Wasting time online = good business

Here's the question I get asked: How do you use social media to help your business grow?

Social media is so recent, who knows? On the other hand, an active online presence across all kinds of communication technologies is what enhances any online business. Being a person, not a business, is what it's all about these days. In other words, I think wasting a lot of time online as yourself is the key to helping your business grow devoted, repeat customers.

I've logged thousands and thousands of hours online since 1995, when I first dialed up to connect. I've written hundreds of thousands of words (maybe millions, but I lost count after ten). I've posted my heart, soul, thoughts, secrets (consequently, I have few), mistakes, regrets, questions, answers, help, insight, mistakenly-believed-to-be-insightful-at-the-time remarks, quips, jabs, passions, premature commitments, and the odd overstatement-passed-off-as-fact.

In that time, I've cultivated a vibrant online life that has resulted in more in-person meetings than most skeptics of the virtual world would guess (numerous retreats all over the country with online women friends, BBQs with out of state theological pals, meet ups for concerts, coffees and desserts, drop-ins from both a client and two friends moving from point A to point C and Cincinnati turned out to be point B). I've been invited to and spoken at a conference on the strength of a tweet (twitter). I've walked on a beach with a homeschooling mom and her kids when she heard I was in her neighborhood.

I've made local friends and networked myself into a social media community (recent!), I found fellow Obama campaigners through my online life, I discovered fantasy football and U2 fans and the important world of gay rights issues because I loved the movie "Brokeback Mountain." I've contributed to two books as a result of these passions: Get Up Off Your Knees (about U2) and Beyond Brokeback (about the movie's impact) based on posts I'd written. I wound up in a Scot McKnight book because I posted a lot to his blog. Currently I'm working on two projects: Divine Feminine Version of the Bible and a project called Wikiklesia that is focused on women in ministry. Online relationships made both of these happen.

I've made friends in foreign countries and have a strong following of homeschooling mothers in Australia and New Zealand (I will get there and use my business to pay for it, yes I will!).

When someone says to me that they don't have time for a virtual life, I think: I don't have time not to! My richest, most satisfying personal relationships hands-down have come through writing back and forth online. And even the less personal ones have been a rich source of insight, support, and challenge in ways I don't achieve in person. The power of the written word combined with the significance of self-selecting community has revolutionized relationships.

Still, my business is writing and this post is supposed to be about how social media adds value to business. And everything I said above falls into that category. I don't think there is anything you can do to get people to be interested in your business through a couple of tweets a day or a fan page on Facebook. Who cares? You have to start by being interested in other people. The only way to do that is to talk to them about what they care about. For hours. On end. Even when it has nothing to do with your business.

Brave Writer began because I wasted so much time talking to homeschoolers online. I got to know them, enjoyed them, asked them questions, shared my insights; we became friends. We talked about stupid stuff like favorite snack foods we hid from our children. But we also talked about best methods for tackling spelling.

I learned everything I needed to know about how to make a successful writing program by listening to moms tell me what frustrated them about writing and teaching it to their kids. I paid attention. Then I figured out how to meet that need. I ruminated, researched, tested, shared, gave away my ideas, helped moms with no compensation whatsoever. Slowly, I built a little credibility when my ideas worked.

I was lucky. I didn't have to earn money right away. But that first check for $25.00 told me everything I needed to know. I had no website, I had no business name. Yet my first online class in 2000 was full (25 families). And so was the next one, and every one after that for the first five years, even while I raised my prices to over $100.00 per family in that time. I started with my name, and I was known in homeschooling circles because I had spent so much time hanging out, chatting with homeschoolers.

I've hardly advertised (maybe 8 weeks of a banner ad once). Word of mouth, email lists, discussion forums, blogging, and now, the miracle of twitter have accounted for all my business. Simply being transparent, available, and frequently online has been the key to generating interest in Brave Writer. It helps that the mothers (and some fathers too!) I work with are incredibly generous with their ideas, support, issues and needs. We know each other. In some cases, I've worked with every student of a family with eight kids.

To me, the question isn't "How do I use social media to generate business?" but rather, "Who have I connected to today?" Jon used to say that I got paid to give compliments. There's some truth to that. We all need encouragement. If there is one thing I've learned online—most of us are looking for support and reinforcement in our primary commitments. Brave Writer exists to give moms the courage to follow through on their best intentions for writing and language arts, while nurturing their relationships with their kids. Brave Writer provides the resources and support to to get it done. I'm every homeschooling parent's biggest fan and cheerleader. I believe in my committed, devoted, amazing customer/parents. I enjoy them. I learn from them. I like hanging out with them.

To me, that's what it's all about.

A morning from hell...

