TGIF: Biz Dev Fridays

Thank God It’s Friday (if you come from Mars and were wondering what TGIF stands for): today it’s my first official “Business Development Friday” since I announced I’m working on making businessbloomer.com more acquirable.

The picture you see above is a perfect fit (apart from the “dm” logo which I have no idea what it is. Sorry… you’re on Pixabay).

If I am to develop my business, I must open a vault every Friday, lock myself inside it, and get work done. I’m out only when I’m happy.

Anyhow, there used to be a time, at Google, when they encouraged employees to work 20% of their time on “what they think will most benefit Google“. That meant one day/week was fully dedicated to business development, brainstorming, planning, spin-offs and such.

Then Google suddenly dropped this rule for “productivity” reasons (thankfully I don’t work there). That’s a pity. Because it’s a great idea. And today I’m excited to announce Business Bloomer is now following that same 80:20 formula.

Fridays will be dedicated to business development. No client work, no client emails, no content, no social, nothing else. Just pure "planning and getting things done" time Click To Tweet

In this way, I have no distractions and can focus on reaching my ultimate goal of selling Business Bloomer for 1M USD.

So, what will Biz Dev Fridays look like at Business Bloomer HQ? Read more to see how I’m getting organized and how I plan on working.

No client work. Really?

It’s hard not to open your emails and notice clients need this and that. And need it right now.

Fine, I will be opening my emails on a Friday, that’s not the problem. The real issue is to actually spend time replying to them, getting work done and let clients dictate when you have to work and when you don’t.

While I totally get if a client’s WooCommerce site goes down or has serious issues (such as a broken checkout), well, for the other requests it’s as simple as saying to myself “I’ll be back on Monday“. Clients won’t get a “Sorry, I’m doing biz dev today“, it will be totally sufficient to get back to them on Monday without coming up with an excuse.

They already know I work with no deadlines, so a day or two won't make a difference Click To Tweet

So, from today onwards, I won’t replying to client emails unless it’s urgent WooCommerce matter with their sites / businesses. First rule in.

In case I have a backlog of projects to get done, well, that’s my fault for having overloaded my week. This will mean I’ll work a few hours on a Saturday or Sunday so that I don’t end up upsetting my clients. But other than that, Friday is Biz Dev Friday and that’s the only way I can concentrate on my objectives.

Coming up with a system

If I don’t get organized, my Biz Dev Friday would become a waste of time and money. Because, yeah, I could’ve worked on that client’s WooCommerce website and get paid for it…

So, I need to come up with a system that would suit the flow and get myself to work without thinking “oh, I could do that instead“. Once again, I’m trying to fully focus on my goal, so I can’t afford any distraction.

Here goes the system, which I’m literally brainstorming now as I type:

1. Write a public Biz Dev post on this website: writing helps you empty your brain. Also, it helps with planning because you need to explain things to other people with proper language. Sharing things in public is what made Business Bloomer a success, so I believe this is the right thing to do. Last week’s post got a lot of shares on Twitter and 153 unique views in the first 2 days, it’s amazing to know there are many people interested in my work and hearing about my developments.
2. Define a Biz Dev to-do list (you’ll read my first list below): in this way, I know exactly what needs to be done and, in case time’s up, what I need to do next Friday. Once again my goal is developing the productized chunk of Business Bloomer: online courses, Bloomer Armada memberships, newsletter sponsorships, affiliations and other “products” I won’t uncover for now (more will be announced in the next few weeks). Also, as I said last week, I need to look at analytics data regularly, bring in more workforce and keep generating traffic on and off site. Seems like a lot of work. Well, it is
3. If necessary, address urgent client work e.g. site down. If not necessary and clients aren’t in trouble right now, skip to 4
4. Get stuff done. That’s it. Otherwise I get nowhere.
5. Save a log of daily achievements. Because it’s nice to end the day compiling a list of things that were done based on your to-do list. You’ll read my achievements log from today below, so that you can either clap or slap me in the face because I got nothing done…

So far, so good. Now it’s up to me to make the system work. It’s important to highlight the fact writing is helping me focus on my daily objectives. It’s also a nice routine.

Doing nothing gets you nowhere Click To Tweet

If I can “block” my brain once/week and concentrate on business stuff, surely I can go far.

My first Biz Dev to-do list

I’ll keep it short and straight to the point so I don’t waste your and my time. I’ll try to move in every business development direction, so you’ll find a list for each topic/section.

