Full Transcript: MOTM #585: 7 Tips to Prepare for the Summer Slowdown

[Transcript starts at 1:08]

Hello, hello, hello, my podcast people. And thank you for joining me for yet another episode of my favorite podcasts. If you are listening to this or watching it, when it drops, it is Monday, June 3rd. Welcome to June, folks. Welcome to June. Today, we were talking about seven tips to prepare you for the summer slowdown.

Why? Because it's June, which means that it's almost summer. I believe the first day of summer is like June 20 something. I don't know, but either way, summer is coming. And that means the summer slowdown is coming. And every year folks are like, I never knew. I never knew. I don't want that this year. Right?

So obviously this episode is an episode for my Northern Hemisphere homies. If you're not living in that or residing in that part of the world, feel free to skip this episode. I'd love to let you have you listen, but also if it doesn't apply to you, go enjoy the impending winter. So life updates before we hop on to the new episode.

Okay. Uh, one, I'm recording this at nighttime because today is, when I [00:01:00] record it, is Memorial Day. Went to play volleyball this morning, then spent the day outside just, you know, by the fire, like, cause it's still cold here, uh, but it was sunny, but it was chilly. So I'm outside in the sun and then the sun kind of goes down and I'm like, turn the, the, uh, fire table on, was doing work out there.

And so I'm recording at night. Uh, so if it looks a little different, that's why. Uh, but Lex and I basically took a staycation for the weekend, um, before Memorial Day, which basically meant no volleyball. Cause when we play volleyball, we have to wake up very early. So Saturday, Sunday, no volleyball. I went to the store and got a bunch of cheese and grapes and chips.

I made popcorn with the popcorn machine. Like we have like the full standup, like a court popcorn machine. It's great. I love it. We got it from, uh, I almost said Etsy. No, fuck Etsy. Uh, we got it from, uh, Wayfair. Uh, I got some chip witches. We binged a Netflix show. Inventing Anna. I know I'm late to the party.

It's a 2022 show. I don't care. Watched it. Fucking loved it. If you haven't seen it, consider checking it out. Uh, what [00:02:00] else? I'm dealing with a little weird elbow stuff right now. If you're watching, you see. I still have my volleyball, like, I usually wear like a maestro thing. I didn't even change. It is what it is.

Uh, but I got some tape on from my guy David. He's over in Where is he over? In Berlin. He's over in Germany. But I got some Rock Tape stuff on, some his personalized Rock Tape stuff because I got some elbow stuff going on. Thought it was some sleeping weird, but it's clearly volleyball related because it's really owning the right side.

But either way, PT is the best first career because I know what to do. I'm taking care of it and it's actually much better. But that's what's going on there. I did not change the oil on my Jeep. I do that twice a year. I don't want to hear if you think I should do it more. I don't care because I don't need to.

I literally never drive. Uh, but I changed it on Memorial Day. It's one of the times and didn't do it this weekend. Hopefully, I'll do that next weekend. Um, why do it myself? Because I can and because I want to and I don't have to deal with anybody else. So, uh, what else? Everyone is complaining about May Gray, which happens every year.

May Gray happens every year. And then you know what comes after that? June Gloom. [00:03:00] Every single year, it's gray outside and every single fucking year, Everybody, including the locals, complained about it. And I'm like, dude, it's not even that bad, honestly, because it's not raining. It's a little bit chilly, but it's not raining.

And it usually burns off around midday, early afternoon. So you still do get some sun, it's just not sunny in the morning. I think part of the biggest issue is that we get, It's May Grey and June Gloom on the weekends. I think if it was like gloomy all week, but then fine on the weekends, most people wouldn't say anything.

Although I will say most people in California, many people in Southern California, like do make an effort to like live life and not just be like living for the weekend. But either way I think part of it's that it's May Grey and June Gloom on the weekends. But uh, either way it happens every year and every year I'm like, Folks, write it down because it's going to come back again next year and this way you're not surprised.

Although I don't, I don't think it make a difference for people because they just will be like, I know, but I'm still sad. But either way, this is the perfect segue for today's topic, which is preparing for the summer slowdown. [00:04:00] Of note, something that I talk about actually pretty often is writing things down. Whether it's the weather or how you're feeling. Those are kind of the two most important things to me, the weather and how I'm feeling in that time period. And I do it in sort of this like short journal format. I haven't been doing as much as I like because I've been doing the morning pages.

