EP 359: The fix for selling products or services that are stressing you out.

Welcome And The Core Promise

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Well, hello friends, it's Kimberly, it's episode 359, and I am so glad that you're here today because we're talking about the products and services that you offer and how to actually offer stuff that works, that sells, that feels good to you, and that actually makes a difference for people. I think so many of you struggle because something feels out of whack. Maybe your products and services aren't selling. Maybe you just don't like what you're offering. Today we're gonna end all that. I'm gonna get you to the one main thing you need to be focusing on in order to choose the best products and services for your business. If you're new here, welcome. I'm so glad that you found this podcast. I have no doubt it's gonna help you along your business journey. Whether you're in the idea stage, starting or growing, this is for you. And no matter what kind of business you have, this is for you. Whether you're selling products, services, programs, you have a mobile business, you have a retail business, you do retreats, you have a podcast, you're you have a YouTube channel, anything where you are trying to build a business, this is for you. Because here's what I truly believe that all of us are searching outside of ourselves to build a successful business. We want all the strategies, we want all the tactics. And yes, I share those. But where it really starts is with you. And that's what this podcast is about: getting you back to who you are, what you're best at, and who you're meant to serve.

Free Resources And What’s Coming

SPEAKER_01 1:27

So welcome. If you're new, I'm so glad that you have found us. And all you have to do right now to get plugged in, you can go to Kimberleybrock.com or down below in the show notes are links to free goodies for you if you're new, like a 16-step checklist. I also have a spreadsheet of all the apps and tools that I use for my business and my podcasts. And so if you want some quick referral, you know, references of what programs to use in apps, then that is for you. So that'll help you with all your technology and everything you're using. And if you've been listening a while, thank you so much to all my loyal listeners. Y'all are wonderful and awesome. And I'm so glad you've been here. And I do have to say, I'm super excited because something new is on the horizon for you. It's another way that I can help you. I've been helping you here with my voice every week. I've helped you in coaching and one-on-one programs and group programs and courses over the years. And now something new that you can hold in your hands is what is on deck. And I can't wait to share it with you soon. So stay tuned. You can also check down in the show notes below. There may be a link to that. I've actually got a new boutique opening soon for those tangible goods to help you along your business journey. I'm so excited to expand this whole business into that as well. So, anyways, you can check in the show notes down below if I've added it, depending on when this is. And I just want to thank you for being here. And I'm so happy. And if you do find value in this podcast, would you rate this podcast super quick? All you have to do is hit the five-star rating. And if you have 30 seconds to write a written review, that would mean the world to me. Okay, that's it. On to the episode.

Why Choosing Offers Feels Hard

SPEAKER_01 3:10

Well, hello friends. I'm so happy you're here today. We're talking about something super important, which is what you should sell and what would actually work for your business, your season of life, all of that. I know it can be hard, especially in the beginning, like figuring out what exactly should I be selling. Maybe you offer a service. Maybe you offer some kind of tangible goods with the service, or maybe you offer just products. What kind of products should you offer? Maybe you have a mobile business, like how many things should you offer? What variety? Like it becomes very hard. Don't y'all think? I mean, this can be hard. I've had product businesses over the years. I know I went a little crazy and ordered too many products and had way too much inventory. Even though my businesses were successful, I found myself buried in inventory. And that is just something that's so hard for product sellers. And I'm sure if you offer products, physical products, you're probably shaking your head. You agree. It's hard, right? And if you offer some kind of coaching or service business like I've had, I get that because you're like, well, I want to offer a group program. I want to offer coaching. I want to have a course and you want to do all these things. And I want to do retreats and it's hard. Like, how do you focus? And maybe some of you out there have done these things and something isn't working. Like something isn't selling that you thought would be selling. Maybe something was popular that you're like, oh, I'm going to jump in on that and do that too, because that should work, right? It's working for everyone else. And I think we get caught in this hamster wheel. And we also have lots of ideas, right? Don't you? I feel like many of us that are business owners, we've got a bazillion ideas. If you're like me, I've got a notes app full of ideas. Now I've got Chat GBT and Claude. I use both of them. It's kind of insane. I feel like I'm just gonna be honest. I feel like I'm spending more time going through ideas and things on Chat GBT and Claude than I did when I didn't have it. So I have been literally thinking about this today. Like, am I spending more time doing things because I'm using Claude? Like I thought I was supposed to be saving time. And I feel like I'm pondering so many things. Do y'all feel this? Is it just me? Uh, I hope it's not. But here's the truth this stuff can cause us to go down rabbit holes. Like that's what I'm doing. I keep getting distracted. And then I've been telling Claude, like today, I'm like, okay, can you go back to my plan for today? What was I supposed to focus on today? I mean, I feel like I have some kind of business ADD when I'm sitting here working too now. I've got too many things I can look at and get help with. And I don't know, y'all. Am I the only one?

