7 ways you as an entrepreneur can stay motivated during difficult times and in economic uncertainty.
Being an entrepreneur is not always an easy path. The truth is there are often more downs than ups when you take this journey.
From Covid-19 to #BLM protest happening all over North America, 2020 has already shown to be a challenging year for many business owners and entrepreneurs.
Here are 7 ways you as an entrepreneur can stay motivated during difficult times and in economic uncertainty.
Understand that what you are doing is progressive
Since launching Be of Good Comfort, my experience has been exciting, stressful, and above all, exhilarating, but what keeps me motivated is the simple notion that I am pushing towards freedom, freedom to do my own thing, freedom to be creative, freedom of someone else telling me what to do.
Some advice to stay motivated through adversities, is to understand that what you are doing is progressive, you’re carving your own path, you are saying no to the status quo and doing your own thing, that’s pretty cool. Adversities as an entrepreneur is inevitable, but how you handle them is what matters. It’s important to keep that in mind as go through your own ventures.
Maintain your mind, body, and spirit
We all need to keep our energy barrels full. When you have your own business, you could easily work 24/7 and never finish everything you need to do. If we don’t take care of ourselves — if we don’t put on our oxygen masks first — we won’t be any good to our business, clients, family, or anyone else that matters in our lives.
I find my motivation stays highest when I am eating right, not going to bed late, working out, and waking up early. I also like to take time to meditate, pray, read a devotional, and journal before starting my day in order to shut out the constant stimulus of the outside world and reset my mood, mind and energy.
Keep a journal
Staying motivated in the midst of this roller coaster of a life called entrepreneurship can be difficult! Contrary to popular belief, it’s not always puppies and rainbows when you run off and start your new business.
I personally write a journal of the days business events each day.I do this because when the going gets tough and I start to feel very discouraged, I just look at the journal entry for a few weeks or months prior and then I get to see how far I’ve come for the business. It’s never disappointed me.
Find like minded community
My number one tip for staying motivated as an entrepreneur is to surround yourself with other entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship can be a very lonely existence. Without a good support network of like-minded people who you can lean on for support, inspiration or guidance when times get tough, it is very easy to get demotivated.
There are many ways one can do this, but in my experience the following channels have worked great for me.
Joining an online community of like-minded entrepreneurs ex: Facebook groups, LinkedIn
Join a co-working space to meet other fellow entrepreneurs.
Join a mastermind.
Finally, if you are someone who doesn’t naturally like networking or interacting with other people then start by listening to entrepreneurship podcasts
Reconnect with your customers/ clients/ audience
When I’ve lost my mojo, I find I get a huge boost by reconnecting with customers/ clients/audience/followers. Having some conversations with my past/current clients or even my followers on social media helps immensely when it seems that the effort of building and running a business is too much.
Specifically, I like to call customers that seem to be happy and ask if I can get their feedback and perhaps use their story to write up a case study.
I ask them questions about how they found us, what their situation was before they started working with me, and how that’s changed now. I also ask what their favorite thing about our business is, as well as their input for improvements. Whichever way you do it, if you can direct the conversation towards finding out how your business has helped this customer, you’ll start to feel a whole lot better about the value your business delivers. Helping others is a basic need inside all of us, so the more you can recognize the ways your business is making a difference, the more motivated you’ll feel.
Celebrate the small victories
One way to stay motivated when times are tough is to make sure that you celebrate the small victories. Often, when we have a large and significant end-goal in mind, it’s hard to feel content about most of our progress, since even when we manage to move forward there is still so much left to do.
The best way to avoid this pitfall is to make sure to acknowledge the small victories along the way to your end goal. For example, let’s say that your goal is to launch a certain product/ podcast/event etc. While the launch itself might be the most notable end goal that you have in mind at first, if you don’t celebrate any of the other milestones along the way, you will likely end up being discouraged and getting burned out. These milestones can be anything from finishing a draft of the product design, booking your next client, to securing a location etc.
Doing this not only helps you stay motivated, but also helps you plan ahead and stay on track, by encouraging you to create a detailed map of project milestones that you need to complete while making progress towards your end goal.
Understand that certain consumer patterns or economic conditions are beyond our control.
I remind myself that certain consumer patterns or economic conditions are beyond my control. Currently our nation is facing a time of uncertainty.
From Covid-19 to BLM protest happening all over North America, 2020 has already shown to be a challenging year for many business owners and entrepreneurs.
What motivates me during this period is to think of how my hard work will eventually pay off, even if the reward is not immediate. This might mean keeping up meaningful communication with suppliers or clients, brainstorming new products/services to offer, staying active on social media and so forth.
Patience and consistency is key – and looking at things from a bird’s eye view – keeping in mind that despite seasonal lows there will still be people in need of your products/services. See how you can alter your services/ process to better meet the current needs of your customers.
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