Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! If you're new to grace + hudson, I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. It's been quite a journey! Some of you may know this already, but grace + hudson is not my first business. I actually owned a jewelry store back in 2010 that only survived for about a year. It was a brick and mortar store in New Jersey where I grew up. So yes, that's right, I actually quit my lawyer job twice! Once in 2010, after about 2.5 years in the legal profession, and then again in 2017.

A lot of people say to me, "Wow, you were brave to try again." I suppose that is true, but I don't see it that way. That first business - that first "failure" - proved to me that I wasn't going to die if I tried to start a business or change careers. I say that with some humor but it's true! When you want to make a big change like I did - opening a jewelry store after practicing law for 11 years - we think the decision to do so is life or death. It can feel massively overwhelming. But the fact of the matter is, it isn't. I don't say that to trivialize the change, but to emphasize that the decision isn't necessarily permanent. If it doesn't work out, you'll probably just go back to your first career and maybe even the same job you had before (if you left on good terms). Sure, you might lose some money in the process, but relatively speaking the damage is quite minimal. It is NOT life or death. My first failure taught me that. When I closed my brick and mortar jewelry store in 2011, I went back to being a full-time lawyer and I paid off the small amount of debt I had acquired from the store. That's it! Was there some shame involved? Of course. It was a little embarrassing to fail. But those feelings quickly passed in a matter of days. People are too wrapped up in their own lives to spend too much time dwelling on a failed jewelry store. Who cares, right? It's an interesting bit of gossip - that's about it.

So, if you are just dying to make a huge career change or start your own business, do it! Try it out. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work. I guarantee you you'll learn some things along the way and probably meet some new people. And maybe, like me, you'll try again 5 or 6 years down the road with different results.

If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every week, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something valuable from my business journey and my experiences!

P.S. Are you on Pinterest? I created a Weekly Journal board so you can easily navigate all of my journal entries. You can view and follow the board by clicking here. I've written so much about quitting my lawyer job to start g+h and I want to make it easier for you to access and read the entries that resonate most!

xoxo,

Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! If you're new to grace + hudson, I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. It's been quite a journey! And I know a lot of you would love to leave your 9-to-5 someday and start a business doing something you love. In this week's journal entry, I am writing about my daily mindset practice. If you follow me on Instagram you already know that I share a daily inspirational phrase each morning. I started this practice a long time ago in my own life, but I began to share it on Instagram at the beginning of the pandemic when the world felt really overwhelming. I got such positive feedback that I've continued sharing inspirational phrases every day over the last two years. If you don't follow me over on Instagram already, you can do so by clicking here. Anyways, here's why this daily practice has been one of the keys to my success in making the successful leap from lawyer to jewelry business owner.

Let me start by sharing an example of what I share on Instagram each day. At the beginning of the week, I usually post something like this: "I'm excited about all the possibilities this new week holds. I don't have to dread Mondays. I can choose to be excited about all that will happen this week." You see, the storylines that run through our minds shape our experiences. We can choose to repeat negative stories (for example, "Mondays suck") or positive ones (for example, "I am excited about a new week"). When we choose to adopt a positive perspective, we grow our ability to look at something "negative" and focus on the important lesson it taught us rather than the heartbreak it brought us. And when you have that kind of perspective, it becomes easier to manage life and to "roll with the punches" sorta speak. Negative things no longer hold the extreme power over us that they once did. Sure, we all have to deal with negative things and that's a part of life, but we can become more stable and even-keeled and "bounce back" sooner when we have the right perspective. Maybe we spend just one day crying in bed about a negative event rather than 8 or 9 or 10 days. You see what I mean?

After you start to use affirmations or mantras for the small things (like how you feel about Mondays) it becomes easier to use mantras for the big things. And this brings me to my point - mantras were one of the keys to my success in making the successful leap from lawyer to jewelry business owner. When I first wanted to make this big career change, I became very aware of the powerful negative stories that were holding me back and I started to change them by using mantras. This didn't happen overnight because, let me tell you, I had some pretty powerful negative stories about career and money running through my head. But slowly and surely, my beliefs and my stories changed.

For example, one of the thoughts I had running through my mind was that I will never be able to make as much money selling jewelry as I did as a lawyer. When I became aware of that belief, I realized how much it was creating my reality. If you believe you can't make a living selling jewelry, you won't. If you believe on the other hand that you can make even more money selling jewelry than you ever did as a lawyer, you will. It really is that simple. And so I began to say this mantra over and over again: "I can make more money selling jewelry than I did as a lawyer. I deserve to make money doing something I love." It worked! And I have concrete evidence to prove it. I had a jewelry business about ten years ago, in 2010, and it failed after about 12 months and I had to go back to being a lawyer. Why? I didn't believe I deserved to earn a living doing something I love. I didn't believe that a job could or should be fun. I didn't believe I could earn enough money to support myself making jewelry. But this time around, with grace + hudson, I do believe I deserve to earn a living doing something I love. I do believe that work can and should be fun. I do believe I can earn more money than I did as a lawyer. And you know what? That's exactly what's shown up for me this time around. (Side note: I also did a TON of self-development work on myself in the intervening 10-year period between these two businesses. And it was hard. It brought up a lot of tears and caused me to examine a lot of things about myself, some of which I didn't particularly like. But it was 100% worth it. Some storylines take a lot of work to reframe.) 

So how do you implement a similar mindset practice in your own life? It starts with awareness. It's hard to be honest with ourselves about the storylines running through our heads. You might think you're a positive person, but upon further examination you might realize that you actually have a lot of negative storylines running through your head each day. This is where the personal, self-development works comes into play. It takes a lot of courage to admit where we can do better, and to ask for help in making changes if we need it.

