Becoming a Mumpreneur

Hello everyone,

My apologies for the delay in posting. It’s been ages since my last post and I feel a bit like I’m confessing my darkest sins in a support meeting. But the truth of the matter is that I’ve just been a bit busy and distracted. However, the new school term has started and there has been a noticeable shift in focus and determination. So hopefully you’ll be seeing a lot more of these posts as I become a fully fledged blogger!

Today’s post is all about becoming a mumpreneur. I normally avoid using that particular term because I don’t feel very entrepreneurial, but I suppose it’s just the whole “taking the initiative” thing. Anyway, the reason for writing about this is because I’ve been involved in a mumpreneur initiative on the Moonfruit Facebook page. This is a company that provides website templates for people and businesses. I’ve had to do a number of things:

1. Post on the Facebook page about my inspiration for starting the business,
2. Post about the services that I offer and promote my website,
3. Post about my family – part of my inspiration, and
4. Write in a bit more detail about the decision behind becoming a mumpreneur, which mumpreneurs inspire me, how it has changed my life and any top tips I have for other would be mumpreneurs.

So I thought I’d share the last bit with  you as this week’s blog post. I guess it might help you see a bit more about what makes me tick. Here goes.

My decision to become a Mumpreneur was in some ways easy and in some ways difficult. I’d worked for the same business for 9 years, 4 of which were after having my son. I was becoming increasingly frustrated at the lack of flexibility in my life and I was very conscious that life was going to become more challenging when he went to school. My husband and I talked at length about my options and we agreed that I would leave my regular job to go it alone as a marketing and social media consultant. I’d worked in this field for over 12 years and still enjoyed the work, but I just needed a new direction and fresh challenge. So in March of this year I left my permanent job (and salary!) to start my own business. It’s not always been an easy move – the drop in income has been considerable and quite stressful at times and it can be quite lonely during the day. Making sales contacts and trying to sell myself does not sit very easily with me, but I do it because I can see the benefits. Being my own boss and setting my own schedule is very satisfying. Over the course of the summer, I’ve had lots more quality time with my son and it’s meant that I’ve been able to do things with him that I wouldn’t have been able to otherwise – for instance playing in the garden on sunny days with the sprinkler on or going to the park. Previously I’d have been working and we’d have had to wait for a sunny weekend, which is not always guaranteed. It’s also meant that I’m able to take him to school in the morning and collect him from the gates at the end of each day, which has been lovely.

My inspiration has come from a number of sources. My former boss left the business a few years ago to set up her own business which has gone from strength to strength. My sister in law is a freelance market researcher and another former colleague left work to look after her own kids. I looked around me and saw lots of women struggling to juggle the demands of work and family and I was desperate to find a solution. I saw these women working for themselves and they appeared to have a much better work/life balance than those of them trying to do full time jobs in part time hours and dashing around dropping kids off and picking them up again at the end of the day. I have no ambitions to be the next big thing. My ambition is simply to build a modest business with a reasonable income, doing work that I love while being the wife and mum that I want to be. I’d like to be able to go on school trips sometimes, or attend school meetings before 6pm and I really want to meet my son at the school gates. It’s an emotional thing – and I’m not going to apologise for it. I don’t want to look back in 20 years and feel regret.

And the top tips for would be mumpreneurs? Well, watch this space. I’ll tell you those next time. Have a good week!

A long awaited update

Hello everyone!

I’ve had a diverting few weeks, but am now back at it again. I temporarily lost my focus as the rain set in, the decorating took over and the doubts popped by. Sometimes, I get a bit bogged down by big challenges and unable to start on them. However, once I’ve come out of that fug, I can make a start and get on with it.

It’s funny because sometimes the thought of something is much bigger and scarier than the reality and even though in my head I knew I had to get on and get things moving, it’s as if I need to go through the lows to get there in the end. Anyway, the good news is that I’ve finally got there!

So the good news to report this week is that I’ve set a date for my first networking event for mums in Chester. However, I’m trying to pull it forward by 1 week, so will confirm the finalised date very soon. My venue is sorted and I’ve thought quite carefully about the format, asked a number of people for advice and have decided to get a speaker in to talk about SEO. This is something that I’ve been asked about quite a bit recently, but it’s not an area of expertise of mine so I thought I’d ask someone along to help out.

