Why your DIY approach to coaching might be costing you more than actual coaching

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Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:12

Welcome to Designing Success from Study to Studio. I'm your host, Rhiannon Lee, founder of the Oleandra Finch Design Studio. I've lived the transformation from study to studio and then stripped it bare and wrote down the framework so you don't have to overthink it. In this podcast, you can expect real talk with industry friends, community, connection, and actionable tips to help you conquer whatever's holding you back. Now let's get designing your own success.

Speaker: 0:37

Over the weekend, I read a favorite of mine. It's an oldie but a goodie if you haven't read it before and especially if you haven't got a marketing degree and you would just like something to step things out. I actually realized as I was going through, I was like, oh, a lot of this foundational stuff exists. Inside of the framework for emerging designers. But it is a book by Ellen Dibb and it's called the one page marketing plan. And I often just stop into some of my faves from time to time. I went for a big drive. I was driving for sort of three and a half hours. So I had my audio book in my ear and it was a really nice reminder, but there was a specific quote at the beginning that really spoke to me. I wanted to share it with you today. And that is, that struggling business owners will spend time to save money, whereas successful business owners will spend money to save time. Because you can always get more money, but you can never get more time. And it was a bit of a mic drop moment for me, because I was like, yes, that's actually how I see the difference between emerging and established interior designers. I have spoken To three experienced designers this week, just looking for space in my calendar to plug in some one on one coaching pockets intensive coaching for, you know, fewer than wanted before Christmas, but there's really only one spot before Christmas. And then after that Christmas break to start 2025 with intention. And we had no issues talking about the budget for that kind of intensive coaching, it's something that has to be done. It's something that's beneficial. And today I really wanted to talk to you about DIY approach to coaching might be costing you more than actual coaching, right? So firstly, let's prefix this with, again, no shade, not ever. I was the scrappiest startup that ever started up. You will see me patch together all sorts of things. So obviously the first year of business, I've spoken about it often. I had a six week Um, you know, I worked 10 hours a week, there's very little income in the house. I wanted to kick off my career, but I certainly didn't have investors or backers, or I wasn't coming into it from a place of Oh, here's the 10, 000. I have to start a business. It was more like from a place of I'll get one client and invest 80 percent of what that client paid me into something that my business needs like Canva Pro or, and I just kept spending to earn and getting better and better on that sort of wheel. Now that I am in my seventh year of business, I never want it to sound preachy if I'm coming at you and saying these are some things to consider. It's just that, when you know better, you do better. And now when I think about how much time I actually physically lost trying to do it all myself, I'm like, Oh my gosh, I should have just saved up, found a person who'd already done it, who was willing to share with me, coach me through, mentor me, speak to me, support me and give me the pass to the fast lane and just stop googling all of the things. Half the time, I didn't even know what I should be searching for or what I was even googling. So today, I'm talking to the common objection that coaching is, or a group membership is not something that I can invest in just yet or it's too expensive. Whereas I really feel as I watch people progress and the way that they leave the framework, I feel like something like the framework is a really smart long term investment that actually saves so much time and helps you get to your goals faster. Okay. So let me ask you something. How much time did you spend Googling how to price interior design projects this week or this month or this year, or piecing together random advice from Instagram posts? So podcasts or bits out of marketing books, like I just read to you, if you're trying to figure it all out on your own, you might actually end up paying more of a price just in wasted time. It's so great that we have tools like AI and other things, but if you still don't know how to use them, and you've got to go back to basics and learn. You might be putting a lot of your attention into parts of your business that won't actually help you get a result. So what am I talking about? There's a reason inside of the branding studio in the framework, I set timelines and expectations around how long I want people to spend on certain tasks because otherwise a website could just be the first six months you're worried about going live. telling people you're an actual designer, you're worried about what you're going to do and the first clients. So then, we can tend to lean on procrastination and just play in that space of getting our logos right and our website and branding. Branding is super important, but it takes on such an evolution anyway. And we're always going to change it that it's sort of like, Oh, you probably don't need to spend as much time as we do in that procrastination stage at the beginning. When I started my business, I absolutely was like, look, I just need to save all the money and do it all myself. Massive spoiler alert. I didn't save much money or any time I spent three times as much time just Trying to learn how to do the thing. I'm