1. Data analytics to-do list

• Collect “day zero” data from Google Analytics, Metorik and newsletter software with historical data from the last 10 years. In this way it’s easier to notice improvements while I spend time on business development in the next months
• Write (pre-write) a post for the public which will go live next week showing such data trends, so that I keep being transparent and can then show comparisons as I work on Business Bloomer acquisition value

2. Workforce to-do list

• Talk with my September newsletter co-author (yes, that’s a new thing!) to define details
• Pay and re-hire copywriter for affiliate content (I invest, but will get the money back with affiliate commissions): define 3 new posts, titles, outlines, quote

3. Top of the funnel to-do list

• Blog: keep writing one WooCommerce snippet/week for Business Bloomer fans / SEO / populating Wednesday’s newsletter
• Newsletter: since I’m trialing new software for WooCommerce Weekly, double check user import, add logo, add new sections such as the co-author bio, add signup form @ Business Bloomer, start working on the new website, define sponsorship plans and how to invoice sponsors
• Twitter: one post/day if possible. Find a tweet scheduler. Thanks, Google: just found out that can be done via ads.twitter.com – scheduling some WooCommerce posts right now until next Friday!
• Facebook: I haven’t been on Facebook for ages and I deleted myself a couple of years ago. I used to hang out on FB a lot within the various WooCommerce help groups. Ideally, I’d like to create my own private, vetted, subscriber-only group. TBD
• YouTube: I don’t have my recording gear here in the beach house so I’ll hold on for now until we move back to the city next week or so
• Speaking: just applied to WordCamp Italia 2021 and WooSesh. Hope they pick me!
• Podcast: TBD. For now you can listen to the chat I had with BobWP on DoTheWoo a few weeks ago
• Guest blogging: said yes to an expert round-up proposal, but I need to up my game if I wish to reach bigger audiences

4. Product development to-do list

• “New product”: to be announced soon. Simply keep working on it until it’s ready to be sold. Maybe next week, unless client work is too much
• Online courses: put down outline for PHP for WooCommerce and CSS for WooCommerce courses, and CustomizeWooAdmin mini-course. Remember to define Black Friday promo for existing WooCommerce courses. Talk to partners to see if they want to create & sell their own course (or co-create and co-sell)
• Affiliates: now that I think of it, I’ve been using AffiliateWP for ages on Business Bloomer but never did anything with it. I need to approach potential affiliates and tell them about the earning potential. I also need to approach existing affiliates to remind them their links are still active
• Bloomer Armada: consider switching it to an annual subscription as opposed to a manual renewal. Either way, define 2x year promotions where I push sales. Increase the number of WooCommerce-related discounts and check on the existing ones. Re-add “affiliate program” to the list of benefits for SUB and PARTNERS, and email them to let them sign up. Update “150,000+ Monthly Readers & 14,000+Subscribers” to reflect 2021 figures. Remind users via design that the “WooCommerce Mentorship” I personally offer via tickets is invaluable (consider switching to a ticket system e.g. ZenDesk, Help Scout?). Remove duplicate users if any when they purchase the same membership twice
• Guest blogging: I require guest blogs to become a Bloomer Armada “partner” in order to publish on Business Bloomer. Close more partnerships
• Affiliate content: already talked about the copywriter for new posts. Add a recommended plugin to some of the most popular posts
• Newsletter sponsorship: already talked about defining slots, rates, frequency and invoicing
• Premium newsletter: TBD

Getting stuff done…

As I said, without action I go nowhere. Based on the to-do lists above, I’m trying to achieve as much as possible in these few hours I have left.

And here’s the final result since Friday (today’s Wednesday).

Last Friday I wrote this article but I had no time left to get things done unfortunately. Family time took priority. Click To Tweet

So, I made up for it on Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday:

Up until today, here’s what I’ve done, if we follow the same order in the to-do lists above:

• Data analytics
  • I started taking Google Analytics screenshots – no Metorik yet as I ran out of time
  • Next week’s post “From analytics to business growth” is already half written, happy with that. Sign up here to be the first to know:

• Workforce
  • David Mainayar from PeachPay agreed to be my WooWookly newsletter co-author for September. Delighted of having him! He already wrote some WooCommerce tutorials for Business Bloomer and every week he’ll share some Woo-thoughts as well. Looking forward to that! You can sign up at https://wcwkly.com/ if you want to read more
  • I’ve hired two copywriters on a one-off basis for assessing quality and price, very happy with what I’ve got (here’s the first: https://www.businessbloomer.com/woocommerce-dropshipping-plugins); so I’ve renewed one writer’s contract for another 3 WooCommerce posts. Looking forward to getting some help in writing non-dev and affiliate articles
• Top of the funnel
  • 3 new posts on Business Bloomer
  • WooWeekly newsletter going out today
  • 1 tweet/day about WooCommerce, happy with that
  • Facebook, I signed up again for some WooCommerce groups
• Product development
  • Haven’t done much here unfortunately, because I spent lots of time putting together the new WooWeekly newsletter website https://wcwkly.com

Wrapping up

It’s been a busy few days and haven’t got done as much as I would have loved.

But I got to start, I got to block my Fridays, and I’m on the right direction.

Wanna help? Subscribe, leave a comment, join the conversation on Twitter, send me an email – whatever you prefer.