Adapting and Pivoting | Ep 76

In today's fast-paced world, being able to adapt and pivot isn't just a business strategy—it's a survival skill. At www.TheBusinessProject.com, we understand that the landscape of entrepreneurship is constantly shifting, and those who can't keep up risk being left behind.

Imagine you've launched a startup with a brilliant idea, only to find that the market has changed overnight. Maybe a new competitor emerges, or perhaps consumer preferences have shifted unexpectedly. If you're not willing to adapt your business model or pivot your strategy, you could find yourself struggling to stay afloat.

This also happens daily to existing businesses all over the country.

We are here to have a conversation about the importance of adapting and how you can structure your business for success no matter what comes your way!

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Transcript

 We're in a new studio today. Yeah. Yeah. What is this, number five in like a year and a half? We're getting, we're getting really good at moving.

For real? Yeah.  Look at our chairs. Why not? Look at this. We are, I think we're coming up. Yeah. Every move has been like a little step up. It has been. This is our final studio, hopefully, for a while. But we don't have anything on the walls yet. And I couldn't get our white tree here yet. We're still, you know, decorating.

But we'll get there. The meat and potatoes is done. It is. So now it's just the The final decorative Lighting and all that stuff the final touches But why why did we do this? Why did we do this? Because we know how to pivot exactly and stay flexible and not freak out. Yep when something Changes. Yep. Yeah, can you do that?

Do you guys are you how how? Adaptable are you in your business when you see a shadow a dark shadow? Do you freeze  and not know what to do?  All right  Do you become a statue, or do you find a way to turn the light on in the darkness? Yeah. Right? And, and, and just, you know, shine a light into that and find ways through it.

All right, what do you do? What's your mindset?  Hope it's the other one. Most of the time when it when there's darkness too, it's like not an actual thing. That was a good Yeah Because when you turn on the light you're like, oh that wasn't as bad as I thought but a lot of us see the darkness Or see the shadow and we're like, oh, it's so scary.

I don't want to do it  but if you just  Punch it in the face and turn on the light. Usually it's not as bad as you think it's gonna be. Find out there's nothing really there.  Actually, all the things that come out of the night when you turn on the light, they scurry. They do. You know, the roaches scatter when you turn on the light.

Do you have roaches in your house? When I was little.  I got some stories to tell. All right, so that's what we're talking about today is we are talking about being flexible in your business, being able to pivot. And we can speak from this in. A lot of experience definitely we've got the experience. Yeah, we've moved so many times This podcast has moved like four or five times My our office business has moved several times you're in the middle of doing a complete reconstruction and you're With a new building and and I think we're we're not going to just talk about the physical moves, but we're going to talk about Like the,  the purpose, purple, like the mission moves, the structural moves to not just the physical moves, right?

No, because there's so much more involved than just,  you know, opening another location or the reason, you know, wanting to open another location, opening another location or going to another place is just, there's so much more involved in that. And even if you're not physically moving. You're say you're you have your business in the same spot for years and years and years The world around you is moving and I feel like it's moving now quicker than it ever has before my god technology is just it's rapidly evolving and Unfortunately, if you're not at least staying up to date on the basics of technology Then you're going to get left behind and we don't want that to happen  100 yeah You Ooh.

So  let's talk about this. Let's do it. Like, why  I, I kind of like want to incorporate the conversation to what we've done. Let's do it. Why, why the business project is here right now. Why are we, why are we, I can't even speak today, . That's re why are we recording here? And, you know, what is the purpose of that and how, what, what drove us to do something like this?

Right. Because it's the goal of the business project is what? To support the small business community, right? To be that resource for small, for the small business community. Um, you know, and technology, incorporating technology the right way is a major part of that. Yeah, especially as the world is evolving and as technology is evolving and it's overwhelming as a business owner.

Because you're like, I don't even know, we went from having Facebook as our main, just one social media, to now 5, 000 different social media platforms. And so even something as basic as that is overwhelming, because you're like, I don't even know now, do I have to do 5, 000 videos a day and post them on all of the things?

Yep.  Exactly. So we're here to help weed that through meeting with experts, meeting, having accounting professionals, having marketing professionals, having, um, what else, lawyers, sales professionals, people that do manage social media accounts, business bureau organizations, Christina, who does website development and systems.