such a big believer in like reading all the nerd forums. I call them nerd forums, but like Reddit threads and things where people are talking about how to DIY your coding and do stuff. I love a challenge like that, but I look at so many designers and I think, Oh, while we were doing all of that, you could have got on with designing in some beautiful projects and start working with some actual clients. So in this episode, we're getting stuck into the hidden cost of the DIY approach and how coaching could actually save you time, money, and stress. And the first thing I'm going to say about the DIY approach is what happens when you invest in or work with a coach in a paid capacity is you go all into their voice and you start. And Just not hearing the cacophony of noise as much. So when you're doing things for free, you're going, Oh my God, Claire at the little design codes got all this great educational content. She sure does. You taking a bit of that, that's Claire's way of doing things. And if you're not, if she's not aware of the context of your business, she's talking in a vague, generalized way. Non specific way about things that are great for the design industry. Her content is fantastic, but it isn't about you and your individual goals. Then you're going over here and you're going, okay, cool. I'm going to go check out. I don't know some other platforms. Players in the education space, in the design industry. I listened to this podcast in the U S and or a well designed business, a Luann, like I'm going to go and listen to a conversation and picking out bits and pieces. All I actually got from doing that. And I listened to that. I listened to wing that social, I listened to all the big Jenna Kutcher and Amy Porterfield and everything. All I got was confused. And actually I wasn't skilled enough to know which parts of those I should be putting together. Pulling out and plugging into my business to drive a result and which parts I just thought, Oh, that sounds good. I thought it sounded really good, but the information that Claire was giving was for established designers who were five to 10 years into their business, and I was trying to plug it into my first year of business play, or I was getting information from this podcast about marketing. But I'm not even in the same market. That's a U. S. designer speaking about the challenges in a U. S. economy at a post elect, like all sorts of things. And I just didn't put two and two together.\ DIY often feels like the safe option. Obviously you've got no skin in the game. You haven't paid anything. And it's really easy to think I can't afford coaching right now. I'll just figure it out or I'm capable. So I don't need to spend money on it. Nobody is doubting you. capacity to learn this sort of stuff. I work with designers day in and day out, and not once have I ever thought, oh wow, I really had to teach her to do that. Nope. I shared a roadmap on which of the things would really move the needle in her business, and which things she could bypass, risk free. I listened to her, I supported her into a next level of her business, but I absolutely do not trust her. Or they don't ever go, Oh, it's because you probably couldn't figure it out. I had to teach you. No way, they absolutely can. It's just a case of if you go to try to figure it out, you're probably tripling the time that you're spending on that one question. And let's be honest, choosing what feels cheaper or safer upfront is important. It's just something that we will all do. The internet is full of free advice, like I said, but the challenge, it actually lays in the curation and shifting through it and figuring out what is correct for you and what is actually a good idea that you need right now, versus just a good idea in the universe. Having said all of that, I think you can get that sense of when you actually start writing. Like just going on the explore page, grabbing good Instagram hooks for this. And this is a bit of that we're wasting so much time and energy. If somebody could just sit down and say, what are the three challenges? What are the three goals? Where do you want to be this time next year? What does your business look like for your existing business? Tell me a little bit about your processes, your systems. Show me behind the scenes of your business, and I will show you a Step by step map to get you to whatever it is that those goals were that you just mentioned. And that is what you actually need real clarity and not just, a whole bunch of things that you've saved in Instagram folders that you'll never go back and implement. And that's the other thing. And I even see this inside of the framework from time to time. It is down to action and implementation. I can, you can bring the horse to water, but you can't make it drink and you can build the entire. framework and you can build this group coaching program that if you see it through weekly from zero to the 12 months, you will feel so secure, supported, and skilled in your business at that level that I can't even believe it, especially with all of our AI assistants and whatnot. And and I can't ever imagine just going back to a place where I was making that up as I went along. It's starting to make me feel really stressed out now that I know there's a different way. One designer I spoke to a few weeks ago told me she spent days trying to write her first proposal. And that's just something that we can solve in minutes with Percy the pricing calculator, the scope of work templates, the step by step, me saying this is what happens. You have a discovery call, then you go to the in home, then you do this, then you do that and just stepping it out for you. And I think. literal days Googling what does an interior designer charge to come over for an hour or after I've been to the in home consult, what do I do? There's