FREE Download: Start your own online business checklist

This guide includes:

• How to plan your business

• How to set up your marketing

• How to build your website

• And more!

All in a simple goal-oriented format.

* Disclaimer * Some of the posted links are affiliate programs. By clicking these links, I may receive monetary compensation. This will not alter the price or change the buyer's experience.

We all have weaknesses, whether we want to admit them or not.  We all have gaps in our knowledge or insecurities.  We could all improve on one or two areas, and that’s okay.

I know I am an imperfect person.  I love learning new things and practicing skills I haven’t yet mastered.  These experiences open my eyes to new ways of doing things and help in all aspects of life.

Even when I write each of these blog posts.  I hover over them, scowling, constantly trying to make them better.  I know they’ll never be perfect.  Perfection does not exist.  But I want each publication to be better than the last.  It’s the improvements that push me forward.

You may have your own weaknesses.  Maybe you can’t focus in the morning without a shot of espresso.  Perhaps you allow stress to get to you and are easily overwhelmed.  There are as many examples as there are people on the planet.  Regardless of what your weakness is, you can overcome it.  Be it something monumental or a mere inconvenience.  We can make a blueprint to mitigate the effects.  We all have dreams, plans, and goals, but we don’t all achieve them.

So, what is the difference between those who merely dream big and others who achieve their dreams?

All achievers start out as dreamers.  They may even be ridiculed for their massive ambitions.  Despite this, they played to their strengths and didn’t let their weaknesses impede them. 

They identified weak areas and made a plan to overcome them.  Then, they created an achievable strategy to chase and attain that dream.  Step by step, they created a plan to dominate their niche and followed it to success.

If you want to finally break free of your day job and build a business of your own to love, pick up my FREE business-building checklist.  It will guide you through the steps of building and launching your own profitable business in an easy-to-use, goal-oriented checklist. 

For now, let’s count down 10 areas of weakness you should identify that are holding you back as an entrepreneur.  And I will even give you some tips on overcoming these obstacles to build the life you want.

10 areas of weakness that you should identify.

 We are often highly self-conscious about our own weaknesses.  Even though everyone has areas that they could work on.  For some reason, we allow ourselves to believe that having a weak point somehow makes us less than our colleagues.

This isn’t true.  We need to seek out and identify our weaknesses to make a plan to compensate for them.  If your weakness is spiders, I won’t tell you to adopt a tarantula.  Instead, let’s make plans that don’t involve befriending an arachnid.  Knowing you have this weakness allows you to plan and avoid it or arm yourself with the best spider-fighting technology just in case you have to face one.

I take on too much and forget to delegate!

This is the fastest route to burnout.  When you first start your business, it’s all on you.  You have to wear all the hats and do all the jobs. 

You can rarely hire an entire staff to outsource responsibilities at the onset of your business.  Most of us don’t start out with that kind of seed money.  Instead, we sit at our kitchen table, day in and day out, hustling and grinding for every inch of growth.

And let’s be honest.  Many of us are overachieving perfectionists that refuse to accept help.  We believe we are the only ones who can do the job to our standards.  But this is just going to lead to exhaustion and burnout.

If someone offers you help, take it.  You would be surprised at how many people want to see you succeed!

For other tasks, some services make hiring contract workers to complete simple tasks easier than ever.  Sites like Fiverr connect you with freelancers who can do anything from writing a blog post to doing the graphic design for your next set of Pinterest pins.

You are just going to go over it anyways and rewrite that blog post how you want it.  Let someone else work on the draft.

I struggle with finding clients or promoting my business.

This is the ultimate struggle for every new business.  It doesn’t matter if you are looking for clients or trying to sell products.  Before you can close those sales, you need eyes on your offers. 

The truth is, in the beginning, you need to spend as much time promoting your business as you do creating content.  You have to do something daily that gets your business out there and brings in customers.

This doesn’t mean spreading yourself too thin and trying to frantically post across all social media platforms.  This means choosing one or two platforms and doing them well.  Build a community and engage with your followers.  This will be the best avenue to drive traffic to your site. 

The best marketing plan is consistency.  Be consistent in posting, responding to comments, and engaging with your followers.

Leave your own profile and go comment on other people’s posts.  Start a conversation or continue one.  Don’t sell.  Just talk.  This is how people get to know you and your business.  They have to do this before they fall in love with you and your products. 

I feel icky closing a sale.

I hate selling.  I worked in retail once, and I hated it.  I felt like I was put on the spot every single time a customer came in.  I had terrible anxiety whenever I approached someone, but I needed the job.  What could I do?