Once you've identified your negative storylines, the rest is (comparatively speaking) easy. Switch those negative stories into positive ones. Change your perspective. And start repeating the positive ones whenever the negative ones try to creep back in. For example:

• If the storyline you hear in your head all week long is "I hate this job and I'm never going to be able to break out of it and pursue my dreams" change it to "I wouldn't have been given this dream if I didn't have the power to make it happen. I might not be happy at this job right now, but it's paying the bills and teaching me things I might need to know down the road. I'm saving a little more money each week so that I can one day leave this job and do what I've been put on this earth to do."
• If the storyline you hear in your head all week long is "I'm overweight and I'll never feel good in this body" change it to "I am releasing excess weight that is holding me back. I am grateful that my body can move and support me and it's only a matter of time before I feel healthier in this skin."
• If the storyline you hear in your head all week long is "I am not smart enough to start my own business" change it to "I may not have any experience with business ownership but there are online courses available to me and so much free information on the Internet. I know I'll be guided to what I need to learn." 

In time, you'll begin to change your beliefs around the subject you're struggling with. And the positive storylines will drown out the negative storylines. Once this happens, new and different things will start to show up for you in your life. New opportunities and relationships and people and events and options. Your reality will gradually shift, which is an exciting thing to experience.

If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every week, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something valuable from my business journey and my experiences!

P.S. Are you on Pinterest? I created a Weekly Journal board so you can easily navigate all of my journal entries. You can view and follow the board by clicking here. I've written so much about quitting my lawyer job to start g+h and I want to make it easier for you to access and read the entries that resonate most!

xoxo,

Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. In this week's journal entry, I want to speak directly to those of you who desperately want to make a change in your job or career. It's not just a case of "I don't like my job" but rather a deep knowing that you are not in the right place. You also have a deep knowing that there's something more out there for you. You likely feel physically drained. Perhaps you even feel you're in a toxic environment at work. If these things are resonating with you, read on. 

I understand the desperation. I have been there. In fact, I was there for almost all 11 years of my 11 year career as a lawyer. I knew almost from the very, very beginning that it was not the right career for me. It felt like I was betraying my soul by staying in that career. That might sound dramatic but if you've been in my position (or currently are in that position) that phrase probably resonates deeply with you. Like I said, this isn't merely a case of "work stinks" but a much deeper issue. A complete and total mis-alignment that tugs at your heart strings and your soul each day. You feel lost. Misplaced. Like an outsider.

Here's the problem with desperation - it can result in rash and extreme behavior. You need only look to a dictionary to see that is true. "Desperation" is defined as "a state of despair, typically one which results in rash or extreme behavior." So my message to you would be this: resist the urge to pick another job or career and jump to it. Instead, make your mental health a priority first. Work on the issues around career that are coming up for you. Again, and I can't say this enough, this isn't merely a case of "I don't like my job," It's far, far deeper than that. And those issues need to be brought to the surface and addressed first. In fact, just like in a romantic relationship, if you don't understand the issues that led to your breakup, you're more likely to repeat them in the next relationship..errr I mean career. You get the point.

Let me give you an example from my own journey. One of the reasons I believe I was attracted to the legal profession had to do with my father. My father was a bit difficult to grow up with, and he rarely gave encouraging, kind words unless we did something great at school. I grew up thinking that "in order to make dad happy, I need to get an A on my exam." On a deep level, that translates to "I am worthy of love if I am a high achiever." Of course this conclusion is incorrect, but as a child, you don't know any better. You don't realize that your dad has issues of his own that are causing him to withhold love from his children (in my case, my dad had some mental health issues). This belief carried throughout my life and led me to be an A+ star student and perfectionist. I went to an Ivy League college, went to a top 25 law school, graduated in the top of my classes, and got a big fancy lawyer job with a high salary. Sadly, my dad's love was not waiting for me at the finish line. Nor was my own happiness. I am so incredibly glad that I worked with a therapist before I quit my legal job. I was able to understand my journey much more clearly. In particular, I was able to understand the reasons why I picked law as a career. This newfound awareness ensured that I didn't pick another career based on the same subconscious motivations. Instead I was able to get in touch with my true gifts, talents, and skills and pick a career based on those things. There's a much higher chance of success when you take action from that grounded, practical place, rather than from subconscious beliefs you don't even know are running (and ruining!) your life.

I hope this journal entry was enlightening. If this sounds like you, make your mental health your first priority right now. Changing careers can be a dramatic change, depending on your circumstances, and you want to make sure you're setting yourself up for success. Maybe you don't have deep-seated issues around career like I did, but you'll never really know unless you pause and explore it. You don't become desperately unhappy in a job by accident. That feeling of desperation is deserving of being explored. There might be important information it's trying to tell you. 

If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every week, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something from my experience and also my mistakes!

P.S. Are you on Pinterest? I'm in the process of creating a Weekly Journal board on Pinterest so you can easily navigate all of my journal entries. You can view and follow the board by clicking here. I've written so much about quitting my lawyer job to start g+h over the past couple years and I want to make it easier for you to access and read the entries that resonate most!

xoxo,
Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. In this week's journal entry, I'm talking about my daily practice of sharing a phrase or mantra on Instagram. If you've been following me over there (click here to check it out), you know that each morning I post a phrase on Instagram Stories that speaks to me that day. Many of you resonate with the phrases I post, so I thought I'd share a little more about this practice.

