Joe Casabona
Hey everybody and welcome to another live coaching call here on the streamlined solopreneur. If you don't know me, I'm Joe Casabona. I don't know why you wouldn't know me if you're watching this right now.
And I am excited. I to have this call with Amy, it looks like, all right, great, we are live. So I was just double checking that.
So this is going to be a live coaching call. You will be a fly on the wall while I help Amy through whatever it is is on her mind, probably around systems, productivity, technology, things like that. So I will be semi-watching the chat, but this is really about my time with Amy.
So say hi, if you'd like, let me know where you're coming from. And let's enjoy this call. Let me bring in Amy.
Amy, how are you?
Amy
Hey, Jill. I'm really good. Really glad to be here.
Joe Casabona
I am stoked. You are here as well. I'm just going to double check that I can hear you on the stream.
If anybody is watching, I don't know if anybody is watching. Let's make sure we can hear you on the stream. Perfect.
I can hear you on the stream. Okay. So, first of all, I was going to say your full name and then I didn't ask you how to pronounce your last name.
Is it Beardsley?
Amy
It is Beardsley. Yes.
Joe Casabona
All right. fantastic. All those years teaching in the classroom has really helped me pronounce people's names better. So let's start with the question I always like to start with, which is what's on your mind?
Amy
So I feel like I'm an employee in my business instead of the owner of my business. And that's worked really well for me, you know, for the first, I don't know, five or six years of this whole freelancing solopreneur thing. But the last especially three, sorry, my cat has popped in to say hello.
For the last three years especially, I've, I just want something more. And I'm not sure what the next step is to get there. And I need to spend more time working on my business, but I don't actually know what that means.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. Yeah. That's really common for, a lot of people, right? So let me start with this then. Why did you start your business?
Amy
Freedom.
Joe Casabona
All right. That's my favorite answer. Do you, I think I know the answer to this, but let's lay the cards out on the table. Do you feel more free in your business than you did in your full-time work?
Amy
I guess and no. Like I can, you know, decide when and how to take time. off and, you know, not have to worry about someone else's schedule. And that's really nice to have the flexibility. But at the same time, I have never worked harder or more hours ever in my entire life than I have doing this thing.
Joe Casabona
Yeah, yeah. It's like, it's that feeling that like I don't feel like I can just clock out at five because it's my business and everything is. It doesn't feel like there's somebody else to pick up the slack when you are gone, right?
Amy
Exactly. Yeah. And so even with the flexibility, you know, I'm working way more hours, way more stress. It's a lot.
Joe Casabona
Okay. So you started it for freedom. You feel like you're working way more hours. What do you tell me a little bit about what you do, like the kind of work you do and then how you work. Is it client work? and you know we met in the same like freelancers community so I assume it is around client work but I'll let you kind of tell us how it works yeah it is client work I do well I do content
Amy
creation and strategy so there's a lot of like SEO now AEO GEO where we optimize for AI in addition to like the Google search results I do the primary revenue is through blog writing, but I also do newsletters. I've done two e-books and a couple strategy sessions, a couple web pages, but it's primarily blog posts and the strategy around that.
Joe Casabona
Cool. And so, I mean, so where in this, would you say, what is the most time-consuming part for you?
Amy
editing is the most time consuming part and is that usually editing very good at research yeah yeah my own work
Joe Casabona
yeah okay um yeah okay so this is really good so why don't we then go through let's say you've landed a new client what is the process uh for one and then and then we'll we'll kind of step we'll like do like a quentin tarantino thing where we go backwards to how you got the client but Let's talk about your client process since we're in this now.
Amy
Sure.
Joe Casabona
You've signed on a client. Who is your, like what kind of company or organization is your ideal client? And then how do you walk them through from onboarding to like post, post engagement, I guess we'll call it?
Amy
Sure. So my ideal client is in the insureTech space. I prefer B to B. but I do have a couple B2C clients.
So B2B and SureTech. So we've signed the agreement. We go through introductions, who's the main point of contact.
I get logistical details and information. And then we talk about their audience. And usually they have all of that information.
Like they have a persona and a contact. strategy that they're working towards. And I ask about quarterly goals and business developments that are coming down the line.
And from there, we talk about workflow, like how, what's the best method to get the assignments to me for me to submit the assignments back to them? A lot of clients have their own platform. Asana, Reich is a common one.
A couple clients just do it through email and so either way no matter if they have their own platform or we do it through email i track everything in notion so i set up a company profile and then start adding tasks because a lot of my work is blog posts it's not like project based if it is a specific project that has a start and end like a strategy client then i'll set up a project and put tasks in there but otherwise I found that's just an extra step that sort of muddles thing so we start adding tasks and so we deliver back and forth some editing perhaps some revisions unlikely but does happen on occasion and offboarding doesn't happen very often most of my clients I've had for like five to seven years. I did lose a couple towards the tail end of the pandemic. And that was a budget decision on their end that they needed to cut costs.
And one of them has come back and hired me again that their revenue is picked up. And so that's been really nice. But I don't really have an offboarding process other than, you know, it's been really great to work with you.
Joe Casabona
Are you getting testimonials or anything like that?
Amy
I do not have a process for testimonials. No.
Joe Casabona
All right. So that's one thing I would recommend, right? So I guess like your work, so I want to kind of go back to the things we've heard, like you're working way more.
You started for freedom. You are, it's a team of you. Is that right?
Amy
A team of me, yes.
Joe Casabona
Okay. And you do, I've made an assumption and I want to say it out loud here, but like you are doing the research, the writing. Is AI doing any of it for you?
Amy
Yes. AI has been super helpful, especially for the research portion of it.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
So I have a legal background. So quality of sources is very important to me. And so I double check everything.
And, you know, I only use like the tier one. the primary sources. And if I find it somewhere else, you know, that's cool.
That can point me in the right direction. But I always, you know, do the research myself and make sure that's what it actually said because things can be misinterpreted or misquoted so often. So I have programmed Claude to do a significant portion of the research for me.
But it still, you know, requires going in and double checking to make sure that it got it right.
Joe Casabona
Right. Yeah, yeah. You're not just taking that blindly.
Amy
No.