Without casting aspersions or blame, let's just say that this morning didn't go quite the way I had hoped. It's class registration day for Brave Writer and my FTP program decided to quit working right after Jon's computer's start up disk took a late winter's nap. Ergo, I had no way to make the registration page go live at the 12:00 noon time mothers around the world were waiting for. In fact, I got an email from a mother in Australia telling me she had stayed up until 3 a.m. her time for that magical "live" moment... which didn't come.

After 100 attempts to fix the problem before the clock struck noon, I writhed on the floor in desperation and then stopped the hemorrhaging by sending out an email with the registration links (only to discover that the email itself had the wrong links in it!). Oh horribly cruel world!

At that point, I sent another email, slathered the information on my BW blog, yahoo lists, the public Brave Writer forums and answered the endlessly ringing phone with sincere moms who were sure that they had done something wrong (Btw, can I just say I love women? They are always so much more willing to assume the best about you and the worst about themselves than the men who call...). In any case, of course they had done nothing and they all immediately empathized with my plight, offering me verbal hugs and ladle sized doses of forgiveness.

For some unknown reason to any but the computer gremlins, my FTP program decided to work again about ten minutes ago for ten minutes. It is now officially not working again, but it was enough time to make the links go live. Which matters. Johannah's college fund will thank it.

And now I am sitting in my office, staring at a dreary, rainy world of downpours (which means bailing water in the basement). All I can think about is the election, the importance of these returns, the enthusiasm of the campaign this month and the heart-break it will be if Clinton hangs on to her lead. I can't stomach any more of the attacks - her aligning with McCain saying they have experience and Obama has speeches, intimating on Sixty Minutes that "Of course Obama is not a Muslim... as far as I know." It's enough. She's willing to tear the party apart to win. Obama just keeps pounding his platform.

So today is a fittingly stressful grey unsunny day. May the skies clear tonight!

Up since 5:00 a.m.: business driving me crazy

I pledge never to criticize any business's prices again.

I pledge to accept the prices as representative of what that company needs to charge in order to create fair compensation for its expertise, materials and promotion of itself for the purpose of remaining a viable business.

I will not make random calculations in my head about the amount of money it takes to produce the materials, distribute the product or how much energy/expertise/experience went into the original creation.

I also pledge never to assume that it is easy to run a business, to get customers, to produce the promotional copy for a website, to keep up a blog, to send out email notifications, to train teachers, to stay abreast of the latest developments in technology and education... as though these are after-thoughts and have no bearing the on the cost of the materials to which they pertain.

I confess that I now understand why teachers are paid so little when compared with the universities and schools for whom they work, who must take the lion's share of the tuition to run the business side of the school, and to recruit students. Hello. Who can teach without students?

This summer I live with the daily awareness that the changes I'm making to my business have the ability to either make it or break it. The stress of being in charge is something I have never felt in 7 and a half years of running Brave Writer. I feel responsible for the salaries of my teachers and their general happiness with the job they do so well for Brave Writer, the satisfaction of my customers who are both amazingly supportive and enthusiastic, the need to consider the tight budgets of most homeschooling families, the responsibility to sustain income we've come to depend on, and the need to create materials that serve the purposes for which they are designed.

Suddenly, in an attempt to stay current, I find that I'm on the edge of a breakdown. I don't think it's possible for me to do any more work than I am. I literally can't turn off my brain. I wake up with whole new sets of considerations I must take into account.

Every time I turn around, I think of another permutation that ought to be considered in the redesign of my website, of the registration process (which is effing - excuse the language - complicated), of the new learning platform (which has a learning curve of about 90 degrees straight up!). And every time I think of another change to the existing structures, it's $500-$1000 more to a developper than I planned to spend. Worse, I can't even tell if the end result will be experienced as better (it may look better, but will it accomplish the things I hoped it would alleviate as well as enhance?).

I'm exhausted, stressed, tired, worried, anxious and sick of being a business owner today.

I've been to three graduation parties this weekend

Graduations are everywhere, originally uploaded by juliecinci.

...hugging my kids' friends, eating the requisite snacks, watching Jon et al play cornholes (total Cincinnati game)...

I taught many of the kids I saw this weekend and all the celebrated graduates. In fact, at one party, an invited guest and student from my online business walked in and said, "Hi Mrs. Bogart. I'm Ben... (last name)? I took your essay class?" I replied: "Sorry I teach so many students, I don't always remember their names." He responded, "My user ID was oldbenkenobi..." And bing! I knew and remembered. :) We had a great time catching up. I always know them by email or user ID.

My business is seven years old so it's just bizarre to be at this point to see these kids I knew as littler kids heading off to college. One of my students (who both took writing and theater from me at our co-op) smiled hugely when I arrived at his party. He said, "I'm not going to college!" I got it. :) He's got a band. He writes music. He gave me their first CD. I felt so happy for him that he is finally relieved of school. It's been this constant source of interference with his musical life (which has been mostly self-taught... bass, drums, piano).

