13] Yvonne Heimann: So I love that. Yeah. And I’m, I’m one way, it’s like, I like to be the boss. I like to build the things, too. With that, this is the perfect example of how do you build a business around your lifestyle. You knew what you wanted, you knew where your values are.

The importance of building a business around your lifestyle

[00:15:32] Yvonne Heimann: You, you knew where you wanted to take it, and therefore you decided, let’s keep it small. This is what the, what the framework is going to be. This is what we’re gonna do, and there you go. That’s, that’s how you build packages, people. That’s how you build a product.

[00:15:49] Colleen Biggs: And then if we’re talking about someone who has a, um, I own an, I own another type of business, so you know, this business is online.

[00:15:57] Colleen Biggs: With the business coaching I do in the [00:16:00] community that I run similar, you know, you have a community of people. Um, my husband and I also own a local business here in Arizona and it’s a mobile, it’s a mobile pizza business and it’s for private events and weddings and corporate events and showers and things like that.

[00:16:15] Colleen Biggs: So this is a very different business model now than my other model, which is flying around every quarter and going to a different house and masterminding and you know, having the best time. Now we’re talking about health codes, food prep, you know, kitchen, rentals. We’re talking about trailer upkeep.

[00:16:34] Colleen Biggs: So, we own this with, uh, one of our children and I was like, I don’t wanna work in the business. I don’t want to be the one flipping all the pizzas and serving everybody. I’m, I’m happy to fill in and I will learn all this, and I did learn it in the beginning, but it’s like our job right now is to get employees.

[00:16:53] Colleen Biggs: If we want to be able to continue growing this business, I need to focus on what I do best, which is [00:17:00] building relationships, getting on like AZ Bride company, um, building all these other relationships so that our employees can just go turn the events, right? You just want them to turn the events to make the cash.

[00:17:13] Colleen Biggs: So I think that most people forget about that. They think if I can do the work, I keep most of the money, but that’s actually not true. When you have employees doing it for you, now you have the time to go sell more events, to do marketing, to do whatever it is that you need to do. I mean, network with someone and before you know it, they’re like, oh my gosh, I have an event coming up and so-and-so needs a caterer.

[00:17:37] Colleen Biggs: And then there, boom, you just got another event versus being an employee in your business, and if you’re paying an employee $25 an hour, you just made $25 an hour working that event versus selling another one. So you have to shift your mindset to a CEO hat, uh, versus, uh, the mindset of being an [00:18:00] employee and creating a job.

[00:18:03] Colleen Biggs: I see so many entrepreneurs leave corporate America. They create a job for themselves. Yeah. And they’re literally slaves to their business they created cuz they made a job. And that’s not why you became an entrepreneur.

[00:18:16] Yvonne Heimann: And I think that’s, it’s, it’s a natural growth of, yeah, hey, I don’t want this. I’m starting a business.

[00:18:27] Yvonne Heimann: I see a need, I have a passion, whatever it is. And then realizing this, and I’ve seen people realize it and I’ve seen people not realize it. Where it’s like, you are doing all the things now. You could have stayed in corporate America without having to worry about getting clients in the door and getting all the things and doing all the things.

[00:18:47] Yvonne Heimann: You would’ve had an easier life for the same money. Yeah. So let’s get you out of this thing. Let’s turn you into an actual business owner, into a CEO rather than [00:19:00] you working for in the end, often enough, less than 25 bucks an hour because you’re doing all the things everywhere and all the time.

[00:19:09] Colleen Biggs: And people think working it means something different. You know, if I’m, if I’m out at a mastermind, I’m working. I’m working the entire time and I’m having a lot of fun. That working looks different, right? So working can be multiple things. It doesn’t have to be hard, grueling, uh, emails, phone calls, you know, sales, sales, sales. It’s about building connections with people. And the more that you build connections with people, the more you’re depositing equity into what I call social capital. And that social capital is always gonna be who you know and who knows you. And you need to be getting in front of the people that don’t know you right now, that you know needs to know you cuz they’re gonna be referring people to you.

