Episode 148: 5 Years of Lessons from Building a Successful Solopreneur Coaching Business & Personal Brand: Hi, I'm Cheryl Lau (Part 2)
Cheryl Lau
Podcaster | Coaching entrepreneurs to build a substantial and compelling body of work
In This Episode:
This episode was released on November 28, 2023 | You can also tune into the full episode 148 of the Thought Leader Club Podcast on iTunes, Spotify, or YouTube
Starting My Coaching Journey In 2019
In early 2019, I started off my coaching journey by working with a few people for free. I offered several free single sessions and I also worked with one client, for free, inside a 5 or 6-week coaching program.
What did I coach on at that time?
Well, it wasn’t exactly business coaching. I’d say it was more like helping them build a content and personal brand strategy and show up online confidently. Not gonna lie but I really wasn’t even sure what I was doing, but I did my best to support this client in building her brand and she signed on her first paying client!
When that happened, I realized maybe I could help other people show up online confidently to share their work and their message so they can make an income and impact.
Even though I was not exactly certain in whether I wanted to specifically focus on helping entrepreneurs, I knew that the core of what I did is based on my belief that each and every one of us has a story or message that someone out there needs to hear from us. This could also apply to entrepreneurs and online coaches.
So this was how I eventually decided that I’ll become a business coach.
Honestly, I’m not a huge fan of my decision-making or thought process here. If I were to go back in time, I would not have chosen to coach on helping side hustlers to sign clients in their coaching business. Especially not this early on in my journey.
First, I acknowledge that I lacked a lot of skills myself especially at that point in my journey. This includes both coaching skills as well as the business skills necessary to grow my own business.
Second, that simply wasn’t my story. Building a business, especially in 2019, wasn’t my story at the time. Even though I was a side hustler at the time, I didn’t have a compelling “why” for coaching on business.
Fast forward to today in 2023, it might make a lot more sense for me to coach others on growing their business or being side hustlers because it’s been 4 years and I have a much stronger portfolio of skills and a body of work as well as client results and my own personal story to back it up.
To be brutally honest, I don’t believe that I had that back in 2019. I lacked the experiences, skills, and a personal connection to the work I was doing.
If I could go back in time, I would have doubled down on building my body of work instead. I would focus on developing skills or honing a certain craft that I had natural talent in. And if necessary, I would take relevant training or courses to build up those skills of crafts even further.
But notice how I didn’t say I need more years of experience.
Let me use a concrete example here to explain why. Let’s think of an 18 year old painter who’s absolutely talented at painting. They don’t necessarily need years of experience to be deemed a skillful artist or need more years of experience in order for customers to purchase their artwork. There are definitely cases where years of experience don’t correlate to the results you want in your business/career.
But in these types of scenarios, it’s so important to 1) have a certain skill or craft that you excel at and 2) build a body of work to showcase that level of skill, your craft, and the depth of your expertise
This is what I would have doubled down on if I were restarting my business, rather than jumping straight into coaching, especially business coaching.
I launched my first paid program on March 6, 2019. When I say launch, I meant that I had published my sales page on the quarterlifeproject.com aka my new website. And I shared about my program on Instagram.
The incredible thing was that within a month of that launch, I had signed two clients at $1500 USD and one client at $2000. When my first client ever paid me in full, I was blown away. When my second client paid in full, I was once again blown away. And when my third client paid, again, I was mind blown. I couldn’t believe that people wanted to work with me.
Between March and July 2019, I created $21,500 USD in sales. During this period, I sold my offers at $1500, $2000, and $2500 USD. For someone who just started her business 5 months ago, creating $21500 is pretty damn incredible.?
Looking back, I think the reason why clients wanted to work with me despite me technically not having much experience or body of work available at that time, was because they resonated with my story.
They felt the sincerity in my story, and they wanted to learn how to create content or share their story in a way that also lets them resonate with their audience and hence attract opportunities, such as paying clients for their services.
When I look back at my content and marketing from this time, I can see that even though my messaging wasn’t super specific or clear and it was honestly very basic and generic. I think what still shone through was my sincerity in what I was sharing. People really resonated with that.
This is why today, years later, I still talk so much about being sincere with what you do and what you say as you build your dreams and as you’re building your body of work.
Then despite seeing some pretty solid results in my business, very, very soon, I started reaching burn out. So much so, that I stopped my business entirely from August 2019 to around February 2020. I let go of some clients. I deleted social media. I deleted all traces of the Quarter Life Project from the Internet. It was really dramatic.
There were several clear factors that led to me crashing and burning:?
First, I found out my mom had thyroid cancer. That shook me to the core. I didn’t see this coming at all. Even though my mom and I may not have the closest mother-daughter relationship, finding out that she had some form of cancer was extremely overwhelming and stressful to say the least.
Luckily, she eventually got a surgery in late 2019 and has been extremely healthy and happy since then. But between August to November 2019, I was stressed about this news. This was the first thing that contributed heavily to my biggest business regret.
Second, I was not taking care of neither my physical health nor my mental health since starting my business. Actually, I didn’t take care of my physical or mental health for years up to that point. For a five foot two Asian female, weighing at around 158 pounds or almost 72 kg was considered quite overweight by medical standards.
But the more pressing issue here is that I felt horrible both inside and out. I had no energy. I constantly felt out of breath and felt some sort of constriction around my chest and felt like I had trouble breathing. My body constantly expressed physical symptoms of anxiety.
For some reason, in August 2019, I decided to get a health check up. And I’m glad I did, because the doctor told me I was pre-diabetic. When she first said that, I was in utter disbelief. ME????? Pre-diabetic??? What does that even mean? What should I do?
She then proceeded to explain to me that one thing I could start doing to reduce the likelihood of me becoming fully diabetic is to lose weight.
