Guest post by licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitator Ane Axford

What to price your goods and services at is usually a very tricky topic that often makes new right-brain business owners squeamish, and can also affect the seasoned business owner. If you are offering something intangible like coaching or abstract like art, it can feel confusing to put a price tag on it. And, at the same time, if you know it is going to bring a lot of benefit to those who want it then you want to offer it at a price that reflects that. Let’s break this down and I will tell you why I think it’s best to charge the least you can rather than the most you can.

First, consider why you have a business at all and what money does to serve you. It provides for your needs and you probably started a business to provide for yourself in a way that felt more authentic. So, money that comes in is meant to cover the costs of living for you. Add up those costs. Add up all your bills, look at your account history. Get clear on the specific amount of money that you need each month to provide for yourself. This includes needs, wants, and luxuries that really allow you to operate at your best where you are now. This will change over time as you and your business evolve. I like to re-evaluate this each year.

Second, consider that in order to offer what you offer, you must have your needs met. Your value lies in what you share with others who want it. So, they are helping to provide for you so that you can offer it and they can get it. They are not paying for what your product or service is worth. For myself, I know that much of my work is invaluable to my clients. Their whole life may change from one session or program. And it’s impossible to put a price tag on that. But, I can offer it at a value that allows me to meet my financial needs and therefore feels worth it to offer it as well as doable and valuable for those who want it.

Get clear on the optimal amount of time you need to provide your service or offering. This will also change over time, so let it just be for now. For instance, you may know that you do best meeting with 3 clients a day, or with 2 hours of production time. Feel it out. Get to a specific number again. This will help you know that you have ____ hours a month to offer your service and you need to make ____ amount of money a month. Now you can figure out the LEAST amount that you can charge to offer what you offer. Trying to figure out the MOST you can charge is like trying to figure out how to eat the most food you can eat at a meal. That’s not what your body needs and it will create an unhealthy experience. But, when you tune in with what is the least you can get that is enough for your body, then you can feel healthy.

Monthly Money Needed \\ Monthly Time Needed = Price Tag

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Ane Axford is a licensed psychotherapist, clinical hypnotist, and highly sensitive CEO of sensitive + thriving, Inc. She utilizes holistic lifestyle services to serve those who have the genetic trait of high sensitivity in thriving wherever they may be, from struggling to leading with sensitivity. Ane is of our licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitators.

Guest post by licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitator Amy Egenberger

How is going fishing good for creative entrepreneurs? Brain research now shows that downtime activities support creativity.

You know that, right? Get stuck on a project, and you might take a walk to clear your mind. Set out in a boat on a quiet lake, even better.

The added bonus for your creativity is if your incubation time includes something new to you. Exploring outside your field, in a realm unrelated to your usual focus adds to the raw materials and interconnections you have for making something novel and useful.

For me, fishing would fit the bill. I don’t fish, and never have. While that’s certainly lucky for the fish, playing with tackle, rod and reel to learn a new skill would be good for my creativity. Here’s why.

Three things you can do to support your creativity:

Broaden your knowledge and skills. Read, take classes, hang out with diverse people, and learn about fields unrelated to your own.

Spend time in nature. Allow your ideas to incubate.

Seek out challenging tasks. Trying to figure out a project that doesn’t necessarily have a solution leads to new ideas.

But what do creative people need with more creativity?

Running a creative business means knowing how to both generate ideas and develop them. We need to apply our creative prowess to the later stages when we polish and shape our ideas into reality.

Outlines of the creative process may always come up short. But about 70 years ago, James Webb Young presented a 5-stage creative process based on his own experience in the ad biz. His model for producing ideas, similar to that of English sociologist Graham Wallas (1926), still has relevance today.

Here’s my synopsis of Young’s model of idea development:

1. Gather it in – collect raw materials, knowledge, skills and experiences that are both specific to your field and unrelated.
2. Soak it up – take in what you’ve gathered, mess it around, tune in and get to know and understand it
3. Let it go – allow it all to incubate
4. Mull it over – bring it back into focus with renewed light and insight
5. Shape it up – make it fit the context of what your after and make it real

While this framework may be both linear and cyclical at the same time, new science gives clout to the incubation phase.