Joe Casabona
Yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. And then, so one thing I think we, and I'm sorry, no, I'm jumping around a lot.
The other thing I want to say is like you've had a lot of these clients for five to seven years, aware that we're on a live stream. Does any of the amount of work that you're doing have to do with the client relationship or the demands of any current, of any clients? You can clean the fifth on this if you want.
Amy
I have had clients that eat up a significant amount of time in managing the relationship, you know, whether due to lack of communication on their end, not really understanding or having a clear goal in mind. I'm not sure what happens happens on their end. But the clients that I have and have had are an absolute delight to work with.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
They require, you know, very little relationship management.
Joe Casabona
Okay, cool, cool, cool. Yeah, so it sounds like there's probably some optimizations we can make around the process side of things. And so the one question I'll kind of have you noodle on while we keep talking is, is like, has there been pushback or opposition to getting the clients into your system that you are familiar with, right? Because that the, I used to do this too, right? Oh, whatever project management system you use is fine.
And then it's like, okay, now there is the inertia or the, the, the energy management and use. Right? There's like the hours burned learning the platform and making sure you're seeing what you need to see.
So is this just something that you haven't pitched to clients or your clients are like, no, we want to use the thing we want to use?
Amy
A combination of both. So I was using Moxie for a short time and discovered that the client portal there was blocked by a lot of the clients that I was. was working with. They couldn't, they just couldn't access it.
Joe Casabona
Oh, interesting. I wonder if they like look for yeah names. Yeah. Some of those firewalls are like pretty. Yeah.
Amy
So I'm not sure what that was about. And I'm not sure if they block other ones, you know, like the 17 hats or the you know, the bonsai or or the other management platforms. Um, and so I did hit that roadblock. so I haven't pitched other than that using my own platform.
Joe Casabona
Okay. I would, I think this is like the thing I would want to noodle on the most, right? Is like you having a clear, because like the other thing is like, I mean, editing documents via email, like you can't see it because I'm wearing headphones, but my ears started to bleed, right?
Like just like that's just like, um, I know a lot of big orgs like use word. And I don't really like word, but I get it. But like tracking that stuff via email is that creates a lot of overhead.
So I would definitely want to set up something. Right? With large language models, like maybe this is a thing that we can solve on your end, right?
Where it's like set up a skill to look for these sets of emails and parsy parse or whatever. But like I would definitely want to get, if it's Notion, great. If it's something else.
Like you use notion. And so I'm always of the mind that let's use the tool that you're most familiar with. Right.
Honestly, for me, if I was doing like a ton of client work right now, it would probably happen in To Doist. Just because like that's where I put a lot of my projects. I guess I should explicitly state since this is being live stream that To DoS is a former sponsor of mine, but I've used them for many years.
So, you know, it's, I think that's a big, I don't want to get stuck too much. I'll do like a follow-up document with some more information. I do want to get some more context here.
Around when you talk to your clients, I know a lot of like writing projects start with like some sort of interviews. Right? you said a lot of them already probably have like brand guidelines or things like that.
What kind of information are you getting from them in those interviews? Are you doing synchronous interviews or are you sending them like questionnaires? Like what does that look like to get the information you need to get?
Amy
Very few of them anymore require interviews. Usually it's a brief. It depends on the clients. So a couple of my clients send me a, a topic. I want a blog post that talks about, you know, this, the sandwich generation and how that affects retirement planning, for instance.
Joe Casabona
I'm in that. Millennials are that, right?
Amy
Yes. Yes, millennials are that. Yeah.
Joe Casabona
Yes.
Amy
And so a lot of the CFPs that I write for, that's how it starts. But like the larger companies, insurance companies, will send over a brief that has a lot of the information outlined and exactly what they want to cover. And some of the larger ones have their own internal data from studies and statistics that they pull from their own systems that I have access to that I can pull from. Some of them will send over questions that they internally decided we're the best to ask an expert about and then that expert types their answer and so they send me, you know, this document with all of this big huge wall of text that I can then pull insights out of.
Joe Casabona
Okay. Okay. And then what is your what does your typical week look like as far as I guess hold on. Let me step. Let me take one step back. You have five to seven, or you have a bunch of clients. They've been with you five to seven years.
You're working way more. Where do you feel? I might have already asked this, but I'm asking it in a different way now. Like, where do you feel the biggest pain point in your business is? Is it like client acquisition?
Is it like there's not enough hours in the day to do the amount of work you're doing? Like, what is it? What feels like the biggest pain point?
Amy
It's a, It's a combination of things. So the biggest one is there's not enough time in the day for me to get done what I think needs to get done.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
But I have huge time blindness. And so because of that, I meticulously track how long it takes me to do every client piece of work that I do. I track that.
And so that's where notion helps because I can enter in formulas. And so it automatically calculates like my effective hourly rate, for instance, per client. And so I review that quarterly.
I do not have a process for client acquisition. My process is when I need a client, then I start prospecting. And historically, that has worked very well for me.
But I haven't had to do that in a while. And all of the freelancers that I know are saying how difficult it is. is to get a client now in this environment.
So that's very scary. I've also realized recently, I listened to a podcast. Austin Church did a freelance cake episode with Sana High Tower.
And she pinpointed exactly what my problem is with not being able to, like, thinking I don't have enough time in the day to get things. done is as an employee you probably only do you know four hours of super productive work in a day you know you've got calls and co-workers and all these interruptions and when as a solopreneur you know i sit down to work and i work like it's super focused very high intensity very demanding heavy work And that's just not sustainable, you know, for an eight-hour period. So if I work, you know, if I give a good four hours of that in a day, I feel like that's not enough because, you know, I should be working eight hours in a day.
But that's just not like mentally possible.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. I'm really glad you brought this up. This is always something I talk about, right? Like you get a solid four each day.
Amy
Yeah.
Joe Casabona
And so one of the things that I work with people on, and this, This sounds like just a perfect opportunity to talk about now, right? Is when you are at, like when you do your best work, how many things you decide to do it in a day and what your week in your calendar look like. So I'll ask this question first. Do you know when you work best?
Amy
It varies. Usually like 10 to 2 is really good. And occasionally, like the middle of the day is really good.
