Tina Tower
Hello, I'm Tina tower and you're listening to her Empire Builder. For my first decade of business, I thought grinding and hustling and working harder than everyone else was my path to success. It was pretty successful by a lot of measures, but it led to burnout and adrenal fatigue. Then when I travelled around the world on my family gap year, I discovered the simplicity and the reach of online business, and I completely fell in love. You have so much knowledge and expertise that's within, and I want to help you to package that. So you can also help to lift others up. So how do you build a thriving million dollar business based on everything that's in your mind? This is her Empire Builder, the podcast.

Tina Tower
Hello, hello. Okay, so I want to talk about working online. Because yesterday I opened up my emails and in the morning, I had nine different emails that either had the words help or urgent in the subject line. So I really wanted to come in and address how you can actually work online because yesterday we had the Prime Minister give an address, and it was great in terms of calming the situation down. I think that there's a lot going on that is not as bad as what it seems. I know isolation is really difficult because I got back from the US a couple of days ago, I'm on 14 days of self isolation, which is challenging. Even though my husband tells me that that's just my normal life really, and I very rarely leave my office or go out anywhere. So it shouldn't be that much of a challenge. But you know, just being trapped inside is something that's, that's totally new, and really, really difficult.

Tina Tower
Good morning, Tyler.

Tina Tower
And so I wanted to address that because When I when I see my inbox kind of full with this urgent help, what should I do all of these sort of thing and everybody that I then rang and spoke to, and is all in this mad rush to get their businesses online. And so obviously, that's the space I work in is, is getting businesses online. And so at the moment, everyone's going, Okay, usually, this is something that we would think about and plan for months and months. But now this is the way it's going to be. And in the Prime Minister's address yesterday, it was, I was hoping that you know, in two weeks, this would all blow over, we'd see it'd be a massive overreaction and laugh would go back to normal but with the flattening of the curve, which is a wonderful thing. It's looking like all the experts are saying that this is going to be our new normal until around August, they're expecting it to last for about six months, which means that just putting business on hold for a couple of weeks is not an option. So if we want businesses to still be there in six months time, then we need to find a new way of working and often that is moving everything virtually and moving everything online. And there is pretty much every business that can find a solution for that. I mean, yesterday, I did have some challenging ones where, you know, people would ask me, How can I bring this online and I had a moment of going, hmmm can you? I don't know. So it's in these times, so we have to get really creative and figure it out. And while I create online courses, you don't need to go that whole hog. There is always a really simple way to get on that in terms of, you know, say you're running a service based business, all you need is zoom, and then you're good to go. So zoom has a free subscription. You can have up to 40 minutes streaming live in zoom before you have to go on to the paid version. So I would download zoom at the very least, and everything that you can do in person, you can nearly do that online as well. I mean, I know most of the events that I was booked to speak at have all moved to virtual And again, like when people have live in person events, the first thing at the moment is to go, should we just cancel this or postpone this? But because we're in such uncertain times, and we're going, we'll postpone it till when?, like, should we postponed it to June, July, August, like who knows what's going to happen then. And so having that not as a postponement, but just finding a different solution to move that virtually is going to work really well. And so for people that are doing things in person, so for those that are that are listening, that have speaking businesses, or consulting or training or anything like that, there is a values perception, misalignment in what happens in person and what happens online. So I know a lot of the people that I'm speaking at, for example, and they saying, well, this is your speaking fee when you're in person, what's your speaking fee when it's online? And my answer is, it's exactly the same because it's the same amount of time. It's the same amount of preparation. You don't have travel time, but you still bringing in it, you're still bringing everything and you still getting that result. But what I have done is given, like extra bonuses on top to really solidify that online. And so when you're doing things online, it's much harder for people to be engaged. So for people right now that are listening, you know, you're probably not just hundred percent focused on me, there's probably something else going on different things. Whereas if you were in a room, and I was speaking to you, it's 100% focus there. And so it's doing backup things. So going, for example, I'm doing a full day presentation in two weeks. And that was supposed to be in person where I've got 60 entrepreneurs in the room, and we're talking about how to build personal brand, and how to get everything online, good timing right...

Unknown Speaker
But now, we can't do that in person. So we've moved it all to virtual. Now I know it's going to be much harder to hold people's attention and engagement for that full day than it would if I was in that room where I can dance around and do all the sorts of things in person. And so with that, it's going How can we introduce gamification, so How can we introduce different challenges? So if you're doing things virtually, what can you do with people? That is physical that you can introduce in there too? So is there something tangible that you can send people in their home so that they have that to do to complement with the online? Is there something that you can do follow up? So for me, it's then going okay, every week after we're going to be doing a webinar that can really solidify and bring that information in. So there is a way to do that.

Tina Tower
While I'm talking. If anyone has any questions about getting their business online, just pop them in the comments there.

