Are you a corporate woman with a creative flair holding on to a secret dream of starting your own business?
You’ve come to the right place!
The Business Academy for Creative Entrepreneurs is designed to help you leave your 9-5 to launch the creative business you’ve been dreaming of. The four-pillar approach will take your business idea from the initial planning and development stages through to scaling with the people and resources you need to build your creative entrepreneurial success.
After completing the Business Academy for Creative Entrepreneurs, you will be equipped with the mindset, knowledge and resources to support your creative business, and ultimately, the lifestyle you want to have as a self-employed entrepreneur.
It’s time to stop tossing and turning at night wondering how you found yourself in a corporate job you hate with no end in sight. It’s time to stop stifling your creativity. It’s time to empower your ingenuity and build a creative business that you love. It’s time! Let’s do this!
The 4 S’s of the Business Academy for Creative Entrepreneurs
Pillar 1: Sketch your Business
Deciding to quit your 9-5 and start your own business is scary but so is deciding to stay in a job that keeps you unfulfilled, or worse, unhappy. This ‘Sketch Your Business’ pillar will guide you through the initial stages of building a creative business. Together, we will sketch your mission statement and business plan, and initiate the mindset needed to shift from corporate employee to successful creative entrepreneur.
- Apply your ingenuity to design a business that honors your creativity and provides you with a steady income.
- Clearly articulate your business idea and the value it holds for you as an individual so that you can easily explain to others why they need the product or service you are offering.
- Develop your business WHY, including solid vision and mission statements
- Build a transition plan for post 9-5 to ensure you are mentally and financially prepared to focus on building your creative business.
- Deepen your emotional intelligence and tap into your motivators, stresses and needs in order to leverage your unique strengths.
Pillar 2: Service Offering & Product Design
Now that we’ve thoroughly sketched out your business and built a plan to strategically exit your 9-5, the next step is figuring out what you’re selling and who you’re selling it to. You need an enticing product or service tailored to meet a specific need in the market in order to attract customers and make sales. We’re really going to pull on your right brain creativity to establish innovative differentiators that meet your clients’ needs and fill a gap in the existing marketplace.
- Validate the market
- Strategically differentiate your product or service from existing competitors
- Get to know your ideal customer intimately to understand their unique needs and shape your
product or service accordingly
Pillar 3: Sales & Marketing Strategy
You’ve done the behind-the-scenes work and now’s the time to start selling! A strong brand with clear messaging is key to building awareness with your ideal customers. This pillar will get you focused on the look and feel of your business, your voice, and your sales model. We want people to crave and covet your product or service and this is where your creativity really gets to shine as we build your marketing strategy and customer attraction system.
- Use your creativity to build a compelling brand that communicates your style and attracts your ideal customers
- Develop a marketing strategy that eliminates the dreaded cold call and has you building a community of warm leads that are looking for exactly what you are offering
- Build relationships and expand your network to help you grow your business
- Establish a social media strategy that compliments your marketing model and gets your ideal
customers off the social media platform and into your sales
Pillar 4: Scale Smart
Your business is growing, you’re making sales, and the life of a creative entrepreneur is becoming busier than you ever could have hoped for. Great, right? YES! But how do you maintain this momentum without burning out and draining the creativity that brought you here in the first place? Scale.
- Develop a time management system that works for you and sets boundaries around this valuable resource to prevent you from working 24/7.
- Assume the role of CEO and identify which tasks can be outsourced or *gasp* delegated to staff
- Identify the risks associated with your business and evaluate your results to best position your creative business for success. Being adaptable according to risks and rewards will help you endure the inevitable ebbs and flows of being an entrepreneur.
- Learn to prioritize your self-care and recognize signs of burnout. You started this business…we don’t want it to be the end of you.