No Time For Visibility

Jess and Margy are the co owners of Interview Connections, the first and leading podcast booking agency. This is the podcast where you will learn all about podcast guesting and how to leverage podcast interviews to grow your brand awareness.

On today’s episode of Rock the Podcast, Jess and Margy what to do when you feel like you just don’t have time to commit to your visibility. We are asking the question - where is your time going?

We know that there are entrepreneurs out there who know that consistent visibility is incredibly important, but they feel like they simply don’t have time. We at Interview Connections recommend getting on podcasts at least once a week, every single week. Many entrepreneurs that we talk to think that it sounds like a great idea, but they can’t see how to fit it into their schedules.

 

The first thing Jess and Margy recommend is using a calendar system. Unless you start putting tasks down into a calendar, how will you keep track of your commitments? The second step Jess and Margy discuss is then auditing that calendar. As an entrepreneur, you need to ask yourself, “Is my calendar reflecting my vision and my highest priorities in the business?”

 

Are you spending time where you should be spending time? Visibility is being seen and heard by more people, so you can get more leads, more clients, and more speaking opportunities. Visibility is a major domino in changing the game for your business and getting to the next level of where you want to be. You don’t have time not to do things that raise your visibility consistently!

 

Look at your calendar and ask yourself, “Am I spending time on tasks that are not important? Am I doing tasks that someone else besides me could do and should do?” 

 

Jess and Margy also stress the importance of putting those important tasks on your calendar, because if they’re not on your calendar, they likely won’t get done (or at least get done in an acceptable timeline). 

 

Margy is an expert in protecting her time. Both Jess and Margy love using scheduling blocks, and batching tasks in specific blocks of time. Margy has a specific block set aside for podcast interviews, so she never feels overwhelmed with other tasks interfering with her interviews. Podcast interviews don’t have to take over your schedule! Try and create blocks specifically for them, even just one hour a week for interviews.

 

If you don’t have time to work on your visibility, it points to a bigger issue of how you’re spending or organizing your time. It’s something that we’ve all been through - how many entrepreneurs and business owners have complained about not having enough time?

 

The key to solving this is being really proactive and not reactive. Set time aside for your highest priorities.  Showing up the way you need to be and building the momentum that you need, should be at the very top of your priority list as an entrepreneur. 

 

If you feel like you don’t have the time to do the legwork, you’re right. That’s why you can hire an agency, like us here at Interview Connections, to book you! While we recommend that you outsource the heavy lifting, you need to make the time to show up and connect, give value, share your story, and make those listeners want to take the next step with you.

 

By objectively looking at your calendar, you can compare your story of what you’re doing and what you have time for, with what is actually happening. You can see if your actions are in alignment with your goals! 

 

Another important tip is to stay  in your zone of genius! Do not waste time on tasks that drain you if there is someone on your team who can do that task - and oftentimes those team members are much better suited to do that task than you are.

 

Be specific about your zone of genius: it’s the things that you are both good at and that you like doing. Do more of those tasks and less time doing tasks out of obligation, or “I should just do it because it’s easy.” Spending your time on those tasks could really be draining you of the energy you need for the tasks in your zone of genius.

 

If you're an entrepreneur you probably want freedom. Does calendaring make you feel constricted?

 

Before Jess started really using her calendar, she would come in to work every day wondering, “What’s today going to be?” Margy suggested putting tasks in Jess’s calendar, which Jess initially resisted. But Jess ended up feeling that she was much more productive and effective when she laid out her tasks for the day and committed specific time slots to them.

 

Jess also brings up the idea of having integrity with yourself. If you look at your calendar and you have dedicated 30 minutes to a task, you need to do it to maintain that integrity with yourself. And most importantly, when you look at your calendar you need to ask, “What am I going to be doing that is moving the needle for my business?”

 

When you actually calendar out all your tasks, you can actually work much less. If you just do whatever needs to get done, you will never run out of tasks. Instead, if you dedicate your day to specific tasks and time slots, you can work fewer hours because you’re focused on high-value tasks. Things expand and shrink to the amount of time you give them.

 

What is in your calendar is what is prioritized in the business!

 

If you’re saying, “I need more visibility, I need more people to know who I am, I need to get on podcasts” but you look at your calendar and there’s nothing on there that’s helping you get more visible - there’s a misalignment, and there’s a lack of workability. You have to change something in your calendar. 

 

When Jess transitioned from closing sales herself to managing a sales team, she struggled with “I don’t have time to train the sales team.” In reality, she didn’t have time not to. If visibility is the thing that your business needs, nothing else on your calendar is more important than that. 

 

You are planting seeds with your calendar. If you’re focusing on visibility, it’s going to be a few months before you start to reap the rewards, it’s not overnight. Is your calendar reflecting where you want to be? The direction you want to be steering the ship with? If not, it’s time to reevaluate and recalendar!

 

It’s crucial to ensure that your calendar reflects the priorities of your business!