2021 Forecast Live with Kim Woods

2020 was obviously a challenging year for all. And I'm so grateful to have had you in my orb during 2020 to kind of help me stay (somewhat) sane. You are so grounded. And you know, I'm actually quite calm in times of craziness but this year even challenged me. And when the New Year rolled around, I almost felt like I could inhale. So, I'm so excited to hear what you have in the forecast for 2021.

Aside from being literally magical, Kim's background is actually… well... she is a business strategist. She's helped build multiple multi-million-dollar companies. She has consulted with Fortune 500 CEOs. And one of the things that she has enlightened me to is knowing yourself, trusting yourself, liking yourself. Especially in 2020, you're questioning yourself all the time. Should I invest in this? Should I not invest in this? Should I employ an extra person in my team? Shouldn't I do that? What about this marketing thing that we want to roll out? That's how my mind sounds. It's very loud in here. So I’m excited to have you share some tangible activities that we can use, and overall what the business forecast for 2021 holds in place.

René: So, here's the thing... 2020 is over. Here we are in 2021. What's the difference going to be?

Kim: First, I just want to start with how it's going to feel. So last year, I would say, felt really tight. You couldn't really look ahead; you couldn't really move; you couldn't really breathe. 2021 is not going to be like that. It's lighter. It's looser. We’re going to be able to navigate and move better. So that's going to feel much better.

Last year it was heavy. It was like I used to say it was like walking through molasses. But 2021 can be one filled with tremendously good fortune. 2021 is going to feel expansive. It's going to feel like we're growing. It's going to feel like we have movement. It's going to feel that we have momentum and we can we can we can get things done.

There's a caveat. It's going to feel like this, but we’re going to have to navigate. We’re going to have to get a stride. It's going to be like two steps forward, one step back. We're going to be finding our footing.

What's happening with the energies is there's going to still be uncertainty. We all want to know, what date is everything open? Is it going to stay open? It's all in the stars, you guys so, if it wasn't the virus, it would be something else.

But that uncertainty is why I'm saying that it can be a stellar year. We’re going to be in creation. I know we're tired. I know we've been through a lot. We should be asking ourselves: what are our priorities? What's really important to us? This is my number one thing I love to do. This is my number two thing I love to do. And this is the number three thing I love to do. That's where the creativity comes in. We are going to be going through fits and starts this year. We're going to get some momentum in the middle of this month, to the end of the month. We get momentum starting a third week in February, until the last week in April. September is the best month literally on the planet, and then we have pockets. You're going to have pockets of really good, forward momentum, and you're going to have to revisit some things. Think about it like that. You're not throwing things out.

There's going to be a truth revelation thing for the world in the end of May and June and I don't know what that's going to look like. But it's going to require people to kind of reassess and re-evaluate and so then therefore, as business owners, if you want to be strategic about it, we want to plan for that without getting too fixated on the plan.

This energy is helping us let go of control and move into influence. It's not a softer approach, it's just a more open approach. I need a plan A and I need a plan B, but now maybe I'll have six plans. And it's not going to be six fully baked plans. (I can't be a business strategist and say, oh, everybody should do six fully baked strategies - that would be a colossal time waste, right? And I hate wasting time.)

So, two things. One is collaboration. But the first thing I want to talk about is the response to your question.. So, think about this, René and I talked about Dermaviduals and we talked about doing some more things with products and more things with seasons and more things with customization. Lay that foundation and then look at some complimentary things that beautifully augment. If it were me, I’d get really into the products because you know that they are a mainstay. You know that you can sell them. You know that they can come off the shelf, no matter what happens, on whatever continent you're living on.

You want to keep Top of Mind but you don't want to be bothering them with 10 emails a week with various discounts and promotions - that’s terrible right? So how can you not do that, but still keep top of mind. Really lean into different products leaving lead into different ways to connect, to have fun, celebrate seasons, things like that.

You have an opportunity to deepen the connection with your clients, believe it or not.

If you were to say, I'm going to say products are going to be central right now because they're reliable. But I'm going to do something for touchpoints that are going to work really well to increase that trust and to increase that connection and to woo them to come back.

If it were me, I would take the calendar and I would say okay, what's my vibe? Is my vibe wellness? Is my vibe celebration? Is my vibe sanctuary? Is my vibe holistic? Whatever my vibe is, that will stay true. But how can I pivot around that?

Let’s say my vibe is joy. “I like to bring my client’s joy.” They like to feel beautiful. They like to feel safe. They're upbeat. They're uplifted. If that's my vibe, I'm going to do celebratory things. I could have a party! “Oh, you don't be stuck at home on Valentine's Day” hang with me, let's have a little virtual party!”

People feel lonely, they don’t feel supported, they feel disconnected. They don't feel like themselves. They don't have peace and sanctuary, maybe their kids are home and driving them a little cuckoo. Look at your client list and put yourself in the vibe of your client, and relate that to your vibe. You can mix it up and even do a combination. If that feels like too much, do one thing and do it well.

This is going to broaden your ability to connect with your client in more ways than ‘come into my space and get a facial’.

If people feel like they can come to you for feeling (as well as an awesome skin experience), they will be tied to you for life.

René: Is this going to be a good year of abundance of like money coming in? How about things like is this a good year for people in the group looking at expanding? They're not necessarily the team but let's categorize it by ‘Is it a good year for growth in terms of team or even growth and like into a new bigger space even if you're an increase your team’ for example?