And occasionally I get like this burst of super focus and or like after dinner in the evening like six to ten. But I don't capitalize on that very often because I've struggled with work boundaries. And so, you know, I try to just turn it off, you know, by five or six.
Joe Casabona
Yeah, yeah. That, I mean, do you have, what's your home life look like, I guess is maybe the best. I was going to ask you if you have kids, but that's like an amount. Ox's question, I think.
Amy
So I am, is it an empty nester if your kid is really at college but comes home sometimes?
Joe Casabona
Yeah, yeah. Some brand new. They're not there all the time, right? Like, yeah, absolutely.
Amy
Yeah, yeah. So I'm brand new to this whole MD Nester thing. Well, I don't know that that's fair.
This is her second year. So I guess I've been doing this for about a year and a half. But she's, and I only have one.
And she's perfect. So I want and done perfect. You know, that's with perfection.
And so she's four and a half hours away at college. So she can't just like pop in. So when she comes to visit during college breaks or we often go visit her, you know, it's like a very focused, you know, no work gets to come into this time.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. Yeah. That's really good. That's really, that's really smart. Yeah. And I should say,
Amy
I do have a husband. He works a regular job. So he's, gone from seven to four 30.
Joe Casabona
Okay, cool. So that was kind of like, I'm really glad you just said it because I didn't just want to ask that again. Like that feels like a very personal question.
But it kind of sounds like once he's home from work, right? It's like spouse time, right? Or partner time, like husband time, right?
Amy
Yeah, unless I'm behind or said yes to way too much work. And then I say, I'm putting my headphones down now. And I like, I bought these really obnoxious Bose headphones.
Because I was just using my air pods, you know, to tune him out. But then he didn't know I was tuning him out. And he was still trying to talk to me.
So I have these really obnoxious Bose headphones now that I wear so that he knows I'm focusing.
Joe Casabona
Gotcha. Okay. Cool.
Okay. Yeah, that makes sense. So like you get a burst from like you said six to ten.
And then, oh, I've already lost the first time you said. Like when you work best.
Amy
Like 10 to 2. Like middle of the day. 10 to 2.
Joe Casabona
Wow. Okay, cool. That's like, I literally tended to conference last week. I don't know anybody who does their best work after lunch, but I'm sure they exist. Oh, yeah.
Amy
Well, I skip lunch. Okay. I'm so focused. You know, I just, I might have a late breakfast and, you know, then I just skip lunch and then eat when I'm done.
Joe Casabona
Yeah, okay. Yeah. So, yeah, so like you eat kind of like around the 10 to 2 time, right? Is, is, you're not like missing meals, but you're just not. not eating at like noon.
Amy
Right. Yeah.
Joe Casabona
Right. Yeah. Okay.
Cool. Cool. So I would, so first of all, uh, tend to do to two solid.
That's a, that's four hours, right? 10, 11, 12, 1, 2. Yeah.
So I would optimize your days. Where are you based?
Amy
Michigan.
Joe Casabona
Michigan. So Eastern time zone.
Amy
Eastern times.
Joe Casabona
A lot of your clients. I'm going to guess they're in California just based on the fact that there's like, insure tech. Is that what you said?
Amy
Insure tech, yeah. One of them is on the East Coast. I actually don't, I don't think I know where the other ones are based actually.
Joe Casabona
Okay, cool. I mean, that's great, right? Because you're not like playing that time zone game, right? Do you have a lot of meetings during the week?
Amy
No.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
No, I have one client where I do a lot of editorial support and copy editing. And that's really the only client that has meetings. And so that's, we have one monthly meeting and then two every other week meetings. So it's still pretty light.
Joe Casabona
And what time are those meetings?
Amy
The most inconvenient, obviously. Like the middle of the day. They're in Eastern time too.
So that's nice. You know, they don't have to get up super early or or stay super late for those meetings. But when is it like 3 o'clock and when is it like 10.30 in the morning?
Joe Casabona
Okay. So I would try to protect your, this is, there's a great book by Carrie Newhoff. It's called At Your Best.
It's like determining when you work your best. That's your green zone and you want to protect your green zone at all costs because that's when you do your best work, your most productive work. And then there's the idea of your red zone, right, which is you're unmotivated, you're sluggish, you don't know what to work on. And so you put different tasks there, right?
So these coaching calls, I will make an exception for the morning because they're work, right? Like I want to be at my best. But my best working hours are like seven, to 10, which is moderately inconvenient when you have kids and you have to drop them off at school.
And like my wife is home half of the week, right? She's in there. She works 312s. And so I like and I, so I know what days I need to like optimize my best working time for.
Um, but most of my meetings take place in the afternoon. Because like after lunch, I am almost completely useless. Right. Like if I. If I. am left to my own devices.
But if I have meetings, coaching calls or whatever, like client onboarding calls or something like that, that gives me the focus I need to actually do something productive, right? And so most of my meetings are taking place after 11 a.m. Eastern. And so I would, I would challenge you to try to do the same thing, right? Like protect those 10 to 2 hours because that's when your best work.
The other thing that I would recommend is, it sounds like you're already doing like some version of this because you're time tracking, but I call it task journaling. I write down three things I intend to get done each day and three, like three things and that's it, right? And so when I plan my week, I will write down 15 things and then I will fill them in one per day.
And so now I've got my, these are the things that I know when I work best. These are the times I'm going to try to get this work done. But doing that should alleviate some of the stress of like I didn't get the thing.
Like I didn't get everything I wanted to get done. Done. So I like I consider that my weekly planning.
I look at all of the, I have a lot. I've been having a lot of meetings because I've been traveling a lot. and so my meetings have just been like stacked in alternating weeks.
But again, I try to make those meetings not during my best hours. And so I will look at all the meetings I have throughout the week. I will cancel with reckless abandon.
Like if I don't feel like I need to have this meeting, I'll be like, hey, I'm sorry. I need to like move this or not have it. Can we do this asynchronously is one that I is a question I ask all the time?
Like, hey, I know we have this time. I'd love to give it back to you. Is there any way we can do this asynchronously?
