Welcome to season two of The Spooniepreneur Podcast! Today I am talking about what it looks like to run a service-based business during a pandemic. I have been witnessing my clients shift and pivot their businesses as our lives continue to change daily, but as a Spoonie this is something I have experienced throughout my entire life. So I’m sharing what I’ve learned and how we can continue to succeed. 

Here’s what I discussed in today’s episode: 

• How being a Spoonie prepared me for the pandemic. 
• Should we be selling? It’s time to look at your mindset! 
• The path to success 
• If you are looking for a community or a safe space to share your thoughts and feelings at this time, head to http://www.facebook.com/groups/spooniepreneurcommunity 

Can’t listen? Here’s the transcript: 

Hey everybody, and welcome to the Spooniepreneur podcast. I’m Nicole Neer, an online business manager living with fibromyalgia and bipolar disorder. On this podcast, I’m going behind the scenes in my business and talking to other Spooniepreneurs to get real about what it looks like to be an entrepreneur living with chronic illness to inspire you to start the business of your dreams no matter what life throws your way.

Hey everybody! Welcome to season two of the Spooniepreneur podcast. I am thrilled to be podcasting again, even though the world looks a lot different than the last time we spoke, and I’ve already been interviewing some amazing Spoonie entrepreneurs and I cannot wait to share those stories with you.

But in this first episode of the season, I really wanted to take a moment to talk about what it is like to run a business in the middle of a pandemic and why I really feel like being a Spoonie has prepared me and really all of us for this very unique challenge. So I’ve said for a long time that living with a chronic illness is the best preparation for being an entrepreneur. We know for sure that things will never turn out the way that we planned them. We are great at adjusting to what needs to be done to work around uncertainty, and probably most importantly, I think that we know that we can do hard things by just taking it one step at a time.

So some of you may know, I run a digital marketing agency and I work as an online business manager. My team supports a dozen service-based businesses right now, and I can tell you that every single one of them is pivoting plans that we’ve had in place for months. I literally had a client who opened the cart of her online course on the day that President Trump declared a state of emergency over here in the U.S., so it’s been a crazy and busy season for our business. And I have to say that I am so incredibly grateful for that because I fully recognize that my story is not everybody’s story.

But right now what I’m seeing in the businesses that we support and certainly in my own business as well is that people are really falling into two categories when it comes to marketing right now (because that’s generally my wheelhouse). And I want to qualify all this by saying that my agency supports service-based businesses that help others really. Obviously, as an online business manager and our team of virtual assistants, we support others–these are coaches and online course creators, and realtors and photographers just to name a few.

So the advice that I’m going to talk about today is really best suited for people who are providing a service rather than a product right now because obviously selling products looks very, very different in the light of the pandemic.

So the first group of businesses that I’m seeing, they feel like selling their businesses right now is wrong because so many of us have lost loved ones or jobs and every single one of us has lost a sense of security. We’re definitely mourning the lives that we had before. And so I think the knee jerk reaction for some people is that it’s best just to give people the support that they need for free right now, and this is why your inbox is full of emails with resources. Big companies like Digital Marketer have opened up their platforms for people to have free access right now and everybody and their brother are going live on Facebook at this moment. I’m seeing so many virtual support groups or pop-up Facebook groups happening right now, but the truth really is that we have no idea how long this period of self-isolation is going to last. And businesses that are choosing not to sell right now, they really risk going out of business themselves. It’s a really difficult balance to strike.

And on the other hand, I see that there are people who recognize that their services are in need now more than ever. People need support with their mental health. Many people are considering starting an online business instead of searching for a “traditional job” when all of this blows over. Online courses, especially those who are teaching people like yoga instructors or Reiki practitioners, how to deliver their services online, they’re experiencing unexpected growth.

I was chatting with a fellow Spooniepreneur a few days ago and she told me, and this is so true, that any mindset issue you have will multiply when you’re experiencing something like this. So if you’re struggling with sales or feel icky about asking what you deserve to make for your services, you are going to really struggle to sell right now. If you’re telling yourself this story that people don’t want to pay for your services or that it’s hard to sell, you’re really going to hold yourself back now when people may need you now more than ever. You really have to let people make the decision on what they can and can’t do when it comes to their money. But if you’re not showing up, you may be denying people access to things that they really, really need right now.

That’s why my advice on how to run a service-based business during this pandemic is really simple. Do what is right for you. And it’s really helpful for me to view all of this through the lens of what I’ve learned from balancing entrepreneurship and chronic illness. You know, because of my illness, it’s difficult for me to get out and do much. So even before social distancing started here in the U.S., I hadn’t been able to go grocery shopping for myself in two months. My life right now in the middle of this pandemic is basically what my life was before. The difference really is that everybody else is home with me, and really complaining about the life that I have to lead every day. But that’s a whole other story, right?

And it’s so easy to get angry about not being able to go anywhere. It is easy to fixate on it because when you hop on social media and you’re living with a chronic illness, you see you’re able-bodied friends going out and doing amazing things that they probably take for granted, like swimming in the pool on a hot summer day. I mean, even now people are like, “I go out and I take walks or I go hiking” and you know, I really can’t do that. So there’s a lot of FOMO happening even when you’re not in the middle of a pandemic.