The third contributing factor to my burn out was that I was hustling in my business 24/7. I was creating way too much content and focusing on quantity over quality. I was creating content for multiple platforms, including Instagram stories, Instagram feed, my private Facebook group, Facebook live streams, podcast, email newsletter, and blog.
I was also working with, I believe, 6 or 7 1:1 clients at that time. This was on top of my full-time job at the time. I was doing coaching calls in the morning, during lunch breaks, and in the evening.
I was also trying to consume a ton of free information and joining every single webinar or masterclass, and going through every single lead magnet other coaches were offering. This meant I was spending way too much time consuming as opposed to using my brain to create original fresh new content.
I was also so caught up in planning things. Planning for a potential group program launch. Planning for a potential course launch. Planning two months of content at a time. Planning, planning, planning.
Finally, the fourth thing that was happening around this time was that even though I was able to sign clients, it felt so damn hard. Every time I signed a new client, I would once again stress out over where the next client would come from.
This led me to feel extremely stressed even though I was attracting paying clients consistently. And of course, when I am stressed about signing clients, that meant my headspace was constantly spinning out and hence I experienced a lot of comparisons and self doubt.
Long story short, I burnt out. Then I quit my business. For six. Whole. Months. From August 2019 to around February 2020. I was completely quiet on social media. I took down basically all of my online profiles and social media accounts.
For my clients at the time, I had explained to them the situation and continued to work with them privately and quietly behind the scenes, and I also let some clients go. Then, I basically just disappeared off the Internet.
During my digital absence between August to February, I focused heavily on my family and relationships, my own physical and mental health, and my career. During this time, I applied to a PhD program and got accepted around February or March 2020, and I was so excited to start my PhD journey later on in 2020!
During this break, I spent a lot of time with people I cared about. And, also, I finally learned to prioritize my health! I ended up losing 40 pounds during this time, and kept it off until COVID hit. Side note: I did gain back some weight during COVID, but that’s a completely different story.
Around January 2020, after I felt a lot more stable in my personal life, I started to remember the sense of fulfillment, impact and joy I experienced during my business journey in 2019.? I then decided to reactivate my Instagram account.
In January and February 2020, I actually thought I wanted to just become a graduate student influencer and create inspirational Instagram content for fellow PhD students, because there’s actually a lot of accounts like that!
But I really, really missed the work I was doing. I started having conversations with people I connected with back in 2019. And wow, I realized that I really missed these interactions and I really wanted to give my business another try.
But this time, I promised myself to do things differently. And that’s exactly what happened in 2020.
Restarting My Business In 2020
I reopened my business coaching program around March of 2020, and since then, I operate my business in a completely different way.
For those who have followed me since 2020 and 2021, you’ll know that I talk a lot about running your business in a way that’s simple and streamlined, ideally on just 0-2 hours a day.?
This is because ever since my business burnout and quitting my business for 6 months, I started to deeply appreciate the importance of not running your business in a way that feels like a second full-time job, especially for someone who was side hustling at that point in my journey.
Now, that said, when I first decided to give my business another try around March 2020, I was extremely low in confidence and self-belief as an entrepreneur. I felt embarrassed about needing to take time off, especially when I saw my peers who started at the same time as I did back in 2019 and were now way ahead in their business.
I didn’t believe I had anything of value to share with my audience. Some people who started around the same time as me were signing on clients consistently and some were making 10k months.
Needless to say, I felt a lot of comparisons, envy, and also shame and guilt for taking a 6-month hiatus. I actually struggled a lot internally during this phase of my business.
Who am I to share my thoughts about showing up online and building a business when I had to take a break for 7 months to get my life back together? I felt like I had lost all credibility.
But because I lacked belief, I didn’t push with the strategy. For the majority of 2020, I kept my strategy low just so I could focus on rebuilding my belief back up again.
What this looked like was going back to the basics and simplifying everything. This meant sticking to what I knew best, which was building a brand and business on Instagram. This meant not doing twenty different things at once, which was what I did previously in 2019.?
This meant not caving into shiny object syndrome and feeling pressured to implement every single strategy in existence. This meant mastering the basics really well.
Overall, focusing on the basics and simplifying my business was tremendously helpful for me in terms of helping me rebuild my belief as an entrepreneur and coach, and also it allowed me to actually function like a normal human being.
During this period between March to October 2020, I had created $8600 USD in sales in total. I was actually signing clients quite consistently, and my offers ranged between $497 to $797, which is quite different compared to the $1500, $2000, and $2500 prices I was selling at the year before.
Looking back, I knew it was mostly my ego speaking whenever I looked at my pricing and felt bad about myself. There were moments where I thought that my non-high-ticket pricing made me seem like a beginner coach.
As much as my ego wanted me to raise my prices, I knew that this simply was not the time to dabble in the so-called strategy. This was the time for me to learn to strengthen my mindset and belief as an entrepreneur, and simultaneously to rekindle my skills as a coach as I worked with the many amazing clients who I worked with during this period of time.
This was simply not the time to let my ego get in the way of what the business really needed from me, which was me cultivating my self-belief and confidence as well as skills as a coach who is capable of helping my clients create results.
By the end of the year in 2020, I had developed my own cadence for balancing my business on top of my full-time job and other personal life shenanigans. So much so that I decided to start my podcast. At this point, I saw that I had the capacity to add a long-form content platform to my business.
The way I saw it was: in addition to creating content on Instagram, the podcast and Instagram would go hand in hand because Instagram was for bite-sized content, whereas the podcast would allow for much deeper conversations and let me practice honing my thought leadership even further.
Now that it’s been 3+ years since I started the podcast, I can confidently say that the podcast is one of the biggest movers and shakers in my business and journey in building thought leadership. Starting the podcast is probably one of my favorite decisions to date.
