The week I almost rewrote my entire business (and why I'm glad I didn't)

Last month, I was at a conference when someone asked me a simple question about my positioning. And suddenly, I was convinced I needed to completely rewrite my business.

The problem? It was never about the positioning.

In this episode, I'm taking you completely behind-the-scenes of a decision-making spiral that happens to more founders than we talk about. You'll hear the real moment when I realized: this isn't a strategy problem, it's a belief problem.

What We Cover:

• How one question spiraled into a full business crisis
• Why "imposter syndrome wearing a niche spiral costume" is the perfect description
• The marketing gardening metaphor (and why you can't dig up seeds after 3 days)
• What happened when I paused instead of panicked
• The Success Equation: Result = (Time + Consistency + Intensity) × Belief
• Why waiting is so hard for doers — and why it's often exactly what's needed

This is for you if:

• You're a mom founder questioning whether you're cut out for this
• You've ever spiraled about your positioning or niche
• You struggle with patience when your strategy isn't working fast enough
• You want the real, behind-the-scenes story (not the highlight reel)

Sometimes the gap between where you are and where you want to be isn't your strategy. It's your belief in yourself.

I'm sharing this because I think female founders need to see the real, not the highlight reel. Because everyone spirals. They just don't talk about it.

Marketing Mixer (May 21st): consistencycorner.com/mixer

Join the next Marketing Mixer, a virtual networking event for mom founders. 

Don't forget to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode, and follow along over on Instagram!
@ruthie.sterrett
@theconsistencycorner

Transcript

Ruthie Sterrett (00:01.962)

Hey there, welcome to another episode of the consistency corner. Today, we're going to be doing something a little bit different. So I'm recording this at the beginning of May, like pretty close to when it's going to air. And I've been doing a lot of reflecting on my business in Q1 and the beginning of Q2. And I'm going to take you behind the scenes. I'm going to share with you some things that have been happening and tell you the story of the week that I almost rewrote my entire business.

So let's jump into it.

Couple weeks ago, I went to a conference called the Podcasting Moms Conference. If you follow me on social, you may have seen some of the images from there. My intent of going to this conference, which I've been to it before, was to have a reunion with my friends. Like, totally, totally honest. I have some really good business besties that were gonna be there. We were all staying together. And for me, this was an opportunity to have a reunion with them. I also thought this is a great opportunity to network, meet some new people in the online business world.

Women in Business, Moms in Business World, and attend the conference and learn some things about podcasting. I have a podcast, I wanna learn about podcasts. Some of my clients have or want to launch podcasts, so let's get in the room and have conversations. So, that's the context for the story, right? Okay, so zoom in or set the scene. We're in the Dali living room. Now what does that mean? The conference is in Franklin, Tennessee, right outside of Nashville.

and the Airbnb we're staying in has a Dolly Parton themed like sitting room. So we're hanging out in there and I'm talking with one of my good friends who is a fractional CFO and serves clients in a done for you capacity. And we're talking about my business and my ad funnel and my messaging. And she says, okay, I wanna ask you a question. Just take this as something to be curious about. Do you think the word mom,

Ruthie Sterrett (02:00.766)

in your positioning as I serve mom founders might be hurting you in attracting the right clients. And I was like, okay, what do you mean by that? And she's like, well, your ideal client might be a mom founder, but is that how she identifies? Or does she identify as a founder who happens to be a mom?

Because here's the thing, as a done for you agency, my services do not support DIY, new business owners, people who I think tend to identify as the mompreneur, which is often kind of the side hustler. And so we don't want to get confused that that's who I'm serving. And so we're talking about some ads that I'm running and how they haven't converted yet. And she's like, I'm not telling you to change anything right now. I just am curious.

if the positioning around mom founder in your headline could maybe be hurting you in calling in the right people. So I'm like, okay, that's fine. We'll think about that. And we started to kind of go down this like rabbit hole of like, well, if you were gonna niche into something, here's the thing about niching. You gotta either niche into the who, you gotta niche into the what, you gotta niche into the how, or you gotta niche into all three.