And so I just, I just can't do it all. Um, but when there are notable things, especially in the weather, I will go and I turn in my notes section, I write it down, I break it up by month. This allows me to prepare for the next year because everything comes back around spirality and seasonality. It's real.

It's very real. I have an episode about that with the ever wonderful Emily Reid. Courtney, if you could drop that, thank you. It all comes back around, let's not be surprised, right? So one thing that comes back around every single year, besides May Gray and June Gloom, is social media numbers dropping big time because people are outside, right?

They're traveling, they're doing summering stuff, and they're on their phones less. And every year, people freak out about that. Every. Single. Year. [00:05:00] Don't be like that. Let's have this year be different, alright? I am making this episode, and I'm putting it out before summer starts, to tell you that it's gonna happen.

Yes, it's gonna happen on top of whatever nonsense is currently happening, and all that I see on threads is people complaining about their reach being so far down on Instagram. Honestly, folks, post and move, post and move. But, I am telling you now about the summer slowdown, so that you cannot say, I never knew!

Shoutout to Tony Baker for that line. 

So, I'm going to give you seven tips to prepare for the summer, summer slowdown. And, and the kind of ties in with some ideas for what to do during the summer slowdown. So it's not a surprise. And so that you can kind of, I don't want to say that make the most of it, but let's lean into it.

Right. Let's say that so that you can lean into it. Okay. Seven tips. Number one, write it down. So it doesn't surprise you again, next year, write it down, write down what happens this Summer, write down about your numbers or anything in the business. Maybe the business slows down, you get less inquiries. Write it down because it's going to come back next year.

Number [00:06:00] two, write down how you feel about the amount of work that you're doing right now and during the summer. Some folks, you may be some folks, may feel like you want to be working less. If that is the case, then you're going to have to front load the year and make more money in quarter one and early quarter two so that you can work less in the summer and be fine.

So write that down so that you can prepare for next year. We're going to use this summer slowdown to prepare ourselves for the next summer slowdown.

Number three, continue with your normal content creation schedule. Momentum is magic and it will beat motivation every single time. We know activation energy is a real thing.

It is hard to get started. So just keep going, embrace the summer, slow down and just keep posting. As it relates to Instagram, if you folks are going to be like, no one's seeing my stuff, it's slowing down. Then that means that you can create that stuff. No one sees it. And then you can just repost it later.

Right. Look at that building the body of work, giving yourself a little buffer, a little pad that you can lean on later. [00:07:00] 

Number four, speaking of reposting, lean into reposting old things. If you feel like, if you don't feel like creating new things right now, again, I just suggest that you keep going with the content creation, especially if you're newer to this from a, a strategy perspective, right?

The summer slowdown does mean less eyes, but that also tends to mean more creators taking a break because they're like, Oh, there's less people. There's less eyes, which realistically means that there is more opportunity, right? There's more room for you to get your stuff seen. So one, we look to build that habit to continue with that habit.

And two, we're looking to capitalize on the fact that other people are taking a fucking break. 

Number five, tip number five, Jill speaks about anabolic, Jill, Jill Fit, my girl Jill Fit, right? Jill talks about anabolic and catabolic phases of business or seasons of the business, right? Anabolic meaning you're building up the business, catabolic, you're breaking it down.

Summer traditionally tends to be [00:08:00] more anabolic, meaning it's a building phase for the business because you're typically not selling, right? Selling is typically the catabolic phase. You're you know, losing followers, people unsubscribing because you're asking them for money. Happens. During the summer, we're oftentimes not selling as much.

You, there may be some summer programs that you run, but in general, it's kind of like the spring and the fall where we sell the most, right? Summer, not as much. So what can we do? We can use this time to build your audience, right? Just give, give, give. So circling back to that last point, number four. And number three, just keep posting, keep sharing content, keep nurturing that audience, keep providing value for that audience.

Continue writing to your email list. If you haven't started the email list, start it. If you haven't written in a long time, write to them. Consider creating a lead magnet during this time. And I think maybe Thursday, this Thursday's episode will be about lead magnets. I have to go and see if, and see if I have one.