Key Lessons From 2020
Let’s take a moment to recap some of my key lessons from 2020.
First, I learned to master just a few key things and do them really, really well before diversifying your efforts and adding more to your to-do list. I saw how helpful it was to create a plan that you’ll actually follow.
I started to recognize that the best strategy for your business is the one you’ll actually stay committed to implementing and problem-solving for.
Because the truth is, there are hundreds of effective ways to grow your business and hit your income goals. Every successful entrepreneur will have a different journey or process, and it all worked for them in order to get to where they are now.
But a lot of entrepreneurs give up when they try to follow a business plan or strategy that they just aren’t able to stick to. I think it goes without saying that if you aren’t taking action, then there’s literally zero growth. Both personally and in terms of business revenue.
It also takes time to build up your ability to stay committed and to stay consistent at a series of actions, just like how it will take time to build your own confidence in what you’re doing.
The second lesson I learned in 2020 was that you can take care of the other areas of your life, even on top of your 9-5 and business. Whether it’s family, physical health, mental health, social life, or whatever it is, you get to create your own schedule.
You call the shots on how you operate your business. If you opt to simplify and streamline, you’ll end up freeing more time in your business to take care of other parts of your life. You don’t have to sacrifice what’s important to you just to make your business work.
That said, there will be a certain level of exercise, but you get to choose which sacrifices you make. For instance, you can choose to not indulge in scrolling on Instagram and instead choose to do a 30-minute workout. You can choose not to watch two hours of Netflix and instead choose to have a meal with a friend. You can choose to not spend 3 hours planning your Instagram feed, and instead spend 30 minutes doing lead generation.
You have the choice. Everything you do in your business is your choice. If you don’t want your business to feel like a second full-time job, you can choose to build your business in a way where this isn’t the case. So, choose wisely how you want to spend your time.
The third lesson I learned is that your energy matters so damn much in business. When you’re showing up in your best energy, sharing your best and most original content and thoughts and ideas, and truly mean what you say and genuinely care about the work that you do, that converts clients so much quicker than if you were to put out half assed content that even you’re just like meh about.
I also found that when I worked on my thoughts and was very intentional about the things I told myself, this made it a lot easier to show up in the best energy.?
I shifted away from these thoughts like, “Omg how am I going to sign my next client?” or “What else do I need to do so people want to work with me?” or “Can I hit 5k or 10k this month?!”
Instead I started to think thoughts such as, “How can I better serve my current clients”, “What content can I create that will help people become aware of the things that are keeping them stuck?” and “What additional value or new perspectives can I offer my audience and clients today that will move them forward in their journey?”.
That’s when my energy started to change and people could tell.?
If you aren’t thinking thoughts that serve you and let your mind spiral out of control and cave into self doubt, FOMO, comparisons, jealousy, and other limiting beliefs that honestly don’t help your business, your clients, or your audience, people can sense that energy from you.?
This is why strengthening your identity as a successful business owner is so important. Because if you’re able to stop thinking “Oh my god I can’t do this, or I can’t sign another client” and instead start to believe that what you’re doing is already working, people can tell.?
When you start focusing on serving your audience and ideal clients and constantly thinking about ways to serve your people, people can tell. When you believe in yourself and in the world that you do, people can tell.
The reason this works is because people can sense the energy behind what you’re doing and what you’re saying. This energy is what attracts clients to you because they want to be in that energy and learn from you to achieve whatever it is that you help clients do.?
And guess what? You’re not going to want to think these thoughts consistently every single day. You’re not going to feel that self-belief every single day. You’re going to have moments where you spin out over small things in your business, like maybe your Instagram post only got half the number of likes you usually get or maybe you noticed your follower count drop by 10 people in two days.
This is why it is so important to get coached on your thoughts. Whether this means you coaching yourself or working with a coach who is experienced in helping their clients navigate their thoughts and self-belief as an entrepreneur, you need to work on being able to reframe your limiting beliefs or other thoughts that are keeping you in your comfort zone and not taking the actions you know will help you achieve your business goals.
The fourth lesson I learned was that consuming more information is more often than not, counterproductive.
When you’re consuming more than you’re using your own brain to create new ideas and perspectives or even offers and frameworks and methods, what ends up happening is that you’ll end up wasting a lot of time not just consuming information from others, but you’ll also waste a lot of time following the herd.
When you’re following what others are doing instead of standing firm behind your own opinions and thoughts, then you’re wasting time creating content or offers that honestly aren’t very compelling for your ideal clients.
This is important to note because with so many online coaches for entrepreneurs, your original thoughts and perspectives on issues and topics within your niche are one key thing that’ll set you apart.
And I know, it’s a hell of a lot easier to not be a thought leader. It’s way easier to just look at what other successful entrepreneurs and coaches are talking about, and simply model your content after theirs. To model your business structure after theirs. To create the same offer as them.
But the danger of this is that people can instantly sense the lack of creativity, originality, and thought behind the things you put out. That’s not a good look for your business.
This is why when I resumed my business in 2020, I made a commitment to myself that I would drastically cut down how much content I consume from others. This is primarily because I don’t want other people’s opinions to infiltrate my own brain when I’m actually sitting down to create.
Instead, I want to make sure that everything I create is created from my own brain, using my own experiences, and created from the perspective of my own opinions, values, beliefs and ideas.?
Finally, another highlight from the year 2020 was, around Q2 of 2020, I challenged myself to do daily Instagram stories for one week. Then, I challenged myself to do another week of Instagram stories. Creating these sorts of micro commitments was really helpful for me in terms of developing consistency.
I think this also allowed me to develop a sense of trust in myself, because I was able to trust that I’ll show up for my business.