Getting Distracted By Trends And AI

SPEAKER_01 5:44

It's just crazy. But how do we do this, right? How do we pick the products and services that are the best for our business for right now? And I think one of the real problems is that we start with that product or service. We start there. So we sit down and we go, okay, the products or services I should be offering our XYZ because I know my competitors offer or don't offer it. This is what's popular. And we're very sucked in to what is going on around us. And I think sometimes it can lead us astray, even with ChatGBT and Clot. I really do. I'm finding this. Many of y'all know, or maybe you don't know, which I'll be talking about more, that I have been building this business in a way that's offered services and coaching and all that good stuff. And now I'm going to be diving into something I have done for years and years, and that's offering products, like tangible goods. And this time I want to help you along your business journey. Right. And so I'm super excited about that. But I have gotten taken on rabbit hole, you know, hour-long research on Claude, all these rabbit holes, right? But we often look outside. And I've been doing that with my business. Like, what's popular right now? What do people want? And I think when we do that, we get sucked in. We get sucked in because we're looking at what everyone else is doing. We're asking Claude what's popular and Chat GBT and like what's selling, and we're running analytics. You can get all kinds of software now that analyzes Etsy for physical products, and you can find out data now on what's selling and what's popular. But the question is, is it really applicable to my business? I mean, that's the question you have to ask. We keep going outside of ourselves. And there's good and bad to that, right? I think in a way it's good because we want to know where the market is and what they want to buy. But at the same time, we have to ask ourselves does this apply to me? Is this for my business? Is this for the season of life that I'm in for my business? Is this for my people? Today, this is what I wanted to talk about. Was getting out of that mindset of always reaching outside of ourselves to get any information about what we should do about our business. Now, again, I'm not saying not to do that. We have to do that. We have to understand the market. We have to understand what people want. We have to understand what the trends are and what's actually selling. That's good. We should do that. But the very first step is where a lot of

The First Question To Ask

SPEAKER_01 8:47

you I've seen have missed. It's that first, very first step. It's not what's the product or service. That's not the first question. The first question should be what is right for my business right now. Okay. We have to first start within us. Okay. So to give you an example, I had a client that had a service business, and I'm not going to go into detail because I don't want to violate any confidentiality, right? But she had a service business and she loved what she was doing as a service, but then she added kind of a product to it. And again, I won't totally go into it. Let's just, I'm going to make up something totally different that wasn't her business. Let's just say she was a hairstylist and she styled hair. And then she decided to come out with some kind of written book or something. She decided to do something else for people that helped them that was written. Okay. Let's just say it was a tangible product. And when she had the tangible product, she didn't like it. She was like, this is costing me too much time. It's frustrating. I actually don't love doing this. I love doing the service side. But she did the product business because she got hooked into the thought, well, that's what people wanted. Maybe I can make some extra money. And it was a lot less expensive than what her services were. And she was just like, What am I doing? And I'm like, why are you doing that? You don't like it. It's not making you that much money. But she was so stuck on what was going in the outside world going on out there with the market and what people were wanting and maybe what her competitors were doing, instead of stopping first and saying, What do I actually want to do? And what actually helps my clients? What actually helps them, right? Okay. So you have to think about that. I had another client who had a product business, right? And she had a few things that she was going to focus on. And the next thing I knew, she had like 50 products and they were going off in all kinds of different tangents. It was with her niche, but it was just so much right at the beginning that I was like, wait, I feel like your attention is getting taken in all these directions. And sure enough, when she went to, you know, launch her store and had it, I think there were so many things going on. It wasn't a focused launch. And I think people didn't know like, what's her signature product? What am I coming here for? I've been noticing online like all kinds of movie stars and famous people that have had now

Client Stories That Reveal Misalignment

SPEAKER_01 11:35

product lines and are coming out with their own business. And it's a lot of times very focused, right? I saw like Scarlett Johansson had a new skincare line for sensitive skin. I saw her on the Today show. It was just very interesting. And I went to our website. It's called The Onset. I have no affiliation or anything, but um, oh no, is it called The Outset or The Onset? Wait, now I'm like, now I gotta look this up. Scarlett Johansson. Um Scarlet Johanson, y'all, I'm sitting here looking this up while we're recording this. Um, the outset. Is it called the outset? Yeah, it's called the outset. I was thinking it was called the onset. Okay. Anyways, so she has this line. It's very focused and great, A plus, right? And she's using her celebrity to help promote the brain and the ways that it's helped her in her life, this type of skincare. So, anyways, uh, we have to think about that, right? Because we get caught up in what the world wants. And you, you can't be an Amazon, you can't be a Sephora, you can't be an Ulta. Need to be very focused so people know why they're coming to you, right? It has even happened with me here as I'm building out my new boutique that is going to be full of encouraging gifts for women who are starting something new, whether it be building a business or a new phase of life, a new chapter. And it's the encouragement and the excitement around that. And I've been doing that, but I've realized that there's been this one little gap, and that is something tangible that I wanted to provide my people. And I have created a journal, which I'll talk about later, but it's from my soul. It's going to be a luxury journal. And I can't wait till it comes in later this year when they finally all get here. But it's something very important to me that I know will help my people, right? But even I, in building out my boutique, I'm like, okay, well, I need to add some more products. I need to add some more things. I start getting caught up in this whole thing. Well, oh, this is selling, that's selling. I need to, you know, have this, I need to capture this market. And then I'm all of a sudden competing with Etsy and Amazon and all these things. I'm like, wait a minute. I've had to like rein myself in and go, wait, what was my whole point of starting this boutique? It's to help my clients, my business owners, and now other people as well, to encourage them and give them the confidence they need to move forward with whatever it is they're embarking on, this new journey, this exciting time. Maybe they've hit a milestone, right? I need to make sure my products are doing that and I'm not just throwing stuff up on the site. And I've had to be very discriminating and careful about what I'm adding to my site. It's been a struggle for me already, just doing that because I have so many ideas and I want to offer this and that and that. And it's starting to go crazy. And even Claude was like, okay, you're getting a little out of control right now. He didn't use those exact words, but he was like, okay, we need to circle back and get focused. And then in a few months, after you have more data, you can add more products, which he's telling me the things that I've been telling other people. But sometimes we need to hear it for ourselves, right?