So partnering with all of these people that.  experience in these areas. And there, I mean, Christina just went to, um, I think Vega, I don't know, not somewhere on the, on the West coast. And she spent like three or four days in a big mastermind with people from all over the world talking about systems and managing a business and technology.

And so we're bringing these people in here in the business project to give you guys, That expert, you know, these people that are learning these things for you and we're just putting it in one place. Yeah, and you're building the infrastructure behind it. Not only you've been bringing people in but you're building the infrastructure that businesses can participate in and utilize To help incorporate all of that learning they're getting from these professionals into their business  It's big stuff.

It is big stuff You got you got some strong shoulders there  I do. Yeah. Woohoo. Big strong shoulders.  You need that as a, as a small, especially, you know, not only as a small business owner, but as someone that, um, you know, whose goal is it to support the small business community? You know, you get that, that takes a lot of, uh, courage and a lot of, um, you know, just focus and drive to be able to do something like that.

So  well, I think it helps. And this is.  I guess one tip for you guys. We're not keeping track of tips, but this is a tip. So I just, yeah,  um, I think a really important aspect too, is bringing people in that can do the journey with you and you know, what you have going on here. And we just had a conversation before we went live on, I mean, I could name probably.

10 people that are in a very similar industry as I am, but we have great relationships and we support each other. One of them was going, she just launched a brand new business. Great idea,  put so many hours and thousands of dollars and invested so much into this new business. And then a law got changed that completely flipped her business upside down.

And It's a, it's in a way, it's a competing business with ours. It's advertising. We're after the same customers, but instead of us, you know, putting up a wall and competing against each other, we've come together and we've support each other and how can we work together? And, and I think that that is, I was able to, you know, be a voice for her during that time and help her calm down and brainstorm some ways around it.

Hmm.  And so I think putting people and then you are another amazing example of that, you know We have been in this journey together for what three years now And I wouldn't be here if I didn't surround myself with you because there's so many times How many times have I walked in here and been like i'm done.

I want to quit I think that's that's Yeah.  Yeah.  It's so true. It is. And so I think being open to surrounding yourself with people that understand what you're going through and, and, and not just taking from them, right. I think that's one thing. Like, I can say the people that I've surrounded myself with, most of them aren't just there to take from me and to figure out what they could get from me and vice versa.

I'm not always, Hey, what can I get from this person? Instead I say, what can I give to this person? How can I serve this person? And when both of you are in that mentality and constantly looking how to make each other better, you both grow. Right.  Yeah, that's true. Um, where you're looking for accountability partnerships and mentors and things like that.

It's not just about what can I learn from this person or what can I glean from this person and, you know, what can I give back? If you come into, if you go into that relationship with what can I give back, how can I provide value at the same time as, as I'm getting value, then it is just, uh, you know, it's becomes a more fruitful.

Relationship and more genuine at that point because there's there you then you're truly looking to help each other. Mm hmm Right, and I think you're right when you talk about how there's multiple you you have great relationships with people in your industry Because there's multiple you're not the only person doing what you do.

If you think you are you're wrong  Right, we're going after the same target market. Yeah, even if you're doing it a little bit different There's there's people that are after the same. Yeah  And you know, there's enough to go around, right? So being able to partner and just, um, create relationships with people in your same industry, you know, is a good way to grow your business. 

Instead of looking at them as competitors, you're looking at them as, you know, um, what's the word when you have colleagues, right? Peers, you look at them as peers. Um, and those are people that you can learn from and share information with to help the industry as a whole,  right? Which clients love that.

Customers love that when people are actually working together. To better support your base, your client base.  It's about the mindset, like you gotta change your mindset sometimes as a business owner. Get out of your silo and think that you're only in it by yourself. Cause you're really not, it's a whole community. 

And that kind of ties into what I was, another thing I was talking about. Uh, before we went live is, I went to a networking event last night. And it's for small businesses in our community.  I mean, I guess it's just businesses in our community. And I was a little disappointed because I know a lot of small businesses, business owners in our area.