But I know that before I developed any sort of consistency in my business, I had to trust myself and do things even when it felt scary.
Because I was developing my own voice and generating my own ideas through Instagram content, I then also built my confidence in starting and committing to a weekly podcast in October 2020.
This was NOT on my agenda for Q4 2020, but it was somewhere between August and September 2020 when I realized that I was enjoying content creation (for Instagram) so much that I decided I would love to go even deeper and longer via a podcast.
The lesson here is this: One small area of improvement can create massive changes in other areas. By committing to just practicing my voice and communication skills through Instagram stories, it then snowballed into a full blown weekly podcast which, since then, has played a huge role in the success of my own business and thought leadership journey.
All in all, even though I technically quit my business for 6 months, I’m so damn proud of myself for learning the necessary lessons and decided to commit to my business once and for all.
Rather than repeating the same mistakes I was making in my first couple of months of business, I now operate both my business and my life and who I am as a person, in a completely different way.?
That said, even though business feels a lot easier in 2020 compared to 2019, and it sure as heck feels a lot easier today in 2023 compared to 2019, that doesn’t mean the journey of building your business or your career as a thought leader in itself is easy.
Today, I still push myself to do uncomfortable things because I do believe that growth can only happen when you are out of your comfort zone.
In order to take the big, scary action steps in my business, I also had to change the way I think, develop the self-belief that I am capable of making my 1-3 year dreams happen.
And I know each of you listening to this right now is also capable of doing uncomfortable things and making your 1-3 year dreams a reality.
The reason why I’m so committed to seeing you build a body of work that will set you up for your 1-3 year dreams is because honestly, I want to see you create a path that you paved for yourself. I know each of us is capable of defining our own definitions of success.
Of course, while you’re building your dreams, there will be challenges, there will be doubters and haters, and there will be moments where you want to give up.
But I truly believe that whoever’s listening to this, you’re capable of rising above these obstacles and continue to go after the life that you’ve envisioned for yourself.
Let’s now move forward to the year of 2021.
Becoming Known For My Thought Leadership In 2021
In 2021, I was receiving more feedback that people were enjoying my podcast content and Instagram stories.
That said, I didn’t get a lot of feedback. Most of the feedback I collected came from clients who told me either during our discovery calls or on their onboarding surveys, which they had to fill out when they first worked with me.
Generally, I received feedback and comments that people found my content topics to be very unique, helpful, and honest.
Personally, if I had to articulate why my content resonated with clients or my audience at large, I’d say that it’s because:
1) I was starting to become known for something.
2) My voice and energy shone clearly and brightly in my content.
3) People could see my thought process and how I think.
4) At this point, I had a body of work that was continuing to grow and compound, allowing people to quickly get a feel for what I’m known for, my energy, personality, voice, and how I see the world.
In other words, I was starting to develop my thought leadership and become known for it in 2021.
How I was able to start building my thought leadership was well, I started to lean into what’s already inside my own brain. Seriously. I think one of the key reasons why our listeners for the podcast have enjoyed the show so much is because I offer my own perspective and ideas here on this show.
The episodes are based on my lived experiences or honest opinions. I’m sharing the behind-the-scenes of my own business, explaining my thought process behind why I do what I do. I share concepts and ideas that are unique to me because I created them myself. I did not look at someone else when creating these concepts or frameworks.
Another thing is that I’ve been told that people really enjoy my personality. Specifically, I’ve been told that people can sense my sincerity and authenticity through my content.
I think I was able to do this because all I did was say what I mean, truly. If you say something, you better mean it. Don’t bluff or fluff. Actually mean what you say, always.?
If there’s one tip I can provide here, it’s not about your body language, or specific verbiage or words that you choose. It’s not about using specific marketing language to supposedly make it more strategic and convincing. None of that. Instead, it just comes down to speaking honestly. That is all.
The other thing that was tremendously helpful for me as I was building my thought leadership and body of work in 2021 was that I started to create “thinking time” in my weekly or biweekly schedule.
Thinking time, for me, can look like many things. Sometimes, it means creating new workshops and resources for clients. Other times, it means reviewing recent coaching calls.?
Or, it could literally be a time and space for me to whip out some pen and paper and just create and dream. It might also mean literally thinking about clients and considering what coaching I could offer on our next call. It depends on what I’m feeling that day or week.
Finally, one more thing that played a role in me becoming known for something, was documenting my journey and showing how I am a work in progress, how I’m learning and honing my skills, and how I’m continuously leveling up in every facet of my business and thought leadership journey.
I think many of us have already heard about the importance of documenting your journey as you grow your business or work towards your 1-3 year dreams, and honestly, it makes sense why this is the case. Documenting your journey shows that you’re actually in integrity with what you teach or what you’re saying, and your people want to see that you’re a product of your own product.
I still remember one particular client said to me that the reason why they chose to work with me was because they don’t see me “fudging” grand transformations or making anything try to seem bigger than it is.
They said, “You have a normal number of followers, seem invested in growth over the long term, and are using your podcast to funnel most of your content (which I see as my eventual aim).”
All that to say, people want to see behind the scenes. They want a peek into how you think and how you operate.
Through documenting my journey, I also came to realize that it’s not only thought leadership content and content that “adds value” the conventional way we think adding value means. That’s not the only content that is valuable to your people.
If anything, showing up as our genuine selves, showing up on social media with our best energy, that energy alone is also valuable. Most likely because it shows us an example of what’s possible for us.
We look to them as someone we can aspire towards and we want to be in their energetic bubble on the Internet because their energy alone helps us see the possibility for ourselves.
That’s why, I think closer to late Q3 of 2021, there was somewhat of a shift in my content on Instagram, especially Instagram stories, where I reduced the quantity of my thought leadership content and instead started to showcase more of a personal side of me and showed more of my lifestyle.