Right. And then I will basically like fill in the blanks with tasks throughout the week. So like today I have a lot of meetings because I'm traveling tomorrow, starting tomorrow.
And so I have not planned any deep tasks for today, right? They were all left for the end of last week while I was home or yesterday because I didn't have in the morning, right? So that sort of thing should alleviate some of the pressure that you feel to keep getting more done, done. And then I would also say, like, you know, for me, after six is, is no work time for me.
Actually, like, when my wife works, it's like after three because I have to pick up the kids. Yeah. But even when my wife's home, like, you know, six to bedtime is pretty much family time.
And she's in grad school now. So, like, we are kind of working independently a night. But I would give you permission at least once or twice a week to say, like, if you get that second wind at six and you don't have plans with your husband and he just wants to do whatever it is, he wants to do to unwind after work, I think that's, like, perfectly fine.
The thing that I do is, like, no client communication. after five. I try to do that, right?
Because I don't want that expectation, right? That I'm always available.
Amy
Right. Yeah.
Joe Casabona
So, um, okay. So I just said a lot of things at you. What, what struck you as I should definitely do this? What struck you as I, like, there's no way I can do that?
Amy
Uh, the three things per day, like 15 things in a week.
Joe Casabona
Yeah.
Amy
Um, that seems impossible. way way more things to do than 15 things in a week all right tell me about that uh so i i use a bullet journal right okay and so at the beginning of the um usually on a Friday if I don't have a chance on a Friday then I do it first thing on Monday and so you know I have enough out my week.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
And so I write down everything that has to be done each day. And like I have, you know, like Thursday, I have 15 things already just on that one day. And so it just seems like I have way too many things to do to 11.
Joe Casabona
Do you get all of those things done?
Amy
Most of the time, but it requires me to work a lot of evenings and weekends.
Joe Casabona
Right. Okay. So if we're working way more than we want to, then we want to try to figure out what we can take off of our plate, right? So that we're only doing those 15 things. So I guess like, can we, are you willing to share the things from Thursday?
Amy
That is terrifying.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. Terrifying. I was like that too, until like I like physically couldn't be, right?
Like over the pandemic, my wife was working a lot, right? Like I think I've shared that story with you. And like I realized I had to like automate or delegate a bunch of things.
So like the things that I do are the things that only I can do in my business. Right. So that's like that sounds really scary, but I'm willing to bet there.
there are a few things that we can automate away or maybe you're doing that you don't have to do. Like I have found that a lot of the time. So like, yeah, if you're willing to share, I'd love to kind of go through this list and kind of ask you sort of one by one.
Like, do you have to do this?
Amy
Sure. So one thing was a hair appointment. I got my haircut.
This was from last week. I had one, two, two meetings. One of them, well, gym, I go to the gym three times a week, so one of them is going to the gym.
We went and visited my daughter, so I had to pack. I had two podcast episodes show notes. One, two or two, or two.
articles to write, two topics to run through an AI process that I've developed to turn a transcript into a blog post. And one of my clients, I do customer service emails. And so that usually takes an hour usually.
And so then I also had that.
Joe Casabona
Okay. Cool. So this is great Because I said things and things was a synonym for tasks for me, right?
So like, if we look at, if we look at my day, right, I probably have 15 things to, right? Drop the kids off at school, this coaching call, a podcast recording, another coaching call, drama club, because I'm the co-director of the drama club for my kids. Love that.
You're right. And then cello. Like my daughter takes cello, right?
So like those are things that I'm not counting in the three tasks I want to get done today, which are launch my new opt-ins, record a sponsor spot, and then I do asynchronous coaching for this community, right? Those are the three tasks I've written down.
Amy
Okay.
Joe Casabona
And those are the things that I want to fill my unscheduled time with. Right. So I think that's a really good distinction, right?
Because we're going to, you know, we're going to have appointments and meetings, right? One of the benefits of us being self-employed is that we can do the hair appointment or, you know, I'll get my haircut on like a, well, it's been a while. But, you know, like a Wednesday morning or whatever or a Wednesday afternoon because afternoon is my worst time.
So we definitely want to work that flexibility, right? especially if like 10 to 2 is your, right, you can do the early doctor appointment or the early hair appointment. I was scheduling my doctor appointments in the morning and I'm like, this is done.
Like my entire day would be shot, right? Because now I'm taking like my two of my best hours, right?
Amy
Yeah.
Joe Casabona
So yeah. So I would say like of what you said, I heard a few tasks in there, right? Like write the articles, do the show notes.
And then this AI transcript project, right? So like those three tasks could be show notes, articles, AI transcript project, right? And if those are the things that you want to get done that day, then you would say, okay, from my hair appointments at nine, from 10 to 12, I'm going to write the articles, right?
Or whatever it is that works best for you. But having those three things and being able to check three tasks, having those three tasks and being to check them off is going to kind of help you see, okay, these are the things that I had to do. Right.
Maybe the show notes thing is something that you could let AI take a first pass at, right, if you have the transcript. Like that is something I am very, AI does not write for me. Like, I don't let it do any writing.
But like, I will let it generate the first pass of show notes, even if it sucks, because it's a paragraph. And then links, right? And it's really good at finding the links that I'm actually talking about.
And then like my call to action verbatim, right? So like, that's something I feel pretty comfortable letting AI give me a head start on, even if I have to rewrite the, you know. I've always had a saying that like clients don't. know what they want, they know what they don't want.
And I feel like I use AI for that, right? It's like, I don't know what I want to write, but I definitely don't want to write that. And now I know what I want to write sort of thing.
Amy
Yes.
Joe Casabona
So, so, so maybe that's another, maybe that's like another thing. Maybe you're already doing that. Um, but that's probably someplace that can be like semi-automated.
Um, okay. So, so I'm glad we made that I've lost my train of thought. Let me get it back really quick.
We were talking about. Yeah. Yes.
Amy
That stuck out with the things that you said was protect those the peak focus hours, you know, where I work the best. And so I do have, you know, a couple of appointments, you know, that I have control over that I schedule during that time. And I only do that because, you know, they say, oh, does one o'clock work? And I say, sure.
Joe Casabona
Yeah.
Amy
instead of saying, no, actually, could we do another time?