And there were, I see the same like five at every place that I go. And we've got thousands, thousands of business owners. It was a free event. It costs them nothing but a couple hours on a Thursday night. Literally all they had to do was show up. There was food, there was drinks, and um, yeah, like five out of thousands showed up.

And it was marketed all over the place. It's not like they didn't know about it. And I was just, I was pretty disappointed because I'm like, here, on one end, I've got businesses telling me how they're struggling with things. They're struggling, you know, with, Finding, getting creative, or with social media, or finding employees, or, you know, doing these things.

And then on the other hand, they have an opportunity to show up at an event that can help them. And it might not be in a big way, but you never know what'll happen. And nobody shows up. You never know who you can meet. Mm hmm. Yeah, these events are, um, that, that.  That go on that that type of event I think is is great Um, I wish I could have made it but i'm in the middle of still taxi  Building this  So, you know if it wasn't for that I probably would have been there um, but the fact that and i've been there before, um, but the fact that as a small business  And as this, as I see what you're saying about our, our community in particular, um, how do you expect to grow if you're not getting out there meeting people?

If you're not getting out there networking, you know, how do you, what do you expect? Do you want, do you expect people just to come in because you opened the store or you're providing a service? Like you expect that to be like automatic. You got to get out there, like get out. Get out of your comfort zone  Meet people, you know sell tell your story listen to somebody else's story Because that's truly how you're gonna get your the word out there for what you do Yeah, and talk about adapting and pivoting.

I think that that's a great way to to Put your finger on the pulse of what's happening in your community. If you're staying in your store and or your shop or your office or whatever it is that you do, and you're just working and grinding every day. And even if you're watching videos online, tick talks or whatever of like, you know, the latest to greatest business that's a national, usually it's, you know, you're getting a variety from all over.

But unless you're showing up to local events and participating, you're not going to really be up to date on what's going on and how you can serve your community and, you know, voids that you can fill and what your clientele is struggling with and building these connections. And then in addition to that, There are people in your community that are sticking their necks out there talking from experience because we've done a lot of events and, you know, talk about a two way relationship and giving and thinking, how can I serve this person or this business?

If you're not attending these events that these people are spending hours and hours putting together, you're not serving your community either because that's how we all grow as we person. We've COVID. Oh yeah, yeah. Hey, you know what?  We've gotten away from it, but the community's wanting it. Yeah, right. So I think that uh, Business owners are you know, kind of behind the power curve now when it comes back to pivoting back We're talking pivot COVID hit, you had to pivot, right?

You went from in person to, um, video curbside delivery, non touch, six feet away, whatever the craziness was during that time, now that that's behind us, people want to have that social interaction again.  You want to get that social interaction. If you're not doing that, if you're not, as a business owner, trying to bring that back into your business, then you're behind the power curve.

Get with the program. Yeah, get with it. Big time. I've got, um, my Auntie Bones. What's up, Auntie Bones? And we gotta get to Christina. Or to Lornith. Let's do Lornith first. We're gonna say hey to Lornith. Cause we've got some cool partnerships. See, we do what we say we're gonna do. We work, we collaborate. We collaborate.

We bring others in. So we're gonna give you, um, lne, we're gonna hear something from Laurenne  ig. You just stay tuned. You're gonna get to see the back behind the scenes stuff going on. 

Okay, so we're talking about pivoting and adjusting as a business owner I feel like we talk about this all the time because it's super duper important We talked about being flexible as you're moving locations, but also even if you're stable in one spot Yes, adapting your business model getting out there talking to people building relationships Don't be in it on your own  Why should a business? 

Right, let's talk about adapting when it comes to like getting word out there. Okay. Marketing. On the marketing side of a business. Right. The old way of marketing your business was like  networking. I think networking is always going to be there, right? So the old way you have networking, you have direct mail, you have newspaper ads,  billboards, radio, TV, radio.

That's like the old school way of marketing. Newspapers, did we say that?  I don't think so. The news classified ads and all that. And then it shifted to  what? Like uh, I guess the internet started coming in. Yeah. And you had some internet things. Email. Website. Email. Yeah. Yeah. And I think email is coming back.

