I have been wanting to write this blog post for a while, to describe my experience of starting a business. I rely on it often, to help many clients who are on their first steps of starting a new business. Running an online business is much more than having a website.

Why I started my business

I always had been attracted by the idea of being my own boss, and when I was in my twenties I thought that I would never be in a 9-5 job. But things have been different and don’t regret those years working in an office. Everything changed when I had a child and I didn’t doubt about going for a flexible alternative, as I knew that was best suited for me. Neither I or my partner have any family around to help us with childcare, and we wanted to avoid rushing from work to the nursery every day to collect him.

While I was on maternity leave, I started to set up my business. Even though I have the advantage that I could work on my own website, I had no idea how to approach new clients.

My first steps

The first thing I did was signing in into Annie Ridout’s course “Become your own boss”, by then my son was only 3 weeks old.  This course has a great approach about teaching the importance of mindset and setting goals. Honestly it took me a while to understand this, I still was in my comfort zone and in my bubble as a new mum.

When my son was 5 months old, I went to my first networking event and this took me out from my comfort zone. I started reaching out to people. One of them was Katie Carr, who I partnered with on many projects. She is a great support when I need someone to give me slap on my back.

During the process of building an online business many of us, particularly if you are a solopreneur, go into many emotional ups and downs, and that is why it’s very important to find a support group.

During this period I worked updating my website, rebranding my business and researching how to present my services.

Time off

When my son was around 8 months old, my own website and my branding was sorted  and I had a clear idea about what to offer. But, I was getting to the end of my maternity leave and I needed to start signing clients, earning an income and making my business visible. I decided to sign in to The Robora and Annie Ridout become my mentor. I also started making connections and Julia Ferrari who was really afraid to network, started enjoying meeting new people. Honestly there was something with my imperfect English that sometimes made me feel scared to reach out. But then I realised many professionals were open to interchange ideas, to swap skills or to support my work.

Before I had the chance to join a networking group, Lockdown 1 started, and as soon as this happened I thought that I won’t have work coming, but the opposite happened.

In the meantime I realised that this will be the right moment to go ahead with course that I had in mind before the pandemic. I launched for the first time my “Build your own WordPress website” course, and in the process learned that launching a course is a difficult task. I learned many things from that experience and use them often to help my clients with their course technicalities.

Honestly this year I worked more than ever, and during the process I raised a baby who is now a toddler. Luckily now he is going with a childminder twice per week, and I hope to increase that to 3 times per week, to have enough flexibility for my work.

What is coming next?

One of the things that I struggle with is establishing my rates and finding the confidence to put a value to my work. I realised how important it is how your quotation is presented so I made a template in Canva, and I personalize it for each inquiry. I don’t enjoy doing the admin things, and would like to delegate them to a VA, even though now I have more experience doing it.

For the next year I have so many plans, I want to launch new things and find the balance to work on clients stuff and have the time to develop new products and courses.

I think the most rewarding part of having your own business is when you have clients that love your work or even when people read your blogs and they find them useful. Those things need to be celebrated!

If you would like more information, then why not book a 90mins coaching session with me? We can create an agenda based on your needs and queries. Simply sign up here.