Joe Casabona
Yes. And so that's a big thing for me. I will always say, hey, that doesn't work for me.
Can we do this instead? Right. And I'm not saying be so rigid to the point that it's detrimental.
Like I've had meetings in the morning if that's the only time. Like if I have like an Australian client or something and I don't want them meeting at midnight because that's obnoxious. Right.
I will try to do that asynchronously first, but I also know the value of synchronous meeting. And so what I would do, right, is sign up for something like cal.com, which is a free call scheduler. And then you can send that, hey, grab any time here that works, right?
They'll come back and they'll say like, hey, none of these times work. That's never happened to me. We may not have met that week, right?
it might have been the next week. But for me, like protecting that time. And like I just said, right, I've made that same mistake.
For some reason, doctor's appointment in the morning was like deeply ingrained into my skull at some point in my life. And so I'm like, yeah, I'll drop the kids off and then I'll go to the doctor and then I'll have the whole day uninterrupted. But then I get back at like 10 and I'm like, oh, no, my whole day is shot, right?
So now it's like my doctor's appointment is at three or four where I'm already like at the end of my day and not really thinking about what I have to do and doesn't matter. So yeah. Yeah.
So I would definitely try, you know, like even if I have like some post-it notes off camera. If you put a post-it note up that's like never meet between 10 and 2. Right?
And then someone's like, is that good? And you're like, wait, no. Can we do nine or can we do three? right um i also like to as best as i can stack my meetings right so like one of the things i do in my weekly review is i'll look at my calendar and i'll say okay i have a nine to 10 30 and then i have an 11 can i move one of those up or down right so that i have them kind of back to back maybe with like a five minute buffer in the middle because then it's like you have these meetings that are all kind of 45 minutes or an hour apart and it's like what am I going to do for this hour right so that's the other thing I really try to do um and aside from these last couple of weeks right where I've been traveling a lot and so just naturally all of my meetings have fallen in my non-travel weeks because I don't do meetings when I travel um I try to limit the amount of meetings I have in a week, too.
That doesn't sound like it's much of a problem for you. It doesn't sound like you have a lot of meetings, but that's just something else to consider, right? Or like, or maybe it's like, yeah, there's a couple of weeks where I just do all of my meetings.
And that's my meeting week, right? Like, whatever works best for you there. Because that's like, like you said, right? One of the things that we have the ability to make our own schedule and something that a lot of solopreneurs, freelancers, small business owners fall into is prioritizing everybody else's time over hours.
And that does make us feel like more of an
Amy
employee. Yes, guilty.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. Yeah, me too for a long time. The thing that forced me to not do it was having multiple kids, right?
Like, no, I need to protect the little time I have to myself, right? And like, now, all of my kids are in school full time, which is beautiful. But like for a long time, it wasn't that.
Well, for the last nine years, it wasn't that, right? Because my littlest came or my oldest came and then my littlest came and my middleist was in there somewhere. So, yeah.
So I think like we, it's easy for all of us to fall into that because we want to make sure our clients are happier. We want to make sure potential clients are happy. But protecting our time allows us to deliver the best work for them.
And ultimately, that's what's going to make them the most happy. So I want to, so I want to talk about how many clients you have. And again, aware that this is on the internet.
Are you, there's something inextricable between the number. of clients we have in the amount of money we're making in our business, right? And like, I like, is it Warwalo?
No. Oh my gosh. I'm blanking on his name even though I just had him on my podcast last year. But the, oh, Jonathan Stark, right?
Oh, yes. Yeah, the stop doing hourly rate guy, right?
Amy
Yeah.
Joe Casabona
So we, you've worked out your effect. hourly rate, do you think it's good? And like, how many clients do you have?
Amy
Sure. So, my effective hourly rate is, it's fine. Like, I would love to increase it by 50%, but it's fine. You know, it falls, like, Kim, am I allowed to say how much it is generally per hour?
Joe Casabona
Whatever, whatever you are comfortable with is fine by me.
Amy
Sure. So I believe in transparency because it helps other freelancers too. So my effective hourly rate falls between 150 and 230.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
Depending on the type of work and the client and the project.
Joe Casabona
Yeah.
Amy
And so that's fine. I would love to see it, you know, average closer to 200 to 300 consistently. But I haven't been able to make that happen yet.
And as long as I protect. the types of clients that I work with, you know, and the projects that I do and don't venture into, oh, that would be interesting, but it's not really, you know, my strong point kind of projects. Then I can keep it on track and it's good.
Joe Casabona
Okay, okay. And how many clients do you have, if you don't mind me asking?
Amy
No, I don't mind. I have four, like, anchor recurring clients. And then I have two that are more. sporadic that reach out to me a couple times a year.
Joe Casabona
Okay. Um, can you, have you raised your rates on those clients ever?
Amy
Ever, yes.
Joe Casabona
Okay. Recently.
Amy
Recently. That's a, it's probably, the most recent, it's probably been two years.
Joe Casabona
Okay. I know that's like a really hard thing to talk about. I've had, like, I still have this client where I host their website and I've never raised their rates because they're literally paying for like the entirety of the hosting package that I pay for.
Amy
Right.
Joe Casabona
And it's like really zero work for me. But like really what I should do is say like, hey, I don't do web design anymore, right? But I just like haven't done that.
Then I suspect like if it ever gets to a point where it's more painful. Right. Yeah.
Right. But at this point, it's like a check shows. up every year and they ask for like literally for me to update a PDF on their website every year.
Right. Like that's like that's it. Right.
So um my advice to me would be like, hey, that's still a thing that makes you switch contacts. And so like is that worth your time? Right.
Um,
Amy
yeah.
Joe Casabona
But, uh, I don't, I'm, I'm wary to say how do we find you more clients, right? Because you see you, you feel like you're already working way more. And so like what we want to try to do is optimize your time and your processes to free up some time and then possibly raise your rates or give you the capacity to take on maybe another client with a higher effectively rate. And so effective hourly rate. Forgot a word in there.
Amy
So in full transparency. Okay. So it just occurred to me that one of my clients.
clients that I've had for the longest. We've been together since 2019. Only does hourly.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
That's just how they do it. And we've talked about like the flat rate fee, which is how all of my other clients work and that's what we prefer. They do not prefer that.