heaps of content out there but it's generally, as we say, not targeted, very vague, it's like somebody's blog for keywords, it's not actual advice. And then what we see then is where it costs us so much time Googling, as I mentioned, or days writing proposals, but there's also a financial cost. So DIY almost always leads to undercharging or missed client opportunities. or mistakes I absolutely hear all the time. I hear all the time in the first three months of the framework. If somebody has started taking on clients that they, one student was leaving over a thousand dollars per project on the table before joining The framework. And this is for smaller projects. So I can see so clearly how after working with one or two clients with the right pricing, that change in their business has actually paid for The 12 months of the framework and all the video lessons and all of the special guests and everything that they unlock and get access to when they come in. I'm like, Oh my gosh, Just in those two small tweaks and not undercharging. You've sponsored yourself to be in the framework for a start and you're not missing client opportunities. You're not missing opportunities to pitch yourself. You have someone in your corner saying, Hey, no, why don't you reach out to the brand and do a collaboration? Here's a copy of my last brand collab presentation. You can tweak it for yours and send it off and use the assistance to write it. We're constantly driving that result and I'm constantly pushing the girls inside of our weekly zooms to step up and do something scary, like to actually reach a little higher. And then lastly, we have the emotional costs, I think of DIY because it creates just constant second guessing, overwhelmed decision fatigue. You're always wondering, am I doing this right? I just Googled it and it was an, a blog from 2021, but I'm copying the pricing structure. Is that outdated news now? Does this person even know what she's talking about? Another social media guru telling me about, hashtags are dead. Hashtags are living. What's going on? The algorithms change. It's all about reels. No, go do carousels. And you're just wasting so much time. Your business deserves better. You actually can stop this overwhelm and stop the cacophony of. People shouting by just committing to, and in no way am I saying that I am the right business coach. I appreciate, I am not the right business coach for everyone. I am incredibly solution focused, a little bit, no nonsense. I like to get in and get results. I don't like to get in and manifest stuff and wish it towards me. I'm not very, I don't know. There's lots of things that I'm not good for, but if you're looking for practical, actionable solution based results, then I am the right coach for you. So when you do find that coach, and as I say, there are so many of us out there. It could be anyone that you connect with and you get the right coaching in your corner. You get proven systems. Instead of starting from scratch, you get feedback, you get to iterate. They, my course is really high touch. So you would send me a link and I'd be like, yes, loved it on Patriot and make this change. Or I think you should do this instead. You don't have to, but you will get my feedback. You will get all the templates, workflows, tried and tested stuff that other businesses are built on right now and expert guidance at your fingertips. So you won't be. sitting in that thing that I just said am I doing it right? Nothing slows down your progress because all you have to do is ask. Jump in the Slack chat, show the other girls, what are your thoughts? I'm thinking about this and get a response straight up. Coaching teaches you how to charge your worth and attract the right clients and avoid all the mistakes, which actually, as I say, mostly saves you money. I always see recouped investments within a couple of months just by switching pricing strategies or the fact that I will look at your pricing and go, here's the industry standard where you live. Here's what we should be doing. We've got a whole pricing calculator and AI assistant who you can work with if you don't want me to tell you no, but if you come to me and you've worked with Percy and you're also trying to go in like half price, because you're a bit nervous about your skill or your ability, then we're really going to coach you to come up from that, so that you're making some money. Because a profitable business is where you want to be at. If you're not going to go work for someone else, and you've got to make it work for yourself, it has to work for you financially. Coaching also really reduces stress. So having someone in your corner, it makes you feel really supported. It makes you feel more confident. They believe in your skills. They're also someone you can call if you're like, Oh my God, I just got off a discovery call and I forgot to ask the person's what room we were working on and I'm too embarrassed to go back. What? That's a real story from when I was new. I'd do it all the time. I'd be like, okay, great. Can't wait. I'll send you the invoice. And then I was like I forgot to ask what room of the house. And it's so embarrassing, but you know what? You only do it two or three times. And then you think I never want to do that again. I look like such an unprofessional freak. I'm just not doing it anymore. And then you put a post it note right in front of you. That's like room, budget, timeline, and just teach yourself to be better at those things. So ask yourself how much time you're spending right now figuring things out on your own. How many opportunities are you missing because you're stuck in a DIY mode and you're just trying to get it to work? Or you get an inquiry, a collaboration request a feature in a magazine. Something you haven't done yet and you just go to ground because you're