For example, today - a Monday - I posted, "I'm excited about all the possibilities this week holds." There are far too many people who dread Mondays. We can choose to dread them like everyone else or we can choose differently for ourselves - we can focus instead on all the good things that might happen to us this week. Revolutionary, huh? You see, the storylines that run through our minds really do help shape our reality. We can choose to repeat negative ideas and thoughts all day long, or we can repeat positive ones. And those ideas and thoughts create stories about what we believe is going to happen. In other words, they shape our perspective, and perspective is everything. Perspective helps you reframe the story in your head. Perspective is the ability to look at something "negative" and focus on the important lesson it taught you rather than the negative thing itself. And when you have perspective, it becomes easier to manage life and to "roll with the punches" sorta speak. Negative things no longer hold the extreme power they once did. Sure, we all have to deal with negative things and that's a part of life, but we can become more stable and even-keeled and "bounce back" sooner when we have the right perspective. Maybe we spend one day crying in bed about a negative event rather than 8 or 9 or 10. You feel me?

When you start to use mantras for the small things (like how you feel about Mondays) it becomes easier to use mantras for the big things. For example, I used daily mantras as a helpful tool in quitting my lawyer job and starting my own business. When I wanted to make this big career change, I became very aware of the powerful negative stories that were holding me back and I started to change them by using mantras. This didn't happen overnight because, let me tell you, I had some pretty powerful negative stories about career and money running through my head. But slowly and surely, my beliefs and my stories changed. For example, one of the thoughts I had running through my mind was that I will never be able to make as much money selling jewelry as I did as a lawyer. When I became aware of that belief, I realized how much it was creating my reality. If you believe you can't make a living selling jewelry, you won't. If you believe on the other hand that you can make even more money selling jewelry than you ever did as a lawyer, you will. It really is that simple. Don't believe me? I have concrete evidence of this. I had a jewelry business ten years ago, in 2010, and it failed after about 12 months and I had to go back to being a lawyer. Why? I didn't believe I deserved to earn a living doing something I love. I didn't believe that a job could or should be fun. I didn't believe I could earn enough money to support myself making jewelry. But this time around, with grace + hudson, I do believe I deserve to earn a living doing something I love. I do believe that work can and should be fun. I do believe I can earn more money than I did as a lawyer. And you know what? That's exactly what's shown up for me this time around. (Side note: I did a TON of self-development work on myself in the intervening period between these two businesses. And it was hard. It brought up a lot of tears and caused me to examine a lot of things about myself, some of which I didn't particularly like. But it was 100% worth it. Some storylines take a lot of work to reframe.) 

If this resonates with you, what comes next? The first step is becoming aware of the stories, beliefs, thoughts, and ideas that are ruling your life. Journal each day, send yourself voice memos when you notice a storyline, jot them down on the notepad on your phone - whatever works for you. You'll start to notice repeated patterns after doing this for a week or two. Some will be positive, but many will be negative. This is the hardest part. It's hard to be honest with ourselves about the storylines running through our head. And we also have a lot of blindspots. You might think you're a positive person but upon further examination you might realize that you actually have a lot of negative storylines running through your head each day. This is where the personal, self-development works comes into play. It takes a lot of courage to admit where we can do better, and to ask for help in making changes if we need it.

Once you've identified your negative storylines, the rest is (comparatively speaking) easy. Switch those negative stories into positive ones. Change your perspective. And start repeating them to yourself whenever the negative ones try to creep back in (and they will!). For example:

• If the storyline you hear in your head all week long is "I hate this job and I'm never going to be able to break out of it and pursue my dreams" change it to "I wouldn't have been given this dream if I didn't have the power to make it happen. I might not be happy at this job right now, but it's paying the bills and teaching me things I might need to know down the road. I'm saving a little more money each week so that I can one day leave this job and do what I've been put on this earth to do."
• If the storyline you hear in your head all week long is "I'm overweight and I'll never feel good in this body" change it to "I am releasing excess weight that is holding me back. I am grateful that my body can move and support me and it's only a matter of time before I feel healthier in this skin."
• If the storyline you hear in your head all week long is "I am not smart enough to start my own business" change it to "I may not have any experience with business ownership but there are online courses available to me and so much free information on the Internet. I know I'll be guided to what I need to learn." 

In time, you'll begin to change your beliefs around that subject and they'll completely drown out the negative storyline. Can you see that from my examples above? Once this happens, new and different things will start to show up for you. Your reality will gradually shift. Try it with something small to start!

I hope you've found this week's journal entry enlightening. If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every week, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something from my experience and also my mistakes!

P.S. Are you on Pinterest? I'm in the process of creating a Weekly Journal board on Pinterest so you can easily navigate all of my journal entries. I have a few weekly journal entries on the board right now, and I'm adding more on a weekly basis. You can view and follow the board by clicking here. I've written so much about quitting my lawyer job to start g+h over the past couple years and I want to make it easier for you to read the entries that resonate most!

xoxo,
Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. In this week's journal entry, I'm talking about having a social media presence when you start your own business. If you're an aspiring or new business owner, you obviously know that social media is a powerful tool for reaching potential customers or clients, but do you really truly understand how and why you use it? Read on if you're feeling confused or overwhelmed about creating or growing your social media presence.

Let's talk a little bit about the psychology behind social media for a second. It's easy to get overwhelmed with social media when you start a new business. It can be a MAJOR time drain and, if you're not intentional about it, the return on your efforts can be little to none. There's also this sneaky thing about social media posting - hitting that "post" button can make you feel like you've "done something" when really you haven't done much at all. You know what I mean? It's like a quick hit. A quick fix. And then, before you know it, you're spending more time on social media in search of that quick hit of feeling productive, instead of actually doing the real work behind your business. It's important that social media be given an appropriate place and time in your schedule, and an appropriate role in the growth of your business.