[00:19:54] Colleen Biggs: And I would say probably I’m at about a 90% rate now [00:20:00] that all of my business, whether it’s speaking, paid speaking, keynote, um, workshops locally that I do for the city and some other businesses here. Any clients that are referred to me, everything now is on referral basis, and that took years to grow to get your name out there, because you have to create a digital footprint, it’s like, why do you build a website? And then that’s all you do with it is just say stagnant. By the way, no one’s gonna find you if you just build a website. You’ve gotta build a digital footprint that drives people to your website.

[00:20:37] Colleen Biggs: So it’s about being seen in other people’s businesses, letting them promote you. Uh, being on other people’s podcasts, magazines, blogs, um, articles, you know, being a guest at, at someone’s conference. They’re promoting you and that creates your digital footprint online and I, I wanna just wanna ask everyone, go out and Google yourself right now or your business [00:21:00] and see what shows up.

On maintaining visibility online

[00:21:01] Colleen Biggs: And if you’re barely even a glimpse of on page one, you’re not doing a good enough job. People should only see you.

[00:21:11] Yvonne Heimann: Build it and they will come, unfortunately does not work anymore, not nowadays. And I actually do Google myself regularly also because it’s like things are getting shared about me and, and YouTube videos and all the things, right?

[00:21:23] Yvonne Heimann: Where, where it’s like, I think sometimes it’s also we are getting comfortable in our community and our circle, and we forget about that that’s gonna get stagnant, too. So really stepping into other people’s communities, connecting and continuously growing that. So with all of that, you have a whole bunch of stuff going on.

[00:21:47] Yvonne Heimann: We talked about, um, you do have your community, you have your mastermind, you have coaching, you do keynote speaking, you do workshops, you do podcast guests, you do all the things with multiple businesses on top of [00:22:00] things. How does that work behind the scenes? What are some of the tools, workflows, processes, that allow you to do that and still look fresh and gorgeous like you do on camera?

The role of health and routines in success

[00:22:15] Colleen Biggs: Uh, part of that is health. I eat really healthy and I work out. And, uh, so everyone that says I’m too busy and don’t have time for it, that’s a bunch of crap.

[00:22:24] Yvonne Heimann: It just means you don’t pay attention to it. You don’t care.

[00:22:27] Colleen Biggs: It’s not important to you, right? We make, we make time for the things that are important to us. Mm-hmm. And so I start every day, right? You know, with my normal routine. I read, I read books all the way back to like Napoleon Hill and Dale Carnegie, and I constantly reread books. And that gives me a lot of inspiration.

[00:22:48] Colleen Biggs: It keeps my mindset really secure on, you know, uh, what I’m doing, having the, the wall, like I talked about in front of me, keeps me very grounded in [00:23:00] what my goals are and where I’ve come from. Right? So those two things, but the processes that are in place, a lot of it is like you talked about sales funnels, email automations.

[00:23:12] Colleen Biggs: Um, I do very little manual work. Uh, the manual work that I do is the connecting with others. Yeah. And that’s generally networking in person. Um, but even smart things like let’s say you join the Chamber locally, uh, for your business cuz you do a lot of local work, uh, that is, it becomes automated for you as well. Once you get into the chamber and you’re meeting individuals, they’re marketing for you because you’re a member. So now they’re promoting you, they’re marketing for you. Uh, people are are gonna meet you because they, they’ve seen your name within the chambers. So we have to remember that not all automation we create and start. But, uh, I said this, uh, yesterday, I think it was, or earlier today on a [00:24:00] conference I was on, and I shared with everyone that people today, and no matter what’s going on out there, I’m telling you, they are just drowning in content every day. You can open your email, go on any social media feed, and it’s so much stuff, right? People are starving for connection. They just want to be connected with, and it’s so interesting to me when I meet someone brand new and I’m having a conversation with them and I’m literally interested in them and I’m listening and maybe I’ll follow up with them on an email or text them or say, oh, I have someone I think you should meet and introduce them or, and then I say, oh, hey, you told me you’re looking for more networking opportunities.

