What Is Possible When You Simplify and Strategize Your Ideal Path to Success with Jessica Osborn

Christine Li  0:01  
Welcome back to the Make Time for Success podcast. This is episode 98. Today I want to ask you what would be possible if you leverage what you're doing so that you got more time productivity and value from your efforts. My special guest today Jessica Osborn is an expert in answering that kind of question. She's a business coach, podcast host and author who is all about smarter strategies, clever automation, and living a life in balance. With over 20 years of marketing experience under her belt, Jessica transitioned from her leadership role in a top listed company to founding two successful online businesses from home. While juggling the demands of her two young children. Jessica empowers other professional and creative women to leverage their expertise, and command their worth building profitable and scalable service based businesses. Her popular online program, business jam helps undervalued consultants nail their marketing strategy, so they can sign high quality clients consistently. And she has produced many transformational results. For her program members. Jessica is someone who will give it to you straight. She's all about real guidance, real strategies, and real help. She's a delight, and I can't wait to share this session with you. Let's go listen to the episode now.

Hi, I'm Dr. Christine Li, and I'm a psychologist and a procrastination coach. I've helped 1000s of people move past procrastination and overwhelm so they can begin working to their potential. In this podcast, you're going to learn about powerful strategies for getting your mind, body and energy to work together so that you can focus on what's really important and accomplish the goals you want to achieve. When you start living within your full power, you're going to see how being productive can be easy, and how you can create success on demand. 

Welcome to the Make Time for Success podcast. Hi, everyone. I press record really quickly. On this interview with my new friend and colleague, Jessica Osborn. We have been talking because we just wrapped up a podcast episode for her show. She's The Business Podcast, and I just had a wonderful time talking with Jessica. She is lovely. She is smart, she is open. And she's got a lot of experiences to share with us today. She is a business coach, a marketing coach, and author and of course, a podcast host and my new friend from the land down under Welcome to the show, Jessica.

Jessica Osborn  2:59  
Thank you so much, Christine, what a lovely intro. Pleasure to be here with you today. So thank you for having me.

Christine Li  3:06  
Thank you. Thank you for being here. Please share with us some more details about who you are, what you like and what you're doing in your business and what you'd like to share with us today.

Jessica Osborn  3:19  
Absolutely. Well, that's a really big broad question. So I'll give you the very short version of it. i As you know, I live in Australia, I'm now a business coach, which has been about five years. And today, I thought it would be really great to touch on how I started in this because I gave up my corporate career that I spent 20 years building a successful career in marketing, all the way to the top, you know, I didn't sort of leave because I got frustrated that I wasn't going anywhere. I made it to the Head of Marketing and Communications for a very successful listed company. And I changed, things changed, I decided to go my own way. And that wasn't an easy decision to make. You know, I think that I will dive into a bit about that, because I think that would be really handy for the listeners today. But you know, who I work with today are actually a lot of mums just like me who left their role for whatever reason. And not everyone was as lucky as I did and how they came to leave, but have started their own business to have freedom to have flexibility in their lifestyle. And you know, to probably feel like they're a bit more fulfilled and achieving what they want to achieve and the value that they can bring to clients to other people, to businesses to whoever they work with. And actually they have an easier time doing it. Because being in business for ourselves doesn't have to be hard. It doesn't have to be the hard slog. There is a much easier, simpler way. And for me as a marketer, I know it's all about just being able to be really clear who you therefore what it is that you do and attract the right people in so that you're not spending all this time I'm wasting time on attracting people who aren't the right fit for you. And you know, when you attract the right people in then you're working with the ones who value what you do, you're obviously able to charge the right rates for, for what it is that you're offering, and be profitable in the time that you have available, which is ultimately what's so important for us working mums. So yeah, that's a long winded, quick version of my history.

Christine Li  5:27  
Absolutely. I love your clarity of how you describe the path that you've traveled. And I chuckled when you said, I threw you a lot of questions all at once. That tends to be my way of asking questions. I think I go from one topic to the next. But I love hearing people's journeys. I love hearing all of it. So thank you for being clear. And to the point. I think that is what you help your clients to do. Am I right about that, that just like, like really focus in on what is the most important message to share?