Focus Your Signature Offer And Message

SPEAKER_01 14:51

And so for you, whatever is happening right now in your business, if something feels out of alignment, like a product or service offering, or you're not making money, or you thought it was going to be this big hit and it wasn't, you have to ask yourself, why did I add this offering? Did I add it out of good intention just to help people? Or did I add it because I was just trying to follow the crowd? I was trying to capitalize on something that I thought was popular. I'm doing what a coach said that I should do and should offer instead of what I really wanted to do. Have you stopped and really grounded yourself with that very first question that I'm begging you to ask yourself today? And that is, what is right for my people right now? What is right for them right now that I can offer that I've been wanting to offer? Like, what is that core thing? Because I always say this, and this happened to me with this new boutique that I'm opening. Is that I didn't come back to that, like, wait, what was my original intention? My original intention was the journal. And now I'm adding all these things, which is great, and they're going to be awesome. But I'm having to wrangle myself in and be very discriminating. You do too. You have to go, what was my original intention when I first started this business? Like, what was that thing that I was so excited about? Because I almost guarantee it that you've allowed it to get crowded by other things, by other shiny objects that you want to add this and you want to offer this, and you want to be known as a person that has it all. And I think we all have to wrangle ourselves, myself included, right? And I've been doing this for a very long time and it still happens to me. So don't think that it can't happen to you, because I'm being honest with you, it's happening to me too. And I know this stuff, right? I do this for a living, helping other women with their businesses and to help them get focused. But when it's our business, for some reason, we get all excited, we get that adrenaline rush. We want to offer this, we want to do this. So, my challenge again to you today is to go back to that very childlike thought that you had, right, from the beginning of your business of what you wanted to do for people. What is the real mission? And you have to ask yourself does this fit for my people right now? Is this actually going to move the needle for them? Is this going to help them get where they want to go? Where do your people want to go? Is this helping? Or is this just another distraction? Because your store or your online business or if you're a coach or whatever can literally just offer a few things. It doesn't have to offer a million things, right? It doesn't. You can have a select few things that are quality and that actually make a difference. And I've talked about in episodes past as well is that when you are remarkable, when you offer something that is remarkable to people, right? That that is really good, they will share you with other people free of charge. They don't need an affiliate link, they don't need anything. They're excited to be the person to let other people in on something amazing, such as your business, right? So think about it right now. What is your mission? What are you really on a mission to do? Okay. And how can you best help them? That will help you decide what products or services to offer. So you don't have all this mind drama. You don't keep going back and forth. You you ask yourself, is this actually helping them right now? And does this fit like my season of life right now? And it gives you a filter so that you can just say no to right now. You it doesn't have to be no forever. It's just no for right now. Like Claude was doing that to me. Like you can do that in a few months. And I thought, oh yeah, you're right. I don't have to do this all at launch. I don't have to be an Amazon at launch. Okay.

Mission Filter And Simple Next Steps

SPEAKER_01 18:50

So today, write down your mission in one sentence. Like, how do you want to help people? And what's the best way to help them? What is the best way you can help them right now? Because I want to kind of relieve you of something that you're not indecisive, you're not asking the wrong questions, you don't stink, you are a good business owner, you can help people, you can be successful. We just need to focus on what can actually help the people you set out to serve. You set out to help people, make sure that the products and services that you're offering actually do that and be discriminating. That's how you pick the right products and services that feel in alignment with you, that easily sell, that people share with other people, that they get the results they're looking for and they come back for more. So that's it. I hope that makes sense to you. I'm so excited for you, and I'm so excited about your business, whether you, you know, you're in the idea stage, whether you're just starting it right now and you're super stoked, or whether you've been growing and you've been trying to expand your business like I have, right? And now moving into tangible products to help business owners and other people like you. How lucky are we? This is so amazing and so much fun. And I'm so glad you're here. I'm surprised. So that's it.

SPEAKER_00 20:13

Until next time, bye now. Now, this episode may be over, but our relationship does not have to end here. Head on over to Kimberlybrock.com, and yes, you can get more valuable information for your journey. And you know what? You don't need to go through this alone. I would love to help. Thank you so much and have a great day. Bye.