Um, and now it's more social media. Mm hmm. Right? Like if you're not, if you're not creating content for your business and you're not posting on social media and you're not. Utilizing social media as an aspect of marketing your business, then, um,  you should consider it. You know what I found though?  It's very important, yes, and it's a piece of the puzzle, but some of the traditional stuff still works.

Oh, yeah. We're going back, actually, to text message marketing and email marketing and funnels and all of that because some of, there's some of it doesn't, I feel like radio doesn't really work like it used to. I don't think TV, radio, or bill, you know, they billboard stuff, I don't think that really works like it used to.

No, but there are some of the traditional things that are working. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We talked before we got on here about web3. Yes, shall we bring that Break that out of the box My mind when you brought it up. Yeah, do you guys know what web3 is? Have you heard of web3 yet? Raise your hand if you have even if you're not watching live today I don't know if it's a real thing if it's really gonna happen but um it like  Mind blown I feel like  We go through these moments speaking about adapting.

We go through these moments in, as a society where this like big thing breaks and changes the world, right? Um, the, one of my thoughts is, you know, doing, uh,  The lines, what's it called, when they did,  The lines? Like, when you create, What are you doing? The production line. Not those kind of lines. No, no.

Conveyor system. Yeah, like um, Like when they were doing cars, right? To where, instead of each person having to go make this, and then make that, and then make this, and then make that, they had, A line. Assembly line. Assembly line. Thank you. That's the word. The assembly line. Not the line. Not the line that you do.

Um, yeah, so they, that was a big, like a, just a big, huge invention. The internet was a big, huge invention. The cell phone was big. Social media, right? So all of these times in history where this thing like completely impacted the way that we live. Well, We had web one, which is the just static kind of how the website web first broke out where it was websites and you just looked and pretty informational. 

And then we had the web two, which is when social media was introduced, where you can like interact and be a part of it. And then now they're talking about. Web three and I don't know a ton about it, but I can give you what I do know, which is like the next big Where we control our content So web two is like it's centralized um, and you know this one central location that is the internet and these places like Facebook and youtube and you know all the things like they they can control your data and your so they own This is one thing we tell the businesses that we work with all the time is, yes, social media is important.

Building your Facebook audience is important. Being seen online is important. All of those things. But at any given moment, Facebook could just take away all of your things, all of your pictures on Facebook that you've put on Facebook. They could just be like, Nope, you're locked out of your account. Never again.

Can you access any of that? You don't own any of that. Well, web three is supposedly a way to where you actually own your Your data. So instead of having it be in a centralized location It is now the blockchain uses and I don't understand all of that But it's a blockchain technology to where  if you create a video you own it.

So it lives in your  Basically you hub they can't they can't block you out of your own content exactly what you're saying. So Facebook can shut you down so a lot of people and this has been happening to a lot of people where You've been getting shut down and locked out of social media and you lose access to all your videos, all your pictures.

That won't be able to happen with Web3 is what you're saying. I, that, from what I understand, is it's more of a blockchain  thing to where it's not owned by those companies that are centralized, but it is, um, it's owned by you. I don't know what that means, but yeah, very interesting. Yeah. So talking about, you know, pivoting and adapting and moving, I feel like this is, and then AI is obviously a big one that. 

Oh yeah. Yeah. Well, I, the way I look at it is now, right. You have social media and you have, that's like your top of the funnel.  When you talk about funnel and how you get people into bias by your product or service. Social media your goal is to get them off of social media into your website into your um sales process, right?

So you still utilize it but not to live there like that's not that's not where your bread and butter is That's just your top of the funnel You want to get them out of there into your ecosystem so that you can house it and control it and all that stuff Right 100. I feel like my microphone. Yeah, I think it's going in and out  There we go  Sorry guys here.

We're gonna go to christina real quick Why don't we fix this? 

So hopefully you guys can hear us. Okay.  You know what I love about this studio? Let's talk about this studio. What is this studio going to do for small businesses? Let's do it. What do you plan on doing with this for small businesses? It's going to be awesome. So John, we've talked about this in previous podcasts is crazy and loco.

He's like, Hey, we're gonna, I just rented a building with 12 offices with all the, in the middle of tax season. Um, You guys are talking over your guests. Oh, that's good. Okay, so We can hear it over christina. We're talking over our guests. Yeah when she was talking we'll get it eventually guys  Thank you.