On practicing kindness and treating others the way you want to be treated

[00:24:46] Colleen Biggs: I just found out about these three events. Why don’t you go ahead and, and head there and invite some friends, and they’re like, they’re shocked that I’m so nice to them. They’re shocked that I would take the [00:25:00] time to do that for them, and I think to myself, well, I would want you to do that for me. So I just treat other people the way I wanna be treated.

[00:25:08] Colleen Biggs: It’s that simple.

[00:25:10] Yvonne Heimann: I think. I think what a lot of people experience is this. They’re not used to people listening. We are so used to talking at people promoting the whole content overload as you mentioned. When we run into somebody that can actually shut up for a minute and let somebody else talk, don’t get me wrong, it’s like I’m one where I’m like, I’m, I’m itchy. I love sharing. I love doing, so I literally had to train myself to I wanna hear what people are saying. I wanna hear their story. I wanna ask the questions. And I had to stop myself from being like, oh, do you know this? Do you know that?

[00:25:56] Yvonne Heimann: And just breathe for a minute. Yeah. And [00:26:00] let them talk. So I think that’s where, where people really get surprised when people listen and actually remember.

[00:26:09] Colleen Biggs: Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, people, the number, well every, everyone listening today, um, like you and I, are psychics, by the way, because we know every single person’s favorite word, uh, because every person’s favorite word is their own name.

[00:26:26] Colleen Biggs: And, uh, even back in like the 1930s, Dale Carnegie, in his book that I was reading, he said they recorded like a hundred, um, a hundred conversations over the phone or something. And the word I was used over 3,800 times. People are concerned about themselves first. Yep. Their name is their favorite thing. So I’m not asking people to sacrifice all of their needs and not serve themselves because that’s pouring from an empty cup.

[00:26:59] Colleen Biggs: Right. [00:27:00] That’s not what I’m saying, but I’m saying to truly earn leadership, you have to influence others. And the only way you can do that is by serving first. And there is always a slight sacrifice to that. Serving leadership.

[00:27:14] Yvonne Heimann: And by by the way, guys, even if you just call customer support or you are struggling with something, the first thing I do is note down the name of the person I’m talking to, and I at least mention that name three times right in the beginning of the conversation.

[00:27:32] Yvonne Heimann: Believe me, if you are struggling with a credit card company or trying to get a return done, it will help. And it comes back around to exactly what you said, Colleen. And it’s a survival strategy. We care about us. Yeah. And our survival, what, what is in it for me? And it’s not a negative thing, it’s, it’s a survival, it’s a nature. Mm-hmm. This is how we grew up, and if we cannot serve [00:28:00] ourself, we can’t serve anybody else.

[00:28:02] Colleen Biggs: So if we know that, then that is our greatest weapon in business. Mm-hmm. Because I call it with them, like you said, what’s in it for me? You, all you have to do is know that you’re a customer.

[00:28:13] Colleen Biggs: All they wanna know is, how are you gonna solve my problem? Yep. Talk to them exactly like that. Conversion’s easy when you’re talking to them exactly the way they need to be spoken to and you know who you’re speaking to. Like, you know, my, my, my market is a very narrow market in my business that I run online.

The importance of knowing your market and speaking to them in a way they need to be spoken to.

[00:28:33] Colleen Biggs: My market is a very narrow market to the market that I run in my business for the mobile pizzeria. Right. It’s very narrow. I know who I’m speaking to, so when you know who you’re speaking to, how you advertise is easy. Mm-hmm. It’s very easy. You wanna get more weddings booked, then everything that you’re speaking to is to a bride.

[00:28:54] Colleen Biggs: Because you know she’s listening when it’s time for her to plan her wedding. She’s looking at everything. [00:29:00] So you just constantly throw photos out of that, videos, do everything to pull on her heartstrings at, to the bride, right? So you’re gonna talk to the bride if that’s where you want to grow your business.

[00:29:11] Colleen Biggs: So again, you just have to be smart. You can’t do everything at once. And where your energy flows is where you are gonna see the changes in your business. That’s where you’re gonna generate revenue. So, um, I think people try to do too much at the same time. And, and people tell me all the time, like, you’re everywhere.

