How To Keep Your Online Business Working

While You Work Out With The Family

Written by Jessa Lewis

Running an online business and brand can sometimes feel like an impossible task when you’re also trying to raise a family and juggle a household. However, more and more parents and caregivers are taking advantage of this golden age of the internet and are choosing to start their own businesses and brands off the back of social media platforms and the ability to establish an online presence (and extend their reach beyond what was previously possible).

Unfortunately, the downside to running an online brand and having a location free, laptop lifestyle without limits is that the traditional 9-5 office hours are often thrown out the window. Family time and working hours can become indistinguishable.

So, if your work life doesn’t end at 5pm – how can you make adjustments to ensure that both your business wellness and family wellness are maintained?

1. OUTSOURCE. When you have a million things to do, there will always be tasks that don’t get done in the end. This is especially true if you’re juggling a full-time job or managing a complex household or running your own business on top of parenting. You may have days where you quite simply run out of time. So, what can you do to expand time and your business and family wellness are always taken care of? The answer is to outsource!

If you know that you will have to choose between cleaning the house and doing yoga/playing ball with your kids – get a cleaner. If you know you will either be actioning dreaded personal admin or sitting down with your children to talk about their mental health – get an assistant. If you know that you will spend an hour doing yard work that you can’t stand versus tending to your general family wellness – get someone in to help you.

Wherever possible, and where your budget allows, look for the chance to outsource the things that aren’t as important, that don’t bring you joy and that aren’t the critical things that will make all the difference in the end.

• PRIORITISE. Every day, write out a list of all the things you’d like to accomplish in your business, with your family and for your own personal benefit. Then write out the top 3 for each of these sections, where you would feel accomplished and know you’d had a great day if only these 3 things were done.

Where ever you put your focus – that is where you will see things shift and up level. If you want to make your mindset a priority, it will become a priority. If you want your family’s mental and physical wellness to be a priority, then it will be one. And wherever you want your online business to be energised – it will be!

Get laser focused about what you want and make it your daily mission to take care of these things first and foremost.

• BLEND. Where possible or practical, integrate elements of your family life into your online business. Take your family to the beach and film content on your phone while you run around in the sand. Do yoga together and record a meditation audio file for content at the same time. Take your laptop and write an article on weekend drives while your spouse pilots the car. And, look for opportunities for your work life to compliment your personal life and vice versa.

When you show up online and allow your following to see the multiple layers of who you are, you give them a multitude of reasons to connect with you. People are generally attracted to businesses because of their human elements – whether that’s as a result of clever marketing or whether it’s the result of authenticity and a frankness about how the business puts itself out there. There is a beauty and realness to the business that allows you to peek at the behind the scenes, who their employees and founders are outside of work and the character of the people who make the business. (How To Keep Your)

Depending on the nature of your business, you can also use social media to bridge the gap between your home life and work life. For example, if you show up online as an entertainer or public figure then you might consider incorporating interactive social media platforms such as Tik Tok into your online presence. Tik Tok allows users to create short form videos where they lip synch, dance, perform athletic feats, do duets, create or perform skits. It attracts a younger age bracket and therefore could be something that you use alongside your children and bond over.

• MULTIPLE INCOME STREAMS. Find a way for your business to make money without you being in constant attendance.

If you are running an online business this could be represented in a number of different ways – you could write an eBook, sell home study digital products, sell on demand merchandise via a third party supplier, sell training courses/resources, have an online paid member club or have an investment portfolio. Whilst all these things would and do require you to invest time and energy into them initially, they have the potential to continue to earn income long after you have completed the work and, a million times over. (How To Keep Your)

There are basically an unlimited amount of things that you could incorporate into your business to have it working for you, rather than the other way around. And once set in motion, you could be making money while you’re off working out with your family, or going to the zoo together, or sitting down to family dinner, or helping with homework. You could be doing anything! The sky is the limit. (How To Keep Your)

So, in the end - blending online or offline business with family and personal wellness will always be as simple or complicated as you choose it to be. It’s up to you to decide that the two can and will work together. Just know that they CAN work together!