What else have I been up to? Well, I’m making moves to get a website set up. I’ve finally come to the conclusion that I need to have somewhere for people to go to if they want to research my business. So the next few days I’ll be setting out a plan, writing content and asking various experts for advice. I tried myself to use a free website building tool, but have such little knowledge of this area that it didn’t end well. I concede I need to draft an expert in! So I tweeted yesterday afternoon about my frustrations and received no less than 4 offers of help in return. I love twitter for that very reason! So many people out there at your fingertips.

No paying clients to report as yet, but I’m working quietly away in that too. I definitely feel like there’s been a move forward this week, not only in my head, but in my plans and my business so I shall end here on a definite positive note. Have a great week everyone and I’ll be back again soon.

Working from home

Hello everyone,

I’ve been giving a lot of thought in the last few days on what to post this week and yesterday I was convinced it was going to be another topic entirely. But here we are! This week’s topic is all about working from home. I should probably call it “part 1″ because I suspect I may come back to it again.

Anyway, those of you that know me will also know that I gave up my permanent job back at the beginning of March to try and set my own business up doing marketing and social media consulting. There were a few drivers for this, most notably: the desire for a more flexible working life and the need for change and something new. I’m a working mum and my little boy goes to school in September. It’s purely emotional, but I’d like to be able to drop him off in the morning and pick him up in the afternoon. Plus, I’d been with my previous employer for 9 years. Projects that I’d first worked on 9 years ago were starting to come around again and I felt a bit stale.

So after much angst and debate, my husband and I decided that I’d leave work and go it alone. And here I am, sitting in the dining room, blogging! How has the change gone?

Well, I had a lovely romantic notion of how I’d breeze around the house, doing the odd bit of housework, doing the garden, baking and lovingly preparing nutritious family meals, while doing a bit of work and securing clients right left and centre.

And now for reality: I spend most of my days at the laptop (yes it’s true!), dodging about on social media sites (see last week’s post for my current fave), racing out the door late to drop off and pick my son up at preschool, darting out to hang washings up in between rain and generally not quite being the domestic goddess I’d envisaged. However, am I sad about this? No I’m not. It’s just called life.

The first week I worked from home, it was glorious sunshine and I even got a suntan on my face. Plus I took 2 days off because I could. I loved it that week. The next week was a bit grey and dismal, and my mood matched the weather. However, I managed the full 4 days and did some stuff. Last week was a bit up and down and this week has been the same.

I’m finding that I don’t miss being in a corporate environment. I don’t miss the constant distractions. I don’t miss the telephone ringing every 5 minutes. I don’t miss the schmoozing. I really really don’t miss that! However, I do miss the companionship of colleagues. It was my leaving do last Friday night and it was very good to meet up with everyone again.

I like being in charge of my time and I’ve found that I’m quite protective of my 9-3 day. I don’t dart out to the post office or the shops – I save that for after preschool has finished. I quite like being able to do things my way. I’m finding it quite inspirational to be involved with mums’ online networks and read about what other people are doing. And that makes a big difference. I’m finally listening to some of the random songs that I’ve bought on iTunes recently and never listened to (and no, I’m not sharing which ones – they’re a bit embarrassing). I’m enjoying meeting new people and finding out their stories. In fact I’m really liking that!

So the upshot is that I’m getting there. There’s been no baking, but I currently have tonight’s casserole in the slow cooker. The washing is up to date, but the ironing is not. You can’t have it all, can you? I’ve written 2 proposals today for new business (oh fingers crossed!). I’m spending more time with my son (hooray) and I’m less stressed and more content. I’ve discovered that I can concentrate at home, knuckle down and actually work, which is just as well really, isn’t it? So I think I’ll carry on, because I actually quite like it.

Pinterest…

I thought I’d change direction a bit this week and talk a little about Pinterest – my new love! I registered for the first time about a month ago and have slowly been figuring out how it works and how to use it for myself. And I think now I’m hooked.

