Fireside

Today is a coaching episode with Jo Hooper, who you may know better as Mad And Sad Club. After two mental health breakdowns in as many years, Jo took redundancy from her job in communications and started Mad And Sad Club to help organisations better help and support their employees. 6 months in, Jo is struggling to nail her value as, in her words, she’s made up this new job and is unused to applyi...

We talk with Carina Lawson the founder of the Planner brand Ponderlilly.  You've likely seen beautiful Ponderlilly planners in photos on Instagram, but you may be surprised to find out how the brand came about and how it's run.  In this episode we talk through the juggle, the cult of busyness, what's working for her at Ponderlilly and Carina's five simple planning changes.   Here's what we talk ab...

Today it’s just me, and I want to talk about the dreaded SALES. This is something that came up on a Q&A I did on Instagram Live recently, and it is generally just a perennial challenge for so many of us. Many of us feel deeply uncomfortable with the idea of selling, which of course causes one or two problems when you have a business and need to sell things. So today is a bit of a pep talk on chang...

Today is a coaching episode, and I’m talking with illustrator Emma Bradstreet all about self-doubt in business. We identified that Emma was struggling with what I call the Holy Trinity of low confidence - comparison, expectation and perfectionism. We unpack each of these with useful self-talk and exercises to not let them overcome you at the moment, being pro-active and taking action around your d...

Today I am speaking with Tamu Thomas, the founder and coach behind Live Three Sixty. Having worked as a social worker for fifteen years, Tamu felt stuck and trapped in her life and dove into a period of research into self-development and neuroscience in order to better make sense of herself. Finding the wellness world overwhelmingly millennial and Western orientated, Live Three Sixty was born as c...

In this episode, I talk about the customer journey.  So you will have probably heard me refer to a sales funnel before which is the way people move through your band from discovery to purchase.  The customer journey looks at the entirety of the journey from when before someone finds you to past the point of purchase and beyond.  The customer journey is a huge piece of the puzzle when it comes to y...

Today I’m joined by Elise Blaha Cripe, perhaps better known online as Elise Joy, to talk all things goal-setting and productivity. Elise was a maker and blogger, but over time found the thing that she was most excited by was helping others achieve their goals, so she developed and launched Get To Work Book, the planner you’ve likely seen some of your favourite business owners using on Instagram. H...

Today is a coaching episode with Ami-Lou Harrison a Graphic Designer and illustrator working on building her freelance business.  I know I talk a lot about the importance of knowing who your ideal customer is and using that to inform all of your marketing but how do you do that exactly? That is what Amy and I are talking about today.  Going beyond the demographics to find the problem that you want...

Sharing my thoughts on the question and struggle of every business owner - pricing. You get an idea you think is pretty good, you wrestle with the content and the format, you fight away all the the self-doubt about who am I do to this, and you get yourself to a place where you are excited to introduce a new thing into the world, and then you turn around  and you walk straight into this brick wall,...

Today I am joined by Allie LeFevere the owner of a humour based Marketing agency Obedient. I was really keen to get Allie on the show as I knew she could provide a really interesting new take, that would provide a new prospective on all of our struggles.  We dig into using fun as an alternative to fear based marketing and the science begin it, we discuss  examples of humour led marketing,  we talk...

Today I have a coaching episode with Sarah Fraser of Novel and Kind.  A high school English teacher by trade she began blogging over a year ago to reconnect her creativity and in doing so found that other people were making money online and she wondered if this was something she could do too.  Today we are talking about matching your skill set to an offering, getting over the need for more qualifi...

Today is a shorter kind of pep talk style episode with me.  What I want to talk about is getting going.  At the time I am recording this, it is the end of August where here in the Northern Hemisphere we are starring to look ahead to the Autumn and get going with new projects or pick up old ones, as we get that back to school feeling,  and in the Southern Hemisphere as you are emerging into Spring...