So that brings me to my next point. What is the point of social media? When you really boil it down to the nuts and bolts, what's the point? The point is to connect with a new or current customer or client and get them off the app onto your own website. It's not for "likes." Nope. You know what real business owners measure? They measure clicks to their websites, not likes. Likes are superficial and meaningless. That's why some people with thousands (or even hundreds of thousands) of followers make very little through their "influencing." Likes don't equal dollars. And you know what else? We are all smart enough to know that current social media platforms (Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, etc) are not going to be around forever. At some point, a better platform will come along and people will migrate there. So, for example, if you have one million followers on Instagram and Instagram dies next year, your business is going to die with it, unless...what? Unless you've been good about getting people off the app onto your website where you connect with them in different ways! When they go to your website, you can collect their email address or phone number. That way, you own a database of the people who love your company and, if Instagram dies, you'll still be able to stay in touch. Plus, when you connect with people through email or text, you can control how you communicate with them. You don't have to rely on Instagram to show your customers your post (because we all know that Instagram doesn't show your post to all of your followers!). 

When you think about social media through this lens it becomes a lot easier to manage. It gives you a purpose and something to focus on, right? Remember, the purpose is to connect and take your followers off the app onto your own site. I'll say it over and over again until it clicks! When you have this idea in mind, you're probably not going to post that drink from Starbucks again (I hate to be so blunt, but no one cares!). Let's look at a quick example. Let's say that you sell high tech, customizable running shoes. No one really cares what kind of coffee you had on Monday morning, but they might be interested in the trail you ran on Monday morning, right? You can still share personal things but, most of the time, strive to make it relevant to your audience and your shared common interests (in this case it was running - not coffee!). In other words, BE INTENTIONAL! This will save you so much time and so much effort. And it also cures that "quick hit" phenomena I explained above.You now understand that posting your Starbucks drink makes you feel like you "shared" or "did something" but you really didn't do anything productive for your business at all. By the way, if this example resonates with you, check out my recent journal entry here where I elaborated on this idea.

Once you've gotten your social media accounts up and running in a manner that appears to be attracting the right customers, it'll be time to think about advertising on social media. There's so much you can do even on a small budget. It can be complex though, so I highly recommend taking an online course. Then, once you've tested some ads and know what works, you can really scale up your customer base and scale back on the amount of time you spend on the platform (because the ads are doing the connecting for you and directing people off the app to your website automatically!). In short, building an intentional social media presence is the first foundational block to building a successful advertising strategy. And that's when your business can REALLY grow and skyrocket! So stay patient and keep at it - it'll be worth it!

I hope you've found this week's journal entry enlightening! If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every week, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something from my experience and also my mistakes!

P.S. Are you on Pinterest? I'm in the process of creating a Weekly Journal board on Pinterest so you can easily navigate all of my journal entries. I have a few weekly journal entries on the board right now, and I'm adding more on a weekly basis. You can view and follow the board by clicking here. I've written so much about quitting my lawyer job to start g+h over the past couple years and I want to make it easier for you to read the entries that resonate most!

xoxo,
Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. grace + hudson just turned 4 years old this week so in this week's journal entry, I'm sharing the 4 most important things I've learned in 4 years of business ownership. A lot sure has happened in 4 short years! I even moved to a different part of the country and totally changed my way of living - from big city to beach life. Certainly there are more than 4 big things I've learned, but if I had to boil it down, this is what I would want the aspiring business owner to know:

1. It is a marathon, not a sprint. If you aren't a patient person, this experience will teach you patience.

Do not believe the teachers that tell you success is possible overnight. It is a LIE. A business needs to be built on a solid foundation in order to have longevity. Foundations are built slowly and steadily, with each building block being intentional and well thought out. Any "quick success" is going to be just that. Quick. Overnight successes typically disappear as quickly as they came. If that's the game you're playing, then go for it. But if you want a business you can work at your entire life and grow into a stable source of income, it's going to be more of a process. Patience is required. If you're not particularly patient (that was me!) this process can and will teach you how to have patience, which will serve you in other areas of your life as well.

2. Sacrifice is required.

If you want something you've never had, you're going to need to do things you've never done. You're going to need to sacrifice time, money, and who knows what else in order to make your new business a priority (it'll differ from person to person). I hear so many people say they want to start a business, but they're unwilling to do anything about it. They're unwilling to spend time working on it, they're unwilling to save money for it, they're unwilling to change their lifestyle for a little bit in order to truly give it a go. Well, nothing's going to happen if that's your attitude. Trust me, if starting a new business was easy, every single person would do it.

For me, the major sacrifice I needed to make was related to money. I was previously a lawyer making six figures and I never really needed to think about money. It was always there in abundance. But when I quit my lawyer job, I needed to adopt a new way of looking at money (see #3). On the other hand, I will say that I didn't really need to sacrifice time. Why? As a lawyer, I was already working weekends and long hours. As a business owner, I kept the same schedule. But if you're used to a typical 9-5 job with no weekend work, time might be the biggest sacrifice you'll need to make. In any case, realize the sacrifices will be temporary. A few years. By year 4 or 5, you'll be able to let loose a bit and get things more automated. In the grand scheme of things, 4 or 5 years out of your life is nothing! It's so worth the life-long benefits of having your own business.  

3. If your finances and your mindset around money aren't in tip-top shape, be prepared to work on this area.

I've written several weekly journal entries on this topic so I won't get into the nitty-gritty again here, but changing my mindset around money is probably the most critical thing I did to take g+h from a five figure business to a six figure business. So many of us operate from this place of "there's never enough" or "I'll never make money living out my dream" or "it's either (a) live out my dreams and be poor or (b) live a nice life doing a job I don't like." No, no, no. These beliefs will make it impossible for you to build a stable business that can support you and pay the bills. You have got to take a look at this area and do some work on it if your money beliefs and financial practices aren't healthy and stable.