But if I do have one, that's what this Thursday, because it's Thursday's a throwback episodes. Um, but if I do have one, that's what this Thursday will be about. But consider creating a lead magnet and using that to [00:09:00] build your list. The advanced version of this would be to run ads to a lead magnet that you have that already converts really well, right?

So again, with point number five, we are preparing for what we think we're going to do or what we can do during this summer slowdown. 

Tip number six. Pick one, I said one folks, one, because focus is a super power. Pick one boring behind the scenes business task that you know, you want to get done and then do it this summer.

Just one, maybe it's a website revamp. Uh, Lex ran a website audit. Um, we will link that in the show notes. So if you want to do that, it's, it's a website audit challenge and now it's going to be an online course or now it is an online course. So if you're looking for something around that. Some guidance with that.

Uh, you can do that. Um, you could refilm a course. You could update a sales page. I don't know what you need to do. I don't really think that summer is a great time to learn something new. I don't think people are in the might, [00:10:00] the might, the right mind frame. If that's you and you are, go ahead. But I, you know, I don't want us to be setting these like High aspirational goals and then we don't do them and then we get mad at ourselves.

Like it's summer time You're probably not gonna be learning something new. So this way let's just have that one task that you're like I gotta get this thing done. I've been wanting to get this done. Let's try that and Look to just get that one thing. You probably have a list of like a million things. Pick the easiest thing from that list and get it done.

Right? Just one. And then cheer for yourself. And then go get a popsicle. Because it's going to be summertime. The main thing here is that we're picking one. Why? Because summer goes fast as fuck. Which brings us to point number seven. Summer goes fast as fuck. So make sure you enjoy it. Use this summer slowdown and this impending summer slowdown to plan to enjoy your summer and this doesn't mean planning like massive vacations if you want to do that, that's great. But to me this means [00:11:00] giving yourself permission to say yes to those kind of summer only activities. I don't have an extensive list of this. In the summer months I just hang out and do the same thing I'd kind of do all year because the weather doesn't change that much here. But if where you live there are certain things and before you live or how your lifestyle is and your family you have kids, they're all out for the summer, or you really have like big, you know, changes in the weather in a good way.

I'm thinking like Arizona, like stay your ass inside. If you're in Arizona, go inside. Uh, but give yourself permission to say yes to the summer only activities because they go by so fast. And then we already know come September, I already know people are going to be on Instagram. They're going to be on threads wishing for summer to come back.

All right. Because when we get into the thick of summer people about to be on Threads complaining. It's too hot. And they're sweaty. And then it's going to turn into September and people gonna be like, I wish, I miss sundresses. I miss the sun. I already know. So prepare yourself, give yourself permission to say yes to those [00:12:00] summer only activities, right?

All right. I'm gonna keep it short and sweet because well, summer is coming, which means you probably want to be leaning into doing other things. If you live anywhere besides SoCal, it's definitely, it's getting warmer. Um, which is a, a big thing. And again, I don't talk a lot about the SoCal weather, but people just be complaining.

Lex is complaining and I'm like, it's great here. It is great. Cause I know that it's sunnier in other places, but like y'all had fucking winter. You deserve some sun. Yeah, it was fucking cold there. Like it gets chilly here, but not that cold. And you had like big jackets on and then it snowed in some places.

Like, ah, you're allowed to have some warm weather right now. We here in SoCal, we'll get this nice weather until October. until early November. It's amazing, right? So if it's nicer there, lean in. I'm going to keep the episode short so you can go lean into that nicer weather. Hopefully you found these, these tips helpful, uh, and the summer slow down.

Don't [00:13:00] forget folks, tickets for Boss Up, the in person events of the year, are on sale. Early bird pricing ends at the end of Hmm, I should check that. Oof. I think it's the end of June. Uh, either way, just why you gotta wait till the end? Just go, go check it out. Visit themovementmaestro.com/bossup2024.

You can read about the entire event, the speakers, the topics, what to expect, all the things. If you've got questions, shoot me a DM at themovementmaestro or you can text me 310 737 2345. We would love to To have you. All right, gonna wrap it up here. As always, endlessly, endlessly, endlessly appreciative for every single one of you.

Until next time, friends, Maestro out.

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MOTM #349: Living Along with the Seasons with Emilie Reed
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