I worked at Levi’s, a clothing store that specialized in denim.  It was a mall job, and I was 18.  Every time I approached a client with a “Hello!” or a “Welcome!” I could feel them tense up.  They knew as well as I did that I was paid on commission, and it was my job to make sure they spent money.

Years later, I was working at a pharmacy, and I was asked to call some of our patients and remind them that their refills were late.  Most of them were elderly, so they might have forgotten.  I actually found myself enjoying this. 

I would call them each and let them know who I was and that I was just reminding them to place their refill.  There was no pitchy sale call.  I just asked them to check how much they had left and, if they needed more, to give me a callback and place the order.

Most of them thanked me for the reminder.  A good portion of the patients placed the order on the call, saying they had meant to call but had kept forgetting or putting it off.  It wasn’t long before I realized this was sales, just like in the retail store.

So, why did I enjoy calling the patients to remind them of their refills, but I hated selling clothes?

Well, first of all, I truly felt I was helping people.  I believed in what I was doing, and I was doing it for a good reason.  It was not just tied to needing money.  I actually wanted to help these patients, and I was concerned for their health, having to go without their medication.

Secondly, I was not making any hard sales.  The patients were familiar with the company and what we offered.  I was simply a conduit between them and their order.  They knew what they needed.  I was just able to sit back and fill that need.

If sales make you feel icky, you don’t have to engage in icky sales tactics.  Remember, you are the boss.  You can decide what you will or will not do in your business.

Start by only offering products and services that you love and believe in.   When you know that you can help your clients, it is so much easier to explain the benefits of your offers.  If you’re confident in your ability to help and provide value, it will be easier to offer your assistance.

Next, if you don’t like making hard sales, don’t.  Create landing and sales pages explaining every aspect of your offer and the exact process the client goes through.  Make it so comprehensive that there are no questions left unanswered. 

Leave space for clients to email you directly from that page if they have any questions.  Then, you only have to answer inquiries, and the sales page will do the rest.

I can’t come up with content.  It’s overwhelming.

There are three simple strategies for having endless content:

First, coming up with new content ideas is an everyday job.  Don’t save this for when it’s time to sit down and create content.  Keep a journal and write every idea that comes to mind.  Even if it’s something that you are not ready to pursue yet.  This way, you will have these ideas ready for you in one place when you are prepared for them.  Review it regularly to draw inspiration from it.

Second, stretch each content idea.  Extending one idea into many is much easier than developing new ideas.  When you find a topic to write about, try to think of 3 to 5 different perspectives to write about it.  These can then be spaced apart and posted over the year.  Let’s say you have a crafting blog, and you want to write about making resin bookmarks:

1. How to make a resin bookmark

2. Safety precautions when working with resin

3. What kind of embeds can you add to resin?

4. Experiment with different types of embeds and how they turn out.

5. Trying different resin brands, which one works best?

6. Top 10 styles of resin bookmarks

Rotate your content between evergreen, personal, “viral,” and behind the scenes.  This will give your followers enough information to get value from your content and get to know you better.  The better your followers know you, the easier it is for them to like and trust you, converting them into paying clients.

I am an overachieving perfectionist!

The sooner you realize perfection does not exist, the faster you can start having fun with entrepreneurship.  It’s okay to have high standards, but you also have to understand that sometimes others don’t live up to them.

Let go of perfectionism and strive for progress.  Especially when you are juggling everything by yourself.  You will exhaust yourself trying to be all things to everyone.  Allow yourself some grace, and just do your best.

Whether it’s a blog post, a printable, or an offer, you can constantly improve as you move forward.  Your website will be a constant work in progress, edit and update it as you go.

Identify what stresses you out

If you know what your stress triggers are, you can make a plan to avoid them.  If deadlines push you to the edge, use your editorial calendar to plan out all the due dates for the quarter.  This will allow you to budget your time accordingly from day one. 

As long as you can identify what stresses you out, you can avoid it or make a plan to mitigate it.  Taking a pre-emptive approach to lessening or avoiding stressors can help to save you from burnout. Once the stress is triggered, you should seek immediate action to address and de-escalate it. 

Taking time out for regular self-care can also help to relieve stress.  And walking away from stressful situations and taking a breather is not selfish.  It is necessary.  Do not feel guilty for taking time out for yourself.  Sometimes you have to say no and prioritize your needs when overburdened.

Pinpoint what causes you to procrastinate.

Procrastination has many faces and even more triggers.  If you know one quick YouTube video can quickly turn into a 3-hour binge-fest, it’s probably best to avoid it.  Instead, wait until you have addressed your obligations to open the app.