4. Learning marketing and advertising is critical.

What task takes up most of my time at work? It's definitely not making jewelry. It's marketing and advertising. Does that surprise you? I think some people look at my business and think, "Oh she just makes jewelry all day long, what a wonderful life." NOPE. Wrong. I spend most of my day-to-day life on business activities related to my jewelry business - mostly marketing and advertising. If no one knows about your business, they won't be able to buy from you no matter how great your products or services are! I actually love that part of my business. Listen, I used to be a lawyer with very intellectually stimulating work, and I could never in a million years just make jewelry all day long. I'd go crazy! I need to be mentally challenged at work. So I'm always learning the latest changes in digital advertising on Facebook/Instagram, taking webinars on marketing, doing research on how to change my approach to business growth and revise my strategy. If this sort of stuff makes your eyes glaze over, you might want to reconsider starting your own business. I mean it. It's such a big component of your day-to-day and such a crucial element of growing your business.

I hope you've found this week's journal entry enlightening! It's always fun to step back and see how far I've come in 4 years. I like to look back at the big picture and evaluate what really made a difference, what really stands out. I've tried and experimented so much in my business - some things worked and some things didn't. And, of course, it's helpful to reflect on the past in order to gear myself up for the future. I feel like I'm at the place in my business where I know what works for me now, and it's just about scaling those things up. It's a nice place to be! I rarely feel like I'm spinning my wheels anymore (you feel that way a lot in the first couple years).

Anyways, if you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every week, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something from my experience and also my mistakes!

P.S. Are you on Pinterest? I'm in the process of creating a Weekly Journal board on Pinterest so you can easily navigate all of my journal entries. I only have a few weekly journal entries on the board right now, but I'm adding more on a weekly basis. You can view and follow the board by clicking here. I've written so much about quitting my lawyer job to start g+h over the past couple years and I want to make it easier for you to read the entries that resonate most!

xoxo,
Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. In this week's journal entry I'm speaking to the small business owners and aspiring small business owners out there who are trying to grow their businesses on social media. Here's the quick takeaway point of this journal entry: you've got to make it about THEM and not YOU. This will save you loads of time and also keep you sane. There's no need to Instagram every Starbucks you drink, every cute thing your child does, or every date night you and your hubby or significant other have together. Spend a few weeks doing that and you'll exhaust yourself! And you probably won't see much business from it either.

If I had to boil down Instagram for business into one sentence it would be this: every time you think about posting something on your business account, pass it through this filter: "Is this serving my audience in some way?" The other would be: "don't chase likes and follows, instead chase click throughs and website views" (hey that rhymed!) but that's a topic for another day perhaps. 

When you start a small business and you set up a social media business account, such as on Instagram, you obviously have to post pictures of your products or talk about your services. But you also want to sprinkle in some other content to keep things interesting, introduce yourself to your clients/customers, and be seen as a real human behind the business (customers are looking for that more and more these days - a lot of people are moving away from faceless, human-less, ginormous companies like Amazon to support people-centered small businesses). So what do you post to fill in the gaps between product/service photos? It depends on your business of course but every single business should strive to primarily post things about THEIR AUDIENCE and not merely about THEM. Let me make this a little more clear through an example. Last week was my two year anniversary with my boyfriend. Sure, I could've posted a photo of us and said "yay two years!" but I am trying to get better and better about posting things that are about my audience and not just about me so here's what I did instead. I posted a photo of a beautiful bride who recently got married wearing g+h earrings and spoke about how I love hearing all of my customers' love stories. I shared how I met my boyfriend on the dating app Bumble and asked my audience to tell me how they met their significant others. It was really fun because a lot of the people who follow me are engaged and looking for wedding jewelry, so they're in love and eager to share their stories. There was so much love in the comments of that post, let me tell you! It truly brought me so many smiles to read their stories and I also got to connect individually with some of them who messaged me. You see what I mean? I made it about them too, and not just me.

You don't have to do this ALL the time but strive to do it MOST of the time. Listen, most people have a hard enough time keeping up with their close friends and family members on Instagram, so they sure don't have the time to keep up with a complete stranger's daily trips to Starbucks and other routine matters. If that's the type of content you post most of the time, your audience is going to quickly tire and unfollow. They followed you because you {insert what you do - whether that's sell jewelry, or offer one-on-one business coaching, or anything in between} so they want to see content related to that topic. Period. Don't make it complicated!

Let me come back to something I said earlier so there's no confusion. Yes, it is important to introduce yourself and let your audience get to you know as a person. That helps build the "know, like and trust" factor of the client or customer journey. First, someone has to become aware you and your business exist (know you), then they have to come to like you, and then they have to come to trust you, before they will buy. If you're selling a $30 item, people might acquire the know, like, and trust factor with you in one day. If you're selling a $1,000 coaching session, it's going to take a lot longer. I think that's a great gauge for how much you should be sharing about yourself, don't you think? If I'm selling $30 t-shirts, I probably don't need to talk too much about myself. If I'm selling a $1,000 business coaching session, I probably need to talk about how I graduated from an Ivy League school, worked in the corporate environment for 11 years, left and built my own 6-figure business, etc. You see my point?

Here's another thing to keep in mind. I think some business owners post too much about their kids, coffee, or dogs because they don't know what else to post. They want to post SOMETHING and those things are quick and easy to share so that's what they do. There's no thought, no planning, no content creation and, frankly, no work behind it. You might feel better for a second because "I posted yay!" but it's not really serving your audience or your business in any way.