Today is a coaching episode with Fran Norris, an Artist and Illustrator based in the UK.  Fran's hasn't been in business for long and after realising she had taken a bit of wrong turn and arrival of her second child imminent she decided to take down her online shop and start over with the marketing,  In this episode we talk about finding the right direction and setting tiny goals to get there, tim...

I have been away from the Podcast over the summer and I am so excited to back in your headphones as we head into Autumn which is my power season.  It seems to be where my energy is unleashed.  I have a few things that are coming up over the next few months, which include; Basecamp: This is a Course for those who are starting out in their business or feel like they are going round in circles to get...

I wanted to talk about creating and selling digital products.  I know that digital products are are on a lot of peoples radar at the moment as they are touted  as easy/passive ways to make money while you sleep or do another job.  So for those of you who are playing round with the idea of a digital product then this episode is for you.    I have been running e-courses for over a year now and in th...

Today is a coaching episode with Elin Loow, a writer and blogger who supports creatives going through the process of turning idea into reality. Elin is right at the start of figuring out what her services and offerings might look like, so today we’re talking business models - 121 vs one-to-many, how to choose the right business model for you and your customer, expectations and also getting away fr...

Over the last few months I think we have all felt a bit of shift in the online landscape and the conversations I have been having with clients have reflected this too.  It all started with questions about saturated markets, struggling to stand out, authenticity and vulnerability, Instagram growth and email signs up are grinding to a halt, in spite of people doing all the right things.  Today I wan...

My guest today is Greta Solomon, a writing coach and author, whose latest book, Heart, Sass & Soul: Journal Your Way to Inspiration and Happiness, is, as the title suggests, all about finding joy in creativity and self-expression through writing. While she now focuses on creativity, Greta also has a background in teaching business-writing, so in this episode we cover the whole spectrum - from...

You know how people say that when you're thinking of buying a certain type of car you start to see that car everywhere?  Well I'm getting that at the moment with purpose. In the week that my new product, The Purpose Kit is going live, and because of this i'm seeing it everywhere.  Personally, I’m glad to see more people talking about purpose - it’s something the world could use a little more of al...

Today is a coaching episode with Emmeline Bramble, a visual and verbal apothecary who helps women in business unearth their intuitive Purpose and create their visual and verbal branding. Emmeline and I are very aligned when it comes to the importance of Purpose and intuition in business, so I enjoyed having this conversation with her. We talk about how she came to find her own Purpose, and then di...

Today I am talking to Therese Ørtenblad from Small Business Collaborative. Therese is a wholesale expert having a decade of experience working for large and small wholesale businesses selling products into brands as big as John Lewis or small as your local gift shop. She now mentors small product businesses helping them to make the most of their wholesale opportunities. In this episode we start ba...

Today is a coaching episode with Jane Badu, the founder of online homewares store We Are Nomads. After a holiday to Morocco 6 months ago Jane was inspired to bring the artisanal products she discovered to the UK, and now sources textiles, pottery and accessories from all over Africa. With the logistics all set up, Jane is turning her attention to social media, which is where this episode comes in!...

Today is a coaching episode and I’m talking with Carissa Tanton, an illustrator who lives near me here in North Wales. Carissa has a problem that I think we can all relate to: indecision. Particularly as she works on her business part time, she finds herself spending way too much time researching and agonising over decisions as widespread as which print to list in her shop, how to spend her time a...

Today I’m talking with Jessica Uys, a personal growth coach who uses enneagram to help people release old habits and live an uncompromised life. If, like me, may have seen people mention their enneagram type online, but not really know exactly what they’re talking about. I think that, especially when you’re starting and running your own business that any self-awareness you can gain will have a hug...

Today is a Q&A episode where I'm going to be answering the questions you asked me on Instagram, all about starting and running a business.  Thank you for sending in such a big variety of questions, this means that we're gong to be covering topics as widespread as money and Instagram, competition and motivation Here's what we talk about in this episode: How I decided on the name Simple & Se...