Well, as a marketing director, the what is like, I can do a lot of things, right? The how, okay, we have our cornerstone framework, which is our proprietary system that we use to create your marketing strategy. But at the end of the day, then when it comes to done for you, we can do a lot of things, which ends up being a competitive advantage for my brand. We can do your social media, which is what a lot of people come to me for. But then also, we can do the projects that help social media.

get the job done like funnels and lead magnets and email sequences and podcasts and ads, whatever it may be, right? So I'm like, okay, I'm not really niched on that. So the who we niched in to mom founders, but it's like, well, what if that isn't an ideal niche? So we just started kind of brainstorming on topics or industries that maybe I would find fun to create content for. More on that in a minute.

Ruthie Sterrett (04:23.704)

So now fast forward a little bit. We are headed to a networking happy hour, which was kind of the night before the conference to get to know a lot of the people who were attending. And I'm having lots of conversations, chatting with people, having a good time. And I'm talking to a different person about my services and talking about the fact that we serve mom founders. And we're talking about the difference between marketing a done for you capacity versus

a done with you educational coaching DIY type capacity. And she was like, oh, I didn't realize that the consistency corner that you do done for you. I thought when you said you helped mom founders, you meant early stage. Oh, that's an interesting little light bulb that shines a little brighter on the conversation that Emily and I were having earlier. So, okay.

Now we're really thinking about this and I'm getting two signals that like, maybe you should think about this, Ruthie. Plus at the time, the ad funnel that I had just turned on, the ads that I was running were not converting. We're not booking any calls from these ads. So I'm like starting to panic, right? Like, maybe this isn't working. I don't know. So one of the conversations Emily and I had that I said I'd come back to is what are some industries that I might be interested in creating content for? And I was like, golf?

Because I love golf. play golf. My child plays golf. And I was like, you know, service providers in the golf industry. Like that could be really fun. And so what do you know, the universe winked a little bit and I met somebody at the conference who says, who follows me on Instagram, sees me post about golf and my stories. We get talking about golf and she says, my gosh, I need to introduce you to so-and-so who is a copywriter in the golf industry. And I was like, okay.

little wink from the universe there, then I'm talking to another person later who says, yeah, do you know so and so? Well, actually their husband runs a camp for kids who play golf. And not that this person was like, Ruthie, you need to talk to this person, they could use your services. It was just like, this person exists and my existing network could connect me to this golf industry professional. So the conference wraps.

Ruthie Sterrett (06:48.418)

I've got some time before I have to head to the airport and I am spiraling. I'm having conversations with Claude. I'm trying to figure out what to do. What is my positioning? I was about to like head into a pitch sprint for my own networking and guest speaking opportunities. I was about to do some work on the podcast to kind of refresh it and relaunch it. And I'm like, is this, do I lean into this mom founder?

language and positioning or not. So as I'm having this conversation with Claude and my own business coach, the deeper conversation isn't really about, is this the right positioning? The deeper questions that I was really trying to avoid was the confidence of, am I good at this? Does anyone actually want a marketing director?

Am I the right person to be their marketing director? So it was imposter syndrome wearing a niche spiral costume. So what did I do? I decided to pause the pitch sprint. I decided to pause the podcast relaunch. I decided to wait. I decided that in May we would continue the messaging around mom founders, but maybe we wouldn't lead with it. Maybe it wouldn't be the headline. It would just be a part of the story.

And that would guide my content for May because I, know, this is the middle of April and I'm like, okay, but you still have to write your social media content and you've got to plan your podcasts for this month and your email newsletters. And yeah, you're hosting the marketing mixer, which is a networking group for mom founders. So we're not gonna make a hard pivot. We're not gonna stop. We're gonna just like pause. And here's the thing about pausing and being patient that we gotta circle back to. So I've had our...

I don't know if I've talked about it on the podcast or not before, but I have this analogy that marketing is like gardening. So your offers are the seeds and you're planting the seeds, you're putting them out there. And then you have to water them. You have to give them fertilizer. You have to make sure that they get enough sunlight. You have to make sure that they were planted in the right soil conditions. And you have to give them the right amount of time to actually sprout and bloom.

Ruthie Sterrett (09:15.778)

Like it doesn't happen overnight. And with gardening, I mean, there's like historical data that tells us when we need to plant and how long it takes and what the conditions are and how we nurture that seed so that we don't plant a seed and then three days later say, well, this seed is not growing. I just better dig it up and start over. We know we have to be patient and that we have to nurture and cultivate that seed.