If this resonates then perhaps the place to start is to plan out your content. It doesn't need to be formal and written out, but think about it intentionally. For example, say to yourself, "I want to strive to post on Instagram Stories 3 times per day, 5 days per week." Ok, so that's 15 times. So tell yourself that business-related content needs to take up 10 or 12 of those stories and personal posts about dogs, kids, and coffee can take up 3 to 5 of those stories. Does that make sense? Become intentional about what you post, instead of doing it unconsciously. Once you've become good about that, the next step is to become more intentional about those 3 to 5 more personal posts. For example, I live in Charleston, which is beautiful and romantic (and also happens to be a top wedding destination), so I could share some scenic photos from around town. Here's another example: I primarily sell jewelry, but my catch line on the sign outside my shop in Charleston is "jewelry designed by a former lawyer pursuing a prettier life" and so I talk about how I left my job as a lawyer once per week on Instagram. How can you make your personal posts engaging, and not just a Starbucks photo snap? We all have unique traits about us that can help make our business stand out. Emphasize those when sharing about personal topics!  

Bottom line: you want people to follow your business social media account because they are interested in your business, right? So give the people what they want! Post about your business and stop wasting time posting too much personal content. Here's another filter you can use when thinking about posts - if I post this, will anyone be enticed to visit my website and learn more about my business or what I'm offering? Because, honestly, that's the entire point of your business social media accounts! Keep that goal in mind and it might help you come up with some interesting content for your audience. How can you educate a quick tip in 30 seconds? How can you inspire with a photo or idea? How can you use your gifts and talents to serve your audience? It's all about service!

If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every week, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something from my experience and also my mistakes!

P.S. Are you on Pinterest? I'm in the process of creating a Weekly Journal board on Pinterest so you can easily navigate all of my journal entries. I only have a few weekly journal entries on the board right now, but I'm adding more on a weekly basis. You can view and follow the board by clicking here. I've written so much about quitting my lawyer job to start g+h over the past couple years and I want to make it easier for you to read the entries that resonate most!

xoxo,
Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. In this week's journal entry, I want to talk a little about the small business world. If you want to start a business someday or already have, there is something to be careful about in the early stages. I wish someone had warned me about this before I started my business.

When you start a small business, you'll naturally begin to meet other small business owners. For example, if you're selling a product, you're going to do a few pop-up shops, fairs, and markets to see if they work well for your business. You'll meet a few business owners there and they'll tell you about a small business conference or meeting next week. You'll go and meet more business owners there, and on and on your networking will go. New start-up owners typically go to these types of events, as opposed to more established small business owners. On the one hand, this is a great thing! Especially if you are like me. I had recently quit my lawyer job and I was feeling really disconnected to my friends still working as attorneys. I couldn't stand how much they complained about work since I was no longer in that world (side note: I no longer keep in touch with most of those people. I have written about this before but expect your friendships to change in some ways). Anyways, it was nice to meet like-minded people who were pursuing a similar path.

But, on the other hand, I found the small business start-up community to be a bit draining. I heard a lot of complaints about "how hard it is to be a new business" and "how difficult small business ownership is", etc. A year or two into my business ownership journey, I separated myself from these types of meetings, organizations, etc. I realized that this environment was actually dragging me down more than it was pulling me up. It seemed like more time was spent griping over the difficulties of small business life rather than building community, sharing strategies, or solving common problems. In its place, I decided to make more of the online groups and resources that were working for me. I found it easier online to weed out these draining "complaining" groups from the helpful ones - maybe because it wasn't as much of a time commitment. I didn't need to get dressed and go to a meeting or networking event. Naturally, this means that I have small business friends all over the country and I can't necessarily grab a coffee with them, but hey that's ok - especially in this day and age. 

I tell you all this because mindset is EVERYTHING in the beginning stages of starting a business. It is so incredibly easy to doubt yourself, your ideas, and even your entire life's trajectory because what you're embarking on is HARD. If it were easy, every person would be doing it. You must, must, must protect your mindset from complainers who whine about the difficulties of small business ownership. If you choose to see small business ownership as difficult, it will be difficult. If you choose to small business ownership as an exciting challenge, it will be just that. You cannot afford to waste time surrounding yourself with people who are going to contribute anxiety, fear, and doubt to your mindset. If this means that you feel a little bit like a "loner" in the beginning, that is ok. It'll keep you mentally on track and that's where you need to be to succeed. 

So, in conclusion, I'm not saying to avoid these groups and meetups and conferences all together. All I'm saying is to keep your guard up. If you sense someone wants an ear to complain to, keep your distance. Humans are funny - misery loves company! But that's company you don't need in your life.

If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every week, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something from my experience and also my mistakes!

xoxo,
Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. This week's journal entry is a practical post that newbie (and aspiring!) business owners will find helpful. I know a lot of people used their extra downtime over the past year to build a website and work on their business dreams. If that's you, bravo! That's so exciting! But once you have the wheels moving, it can start to feel even more overwhelming than it did at the start. Am I right? That's because you're really in the thick of it now. Your business went from this idea in your head to a real thing, and you're really starting to understand how a small business works and how many moving parts you need to juggle. From building your social media following, to managing inventory, to setting up an email system, to hiring help, to creating a logo, to deciding how to price your products or services, oh the tasks are endless! Take a breather for a second and read on because I want to share a little strategy, as well as my top 3 things to prioritize. I've avoided the obvious things (like design a logo) and instead focus on 3 things you might not realize the importance of yet (but you'll thank me later!).

If you are feeling overwhelmed and in over-your-head, I want you to first embrace the idea that you cannot possibly get everything done now or even this year. Building a new business is a longer journey - a marathon, not a sprint. For example, I purchased a Pinterest for Business online course in 2018 and I am just now, in 2021, really focusing on that course and building my Pinterest presence. I should have done this already since I sell wedding jewelry and many brides plan their weddings on Pinterest. But it just hasn't happened yet. And that is okay. This will happen to you too (not necessarily with Pinterest but with other things) because there are only so many hours in a day. So accept that fact at the get-go, rather than beating yourself up for all the things you aren't getting done every single day.