[00:29:31] Colleen Biggs: Well, if I record, you know, 12 podcasts and then they’re just starting to be, uh, up uploaded mm-hmm. And done by my team, it’s gonna look like I’m recording podcasts and doing live videos and things, but I’m not really sitting there in that moment doing it. I did it months ago, you know.

[00:29:50] Yvonne Heimann: Oh, the joys of content batching.

[00:29:53] Colleen Biggs: Yep. I think content batching is smart. It’s super smart.

[00:29:59] Yvonne Heimann: [00:30:00] And it, it also takes, for me personally, it takes away the stress. It takes away the anxiety of, oh my God, I haven’t done this. I’m like, Uh, okay. We know exactly. We need four YouTube videos. So what are we talking about? Mm-hmm. Script them out, however you script out.

[00:30:17] Yvonne Heimann: I don’t fully script. I do talking points. Everybody got their own way. You record the four videos, they go off to the editor, they get scheduled out. My VA is plugging together a couple of posts for that. Cool. Same with the podcast. Yeah. Short form videos. I literally have short form video going out every single day right now on three different platforms.

[00:30:38] Yvonne Heimann: Guess what? It’s the same content, guys. Yeah, it’s the same thing. Just literally move the dates around because chances are what you saw on Tuesday on TikTok, you’re not gonna see on Thursday on YouTube. And you just make the most of all the things you are already creating. But again, for everybody starting out, guys, [00:31:00] we both have worked our way up to this.

[00:31:03] Yvonne Heimann: Yeah. You don’t have to do it all, all at the same time and all at once.

The importance of standardized processes and procedures

[00:31:09] Colleen Biggs: I think knowing and understanding franchising, which was, you know, way in my past understanding that taught me a lot about, uh, processes and procedures and standardized processes and procedures cuz franchising is about duplicating one business to be exactly like the next, right?

[00:31:30] Colleen Biggs: Yes. So, Creating processes and procedures in your business in the very, very beginning and ask yourself, is this something that can be automated? Like nothing drives me crazier than someone emailing me and saying, hey, yeah, why don’t we meet up next week? Are you, are you available on like Tuesday or Thursday from, or at eight or five and I’ll write them back and I’ll say, hey, thanks so much for connecting. It was really great. Whatever I wanna say to them, and I’ll say, the easiest way for us to connect is gonna be for to [00:32:00] talk, you know, on the phone is going to be for you to find a time on my calendar that works perfectly for you.

[00:32:06] Colleen Biggs: Yep. So click on the link, find a time. Because I already know there’s no way I’m going back and forth on that. That time doesn’t work for me. What about this time? Automate it. And now, in that automation that I sent them, they are automatically gonna get an email once they register, it’s automatically gonna go onto their calendar once they register.

[00:32:26] Colleen Biggs: And then there’s auto set up emails to remind them 24 hours or three days before or one hour before a text message goes out to remind them. I want them to remember that they booked that call with me, and then, after I’m done talking with them, another automated email’s gonna go out to them afterwards.

[00:32:45] Yvonne Heimann: This is, this is why we get along so well, because what you don’t know yet. Once I mark our notes for this podcast in a certain way, I have an email ready to go that says, hey, I had so much fun with you. By [00:33:00] the way, would you leave a podcast with you guys? This is a call for you too. Remember voting for the podcast and leaving a review, but it’s like, mm-hmm.

[00:33:09] Yvonne Heimann: I, I watch so many, I still have this calendar thing going on with people too, where I’m like, really? It’s 2023? Yeah. Why do you not have a calendar link? Um, but also, showing people that there is processes where I had to learn that people don’t see the world like I do, where it’s like I see processes everywhere.

[00:33:34] Yvonne Heimann: Mm-hmm. It’s literally a running joke of me walking the property here and it’s like, you were wasting resources. What the hell are you doing? And it’s, it, it, I’m like, people don’t see the world like this. So it’s fun to watch people that simply don’t think like this in the beginning and are being exposed to it where it’s like, we can repeat this.

[00:33:55] Yvonne Heimann: Look, there’s, there’s actually a yellow brick road you are following every [00:34:00] single time. Sweet. Now let’s write it out. Mm-hmm. Duplicate it and suddenly we have five of you.