But what I found is that the same is really true with business, especially right now. It is so easy to compare your beginning to somebody else’s middle. You look at other entrepreneurs who are bragging about earning six figures even in the middle of a pandemic and it’s easy to feel like a failure when you’re struggling to make ends meet. And this is especially true right now when people are trying to balance running a business with homeschooling kids, cleaning your house frantically, and just dealing with the stress that comes from watching the news or checking social media on your phone right now. It’s really, really easy to feel very overwhelmed.

But what I know, without a doubt, what I know is that living with chronic illness has made me so good at making it work no matter what life throws my way. And I know the same is true for every single one of you listening. It takes other people years and years to learn how to do this. But when you live with chronic illness for even a few months, you learn how to manage this one the hard way, right?

And so when we take this resilient spirit, this being able to just make it work and do what’s needed to keep things going, when we apply this to our businesses, there’s literally no stopping us even during a pandemic. And this is really where that resilience makes us uniquely fit for the challenge that we’re facing right now.

Every single person living with a chronic illness, and this is whether you have a physical health issue or you’re battling mental health issues, you know that you have to be flexible enough to take things at your own pace. So what separates a Spooniepreneur from other small business owners is really that we leverage this to find a way to get things done, even when it’s really hard. It’s what we’re experiencing right now is really no different than pushing through the pain we’re feeling to do the laundry or to cook dinner, right? We find a way to do hard things because we have to.

So in a time like this, this adaptability, this ability to deal with things that feel so hopeless or overwhelming, or you really can’t envision what it’s going to look like on the other side, this adaptability allows us to keep our businesses moving even when others are struggling to pivot.

So many businesses out there are trying to figure out what their businesses look like in the face of this, but we have had to pivot so many times in our lives already. Chronic illness, I know is for me and for so many of you, has forced us to make really difficult decisions, and for some of us we’ve had to do this like in the blink of an eye. So this situation that we’re dealing with right now, even though for a lot of us health issues are putting us more at risk and probably increasing our anxiety, we still have an advantage over a lot of other people in our mental resilience and our ability to keep things going even when it’s hard.

Finally, I really want to encourage everyone to realize that consistent action is really all it takes to run a successful business. The path towards success really isn’t difficult, but it does require you to show up consistently and consistency is what you make of it, right? Consistency for one person could be showing up and working in your business for two hours, posting on social media every day, going live on Facebook, being super involved in all of the things. And consistency for another person could look like showing up on social media a couple of times a week, spending a couple of hours a week working on one piece of your business. You know, if that’s all you can give to it if you’re showing up consistently, you are still going to see progress.

I believe the smartest thing you can do as a Spooniepreneur and the smartest thing that any entrepreneur, any person working from home right now can do is to build a solid routine for yourself, because the chances are, especially if you’re living with chronic illness, that you already know that the benefits of consistency really help you to make strides later on. For many of us, if we aren’t consistently doing things that make us feel the best we can, it’s going to become impossible to do most basic of tasks because we haven’t built up that muscle of doing things consistently.

As I built my business, I have made the conscious decision to show up every single day in big ways or little ways just depending on my energy level. I choose one thing, and I work on it until I can check it off the list and then I move on. You know, every morning I get up and I choose three things that I have to get done that day. And it may be that they all have to do with my personal life, like I need to clean my, you know, my house. I need to do dishes today. It could be in my business, you know, I need to schedule social media posts for this week or I need to get this project done for a client.

But when you have a to-do list that’s reasonable, that you can get through in a day, it really adds up faster than you think, guys. Having this routine is really going to help you maintain your sanity in a world that feels really, really out of control right now.

I was telling somebody the other day that I feel like as an online entrepreneur, like the whole world has just showed up and started camping in my front yard, right? People are messaging me trying to figure out how to use Zoom for their video conferences. I’ve had people reach out to me saying, “How can we build connection with communities when we’re working in a virtual environment and they can’t see what we’re doing?” I’ve had so many people ask me to pick my brain about how to finally step into a freelance lifestyle, knowing that the world is going to change on the other side of this.

And I know every single one of us is feeling really, really overwhelmed by the huge shifts that have taken place in just a few weeks. Over in my Facebook group, I’ve really just been holding space for you to get some support through all of this. I don’t have all the answers, and I know you don’t have all the answers either. We’re all still trying to navigate what life looks like now, but we are all sharing in this unique experience of navigating chronic illness and entrepreneurship. And once you start finding all of the Spooniepreneurs that are out there, I think your mind is just going to be blown because there are so many of us, we are a rare breed, but we build some amazing businesses, and I want you guys to connect in that community because I think it’s so important.

So if you want to join us, head over to http://www.facebook.com/groups/Spooniepreneurcommunity. And if you do want to pick my brain, you can always slide into my DMs over on Instagram. You’ll find me at the @resilientva.

So until next time, guys, I am sending you so much love and light and I want you just to take good care of yourselves.

Thank you so much for listening to this Spooniepreneur podcast. If you enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe, recommend rate and review on iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. To find show notes and to get connected to our community of Spooniepreneur, go to http://www.theresilientva.com. Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next week.