Second, make a list of all that needs to be done. Do a complete and total brain dump. Keep your list handy over the next few days so you can add to it (you'll think of more and more and more things...). This exercise will help you feel a little less frazzled. It always feels good when you get those frantic, random thoughts out of your head and onto a page.

Third, after a few days have passed and you're relatively certain that you've captured all the "to do's" running around your brain, begin to prioritize the items on your list. This step will give you a clearer vision of the big picture and allow you to see how the puzzle pieces fit together. Regardless of the type of business you've started, there are 3 major things that ALL business owners should prioritize at the very start. I'm going to skip the obvious things (like designing a logo) and instead list 3 things that you may not realize the importance of yet, but you will shortly. Here they are:

1) If you've set up your shop on a platform like Etsy or if you're just selling items through your Instagram account, prioritize setting up your own website. 

I cannot stress this enough. That is why it's number one on my list here. Platforms like Etsy, Instagram, etc can disappear tomorrow. And you know who owns all the data pertaining to your sales and customers? NOT YOU! That is a huge area of risk. Let me explain. Let's say you've set up an Etsy page and items are flying off the shelf. You've made 5,000 sales in your first month. Well, if Etsy disappeared tomorrow (or - in the more likely scenario - changed its terms of service in a way that negatively impacts you) you can go from 5,000 sales per month to zero real fast. And it would be completely out of your control. Etsy owns all the data about those sales and those customers and you own none of it. Where would you go from there? You wouldn't even be able to contact these 5,000 people and tell them where they can find you next. You'll have to build your own website at that point and start over from scratch. So just do this from the get-go. It's okay to run a website and an Etsy page at the same time, but make sure the people you sell to know about your website. For example, when you ship their Etsy order, include a little notecard about your website and perhaps offer them 10% off their next purchase from your website. This will encourage them to interact with you directly, and not through Etsy (that'll also mean higher profit margins for you because Etsy won't take a cut!).

It is so easy and inexpensive to set up a professional website these days. Try Squarespace or Shopify. There are beautiful website templates on these sites with easy drag and drop technology so you don't have to worry about coding or designing. In my opinion, avoid Wordpress in the beginning. It's more difficult to navigate which means you're going to put it off longer and this is not something that can wait. You can always upgrade your website down the road. Don't forget that! So just get going as quickly as possible with a website platform that's user-friendly. I use Shopify and highly recommend them! 

2) Get an email system and build your email list from the very start. This is somewhat connected to task number one. The contact information of the people who are interested in your products or services is very valuable. It is perhaps the biggest asset you have. Why? Because you can communicate with these people! And they are likely to buy! They are already at least somewhat interested in what you have to offer so you want to be able to explain your products or services to them in greater detail, advise them of upcoming sales, etc. Once you have a decent sized list, you can also use this information to do other things in your business, like run ads on social media platforms (that's a topic for another day). And trust me, once you get to those more advanced tasks, you are going to be WISHING you had set up an email system on day one. Once you set it up, it runs automatically in the background and you never have to worry about it.

Listen, you don't even have to email these people right away, ok? Just promise me you'll collect their emails. You can come up with on-brand emails and sale announcements down the road if you don't have time now. Even if it takes you a year to come up with emails that you think will be of service to your potential customers, you will be so grateful that you started collecting their email addresses from the start. 

Think about it in relation to point number one above. If Etsy disappeared tomorrow, with a few key strokes on your computer you'd be able to email the 5,000 people who bought from you to tell them about your website. Your business wouldn't die on the day that Etsy pulled the plug. That's a really easy risk-management step to take, don't you think? I think so! Here's another thing to think about. There are a lot of issues with Instagram and Facebook right now - everything from censorship to privacy concerns (there is a big privacy change that Apple is making to iPhones this year that is going to impact the way Instagram/Facebook operates). And I have a strong gut feeling that big changes are coming to social media platforms in the next year or two. So don't bank on them being around in their current form forever. Start now. Build an email list so that you don't have to rely exclusively on these platforms to communicate with your customers and potential customers.

So how do you collect emails? You know those pop ups you see when you go to a website? You know, where they offer you a discount in exchange for your email address? They're not just being generous there. They're offering you something substantial so that you'll want to give up your email address. A discount is usually the best offer (who doesn't love a discount!?) but you can also offer a free guide or something else creative. Just make sure it's good enough, or you are going to have a hard time getting people to give up their email address. Then set up a pop up on your website, just like the ones you've seen on other sites. How do you do that? Read on - I'll tell you at the end of the next paragraph.

The email platform I would recommend is Flodesk. I've used Mailchimp in the past and researched other email platform services but, in my opinion, they are not user-friendly. Unless you know how to code, it's hard to make on-brand, pretty emails. And when you think your business emails look like crap, you don't want to send them. And therefore you completely lose the opportunity to communicate with the people who most want to hear from you! Flodesk finally fixed that problem. You don't need to know how to code and can simply choose from their templates and customize them with drag and drop technology. Flodesk is also incredibly affordable. I was paying way over $100/month on Mailchimp and now I'm paying $19/month on Flodesk. You can also set up a pop up through Flodesk to collect emails very easily. Just go to the Flodesk help section and they'll walk you through it. If the instructions don't make sense to you, go to YouTube and search for a video that walks you through the exact steps. Sometimes you just need a person to show you each step!

3) Last but not least, my third recommendation is to set up your Facebook Pixel on your website. Just like collecting emails - you don't even have to do anything with the pixel right away, ok? Just promise me you'll set it up.