I wonder how all these kids will do. It will be fun to watch.

Utterly spent

which may, in fact, be a good thing.

This week revealed a genetic flaw. I've always known that I don't relate to numbers. My Algebra II teacher literally offered me a B to quit: "Julie, you don't understand math and I don't want your GPA to suffer. I'll give you a B for fall semester if you quit before spring." Let's just say I ran to the counselor's office to drop that sucker. Numbers - for me they didn't add up.

Even today, I still avoid numbers. When I read a book or magazine with statistics, dates, totals of Brangelina's adopted children, my eyes literally glaze over the numbers and skip to words because words MEAN something whereas number rarely do.

This propensity to not notice numbers meant that for three years, I put the wrong Social Security Number on my taxes and didn't realize it until I woke up in the middle of a random night: "OMG - I think I forgot my SSN!" Sure enough, I had to have the little card sent to me again in order to remember what it was.

As a history major, I never could hang onto dates, even important ones like the attack on Pearl Harbor, the beginning of the Civil War or what year Jesus was born (Ha! I'll bet you think it was year 0 when in fact it was 4 BC... or 5 or something...)

Money is worse. Having grown up with a gambler lawyer for a dad (trial lawyers have to be gamblers or they wouldn't take that profession), I lived between the feelings of "abundance" and "hang on until the next big case" all the time. We were affluent without ever feeling affluent, if you know what I mean.

I decided to end that anxious way of living by marrying an MA in English whose life ambition was missionary work. Yeah, not exactly Bel Air community aspirations and I was glad!

It's really worked out too. We've never had much money and so I haven't had to count all that high. Taxes were mostly a breeze (we filled out 1040EZ for years).

Enter the absurd notion of running businesses.

Absurd.

I can't count silverware to set the table and suddenly I have to track hundreds of enrollments, payment options, business related expenses, quarterly estimated taxes, sales tax, pension plans, investment options, payroll, 1099 MISC, contract labor, LLC tax forms labeled by digit, and the ever oppressive choices related to all of these.

Last week was the tipping point. I tipped... right into panic, depression and wishing I could take it all back and just be a mom again (I'm really good at that one and the only numbers required are measuring cups of flour for scones).

So many meetings where competent men and women bearing calculators show you "options" and say words like "It's really up to you" and "With this plan you could save X amount of money over X number of years for X yield" - huh? Did someone say something?

****And may I just interrupt this program to announce****
In Britain, there is no income tax period with CPAs filing dozens of four digit labeled papers on your behalf in order to help you pay too much of your money to the government. How come they don't have to? Who thought King George was extorting too much tax from us anyway? We lost the thread of that idea somewhere along the 200 years on our own.
**digression over**

So no, I didn't get much writing done. And I don't care. I spent everything I have emotionally and mentally on numbers.

And for the record, I have not used geometry or algebra 1 once, in all those calculations. What a waste of time and tutoring money that was.

Working Moms

So it would appear that I've officially entered the ranks of working motherhood. I'm not quite sure when it happened. I mean, I've been getting paid for my work for over ten years. But somehow because I could squeeze it in around the edges of my life, because I could at any moment drop my work to play with a child or go to the doctor or watch a soccer game or spend hours kneading dough to bake bread or make cupcakes for a teatime, I have still always felt myself to be a "stay-at-home" mom. Work for me was a "hobby" - a way to stay engaged in writing and the adult world, not a way to pay the bills or to even satisfy some deeper need for self-expression (though both of these have turned out be real benefits - money and self-expression).

For the last seven years, my business of online teaching has steadily grown and in the last three years, has leaped forward by such a large percentage that our tax bill shows it. (Groan) My income is no longer supplementary for lacrosse gear and violin lessons. It's primary. The hours I commit each day to working have become intrusive to the point where I feel like I have to schedule my time of work so that my kids know it's a "no enter zone." Of course it's been that way for some time, but usually those hours happened after they went to bed or before they got up and occasionally, an entire afternoon or weekend when the business was heavier.

But suddenly I'm swamped with real demands that have no clear end. I have appointments with CPAs, investors, bookkeepers, bank accounts managers, payroll companies and more. Suddenly I have to file all kinds of documents for the IRS and keep better records and know how to pay what when and to whom.

These tasks don't fit neatly into controllable hours where I'm "on" or "off." Add to it that right now I have to, HAVE TO, get this thesis done while finishing off grad school, and my time for children has become classically NOT stay-at-home mom level at all.

I really hate that.

But I find myself also having a lot more sympathy for those who have been working all along and who juggle mothering at the same time. I feel deeply grateful that I didn't have to do that until now. I've had to let go of my idealism again and hope that my children have had enough of me to date to adjust to this genuine change in lifestyle. It's much harder for me than I thought it would be.