Recent studies in the field of neuropsychology lend support for the role of downtime. Scientists such as Dr. Rex Jung found evidence that brain activity actually down-regulates in the frontal lobe during creative tasks, and that certain techniques facilitate this “transient hypofrontality.” Meditating, taking a walk, enjoying a long bath or going fishing, for example, take the brakes off the front part of the brain and let the ideas flow more freely.

What activity would support your own creative process? Whether it is taking on the challenge of something new, expanding your knowledge base, or incubating your ideas out in nature, I hope you find your own version of “fishing” today.

Go fish!

Making way for creative action, Amy Egenberger, MEd., CPCC, is proud to be a Licensed Facilitator of the Right Brain Business Plan®. She is a seasoned educator, life coach, artist and founder of Spirit Out! Coaching. Amy helps people find the courage and clarity to get moving on their creative path. A book, a business, a project, a change… your creative spirit gets out! Amy is one of our licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitators.

Guest post by licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitator Cass Mullane

The first half of 2013 is now in the books… what wonderful things are you going to do in the second half?

Now’s the time to take a good look at your business and think about how you plan to finish 2013. So where do you start? How about with the last six months!

One of my favorite reviews is the look back on the prior months’ activities to assess what’s going right in my business and what changes I need to make. Because I do this consistently and intentionally I am very familiar with my business and I’m able to make strategic planning decisions more comfortably.

Now please don’t get hung up on a phrase like “strategic planning.” In my world, strategic planning involves a journal, a large calendar, project planning sheets (or windows and walls!), sticky notes and favorite colorful markers and pens. Yep, this is strategic planning at Prosper Creatively!

After you’ve gathered your favorite tools, it’s time to ask yourself a few questions and to answer truthfully:

• What did you accomplish in the last six months?
• What’s underway, but not yet completed?
• Is your direction still making sense?
• Did you meet your revenue goals?
• Are you contacting the right clients/customers?
• Are you marketing where your ideal customers are?
• Do you have the right clients/customers contacting you?
• Are there habits you need to change?
• What do you need to start doing?
• What really worked in the last six months?
• What are you going to do differently?
• Who do you need to add to your team?
• How’s your follow up going?
• Have you posted your blog and your newsletter consistently?
• Did you reach any of your big goals?
o If you did, what’s next for your vision board and business plan?

This should be a fun activity. While you may not have achieved everything you set out to achieve, you should celebrate your successes, fairly review what might not have worked out so well and make a plan for success for the remainder of 2013. When you really pay attention to your business, you know what’s going on and you’re better equipped to make sound decisions. Plus, you can get excited about what’s coming up in the next several months.

So, jot down some thoughts and observations in your journal. Think honestly about your results and how you feel about them. Think about what really floats your boat and what you could be happy letting go. Think realistically about what you can achieve and decide what you really want to go after. Then whip out the sticky notes and your calendar and project planning paper and get to work planning out the next six months. Be sure to deal with the major areas of your business plan, like revenue, marketing, your key team members, operations, action planning and what’s going on in your industry.

I find that working backwards is rather effective. For example, let’s say I want to build a new webinar series. First I’ll figure out when I think I’d like to launch the series and put a sticky note on that date. Then I work backwards and I figure out how long it will take to develop the content for each session, how long it will take to market it, etc., etc., and put a sticky note on each of those dates. Obviously you’ll soon see if the timing makes sense just by looking at the calendar. Plus, it’s WAY easy to make adjustments with sticky notes just by yanking them off and repositioning them in a new spot.

Let’s make your second half of 2013 SING!

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Cass Mullane’s calm, comfortable approach consistently yields positive results for clients. Her business and personal coaching practice, www.ProsperCreatively.com, specializes in delivering solid left brain business skills to right brainers and creatives in a fun, visual way. Cass is is one of our licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitators.”

Guest post by licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitator Laura Burns

The advantages of being a creative person in the business world can be uniquely helpful to break new ground and garner attention for awesome work. However, emotional ups and downs, perfectionism, and internal pressure to create can complicate the running of a business and the participation in the greater business community. I have found myself unwilling to attend community meetings and networking events that are important to my business growth because I’m too busy Creating. (Creating with a capital C, of course). Or, even more often I’ve seen wonderfully creative people shy away from interacting with their local business community because they feel they don’t belong there – they fear that they won’t be taken seriously and/or ignored for their contributions.