What is the pixel? The pixel collects data related to your website. It allows you to see who's visited your website and whether they "added to cart" and much more. When you have this data, you can use it to run highly effective ads. The pixel, in other words, is the basis for starting ad campaigns on social media. I don't really know anyone who's wasting money on magazine or newspaper ads these days - any savvy small business is running social media ads because they are WAY less expensive and WAY more effective. I would highly recommend you take a course on social media advertising early on in your business or - if you're not ready for that - regularly listen to some podcasts on this topic so you can begin to learn about it.

If you have a platform like Shopify, it is so easy to set up the pixel. It's literally a matter of cutting and pasting. Go to your website platform's help center and search "how to set up the Facebook Pixel" or head on over to YouTube and search "how to set up the Facebook Pixel on {insert the name of your website platform whether that's Shopify, Squarespace, etc}." Then, when you're ready to run some ads - even if that's two years from now - you will have built up two years' worth of data that you can then use to run effective ad campaigns.

Two side notes: (1) you need to have a Facebook Business Page in order to get a pixel (it takes a matter of minutes to set up a page so just head to Facebook or YouTube for instructions if you can't figure it out yourself) and (2) you cannot set up a Facebook Pixel on an Etsy page or another similar platform. You have to own the website in order to place a Facebook Pixel on it. That's another reason you want your own website and don't want to rely on Etsy!

Let me make another little note since it seems appropriate here: in the beginning, you might just be selling to friends and family. That's great for now. And maybe that's why you don't understand quite yet why it's so important to collect emails, design your own website, and set up a pixel. But selling to friends and family is not a long-term business strategy. At some point, you need to start selling your products or services to strangers. How do you do that? How do you sell to strangers? Word-of-mouth (but that tends to work pretty slowly), attending conferences or pop up shops or craft shows where you can sell your products or services, and running advertising campaigns that target people who are most likely to enjoy what you have to offer. Marketing and advertising might seem overwhelming at the moment but you'll get to it soon enough. For now, just set up the systems (an email list and a pixel) you will need to set up effective advertising campaigns later on.

I'll end on a positive note! Of this list, 2 out of 3 items should only take an afternoon. It doesn't take long to sign up for Flodesk, set up a pop up form to collect emails, and set up your Facebook Pixel. And if you don't have your own website yet, that really doesn't take a long time either if you are somewhat tech savvy. If you're not, consider hiring someone to build a basic site for you (you can always upgrade it later) or set a goal to spend 2 hours per week working on it yourself. Even if it takes you 12 months to complete it, at least you'll be well on your way to having your own website. 

If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every Monday night, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something from my experience and also my mistakes!

xoxo,
Stacy

Welcome to another edition of my Weekly Journal! I use this space to share about my journey from lawyer to jewelry business owner. In this week's journal entry I'm writing about how things can happen so quickly when you're on the right path. I think a lot of people who want to start their own business or change careers like I did get so caught up in the fears of what can go wrong. Naturally! We humans usually don't love the idea of change. But we get so consumed with those thoughts that we forget or overlook just how quickly things can fall into place when they're right and when they're meant to be. I'm sure you can look back and point to something you decided to do, big or small, and say, "Wow, I'm so glad I did that! Things just seemed to fall into place!" Why do we forget those experiences and instead focus so much attention on what can go wrong? I don't have the answer to that but I can tell you that you can (and you must!) choose differently if you want to make that big change. Otherwise, you might find yourself in the same spot 5 years from now, still hemming and hawing over whether you should make the leap.

Let me share a little of my own experience to help illustrate the point. I quit my lawyer job in February 2017. I was living in Chicago at the time with no intention to move or to ever expand my e-commerce business into a brick and mortar storefront. But just 3 years later, in 2020, I opened a storefront in downtown Charleston. What?! If someone would have told me that in 2017 I would have told them they're out of their mind. But you see, when you're in alignment with your purpose, your talents, your gifts, your God-given dreams, things just have a way of falling into place. And they often fall into place FAST.

Have you ever heard of the book The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho? It is a very famous book and a quick read, so I highly recommend it if you're on your journey to finding your purpose. Anyways, there's a famous quote from that book that goes something like this: "When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it." It is so true. That power is always available to us. The problem is we often block the power with our own thoughts, our own plans, our own self-limiting ideas (and that's a whole other topic for another journal entry!).

So, anyways, I'm living in Chicago and right around September 2018 (so about 18 months after I originally quit my job) I get this huge overwhelming urge to move out of Chicago. I did enjoy living in Chicago at the time, so it was a bit of a surprise to feel this so deeply. But I paid attention to my gut and after thinking it through for a couple weeks, I decided to sublet my apartment for a couple months and explore the idea without committing to it. Fast forward just a few months later and in May 2019, I moved to Charleston. And then three weeks later I met my now boyfriend of almost two years. And then not even one year later, I signed a lease to open my first storefront. Wow! It blows my mind that I haven't even lived in Charleston for two years yet (in about 7 weeks I'll hit my anniversary mark!). But that just goes to show you - when it's right, it's right. When it's meant to be, it all lines up. And it can line up quickly. Sometimes I have to remind myself, I haven't even been out of the legal profession for a full five years. Yet it feels so far away. It feels like I've lived another lifetime since then. So much has happened.

Anyways, I share this journal entry this week because I want to give you a little encouragement to think about how quickly things can line up when they are meant to be. When you're on the right path. When you are lining up with your purpose. Trust your gut. Go for it. You can always go back to your "old" life. Trust me. It's so easy to just go back and get another job in the same field you're currently in. Will it be comfortable and fun? No, but you could figure it out. I prefer to adopt the phrase "you have nothing to lose" rather than get so tied up in the fears that I stay stuck for years. Life is far, far, far too short for that. 

If you'd like my Weekly Journal sent straight to your inbox every Monday night, click here to subscribe. I hope you're able to learn something from my experience and also my mistakes!

xoxo,
Stacy