Be honest and aware of procrastination triggers to pre-emptively save time and anxiety.  Take care of your obligations first, then procrastinate.  It will feel so much better not having the nagging weight of everything you’re supposed to be doing pressing down on you. 

First, figure out what kind of procrastinator you are.  We have an excellent video for this.  Next, make a solid plan on how to avoid procrastinating.  Finally, make a contingency plan to exit the cycle once you have noticed yourself starting.

Recognize your distractions.

Some people work best with music or their favourite TV show playing in the background.  Others get distracted by the slightest noise.  Knowing what kind of interferences can completely pull your focus is essential in setting up your work session.

Identify what kind of distractions pull your focus the most.  Is it people walking around?  Or the view of someone watching a movie out of the corner of your eye?  Realizing what distractions pull your focus is a critical first step in overcoming them.

If you have trouble with auditory distractions, try wearing headphones or earbuds when working in busy areas. 

You don’t have to have anything playing.  The noise-cancelling properties of these gadgets should muffle the voices enough for them to be indistinguishable.  Sometimes this is enough to avoid distraction and turn intrusive talking into white noise.

Be alert for your personal productivity triggers

Whenever you pick a location to settle in and get some work done, do a quick survey for distractions or triggers.  Is the area too loud?  Do they have a tv directly in your line of sight?  Are people continuously walking around you or bumping into you?

Being alert for these disturbances can help you to push through them before becoming a problem.  Finding a completely silent space devoid of diversions is not always necessary.  It’s nice to work in a café or park, instead of alone at your kitchen table sometimes.

Schedule around times when you know you’re not productive.

Sometimes the time of day can be your weakness.  Are you a morning person or a night owl? 

If you notice you are incredibly productive in the morning but drag in the evening, do not force yourself to work at night.  The same logic applies if you find yourself alert late at night. 

Plan your work time around when you are most alert and productive.  Plan your leisure and self-care time around your slumps.  It’s often like walking through quicksand to motivate yourself to do something against your body’s clock…. Daylight savings, anyone?

This can sometimes be difficult if you have young children.  Mornings can be a mess when getting them settled, and the evening is often a write-off.  Create a routine that allows you to carve out a bit of time to focus on what you need to do.  Even if it’s 15 minutes, they are picking at Goldfish in their highchair.

Make a plan to conquer each of your weaknesses!

Create strategies and backup strategies that can work around or compensate for your weaknesses.  There is no shame in having a weak point, just as long as you are honest and ready to address it.  No one is perfect, and being conscious of where you can and want to improve is a terrific first step.

Creating an action plan with manageable tasks that you can tackle is the easiest way to achieve your goals.  This can sometimes be overwhelming, so I have designed a digital course to guide you through the entire process.

In this course, we create a simple, actionable, step-by-step plan to reach your revenue goals.  First, we set your growth goals and break down each milestone into quarters.  Finally, we plan a business and marketing strategy.  When completed, you will have a comprehensive plan broken down into precise metrics and tasks you can finish daily to reach your milestones.  Spreadsheets do all the math for you, and workbooks guide you through the process so you can focus on your business and not get caught up in the details.

• Define revenue and growth goals for your business.

• Create a stepwise plan to reach your targets.

• Audit and understand your expenses.

• Identify and create streams of revenue to help achieve or surpass your goals.

• Create an actionable plan to consistently hit your targets.

• Develop a comprehensive strategy to grow your business.

• Plan sales goals, and product launches, for your fiscal year.

This course includes everything you need to create your business strategy for the year and the marketing plan to promote it.  I take all the uncertainty and overwhelm out of setting big goals and sticking to them.  Interactive templates and a workbook are provided.  You will learn everything you need to know.  Templates calculate all your revenue targets, so you don’t have to.

Often, simply being aware of areas of weakness is enough to counteract them.  As long as you are mindful of shortcomings, a plan can be made to compensate.

Knowing the areas where you are weak is not meant to diminish your confidence or make you feel bad.  Identifying the areas in which you are vulnerable will help bring awareness to improve your efforts or take extra precautions to make up for deficiencies.

Don’t forget to pick up your copy of our free business checklist.  It will guide you through the steps of building and launching your own profitable business in an easy-to-use, goal-oriented checklist.  Just click this link to download.

I want to be transparent so that there are no misunderstandings. As an affiliate, I may earn a small commission from any products linked in this post. This is not a sponsored post, and I was not asked to recommend these products. These are products that I genuinely love and wanted to share with my audience.