Here's the thing, you're going to have to be uncomfortable. It’s going to require you to do something you don't normally do. There's a tremendous amount of opportunity for freedom this year.

This is freedom. Freedom from paying too much for your money, meaning, you're not that passionate about your work, or freedom from, you know, clients that you feel may not be your ideal client, or freedom from you playing too small. Freedom from not getting paid what you’re worth. I'm not getting paid for what you were?

We tend to get into habits. We tend to get into routines. Well, if 2020 did anything, it broke us from the routine.

So, you're thinking, well, I just want to go back to the way it was before and I can't wait to get certainty, and I can't wait to get routine... It's not going to be a good year for you.

René: The freedom of cutting loose essentially, is kind of what I'm hearing between the lines, that's how it's resonating for me. Because my skin centric business formula program is like cutting from the edge; like we love our clients, but this is a community of givers. Because we're caring of people, but we can do it often at the deeper amount of ourselves. So, this is kind of where I say to my clients in the program is like, you can serve at an extremely high level and sign now at the same time. I think that is completely acceptable. And the thing that people have issues with are things like “but what if the client then chooses not to come” and so this year, what I'm hearing you say is, this is a great year for things like that because: cut loose, make space for a client that's more ideal who operates closer to the way that you need. You are allowed to have a very healthy boundary and have the freedom to let the clients go

Kim: And they're not the ones referring you to everybody because they are not in that mindset, right? You've undervalued yourself enough to allow this relationship to have to form this way. You can break free. Value your gift like you value yourself. Know yourself and like yourself and trust yourself magnificently, then you have rabid followers, and you have great leads, and you can turn prospects into clients and it really does work.

René: Be brave, charge what you're worth, and have those healthy boundaries.

Kim: Because if you believe in yourself, they're going to believe in you. They're not going to question it. Yeah. Yeah, they literally just go, Okay, great. Thank you for telling me what I need. How often will I need this? And when should I replenish? And what else do you have? That's a deeper conversation. That's the conversation you want to have. That means that you weren't wearing your worth.

You're going to be nervous. You're going to feel uncertain. You're going to want to put pillars in place for yourself as reminders of: Did I say a big enough? Am I really investing in myself in my business? Did I? Did I go to the edge in a way that's healthy for me? Did I really know my gifts and know my worth and know my process and know my clients and know my values? And did I really pivot around that and really get around my offerings? Do I like myself enough to respect myself and dance in the marketplace beautifully? And to deal with my client’s uncertainty as much as mine? And do I trust? Do I trust myself? Do I trust that this is going to get better?

René: It is like the year of feel the fear and do it anyway.

Kim: That was more last year because last year, you didn't get any input back. You're going to get feedback this year, which is going to be great. So, you're going to try something like the facial party or something like that and then feel what it felt like for you and then how your clients responded. Learn from it. Because this is where the get creative piece comes in. You want to follow your instincts. You don't want your mind to rationalize. If you've gotten to be too rigid, it’s because we want to feel safer. But it really comes from not trusting. So, then no. So that doesn't sound really great. But that’s why. So, if we trust in ourselves, we trust in our intuition, we trust in our discernment, we trust in our abilities of what we're delivering in our worlds. And we are now becoming more passionate about it, we're becoming more inspired by it, we're really putting that stake in the ground and saying, these are our bread-and-butter offerings. This is a product line that we love to death. And we want to just complement it. Or these are the services we really love. These are the people that I can count on, both from a client perspective and from a staff perspective. This is what I really want to make sure that I lean into.

And I talked about collaboration, so let’s look at that. If you've got some acupuncturist and some massage therapists and some hair salons, and then the aesthetics and then the doctors and then the chiropractors... think about how much richer a service offering could be, or a go live party could be, if you worked together somehow? Maybe because maybe you don't want to be on the front line. Maybe you're a beautiful coordinator, and you're an awesome connector, but don’t want to run the whole technological platform to go online. Where can you work around that? That's where getting creative with being collaborative.

René: You said that this next year, we have to be open minded to other people's points of view. That what you think is right, is not necessarily. Are you saying, for example, remember to be open minded about opinions from our team members who might come and surprise and delight us with strategies and tips and ideas and things that we might not have necessarily thought of ourselves that might in the end be really great for our business growth?

Kim: Look at your clients and say you do something for Valentine's Day. After, go back to your clients and engage with them and say, “Okay, what if I were to do this again, what would you like to see?” That's being open minded to their perspective. People love to be involved. Is there an opportunity to open yourself up just a little bit more and to be much more creative? It's going to be more collaborative; you're going to have to let go of control. We're opening ourselves up more, broadening and deepening the energy that comes with working with other people.

Now, this is going to sound contradictory, so please bear with me. When you are wildly focused with an open lens, it feels uncertain, and weird. But that's exactly what's required. So, what does that look like?

That you're very sure of yourself, and you're wearing your passion for your work, and all of your value. And you're open to suggestions on how to do it a little bit differently, and a little bit with a little bit more finesse.

René: Now, this was just a taste of all that Kim Woods has in her 2021 forecast, and on offer overall! Here’s a few more ways to connect with her and learn more.

See the full 2021 Business forecast.

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