And the things that I, the task that I've done for them have changed. drastically, you know, over the seven years that we've worked together. And they are my lowest hourly clients well below, you know, the average of the 170.
A little more than half that.
Joe Casabona
Okay. Okay.
Amy
And so they eat out probably 10 to 15 hours a week. I love working with them. And so that's part of my problem. So I love working with them so much.
And we've been together for so long, but they're also, you know, the lowest paying client. And so that interferes with some of the higher paying work that I could be doing.
Joe Casabona
Yeah.
Amy
Because the clients that I already have have work that I could be doing. But I don't have time. Right.
Joe Casabona
Right. So do, so I'm going to ask you, this is a fairly pointed question. Does that client like working with you because you are cheap or because you do great work?
Amy
I like to think it's because I do great work.
Joe Casabona
I mean, the fact that all of your clients have been with you for five to seven years definitely speaks to that, right? Like, that is rare, right? So I think it's, I think that's true too, right?
Amy
Yeah, and I mean, and there are some perks, you know, like it's a financial planning company so I can tap into some financial planning resources. They just had a retreat in San Diego that they paid for my flight in my hotel to attend that with them.
Joe Casabona
Was that work related at all? Like was that based on some of the work you're doing for them?
Amy
Yeah.
Joe Casabona
Okay. So I would say that is a cool perk that you got to go to that retreat. I would say that that is part and parcel with the work that you're doing, right? I wouldn't consider that a perk.
Amy
Yeah.
Joe Casabona
Right.
Amy
Okay, fair.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. Yeah. And the reason I ask this, right, is if they find what you do valuable, valuable, if they value what you do, with the lighting in your room just dramatically changed, and it looks like you're on, like, witness prediction. Yeah.
Amy
I'm going to shut the curtain. One second. Yeah, the sun is shifting over here. here.
Joe Casabona
Yes. There we go. I have a blackout curtain because I as you can tell I record a lot. And like before I got it, there was always one part of the day where like I would just get like a light stripe across my face and I look like Ziggy Star Dust or something.
Amy
Yeah.
Joe Casabona
So, so I think if they value what you do, then the fact that like it, it should be a no-brainer for them if you come to them as long as you're not saying like I'm quadrupling my rate to say like hey there's a way to frame this right hey we've been together for seven years we've always done this billing the rate has remained the same a lot has changed as you know as being a financial planning company um in order for me to keep doing the work I do for you at the same level. I do need to, however you want to, like, I, I, some of this is uncomfortable already. And so we want to light in the uncomfortable blow.
I would say, I am, I have switched all of my, like, I have switched all of my clients to flat rate payment. If you need to work this out in your system as a bucket of hours that you pay me for every week at this hourly rate, that's fine. But this is voice I'm going to be sending you every month, right?
And that makes it way more predictable for you. And if and, and I'm happy to do it in a way that makes, makes it make sense in your books. But I, I've switched everybody and I've, I've waited for you because you've been a long and loyal client, but we're getting to the point now as we go into 2027, then I'm going to have to switch you over to this billing as well.
Right. And so it's like, you're doing it for you. It's a little, it's beneficial to them, right? Like, oh, No, it's a totally predictable number for you, right? And I will give you the accounting you need to make it make sense for your books, right? Because that's probably what they're doing, right?
They have some hourly rate that they are allowed to pay contractors, is my guess. Which I'm guessing has been renegotiated since 2019 as well, right?
Amy
Oh, yeah. I started as a VA there, you know, for, typical VA rate, which is, you know, not very much in the grand scheme of life. But then my role evolved and I'm, it more than doubled, you know, since I started.
Joe Casabona
Okay,
Amy
okay. But it's, it's been at least, um, actually I just looked it up. It's been three years since we last bumped it up. Okay.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. So, so that's kind of how I would frame it. Like, hey, I know that you need to make this an hourly rate in your end.
But this is the flat rate I'm charging for everything now. And if we need to work this out to some hourly rate, then that's fine. Right.
So yeah, so that's how I would frame it and see how that goes, right? Maybe start a little higher and negotiate down or whatever, right? Like the typical negotiation thing. But, um, so that's the first thing I would do, especially since they're operating well below your average, right?
Um, yeah. Now, the other thing, right is and this is really my forte I don't know why we spent so much time on the client relationship side of it um that's just where this call took me I guess is the systems in place right how many like how many things have you automated how many things are have you done manually are you open to hiring your own VA that can do some of this stuff for you um so we kind of talked about how the client stuff works or the actual like client work goes right um I'm gonna noodle more on the system because I think like that that could also be a massive win for you is like getting at least most of your clients into one system and I have found that most people are unopin I mean and I do you know I don't do like insurance companies I you know I do like small B to B stuff um I found that most people are unopinionated And I've also, and like when I did work at bigger companies, like, like I worked at the University of Scranton for a while, I found that like a lot of people were kind of using the thing that they were most comfortable with anyway, even if they weren't doing it like writ large. So, um, so this could be a good conversation that you have with at least the people you're working with directly, right?
And maybe it doesn't have to be, uh, moxie, right? Or, or whatever. Maybe it could just be like, hey, I'm going to write in a Google doc and then you comment in the Google doc so that we're, not just straight up tracking everything via email, right?
Or something, right? Like a Claude dashboard that they can access where at least everything is together, right? Something like that.
So I think that could be a big win. And then it sounds like you're using AI to fill in some of the blanks in your writing process. That's not necessarily the actual writing itself, right? So the research.
Amy
Right. Yeah.
Joe Casabona
You mentioned editing takes a long time. Are you using it to edit? to help you edit at all?
Amy
Yes, of course I am. So I have a clod project, you know, per client. And so I put the client's style guide in there and any other notes about how they prefer things to be set up. And so it helps me with the research on the front end. And then after I'm, after I write it, I run it through that to compare it to the style guide.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
And it also scans their website and suggests internal linking.
Joe Casabona
Nice.
Amy
And so I do that as well.
Joe Casabona
Oh, that's really good. And then what does the publishing process look like? You handed over them to them to publish?