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This was a very intentional shift on my part because I knew that I was going through some personal life events that made it a bit more difficult for me to use my brain to create new ideas and content that was more educational, or content where I’m developing my own viewpoints.
At the same time, I also knew that by taking a step back and by focusing more on taking care of myself and living my best life, and then showcasing snippets of that part of my life.
I knew that that could be of just as much value to my people, just as much as the thought leadership content. The reason is because it shows people a lifestyle that’s possible for them.
When I look back at 2021, honestly, I think I did a lot of things really well! All of the things I just shared were huge contributors to me becoming known as the coach for side hustlers as well as growing the reputation of my podcast, the Side Hustle Club.
I was starting to really become known for something in 2021, in my opinion, and it was clearly reflected in my business revenue that year. In 2021, we created nearly $104,000 USD in sales. This means that 2021 was our first 6 figure year in the business.
In terms of what I sold, the 100k out of the 104k were from selling coaching programs, which includes my 1:1 program and the group program. The remaining 4k came from miscellaneous small offers such as a workshop I sold around April, and some guest speaking for other people’s groups or masterminds.
In 2021, I named my program the Side Hustle Club. Actually, I think I called both my 1:1 coaching and group coaching programs the Side Hustle Club.
Later on in 2022, I merged the two and created a 1:1 + group coaching hybrid program, and it was also called the Side Hustle Club program.
This simple decision of having a common thread among my coaching program names was definitely something that helped my audience associate me as THE coach for side hustlers.
2021 was also a fun year in terms of selling my program because in one year alone, I launched 4 cohorts of the group program. Whereas in 2020, I tried launching a group program and ultimately had zero people join.
In 2021, we had 2 people join the first cohort. Then 4 people in the second one. Then 6 people in the third round. Ultimately, we had 7 people join the last cohort of the Side Hustle Club group program before I merged 1:1 coaching and group coaching together in 2022.
What was cool this year was because I launched several rounds of the same program, I was able to consolidate what are my strengths and areas for improvement each launch, so I know what I’d like to do the next time I launch again.
I also experimented with new ways of talking about my offers. And I was able to evaluate each launch and pick up on things I did well and things I’d do differently next time. So, it made sense why each launch got bigger and better, which just goes to show that selling and launching is also a skill we can all practice and repeat to get better and better at!
The same thing applies to becoming known for something and building thought leadership. The process is pretty straightforward.
First, it’s choosing what you want to be known for. Then, it’s about repeating this concept over and over and practicing how to explain this concept from different angles, and continue doing this over time. That’s literally it. That’s how I was known as the coach for side hustlers by this point in my journey.
To wrap up the conversation about 2021, I want to say this: Thought leadership is a journey. Ultimately, building thought leadership is a journey. It’s not a 4-month thing or even a one-year thing. It’s an actual journey that continues on and on until you fully see yourself as a thought leader.
In 2021, I was starting to acknowledge that I was becoming known for something. I was seeing evidence that I do hold thought leadership. This was possible because I was building a body of work.
I hope that you will say yes to your journey and say yes to committing to that journey, today. Start putting in the reps to build your body of work, today.
Alright, onwards to 2022.
Quitting My PhD, Moving To Singapore, And Becoming A Full-Time Entrepreneur In 2022
In a nutshell, 2022 was the year when I quit my PhD, moved to Singapore, and became a full-time entrepreneur. Coming off the back of a really great year business-wise, I felt a lot of self-inflicted pressure to replicate the business success of the last year and do even better.
But as you may recall from the last episode, where we talked about my career journey and specifically what my year looked like in 2022, it was a rather difficult year for me personally and emotionally.
If I were to describe what 2022 looked like in my business journey, it would be the realization that we are all going to experience very, very human experiences and human emotions even as a full-time entrepreneur. Meaning, we’re all going to struggle, and sometimes struggle deeply, no matter what your business looks like.
As a recap, for quite a while after I decided to formally quit my PhD, and actually, even for about two months before I formally quit, it was a really emotionally and personally difficult period of time.
There were a number of personal events, decisions, identity crises, relationship/marriage strains, friendship situations, and several other financial or logistical stressors that were all happening simultaneously.
As a result, I really struggled deeply, and I could see myself feeling extremely depressed during this time, compounded with frequent episodes of anxiety and panic attacks. My physical body also responded poorly to the stressors, and I actually developed two noticeably large balding spots on my head because of the stress.
The two keywords that I would use to describe this period of time after becoming a full-time entrepreneur were:
1) Shame. I felt like I shouldn’t be feeling so heavy, so sad, so anxious, depressed, unmotivated, defeated. Especially when, from the outside looking in, I was living so many people’s dream lives.
I was newly married. I was now doing my business full-time. I had just finished the previous year at 6 figures in my business. And so much more. I shouldn’t feel all that I was feeling, and consequently, I felt a lot of shame for what I truly was experiencing.
2) Lack of control. I felt like I had no control. I even wanted to just quit my business altogether because I felt like I no longer had the capacity to create for others or give to others because I felt that I was just in such a dark place.
To be very honest, there were so many moments during this period of time where I almost made the decision to just refund all of my current clients and just delete everything and just hibernate. I felt like I had no control over anything, even in my own business.
Because internally and in my personal life, all that was going on… it kind of makes a lot of sense why my external business results reflected my internal results. There were months throughout 2022 where I didn’t make any new sales at all.
Now that some time has passed and I’ve had a lot of time to process and work through a lot of those stressors in life and business, let’s just say it looks very different now as we near the end of 2023.