The five quotes below may be familiar to you, or not. Regardless, I invite you to read through them and really give yourself a few minutes to let the words sink in. Do any of the quotes stand out to you? Can you identify with any of the sentiments expressed? Let down your guard and see if any of these ideas resonate with your inner self’s true feelings. The only way to grow is to acknowledge that you have room to grow.

1. “Have no fear of perfection, you’ll never reach it” – Salvador Dali

I love this Dali quote about perfectionism, because it’s so simple and true. Nothing I do will ever be perfect so there’s no point in worrying and stressing myself out about the idea of making things perfect. However, it’s a hard habit to break AND there’s nothing wrong with investing yourself in your work. There’s a fine line between working hard and working too hard. At some point you have to stop and know you’ve done the best you can. There’s always another project and another chance to be better.

2. “Creativity is more than just being different. Anybody can plan weird; that’s easy. What’s hard is to be as simple as Bach. Making the simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity” – Charles Mingus

I’ve seen so many creative people make wonderful things and then ruin them by continuing to add to them. Whether it’s a painting, a logo, a website, a dish in a restaurant, or a business tagline – often simple is better. Making something beautiful and complex out of simple materials or ideas is the ultimate in creativity. Embracing simplicity is a great exercise for business owners. Often we want to do as much as we can – bigger, better, fancier. It’s not always the best route to take though, and actively trying to increase simplicity can be a great way to stand out from the crowd.

3. “The story that we all live [is] the cycle of creation and destruction, of control and letting go, of picking up the pieces and making something new.” — Julie Burstein

When faced with running a business made from our creative pursuits, many of us let fear keep our work stagnant. We’ll produce the same line of jewelry even after we’ve lost our passion for it. Or we’ll write the same type of book because we know it will sell. It can be scary to leave behind that which is proven to sell for something new and different. This quote is a great reminder that our work and our lives are cyclical. By letting go of past work we can innovate and truly be creative. Ultimately, that’s why we’re here. We chose this work because we needed to express our creativity and make a paycheck at the same time. This fear can only hold us prisoner if we let it.

4. “Education is great … but it’s really my creativity that’s taught me that I can be much more than what my education told me I am.” — Raghava KK

This is one of my favorites and it tackles an issue that comes up time and again with my clients. So often creative business owners feel as if they don’t have the credentials they need to be taken seriously by the business community and some potential clients. Education and credentials are good things, but are not defining criteria for whether or not someone is talented. If you know you’re good at what you do, you can learn how to talk about your experience and your talent in ways that speak to other people’s need for credentials. Beyond that, you don’t need to justify your business and talent to anyone. Your creativity and talent are your credentials.

5. “Every ‘mistake’ is an opportunity in jazz.” — Stefon Harris

Whether or not you’re a jazz musician you can take something away from this quote. It’s a simple but powerful message. Don’t get hung up on the mistakes you make. You’re going to be making them for the rest of your life. Focus on learning how to turn mistakes into learning experiences and opportunities for innovation. As creatives we are especially equipped to for this, so get started the next time you mess something up.

I help heart-forward businesses create thoughtfully crafted plans for growth and sustainability. I love to inspire people to think critically, dream big, and clear out the cobwebs to let in the light and the joy! Wanna leave your soul-crushing job to start your own business? Check out my new book, Work Life Revolution! Laura Burns is one of our licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitators.

The Declaration of You, published by North Light Craft Books and available now, gives readers all the permission they’ve craved to step passionately into their lives, discover how they and their gifts are unique and uncover what they are meant to do! This post is part of The Declaration of You’s BlogLovin’ Tour, which I’m thrilled to participate in alongside over 100 other creative bloggers. Learn more — and join us! — by clicking here.”

I’m super excited to be a part of Michelle and Jessica’s book “Declaration of You” ~ here’s the interview I did with them around their “Success” Chapter. I absolutely adore these creative and inspiring ladies!!!

The Declaration of You: Success with Jennifer Lee! (for zee book) from Pierre François Frédéric on Vimeo.