Amy
Yeah. All but one of my clients, I hand it back to them and they publish it on their site. My one client, my hourly client, I do the, I log into WordPress and I do the publishing also.
Joe Casabona
Okay. I was a WordPress developer specifically in a former life. So now I'm going into, oh, we can probably make that easy for you too. And then do you write in Notion usually? Like where do you, where does your writing take place?
Amy
No, Google Docs.
Joe Casabona
Google Docs. Okay. So then you ship them.
Google Doc to copy base? Okay. Yeah.
I mean, there definitely is like an automate, like there's a, there's some automation in there, like Google Docs to WordPress that probably could happen. I don't know how much the juice is worth the squeeze there. Okay.
Amy
But I automate as much as possible. Like one of my clients sends me my assignments by email each month and they always formatted exactly the same. So I have Claude. I just copy and paste it and it puts it in Notion for me.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
And fills in all of the fields and notion so that I don't have to manually copy and paste.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. Are you, I mean, are you comfortable giving Cloud access to that email account?
Amy
Oh, yeah, it already has access to that email account. Oh, I can set up a trigger. So I automatically did that.
Joe Casabona
Yeah, so like every morning or every week, it looks. Yeah, so you don't even have to copy and paste. Yeah.
Amy
Yeah, clever.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. Okay, cool. And then what does we said we would get to the client acquisition side a million years ago. I know we have about 10 minutes left.
You said that there's no process for that. Do you want a process for that? I feel like.
Amy
Desperately. Desperately want a process for that. I need like a funnel.
Joe Casabona
Yeah.
Amy
Um, my hesitation has been, I haven't been able to find a process that I feel like doesn't require, I don't know, like an intense amount of brainpower for me to keep up. And I haven't found a system or maybe I haven't had the time to test a system yet where I trust whatever automations it has. Yeah. So I think stuck.
Joe Casabona
I think here I would start small, right? one of the biggest things that hurt my business earlier this year and the impetus for me doing these live coaching calls is I have not been doing enough show and tell right I have been talking about the intangible and that's really hard for people to picture but if people watch this and maybe they like some of the advice I'm giving you maybe they don't but maybe they do um they're more inclined to say oh I like the way Joe works I'm going to hire him, right?
Amy
Right. Yeah.
Joe Casabona
And so what I would do is you have a bunch of long-time clients. So I would email them and say, hey, I'm kind of updating my testimonial database. Would you be willing to give me a testimonial?
And then like come up with two or three questions for them to answer. And then you could also say like, hey, you can also like record this video here. Right.
And there's a lot of tools that will help you do that. Senja is one of them. I'm sure there's like some testimonial collection tool on on App Sumo or something.
Or just like a Google form, like if you don't care about the video, right? Or like if you say like, hey, send me a loom, right? Whatever.
Because then that will, because then that will give you the opportunity to share on socials and in the right places what you're doing. And you're not really writing anything, right? So like you're collecting and then possibly posting.
This is something that a tool like repurposed.io can use. Maybe Claude can do this. I haven't experimented much with like with LLMs posting to social media because I don't trust that part of it.
But like this is also something I'm trying to do more social media after being off of it for like a whole year. The reason I'm back on it is because I've been speaking a lot and people like, hey, where can I tag you? And I'm like nowhere.
Amy
Oh, right. Yeah.
Joe Casabona
People should see.
Amy
I don't exist online.
Joe Casabona
Yeah, right. Like, it's cool if people can see like me, like this massive authority building activity I'm doing, right? But like I don't want to spend any time there.
Right. So this is probably something I'm going to give to my VA where she's posting to social media and then once a day like looking at the comments and sending me the ones I should reply to. Right.
But this could be a first easy step, right? Collecting testimonials and then posting them. If you get some good ones, then maybe you can take that and turn it into a case study.
That's going to take some work, though, right? But I think that's a really good first step. And then because you've had your clients for such a long time, doing it after every deliverable is not.
going to make sense.
Amy
No.
Joe Casabona
But doing it every few months and saying like, hey, I know that this is the thing we've been working on. This has been our strategy. Can you share any results with me that you'd be willing for me to talk about?
Right? Because this is, this was a huge thing for me. Like I would help people launch their podcasts and then I would not follow up after.
And so I finally did that. like this year. I was like, hey, how's it going?
And my client was like, great. You know, it's been six months and we're already getting clients from our podcast.
Amy
Wow. Which is crazy, right? That's awesome to post on social.
Joe Casabona
Yeah, right? And it's like an insanely niche podcast, too. It's not like it's like the Joe Rogan or smartless, right?
Or whatever, like the daily. It's like very niche, like lawyers who are talking to first responders in Florida. But because it's so niche and it's super helpful, they're starting to get cases from it. And so that's like a big win for them, but also for me, right? And I want to share that.
So that's another thing that I would do. And you can set like a auto email that goes out or a reminder or like a scheduled skill in Claude that's like, hey, it's time to send that follow up. Maybe it's like something that you just work into the projects. Hey, like you've done these things for this client over the last three months, ask them about it, right?
Something like that, right? Because I'm a big fan of using Zapier or make or something over Claude for a lot of automate or over large language models for a lot of automations. But one place where the large language model automations are better is they have a lot of context, right?
And so if you can leverage that context to help you automate better than that's, that's a really, that's a big win. Okay. So, so that's the first thing I would do, I think, for acquisition, right?
Building your pipeline. Eventually, you know, like my job is not to put a lot more work on your plate. My job is to have you implement something that will immediately save you time, right?
And so I'm always hesitant to say, like, from there you can do this and this and this and this, right? But a lead magnet at some point. And this is also, like, everyone's like build your mailing list.
Most of my clients don't come from my mailing list. Most of my clients come from, oh, a recommendation or I saw you were doing this. I need help with this, right?
Right,
Amy
yeah.