So what is it? It’s a site that lets you pin or bookmark lots of things that interest you all in the one place. You can organise your pins into boards, which is a bit like sorting things into online folders. What sort of things can you pin? Well, as you browse the internet, shopping (God forbid) or browsing (that’s more like it), you can pin things that you spot and create a virtual shopping list. Not only that, if you’re planning a holiday or have just been on one, then you pin your plans on there too. So I’ve pinned some pics from our recent Florida holiday and also some pins for my planned trip to London with my Mum in a few weeks time. It kind of works as an online diary/planner/shopping list/wish list. If you were feeling particularly creative, you could set up your Christmas present list on here, incorporating prices to make things even easier.

When you pin an image, it simply enables people to see a collection of images in the one place, however the links behind them still exist. For example, if you had spotted a marvellous piece of jewellery that you fancied for your birthday, all your lovely partner would have to do is to click on your image/pin and it would lead him/her through to the website to make the purchase. Dead easy.

I’m only a beginner, but I’ve started a few boards already. What have I pinned so far? Well, when I left my permanent job recently, I was given £80 of John Lewis vouchers. My main aim with this nice gift is to purchase a new handbag (joy of joys). So I had a little browse on the John Lewis website, picked out a couple that I like and pinned them to the “My Style” board on Pinterest. The title “My Style” tickles me actually, because I don’t really think of myself as having a “style” per se, but according to Pinterest, I do. So I’m cool with that. When you set up your account initially, there are a few boards that are automatically set up for you, including “My Style”. They are very easy to change or delete and as your confidence grows, you can set up your own boards.

One of my long term aims for the house is to decorate the dining room, so I’ve started a board that allows me to pin ideas there. At the moment I’ve only got 2 wallpapers on there, but I’ve got an image in my head of a light shade that I just need to find online. And then that’ll go in there too.

One idea I particularly like is to pin your favourite recipes in a board and I’ve started one of those too. I like the thought that recipes I’ve tried and enjoyed are easy to find without having to try and rack my brains for which website they were published on, and what the key ingredients were.

At the moment you need to apply for a Pinterest account and wait for them to approve you, but it doesn’t take long for the response to come back. I like that it gives a flavour of me online. I’ve still got to figure out the following aspect of Pinterest, but I think I’m going to love it. As if to prove this, it just sits open in the background while I’m browsing, just in case I spot anything I like and want to record. Make sure you add the “Pin It” button to your browsing bar (it’s dead easy to do and instructions are very clear on the site).

Why would you want to use it for business? Well, it’s very good at driving traffic to third party websites. In fact, more so than Google+, Linkedin and Twitter combined*. And I think that’s pretty powerful. I think there’s an obvious advantage if you’re a heavy image user already and active on sites such as Flickr. For people with small businesses, it could be a brilliant way of showcasing your product and driving people to your website. I think it will enhance your business website because it allows you build networks and alliances at the same time, therefore giving more opportunities for potential customers to see your product.

It is possible to follow people on Pinterest and then re-pin some of the pins that you may see on other boards. And it is in this way that it becomes another social network. Albeit one that is slightly different from the others, with something quite unique to offer. But instead of reading me rabbit on about it, why don’t you give it a go? My Pinterest details are below, as are some of my faves to follow. Do enjoy it and let me know what you think.

http://pinterest.com/geenove/

http://pinterest.com/gooseberrymoon/

http://pinterest.com/allimarieprice/

*http://news.submitinme.com/newsdetails-143.aspx

Week 2 of the “new working life”

Well this is me starting week 2 of my working from home adventure. It’s grey and dismal outside, not like the glorious sunshine of last week! Last week was filled with positivity and excitement and this week it has dimmed slightly. I’m starting to wonder if I really can do this. The phone is quiet, my contacts aren’t responding, I’m a bit worried about the increased financial pressure on my husband and it’s a bit cold in the house.

Now on to the positive bits.

1. I have a great opportunity to do something that I really enjoy, meet new people and stretch myself in ways I didn’t think possible 12 months ago.

2. I do have some money-making opportunities in the pipeline – I just need to make them happen.

3. Lots of people believe in me to make this happen. This is really encouraging and helps carry me along when I stop believing!

So, onwards and upwards. I’ve decided to write a list of priorities this week and things I want to achieve by the time I finish on Thursday. In the middle of this post I went away and sent out lots of emails to people to try and generate a bit more work. I think I need to be very clear what I want to achieve and commit it to paper. It’s much more likely to happen then!

And so I will finish on a positive and report back very soon. Bye for now!