But that said, there are two very profound lessons I learned from 2022:
First, I can now see how we’re all so prone to gaslighting ourselves, in both business and in life. For me, I kept telling myself that I shouldn’t be feeling XYZ emotions because I have so much goodness happening for me. I shouldn’t be thinking XYZ thoughts because I’m literally living someone’s dream life. I shouldn’t be “like this” because I have everything I need to live comfortably.
It took maybe around 7 months to really arrive at this place where I finally felt accepting of “It is ok if I feel this way. I get to feel this. It is valid. I don’t have to gaslight myself. I get to experience all of these feelings and I’m allowed to experience them”.
When I finally embraced that I am allowed to feel whatever I was feeling and I don’t need to shame myself for feeling this way or thinking whatever I was thinking… When I was finally able to unwind and unbind from the shame, I could then learn another super profound lesson which is:
There are always options in every difficult situation. There really are always options.
But let’s be honest, there’s usually no “perfect” option.
I think that’s what I personally struggled with during that period of time because for all of the stressors that were happening, although I was able to intellectually recognize that there were options to every stressful situation, I was resistant because none of the options seemed super 100% optimal. They all had pros and cons. And I was fixated heavily on the cons.
But the thing I didn’t quite realize at the time was that I did have options and I had control over which option to try. I wasn’t as powerless as I thought.
Because of this realization, over time, I’ve started applying this belief of “I have control over my situation” in other multiple parts of my life and business.
I even apply it to how I view my thoughts and mindset. I have control over my thoughts. Because for many months this year, I felt like I had no control over how I was feeling, how my body was reacting to stress, and so on.
But I always have the power to retell the story about myself and my situation. I always have the power to lean into gratitude. I also always have the power to not blame my anxiety, depression, and panic attacks for my results.
By the end of 2022, I can start to see that we’re literally just getting started. It’s clearer to me what I want to do in this world, how I want to help people. I realized my previous dream, when I was side hustling and pursuing a career in research, that was just the stepping stone to what I’m embarking on next.
I think for a while, I was grieving the shedding of what felt comfortable as a side hustler. I was grieving the shedding of that identity.
But by the end of the year in 2022, now that I’ve processed all the emotions, I’m allowing myself to lean into the bigger vision I have for myself as an entrepreneur and taking the next steps to make that vision come to life.
When I looked back at how the year went, honestly it turned out not so bad at all! I continued to build the reputation of my signature program at the time, which was the Side Hustle Club program, and kept creating more interest and brand awareness for the program.
As for my body of work, my primary platforms were still Instagram and the podcast throughout 2022. I also had some cool opportunities this year, such as being featured on the TODAY newspaper in Singapore and CNA 938 radio locally as well, and I also did a workshop for the University of Toronto, Victoria College.
Overall, not a bad year at all in my business!
Here’s a message I do want to share with you all: As you continue onwards in your journey of building your thought leaders career, building your body of work, and building your 1-3 year dreams, I think it goes without saying that we’re human beings and we will experience human life events. Oftentimes unexpected ones and oftentimes they can feel difficult, and we will inevitably experience human emotions. That’s expected, if not, required, to be a human being.
Whether it’s experiencing feelings of stress, frustration or overwhelm, or you’re suddenly hit with a major life event that you didn’t see at all, or anything else in between and at any perceived intensity, it’s gonna happen. And a lot of times, it can feel like you have no capacity to create content, to show up online and talk about your work, and so on.
In 2022, I found myself struggling to manage my thoughts, emotions, and physical energy. As a result, I found it really difficult to create the capacity to work on my business. During this specific period of my life, I honestly did not have the capacity to make offers or sell my program.
I fully acknowledge that I wasn’t in a place to accept new 1:1 clients, and I could see that I needed major rest. So I knew that there was no point in pressuring myself to keep making offers or creating new content for Instagram or the podcast. This just wasn’t what my body, mental well-being, or even business needs from me right now.
The most important thing I had to coach myself on was that I had to trust that this period of my life and business does not define the overall long-term trajectory of my business. I had to be very aware of where my brain wanted to generalize and catastrophize the current phase to the overall lifespan of my business.
For example:
Another very profound belief for me during this season of my business is knowing that the skills I use inside my business are not dependent on how I feel in my personal life. Even if I am going through a particular personal life event, it literally does not have anything to do with the skill sets or mindsets that I need to use in my business.?
That said, I’m allowed to be human. So, I could be a potato for an hour before a client call, then I will give myself the space to do that where possible. But then, as soon as I hop on the Zoom call, I’m able to put on my coach hat and coach the hell out of the client. After I hop off Zoom, I can go back to being a human being.
Because what I’ve realized is that all versions of me can co-exist, and they don’t have to “interfere” with each other doing their own thing. Content creator Cheryl, making offers Cheryl, coach Cheryl, human being Cheryl – They can all exist at once and stay in their own lane simultaneously!
At some point in 2022, I actually started to observe a new thought creep up, which was that I started to feel like, “Hmm… I’m not supposed to share any new content until I have things processed and life things figured out. And right now, if I want to share some of my recent lessons or takeaways, then I’m sharing too much because I’m still navigating a lot of new decisions, transactions, events and challenges. I guess I should wait till I have it “all together”
And I started to wonder, maybe there is a certain professional image I’m supposed to maintain, since I am a business after all and I have a reputation to protect.
Then that led to a rabbit hole of, “Oh my goodness, is my image too immature? Do people look at my website or social media or content and think, “That’s cute, but that’s too… cute,” etc…”
But here’s the thing. For my business specifically, since day one of my business, I’ve built traction pretty quickly because I was sharing honestly and genuinely. Since day one, in fact, the most common thing I hear on my application forms and sales calls with clients is, “One reason why I wanted to work with you specifically, Cheryl, is because I like your energy.” Or “I resonate with your story.” Or “I appreciate your authenticity online.”