Tina Tower
I mean, I know zoom, zoom is my number one thing. So the simplest way to get your business online is sign up for zoom and move everything that was physical into virtual, very, very easy to use. At the moment, I get a lot of questions. This is a new technology that I've been using that has the branding on it as well. So at the moment, it's even more important to show up for your customers consistently to add value to help people as much as you can, because the only way we're going to get through what we're going through at the moment is to really double down on that community, support and engagement and help everybody to to grow and to be okay. So that in six months, post Corona era, everything can go on thriving as it should. So this one that I'm using right now is called stream yard really cool. It is a paid subscription. But it's good in going, you know, if you're going to show up again and again, online, you've got that branding there. So it's not just a normal video, which is a nice thing to do as well. So you want to talk about so the different things you can use. So we've got zoom, we've got stream yard, that's the basics and then it's going okay, what can you offer people that's going to be really easy going forward? And so at the moment, I know as well, finances are really uncertain for people. So the most of the calls that I had yesterday, were obviously people going, how can I get my business online, I need to get these going straight away, I need to get an online course or I need to get what I'm doing online in a simple way of zoom, or I need to get a membership or move all my customers into online scenarios, how can I do that? And so, usually, people would plan a website build months in advance and what we're doing now and how quickly we're having to go into that, you know, from a psychological point of view into changing our mind from what life was two weeks ago, to then letting our brains catch up with the reality of today and going, alright, if this is how our new normal is going to work for the next six months, what changes do I need, what sort of reinvention Do I need in order to thrive in that environment and so that can be a really big shift in doing them. And so, for people what I had to do yesterday was introduced payment plans for website builds, which we have never done so when we you know, build a new website, we get payment up front and then we build we do a really rapid build. So we have people live in under 30 days. So it's a it's a big quick process, but yesterday with everything that happened and people going, you know what, I need this and I need this now, or my business is going to go under

Unknown Speaker
But I don't have the money for it. And that's when we kind of had to go, Okay, let's do a payment plan for six months to do that to be able to bring people online because otherwise, like people have no other option. And that's what I want you to look at in your business is sometimes the things that we've always done and the policies that we've always had, maybe they need a little bit of a shift in order to help people in this time as well. So take advantage of, of what you can do for other people as well as well and take advantage of the banks. So if you're looking, you know, if you need finances at the moment, the banks have all of these amazing packages, because obviously, the banks need some positive PR right. So they're taking this time as going, we can help you with everything. And so they're looking at different sorts of loan products, lowering interest rates, like all of the different things that if you need hardship, money or you need money for something for your business, now is the time you can usually go to the bank and get it. So make sure that you're doing it in a way that is sustainable, and that you're spending money on things that are going to help your business grow and thrive. So what I want to like the main message I want to do is don't stick your head in the sand right now. So don't say, I'm just going to pause everything for a couple of weeks and hold on. And then we'll reassess the situation because these could last for months. And we want to kind of adapt to that new normal. And if it does last only a couple of weeks, then it's something that you've got that's able to springboard into the future because every business should have online capability anyway, yeah, I'm super biassed for that. But I think that that's that's what we should have in terms of longevity.

Tina Tower
So does anyone have any questions about getting their business online and how I can help you with that or any sort of technology that you're stuck with or, or anything along those lines that you need any help with? Because that's most of the questions that I've been getting. have all been around. How do I do that? How do I access zoom? How does zoom work

Tina Tower
Tamika has put in there, Come to 'Up loans' if you need help with the bank. So Tamika actually works for a company called 'Up Loans', which is owned by Kirsty Dunphy, who is my mortgage broker. So if anybody does need any help with money, look op or Google 'Up loans' and they will help you. They're the best in the business.

Tina Tower
Carla has said, oops, sorry Holly's getting all excited. There's a turkey walking past. Carla has said not yet. But I will. And that's the thing. Like you want to move nice and fast.

Tina Tower
So if you're not online right now, let's do it. Let's get it on. And I know that's a very big, psychological shift and a lot of people at the moment of feeling really overwhelmed. But for me, planning always solves everything. So if I'm feeling uncertain, and I'm feeling overwhelmed, and I'm feeling like shit, I don't know which way to go. The second I get a really tangible plan, the better I feel. So if you kind of have that plan for the future, and go, this is how I'm going to fix this. This is how I'm going to be okay. And you get that going. Then I promise you, you will feel so much more confident and so much more comfortable in the direction that you're going. Because the plan always makes you feel more in control. And at the moment, we want to control the things that we are able to control. And that's our actions. That's our thoughts. That's how we're responding. And that's the most important thing.

Tina Tower
All right, so if you have any questions going forward with how to get you online, I'm happy to jump on zoom with anyone or jump on Facebook or messenger or however it is. Usually I charge for that I'm not at the moment. So if anyone emails me and says, Please help, I'm really stuck. I don't know what's going to happen with my business. I will jump straight on with you and help you be able to solve that because there's many businesses I love and I want them all to be here growing and thriving in six months time. So if you need your help, I help you.

Tina Tower
Alrighty, everybody have the most fabulous day. Try and look at this as an opportunity for growth and opportunity for expansion and opportunity for experimentation. We've got this, we've totally got this. Have a great day everyone.

Tina Tower
Thank you for listening to this episode of her Empire Builder. If you loved it, please share it on Instagram and Facebook for your friends. And if you really want to deliver me smiles, you can pop a review on iTunes. I'd love to hear from you. So if you have any questions, email me at [email protected]. And if you want to know more about what we do, head over to tinatower.com . Now I truly hope this podcast gives you so much value and you can use it to dream big, plan well and take massive action in building your very own Empire. That's just for you.

Transcribed by Otter