[00:34:07] Colleen Biggs: It cracks me up because I was in a very successful drive-through of a company that has multiplied and then even moved into another state and multiplied, and I could not believe how they were running their drive through.

[00:34:21] Colleen Biggs: I was mortified that they would take my order, and this was a large order because I was picking up a whole bunch of stuff for family and then, after I ordered and I said, can I just pay here? They’re like, no, you’re gonna pay at the window. Okay, great. I get to the window. They literally asked me my order and I said, I already gave my order.

[00:34:40] Colleen Biggs: Did it just transfer up here to you? And she said, no.

[00:34:43] Yvonne Heimann: Then, then why are you checking my order back there?

[00:34:49] Colleen Biggs: I just, I looked over at my husband and I was like, do I go inside and tell them five things that they could do very quickly to process people through the, the drive-through faster? Or do I just let it [00:35:00] go and he is like, let it go.

Looking at operations from a customer’s perspective

[00:35:02] Yvonne Heimann: Yeah, you gotta let it go.

[00:35:03] Colleen Biggs: Lemme repeat my order again and we’ll wait here for another five minutes cuz I thought you were already working on my order from the last time I ordered it just to pay up here. So I do know there are a lot of businesses out there that have just done some amazing things now to move efficiency.

[00:35:19] Colleen Biggs: Remember you have a short span of, of, of your attention. So does your client. Yeah. The best thing you can do if you take one nugget away from this is put your client hat on. Put your customer hat on, be your own customer. And if you are not gonna buy, don’t expect anybody else to buy. If you don’t appreciate the things you do, don’t expect anyone else to appreciate the things you do.

Being your own customer

[00:35:40] Colleen Biggs: If you’re not doing things that you like and appreciate, then start doing them. Be your own customer.

[00:35:46] Yvonne Heimann: And with that, you have a freebie for the audience. You have your Five Myths That Are Keeping You Stuck. Yeah. Uh, guys, as always, the link for that is going to [00:36:00] be in the description as well as all of social posts and everything.

[00:36:05] Yvonne Heimann: You know, guys, you know how this goes. You’re gonna find all the links in the description. Um, do you, do you wanna talk quick about your freebie? Anything else where, where people can best connect with you?

[00:36:19] Colleen Biggs: Yeah. You know what I love about, uh, that freebie that I put together was, is has a video of me talk, talking with you just straight up raw, right?

[00:36:29] Colleen Biggs: Mm-hmm. Because that’s who I am. And it has a worksheet that I want you to kind of think about some of the things of the decisions you’re making in your business to decide is it really that the economy is bad? Is it really that, uh, you know, people just aren’t spending money right now cuz gas is too expensive, it’s all BS by the way.

[00:36:49] Colleen Biggs: You’re the one keeping your stuck. You’re the one in your way. You are the one preventing the success because we just talked about, oh my gosh, how many different ways did we just talk about [00:37:00] that you can create automation. Yeah. To generate income very quickly. We gave you tools on how to do that. So, you know, for me, I love it when people reach out on LinkedIn and DM me or Instagram and DM me.

[00:37:12] Colleen Biggs: Um, I am not hard to find, and I worked really hard on, you can Google Colleen Biggs and I’m six pages on Google, so you’re gonna find me anywhere in a magazine. You can go to my website. Contact me right away on the very top. You can just schedule a call with me. You can jump on my newsletter. Um, if anything I said resonated with you today, that’s what I suggest you do.

[00:37:34] Colleen Biggs: Reach out to me and connect. I will be the one that connects back with you because I like to do that. That’s what I do in my business and on my team does the rest.

[00:37:44] Yvonne Heimann: So, and this is why we get along so well, because literally if you DM me, I’m the one in there, too. Yeah, we just love to talk with people.

[00:37:52] Yvonne Heimann: Thank you so much for coming on guys. If you haven’t subscribed to the podcast yet, you know what to do. And hit those five stars to [00:38:00] make sure everybody else learns how to build businesses that support their lifestyle. And I’ll see you in the next episode. Thank you so much, Colleen.