Marketing is literally the same thing. Our offers are the seeds. Every single piece of content we put out there is fertilizer or water. The market conditions are the soil and the weather that impacts whether or not our little seeds, our offers grow, AKA meaning convert and sell. So I didn't need to replant my seeds. I didn't need to dig them up.

I didn't need to go out and get brand new fertilizer and different water, like filtered water or sparkling water or pH balanced water. I needed to be patient because here's what happened. In that week that I was spiraling, my ads started to convert. Sales calls got booked. White label relationships brought me projects. And suddenly,

I have eight leads in the pipeline. So I did not need to burn it all down. I needed to wait. But waiting is hard. Waiting and being patient is so hard when you're an entrepreneur, when you're a doer, a solution finder, a get it done kind of person, which that is me. And I'm imagining that if you're listening to this podcast, that is likely you too. So waiting is hard.

But I'm telling you this story because I want you to understand that sometimes we do just have to wait and that being overly reactive is not gonna give you enough time for things to work. Now, yes, is there a balance to that? I mean, I always say that a strategy sitting in a Google Doc does nothing but collect digital dust if you don't act on it.

Ruthie Sterrett (11:36.878)

So we do have to have action, but we also have to have patience and let the time pass. So what does that mean going into the rest of the month? Well, I don't know yet. I know you're here for the conclusion of the story, but I'm gonna leave you with a cliffhanger because as of right now, those eight leads in the pipeline, none of them have been converted yet as of the day that I'm recording this. So I don't know what's gonna happen. I still don't know if we are going to lean in

to the mom messaging or the mom found her messaging again becomes like a character in the story, a subplot, a thread, a storyline instead of the headline. I don't know. And remember that conversation that I was having about golf? Well, follow up to that is one of the leads that booked a call with me from my ads. Guess what her business is. She plans

luxury trips around tennis and golf events. So the universe heard me and it sent me a little wink and said, I heard you. I heard you. And at the end of the day, like what I truly believe is that the universe sends us these winks and these pieces of driftwood as Gabby Bernstein calls them to let us know that we are on the right track and we do need to keep taking action.

like not letting the strategy sit in a Google Doc. And we need to be patient and give it time to breathe and give it time to work.

So why am I telling you all this? Why am I bringing you in behind the scenes? Well, because number one, I believe that as female business owners, we need to highlight the real instead of just sharing the highlight reel. Because you know, when you're sitting in your own comparisonitis and imposter syndrome, you're thinking, everybody else has it figured out. Why haven't I figured it out yet? Why am I the one who's struggling? When in reality, everybody struggles.

Ruthie Sterrett (13:48.034)

They just don't talk about it. And you see like 1%. You see the tip of the iceberg of their reality, but you see 100 % of your own reality. So you think like I'm the only one who struggles when other people do too. And that's what I wanna bring to this podcast. I wanna bring those honest conversations. Those are honest conversations I wanna have inside of the Marketing Mixer, our networking group for mom founders.

And those are the honest conversations that I will have with you as your marketing director, if I'm sitting in your corner, because I'm cheering you on and we're creating the strategies and I'm encouraging you and guiding the team to take the action, to do the work. But I'm also acknowledging the reality and the hardness of it and the mental load of marketing, because part of that mental load is the belief and building the belief.

So I'm not really wrapping this up into a do these five things today or this is what I want your big takeaway to be. I'm just sharing because I think that's important that we have these conversations like I said as female founders and I'm inviting you to the next marketing mixer on May 21st where we do have real and honest conversations about what's working in marketing, what's not, what we as mom founders are dealing with and it's a lot of fun.

register at the consistencycorner.com slash mixer. If you like these behind the scenes podcast episodes, please send me a DM on Instagram and tell me, you know, as a podcaster, you kind of feel like you're talking into the void. I mean, I'm sitting here staring at my computer screen recording, talking to myself and my ring light. So if this resonates, you like these behind the scenes episodes, let me know. And maybe we'll do one a month or one a quarter and take you.

behind the curtain and let you know what's going on in my business and have these real and honest conversations. But I appreciate you being here. I am already cheering you on, my friend. I am in your corner and rooting for you. And I hope to see you at the mixer on May 21st.