like, I don't know how to pitch for that. I don't know how to send you a quote for what my appearance fee is. I don't know anything cause I've never done it before. And you're going back into the Google cycle instead of reaching out to your coach and your team and your group and saying, Oh my God, I've got this opportunity. What do you guys think? And we work it out together or we lean on previous experience and other things that we have templated and ready to go. When you invest in your coaching, you're not just spending money. Like you save time, you grow faster, you reduce the emotional toll of running a business alone, you meet new friends, you put it all on your tax return anyway to be like, that's a business expense, it's business coaching and you I think get a better result because you lean in and commit. I said it earlier in the podcast, but skin in the game matters. Whenever I have invested in anything, you bet your bottom dollar, I will see it all the way through. I will become the best of the best at it because I'm like, Oh, I've spent five figures on this small group coaching. I want to make sure that this takes my business all the way. I have invested in some expensive masterminds in the past and some private coaching and all sorts of things, but those have always been the things that have had the most impact in my business and have driven the greatest result because as soon as I've paid for it, I'm like, I'm really excited. I'm getting the support. I'm getting in there. I have been burned too. I think many of us have, there are some pretty crappy, people out there running some pretty crappy courses and I can't apologize for them. I won't speak to them. They're not me. All I know is that, if you ask the right questions, if you're worried at all, reach out to the person who runs the course, ask for a personal tour. I will jump on a zoom call with you and show you anything you want to see behind the scenes. I just can't give it to you till you've paid your enrollment. anyone following along or who signed up to my email would know that right now we are taking new students into the framework for emerging designers. So anybody basically under five years experience who needs to work on processes, systems, documentation, marketing needs there, to look over their branding, to completely step out a roadmap and to learn how to use the AI assistance so that you're doing stuff. Smarter from the start, not adding things in later. You're just like the lucky ones that get to come along and just learn how to use AI. If you're ready to stop DIYing and you really want to get serious on your business in 2025, enrollment for the framework is open. Head to www. oleanderandfinch. com up the top. There's in the menu, it says courses, emerging designers. You can join today, start building out your dream business. I'll be here every step of the way. You'll meet with me weekly. Talk to me anytime you want. Get my eyes across everything that you do and, Spots are limited. This is your chance to get support you need to make 2025 the breakthrough year. It's incredible what kind of designer you could be at the end of 12 months with that kind of group support and friendship and ability to ask questions and that you're not off Googling it all on your own. Wish I could gift it to absolutely everybody coming into this industry just because I hate seeing people struggle and I hate seeing businesses go under or not make it because they weren't properly supported and they weren't given this real time sense of desire to help them move forward. So having someone there who's just so passionate about being able to say, This is exactly how to do it. As I mentioned, the framework is open, but it is closing again, end of month. So you only have a week or so, please, if you want to book an alignment call with me, just come and see me in my DMS over on Instagram at oleander underscore and underscore Finch, and let's have a little chat. It may or may not be the right fit for you, but there's lots of different ways and capacity that I can coach you and help you to stop Googling and patchworking your business And start planning your quarters and sales mapping and understanding your business at a CEO level so that you can start running one that has space and capacity to grow lots more clients and lots more time in our days and doing all the fun things with AI so that we can just relax. Speaking of AI, I'm running a free Q& A on AI, all things AI, ask me anything tonight. So if you're listening to this in real time, that was last night. If you'd like a replay, please DM me. I'd be very happy to send you a replay and maybe you'd watch that in your own time so you can learn a little bit more about AI. that are available. It was a very casual chat. It is, yeah, definitely just a Q and a not like a full webinar, but I've got plenty of things that I can share with you. If you would like to learn a little bit more about what is out there and how it helps interior design businesses. Okay. I will speak to you on Thursday. Bye for now.

Speaker 3: 20:36

That wraps up another episode of Designing Success from Study to Studio. Thanks for lending me your ears. Remember, progress over perfection is the key. If you found value in today's episode, go ahead and hit subscribe or share it with a friend. Your feedback means so much to me and it helps me improve, but it also helps this podcast reach more emerging and evolving designers. For your daily dose of design business tips and to get a closer look at what goes on behind the scenes, follow at oleander underscore and underscore finch on Instagram. You'll find tons of resources available at www. oleanderandfinch. com to support you on your journey. Remember, this is your path, your vision, your future, and your business. Now let's get out there and start designing your success.