Joe Casabona
And so, like, I'm not going to tell you a lead magnet is the best thing, right? I don't know how many B2B companies are joining mailing lists or whatever, but something for, like, but there is something that you can do to get people talking about the work you do or to have you start talking about the work you do more, right? My friend literally this morning said, like, more, like, when people are having more conversations around your business, that's just going to naturally lead to more work, more and so like ultimately generate the work maybe those one-off once or twice a year clients you can replace with more regular clients and recommend them to somebody else if you want to right in the in the name of more consistent income um but i think that would be a really good first step does that make sense
Amy
cool yes that's an excellent excellent way to start uh i feel like it's a really a minimal time investment but it could yield really big results yeah and give me um like a strategy or even topics that i could talk about outside of testimonials on social yeah yeah absolutely right
Joe Casabona
like getting that voice of customer stuff like something else that i do and maybe this is something that you can steal, right, is I use a call recorder. I feel like everybody uses a call recorder now. I don't know how your clients feel about the call recorders. But like, I'll hop on calls with people.
This is like, I don't know why I decided to do this, this month. But I reached out to like 20 people I haven't talked to in a while. Some potential clients, some like business mentors maybe is the best way to put it.
Um, and, uh, I will have, I use fathom, which has, which can connect to Claude. And I'll just say like, hey, every day run through the calls, summarize them. I'm comfortable with that because I was on the calls. And so I vaguely remember what was talked about on the calls, right?
Uh, what are my action items? And what are content ideas? Like, what are the things that, um, either they asked me or I talked about. Or I talked about that I could turn into blog posts or YouTube videos, right? And so if you do more of these voice of customer calls, that could be another thing that gives you, hey, I was on a call with a client and they asked me, is AEO really important, right? Or is it just a fad?
Right. Here's all the reasons why I think it is important. But it starts with an actual content strategy or whatever, right?
Or an actual keywords. You know, whatever the actual real advice is, right? So, like, I think that could also be low effort data gathering now, right?
This is like, I just wrote about this on my newsletter, like using AI to fill in the blanks. And the example I used was, like, I have a text file of every concert I've been to since the year 2000. And I've been maintaining it for like 20 years.
But as a result, I only had like the band name or the festival name and the year. And I'm meeting with a friend tomorrow. And she's been doing the same thing.
And we suspect we've been to a lot of, like the same shows, right? Like before we even knew who each other were, we suspect that we were at the same show at least once. And so I needed to fill in a lot of information.
And I used Claude for that. Like here's my list. Here's the likely places where I would have been.
Here's a picture of every ticket stuff I've kept because I have a box full of them. And here's like my ticket master history, right? Let's actually build a spreadsheet.
And so like that was backfilling memory. But like with you, what you're doing is like front filling memory? I think I just made something up there.
But like you're getting yourself in a position that when you have some time, like maybe things calm down around the holidays, you can start producing some other content or short form or just talking about these things that your clients are asking you about that potential clients might actually also have questions about.
Amy
Yeah, that's brilliant. That never occurred to me. And like I use Claude and I have, I connect Claude to everything in my business that I can possibly connect Claude to because, you know, at some point I have a question that requires some other context and I just tell it to go there and fetch it. But that never occurred to me. So that's very clever.
Joe Casabona
Awesome. Awesome. Okay.
So we're we're just about a time. I want to be respectful of your time, especially because now we're an hour, we're an hour into your best working time, right? Oh, right. Oh, no, we're like 10 minutes. We're 10 minutes into your best working time.
Amy
We're 10 minutes in. Yeah. 10 minutes in.
Joe Casabona
So if you got 25 hours back, each month, what would you do?
Amy
Oh, gosh. I would start by investing them back into my business.
Joe Casabona
Okay.
Amy
Because I don't spend nearly enough time doing that. Most of my time is on client work. I don't know.
I don't even, I love to learn. And so I don't get to learn. I don't get to spend as much time learning as I like to.
And it's just, you know, like a variety of topics. Like, I want to learn French. And, you know, I've started, you know, duolingo and other things like that numerous times, but then never stick with it.
And so, like, dedicated time that I can actually focus on learning that.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. I love that. All right.
Cool. So, uh, let's set you on the path to learning French. Uh, yeah.
I wish I could help you there. I know, like, two, two things in French. Like, uh, je ma, Pell Joe and then because I'm a millennial, we had those Mazi commercials all the time.
And so I would walk around saying, jishui la Shunfi, which my friend in college informed me means I'm a little girl. And I didn't know that. I was just saying that for like a decade. I love that.
Yeah. So, because that's what they said. It was a little girl saying it in the commercial.
Amy
Love that.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. So, uh, awesome. Okay. So what I'm going to do from here, First of all, is there anything else that we didn't cover that you wanted to ask about?
Amy
No, we covered a lot more than I thought. And I took down a couple of notes, not too many because I wanted to stay focused. But I'm looking forward to reviewing it because there were so many just like little tidbits that could, that just seems so trivial. But I know that are going to make a difference.
Joe Casabona
Awesome. Love to hear that. I took notes on my yellow legal pad, but I will also. send you the full, like, so I will review my notes in the transcript and I'll kind of send you a, here's the first three things I recommend you do based on what we talked about. But I'll also send you the full transcript so that you can put it into your robot with all of your context.
Amy
Perfect.
Joe Casabona
Yeah. Awesome. Well, yeah, thank you so much for taking the time today. I really appreciate it.
I hope it was helpful. It sounds like it was.
Amy
Yeah, super helpful. Yeah, thank you so much for asking all of the questions, you know, to pull it out of me. That was very helpful.
Joe Casabona
Awesome. My pleasure. And in keeping with my own advice, so I will follow up with an email, but I will also send a testimonial link if you are willing.
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And now, again, to keep me honest, because I mentioned something to you before we started recording.
But this was a live coaching call. And if you are interested in getting the same kind of help, I do offer these. You can head over to joec.pro slash coaching or scan the QR code on your screen.
Now, we will have a very similar conversation to this. We'll talk. I will get a whole bunch of information from you.
And then just like I am doing here with Amy, I'm going to send you a document and the transcript. the next three things that you should do, which will result in saving time for you in your business. So again, that's over at joec.pro slash coaching.
Amy, thanks again so much for being, for doing this live, like for being vulnerable and doing this live with us.
Amy
Yeah, sure. Appreciate it, Joe.
Joe Casabona
All right. Thank you all for watching. And until next time, I hope you find some space in your week.