Leave a comment about what success means to you or 1 thing you learned or came away with from the interview and we’ll be choosing one lucky winner on Wednesday to win a free Declaration of You book!

***Winner announced – Gail, you’ve won! So please get in touch with us at info@artizencoaching.com and we’ll get your book sent out***

Name:  Jackie Blain
Company Name:  Savvy Scribe
Website: www.jackieblain.com

Note from Jenn: The delightful Jackie Blain is a Right-Brain Business Plan e-Course grad and currently part of my Right-Brain Entrepreneur Mentorship Program. I love that as savvy scribe and writing coach Jackie found inspiration in the RBBP even if at first she didn’t consider herself visual or crafty (I’m sure there are some of you who can relate). Let her story inspire you to embrace your own creativity in your business!

What is your business and what makes your business unique?

I’m a writing coach/teacher/tutor, and I specialize in helping writers who are struggling to get a project finished. Everybody who writes gets stuck – heck, I’ve been stuck so many times, and for so many different reasons, that I stopped counting. So I help writers by identifying the problem, and giving them tools and strategies and advice to break through those blocks… and most of all build confidence in their writing abilities so they’re not afraid to take the next steps on their own.

One unique thing I do is work in real time on the internet. Facial expressions, body language, laughter, being able to bounce things off each other as we look at a project – those are my real teaching tools. And the internet now lets me connect with writers wherever they are, whenever it works for them, so they can get things done.

How do you use your creative intuition in your work?

Creative intuition is not simply an idea for me. It’s a fact, a way of living and working. I call it “trusting the Universe,” and when I ignore it, I usually get in trouble. As a teacher, intuition is an absolute essential. It’s how I know without the person saying anything when a concept is clear or fuzzy, or when they’re engaged or bored or upset, and what I need try next in order to solve the problems. That’s why I work face-to-face with writers – watching their body language is crucial because it allows my creative (teacher’s) intuition to kick into gear and change tactics so I can provide the best tools and strategies for that individual. It’s also more fun, and my creative intuition thrives on fun.

Is there anything you’d like to share about your Right-Brain Business Plan® in terms of what it’s made out of or how you made it?

The non-visual-artist, non-crafty writer in me got very nervous about doing a RBBP, until I remembered that I think in pictures. Movies, really. But pictures nonetheless. I also remembered that I used to do collages back in the day. So I got the RBBP Kit, followed the directions for doing the fold-up book, and created something very straightforward, but something that I love. It’s kind of a mish-mash of images, quotes, bits from the RBBP Kit, Jill Badonsky’s muses, and a couple of family photos. Best of all, it lets me pretend I am indeed a visual artist!

Illustration by Taylor Schwartz

What’s your big vision for your business?

My big vision is actually pretty simple. I’m not looking to create a dynasty, or a business that I can sell to somebody else, or that has real employees. My whack-a-doodle “career” has been full of twists and turns, and hard-won knowledge – one of my students calls it “eduexperience.” And my big vision is to put all of that to the service of other writers who struggle with the same kinds of blocks and bumps and bruises, to help them remember why writing matters to them and to the world, and to restore their confidence in their own creativity.

What advice do you have for other creative entrepreneurs?

Ask for help! I’m an introvert and have always balked at the idea of asking anybody for anything. But as a writer, I know nothing gets done without the input of friendly critics. So when my Creative Cohort– and Jenn and the RBBP – started pushing me to ask, I gulped, invoked the intention behind my Big Vision, and asked. Help started to materialize from places both expected and, most fun of all, unexpected. Of course, the other important part is saying ‘thank you’ and being willing to return the ‘yes’ when asked, but you have to ask first.

Illustrations by Taylor Schwartz

Is there anything else you’d like to share?

Along those same lines, I have a big fat “Thank you” to Jenn and the Right-Brain Business Plan. I went from struggling to believing, from thinking I wasn’t creative to “hell, yeah, I am!” I now have plans and goals and hope for the future, and it wouldn’t have happened otherwise.

Want to create your own Right-Brain Business Plan®? The Right-Brain Business Plan® Kit includes supplies to make your own accordion book style visual business plan.

For more support with developing your RBBP, check out the Right-Brain Business Plan® Home Study program.