So, I have literally years of evidence to show that one of my strengths as an entrepreneur is my ability to build a connection with my audience and community. But right now, am I sharing too much? Should I even be sharing when I’m struggling emotionally in my personal life and also in business? That was definitely a thought that was lingering for a bit.
But my views on content still remain the same. I’ve consumed content online that has changed my life. I’ve also received coaching that has changed my life. I honestly cannot unsee how the right content for me has changed me. I cannot unsee how honest and genuine storytelling can help people, at the right place and at the right time. And I deeply believe this for my own work.
So, I started to look at this from a new angle, “Okay, Cheryl, so you really believe that content can help someone, especially if it’s something they needed to see or hear during a particular time in their life or journey. So then, is it possible to overshare when I believe that my work can help someone?”
That’s when I realized that if I truly believe this, I can never share enough of it. I can never share enough content that I really believe in and that I fully mean. Because I never know who will need to see or hear it, at the right place and at the right time for themselves.
Right now, I may not know which one of my content is what someone needs the most, but it will be there for them when they need it. People will find it at the right place and at the right time.
Rather than trying to predict “Oh okay, this is going to convert people into a paying client.” or “This is trending, so I should talk about that.” Instead, I focus on creating content that I genuinely and honestly believe in because I trust that it will help someone. Whether it’s now or later, it doesn’t matter.
Also, the value and impact of my content are constantly compounding. From a business strategy perspective, someone who finds my work, let’s say, a year from now, will have years of content to consume and digest.
That can help them make a decision about working with me even quicker than someone who, let’s say, discovered my work back in 2019 or 2020 when I had produced less content.?
The quality and depth of my own content and thought leadership is also constantly getting better. I’m constantly developing more of my insights in this space.
It all works together and it all compounds together. That’s why I trust that my business can only go up from here.
By the end of 2022, despite it being a difficult year for me personally, I realized that I have nothing to lose. Literally. I have nothing to lose.
So what do I want to be known for? How do I want to help people? How do I want to lead? What decision do I have to make so I can create an even bigger impact or amplify my message and work more?
I LOVE being in the state of mind where I feel like I have nothing to lose, because that’s when I free my mind from any constraints I impose on myself. This is when I can be the most creative.?
And that’s exactly how I entered 2023.
Rebranding My Business In 2023
2023 has been very peaceful in both my online and offline life, in both my business/career, as well as my personal life.
This year, I continued to do my business full time. It’s my primary source of income. I occasionally do some contract work for my ex-PhD supervisor, where I support the team by writing manuscripts and other publications with them. But 98% of my income comes from my business.
Within my business, I primarily enrolled clients into my signature program at the time, which was the Side Hustle Club program. At the beginning of 2023, I also ran a round of The Podcast Club program, which was so much fun.?
I continued to build my body of work through the podcast and Instagram. I also started using Linkedin and email more regularly.
In addition to my weekly podcast episode and also weekly Instagram feed posts and daily Instagram stories, I also started using LinkedIn to promote the podcast on a regular basis.?
Specifically, I now work with Esther from @estherloke.co on Instagram, and Esther turns my video podcast file into several shorter video clips that I then post as Instagram reels, TikTok videos, and also LinkedIn videos.
She then uses the written script of my podcast and turns that into written blog posts as well as LinkedIn articles. Since January 2023, I’ve been starting from Episode 1 and posting several written LinkedIn articles for all of the solo podcast episodes I’ve done to date.
As for email, I’m still trying to build my muscle for weekly emails. Specifically, I’ve been building my muscle for writing a fresh new email newsletter on Mondays. If you’re keen on joining our email newsletter, you can sign up at https://cheryltheory.lpages.co/email/
Some other highlights from the year include speaking for in-person events, including the Asian Wander Women event in Singapore, as well as speaking twice for the Tzu Chi Humanistic Youth Center, a non-profit organization.
The Side Hustle Club podcast also received the Golden Crane award from the Asian American Podcasters Association, which was for sure something I did not plan for or expect.
Overall, in 2023, I really learned to develop a new relationship with my business. Specifically, I learned to see my business as a life long, long-term passion project that I’m excited to build and continue carving out even more time to practice my craft as a coach and entrepreneur.?
Even with all of the highs and lows that are inevitable as a full-time entrepreneur, I learned to embrace all of it and truly enjoy and love the journey as an entrepreneur and full-time coach.
Although I think my stance on this was more flexible and lenient previously, I’d say that I’m now a lot more firm on where I stand on the following: I personally would not encourage someone to pursue entrepreneurship unless you’re committed to this for the long term.
It’s been over four years since I started my online coaching business, and I’ve seen so many people give up after 6 months, after 1 year, after 2 years. I think what happens is that many people like the idea of calling themselves an entrepreneur but they’re not willing to endure the mental stamina required, such as being willing to keep going even if you’re disappointed by your results, not blaming external circumstances, and so on.
I’ve seen a lot of people wanting to have the title and Instagram clout of being an entrepreneur, but they’re highly resistant to leaning into the messiness that is often natural and expected in your journey as an entrepreneur.
I also hear a lot of people say that they wish they could just coach clients and not have to worry about the marketing and sales part of their business. But the more I think about it, the more I become curious about whether the person really cares about being an entrepreneur, which includes the “business” components. The steps required to build a profitable business.?
Because if someone does not want to commit to the art and science of building a business, then are they really dedicated to growing a business and being an entrepreneur?
Because for many people who love the practice of coaching, your “purpose” might not actually require you to be an entrepreneur. You can do a craft you’re passionate about without being an entrepreneur. For example, you can be a coach as part of a larger organization.?