Antibones. Um  so we uh john is like i'm gonna get this building and completely renovated and so here we are and Uh, we moved all of our stuff over yesterday and today So we're having to reset all of our equipment and things once we got we had it Working great. Um, so stick with us in the next couple of weeks.

We'll have it working perfect. We're going to do like bars across the top. So all of our wires are off the floor. There won't be any stands. It'll all be hanging and really nice. And we'll be able to move the lights and do a, um, you know, backdrops for photographs and things like that. And then rent out the space, hopefully for people that want to use it for podcasting, we have people all the time ask us to  use the space for podcasting.

So this gives us the ability to do that. Yeah. And you know, what's great about that is, you know, that we're going to be able to rent it out to people that want to use it. You know, the business project is going to be able to offer like some back end services out of that. So you just come and record and the business project will handle everything else.

Yeah. Like that's amazing. So many people have ideas that they want to share, have stuff that they want to talk about, but don't know anything about the product. The technology part of it, the process around it. So you don't have to worry about that anymore.  That's crazy. It's going to be nice. I have, I've had several people come to me and they're like, I want to start a podcast and they just want me to get their equipment set up.

And then they have no plan beyond that. Oh yeah. I know so many people like that. Yeah. And I'm like, no, it's a lot more than that. It's a lot more than the equipment.  100%. Yeah.  So, and then you talk about, you're going to talk about collaborating and bringing. More people in and talk about what you're gonna do with the rest of the space Yeah, so the we this building has multiple offices So we're going to be renting those offices out And the goal is to bring in um businesses that can truly support the small business community You know, like lawyers, insurance agents, um, marketing, right?

Um, things like that, website design, all that good stuff, sales coaches, you know, things that small business owners need to be able to help and grow a successful business. And on top of that. We're going to, we're offering, um, shipping services. Yeah. So if you need it, yeah, you need, you work from home and you need an address.

We got you and you can receive and ship your packages from here, from every carrier. The mailboxes are so cute. You see that? I like them. Yeah. And they're really cute. It's going to be fun. They're in position and looking nice and ready to go. It's going to be amazing. Yeah. I think that this leads into a good conversation about the importance of just, you know,  even if you don't have it all figured out, a lot of people, either when starting a business or when wanting to add a service or, you know, change something in your business, or maybe you feel like what you're doing is not working anymore, but you don't know, you're like afraid to take the next step.

I think, um, I mean, I know in my, all of my, all of my past experience with business, if I just say yes, and then figure it out as we go, like build the ship as we go.  I mean, make sure that it's something that you can deliver. Don't just say yes to like building a rainbow to the moon or something. Um, make sure it's something that you can deliver, but if you like are 80 percent 90 percent sure that you've got most of the things figured out, but you're just waiting on the next, you know, 15 or 20 percent then just do it.

Just do it. Just do it. The information on how to do it is out there and most of the stuff you're going to learn is you're going to learn as you go. Just be willing to learn. Don't be stubborn. Be willing to learn. Yep. 100 percent  That's good stuff. Yeah. All right. Well, we fumbled through this one today. We did good.

We did good fumble. Well, yeah It's gonna get better and better you guys i'm excited. We'll give you um a tour of The of the podcast room. Yeah, and of the offices i'll post it tomorrow. I'll post a tour on facebook and instagram tomorrow um youtube shorts So you guys can see the behind the scenes and then we're excited to see you next week.

We'll have Pictures and I really I miss my white tree. It wouldn't fit in my car. Yeah, we'll have the white tree nice edition my favorite thing in the world and then Um, we will see you next week. We have no idea what we will be talking about But I guarantee you it will be good. I can't wait to see how this thing You know, we're gonna have  Guests here talking we're gonna be able to just it's just gonna be a totally new experience Joe padula Is mad at me every Thursday.

I'm on his show every Thursday morning and every Thursday morning He gets mad at me because we have not had him as a guest yet How can we not have had Joe Padula as a guest? I know that guy. He's like really mad. No, not good We don't want Joe Padula mad at us. No, love you, Joe. Yeah, we're gonna we're gonna have he'll be our first guest when we come back  Let's do it.

All right, you heard it from us Hey