Building a business truly requires skill and commitment. If you feel so discouraged and defeated by the marketing and sales component of growing a business, I’m going to venture to say: Don’t be an entrepreneur. Find another way to do the work you truly want to do, without having to go through the “pains” of entrepreneurship.
Don’t put yourself in a situation where all you do is feel discouraged and defeated about your “lack of results”. Because truly, I do think that you can do the thing you love without being an entrepreneur.?
A key lesson I learned in 2023 especially since becoming a full-time entrepreneur? is to really be committed to the practice of being an entrepreneur. A business owner. A content creator. A thought leader. Someone who is willing to do the work of building their 1-3 year dreams.
On that note, I can’t talk about my business and thought leadership journey thus far without talking about my recent rebrand. This includes both the rebranding of my signature program, from Side Hustle Club to the Thought Leader Club, as well as the rebranding of my podcast from Side Hustle Club podcast to Thought Leader Club podcast.
In addition, this rebrand also encompasses the direction I’m working towards and the vision I see for my thought leadership career over the next few years. I’d like to share about why I decided to rebrand and shift the direction I’m bringing my business and career towards in the next 1-3 years.
As some of you may recall, my offer’s messaging used to consist of terms such as, “5k-10k months”, “6 figures”, “Soft launching”, “Signed X clients in Y months” or “Made $ in Y months”.
But this year, I really took the time to think about why I was using such verbiage in my marketing and content. Even though, yes, all of these terms and phrases were true to me, my business, or the clients I worked with, if I were to ask myself the question “Cheryl, do you want to be known for this language?”, I would say no.
That’s when I realized I was checking off the “boxes” of what I thought I had to be as a coach in a particular niche. I was subscribing to what I thought a business coach is supposed to do, say or sell.
Now, this leads to another observation, which is that I noticed I was attracting several different profiles of clients. Although at the time of onboarding my clients, I was truly confident that they had a problem that I could support them on.
Now with hindsight, I can see that there are different themes in the qualities or characteristics of the clients.
For example:?
These are just some of the examples of different profiles of clients I have worked with. But as you can see, even if both Profile 1 and Profile 2 struggled with the problem of signing clients, they are still two very different types of clients.
The lesson here for me was, although I could technically help many types of clients, there were clearly certain types of clients I personally preferred working with, and my process and approach is more conducive to their success.
This is why I also took a lot of time. Meaning, months, to think about, “Okay, besides my process or approach to helping clients, what are my gifts and strengths as a coach? As an entrepreneur? As a content creator?”
What I observed from my list of strengths is that there were clear themes when it comes to what I’m really damn good at and hence also am really damn good at helping others with.?
For example, some of my superpowers include:
In a nutshell, I realized that among the skills I was building my brand around, such as thought leadership, soft launching, doing the bare minimum in your business, and such, there were definitely one or two skills that my strengths are best geared towards. They are coaching clients to become known for their unique thought leadership and building a body of work that captures that thought leadership.
But what was happening is that over the recent years, I was not able to fully tap into my superpowers when I was operating out of who I “thought” I had to be as a coach.
Which then leads to, “Okay, I’m gaining more clarity over what I’m really really good at, the specific characteristics and qualities of clients that I’m best suited to support and work with, and I also have the awareness that I was making a lot of decisions in my business based on what I think I should be.”
Now with all of this new information about myself and what I was doing, the final question I asked myself was, “What do I want to be known for in the next 1-3 years?”
For the past few years, I was known for “Side Hustle” (ex: Side Hustle Coach, helping side hustlers, The Side Hustle Club Program, Cheryl was a side hustler from 2019-2021, etc).
But in 1-3 years time, what Cheryl really wants to be known for is “Thought Leader”, “Coaching future thought leaders”, “Teaching people how to build a body of work that captures their unique thought leadership”, etc.
And that’s when it hit me:
1) My story (and myself) has evolved
2) As a result, there is now a big gap between where I was now (2023) versus where I want to be 1-2 years from now.
I was known specifically for side hustling, creating a 6-figure business as a side hustler, teaching how to sign clients. All of these were my lived experiences and something I have helped people with, and it worked. Being known for these things was what helped me reach my goals and dreams.
Now, I see that my dreams have evolved. In the next 1-3 years, I no longer want to be solely known for side hustling, helping you to sign clients, etc.
Instead, these outcomes and skills are the byproducts of what I truly want to be known for, which is helping others build a body of work that lets them become known for their unique thought leadership, their story, and how amazing they are at what they do. This is my 1-3 year dream.
And if this is what I want to create over the next few years, then I have to start aligning my present-day decisions to match what it is I’m building and working towards, starting now.
Don’t Let The Past Be The Reason You Slow Down For The Rest Of Your Journey Ahead As An Entrepreneur
As we start to transition from this episode to Part 3 of this 3-part series, I want to conclude this episode with a reflection that I’ve been brewing on recently:?
Please, take the time to recognize what you’ve created and who you’ve become. The version of you when you first embarked on your thought leadership career and business journey, the version of you months ago or even years ago, is probably already mind blown at what you’ve created and who you’ve created, what you’ve navigated and experienced in just the past few months or past few years. Truly.?
No matter what your business results look like right now you still have months and years ahead of you. Whether you’re deeply satisfied with how things are going right now, or maybe you feel like you aren’t where you want to be yet, don’t let the past be the reason you slow down for the rest of your journey ahead as an entrepreneur, a creator, and a thought leader.?
Let’s always, always recommit to our vision and goals and step powerfully into the rest of the journey ahead, continue to create incredible results in our lives and businesses, and become that next level version of ourselves that the version of us today would be so proud of.?
With that, thank you so, so much for being here in this episode. I’ll see you in the next one, where I’ll share with you my 1-3 year dreams and goals, the vision I have for what I want to build and create, and my plan for making all of this happen.
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