Jessica Osborn  6:04  
Yeah, absolutely. Because a lot of us start a business and know what we do sort of, but particularly women, we tend to be people pleasers, we tend to like to serve. So we're often very externally influenced by what we think other people want from us what we think other people want us to be. And you can go off down many tangents you can be searching for that one thing that's going to make your business success forever and ever and forgetting to actually just look internally, to look inside, to find your thing to find your space in your lane, and actually be comfortable in it to get into your groove and be there because that's actually your fast lane to success. And most people avoid it. You know, I work a lot on helping people niche down and get clarity on what their lane is. And a lot of people really push against it, they try to redact it, but really quite forcefully, they really do push that away, because they're afraid of what it might mean, they're afraid of what that lane is, and whether it will be the success and not trusting in themselves that they are the driver of their business, they are the thing that will make it successful. It's not anybody else. It's not about what other people are doing that they might be finding success in, we can all be successful in almost anything. And I think you're gonna have to go online and look at what businesses there are what people are doing to find success in every single industry, every single niche. Anything you could think of, you know, there's people who teach other people how to knit online and have a really successful business, you know, you can turn anything into a success. So it's not about what is that success going to be? For me? It's, what is it that I am best at? What do I do best? What do I want to be known for? So bringing the in out and helping all of us see what your true value is, what your unique value is, and having that really strong clear message. And obviously, building a profitable offer a service offering around that, so that you're making money in the time you want to be working. But I'm all about making it easy, you know, it can work, you don't have to work a full time job, you don't have to work even more than that, which many people end up doing. Because I think they're trying to do too many things. They've got their feet and too many different lanes, trying to serve the market or what they perceive the market to be instead of actually leaning into what they know and do best. So there's a lot of fear around that, I think. And you know, I'm not saying I got it right first time either. I went through the process of narrowing it down in my first couple of years of starting a business. So just to backtrack a little bit the you know, when I started this business, it was the day after I gave birth to my second child, I was actually in hospital after a cesarean, unfortunately, that I had to have. And that was the moment I pushed the button on starting this business because I thought if I don't do it now I've got you know, maternity leave, I know I'm going to be off work for the next nine months. But if I wait until I'm back in my corporate job, I know I'm going to be busy working those long hours and trying to spend the rest of the time I'm not working with my son and my baby daughter and I'm not going to get the time to put into it like I will now with a new baby. And I know that most people are thinking you're crazy. You don't have time with a new baby. I know but at least I didn't have a job and other people that were you know, reliant on my time over that following nine months. So that was the driver for me starting the business and that was why having in creating a model that could Be flexible and have time freedom, which is what then gave me the lifestyle I wanted was the most important thing. So yes, the money is important, but the money can always come. And that's all in, you know how you present your offer. But it's not always something people achieve is having that freedom in their lifestyle and actually getting the lifestyle they want from the business. And you can have that right from the beginning, if that's how you design it.

Christine Li  10:26  
That is beautiful. Could you share with us the corporate part? What was happening to you, and within you, that made you think I need to find another way? Because if you did say you rose to the top, you were doing a lot, you were successful. So what was the other side? That was the part that made you consider? Let me see if there's something else?

Jessica Osborn  10:56  
Great question. I Yeah, so on paper, everything looks amazing. You know, I was head of marketing, I had a very healthy multiple six figure salary. You know, husband, I had one son, so I went on maternity leave the first time and came back. But that was when I started to realize that things were shifting. And it wasn't the fact of me becoming a mother, it was actually more the environment that I was in, in the corporate environment, and how I was suddenly being treated as a woman who was now a mother, I call it the maternal wall, the wall went up, and I was in a box. And it didn't matter what I did, or what I proved about myself, I was still in this box of the mum at work. And it was frustrating to see both that the opportunities, you know, I mean, I'll just come out and say I was almost being prevented from doing my job, because they thought it would overload me. So they're, you know, trying to be kind and thinking, well, she's got a young kid at home, we won't overload her. But when you don't involve the head of marketing in creating a new brand for your business, you know, that was a real wake up call for me that there was something very, very wrong happening there. And a lack of fulfillment, a lack of me being able to feel like I'm achieving in my professional life led me to really analyze what was that path I was on? Where was it leading to? And when I thought, well, I thought it was leading to sort of a role as CEO, I guess, eventually. So I was head of marketing, I could then probably be a chief marketing officer and a company that had that level of role. But at the time, my company didn't, I was the the top marketer, but then it would be CEO and I looked at the CEOs life, and I thought, I actually don't want that, like, it looks terrible. He's working so many hours, never sees the family prioritizes the job is in the office. I thought, why is that what I'm aiming for, because it is not aligned with what I really want for my life. And I'd never even thought about that before. And I think that's the clarity that probably comes when you have children, and you suddenly start to value life. And you think life is so short, these years are going by so quickly. I don't want to miss them. I don't want to miss out on this significant part of my life. So that was really the change from me thinking I was on the right path to me thinking I'm not on the right path for having enjoyment in my life. And I need to do something about it. No one else is going to solve this problem for me, I need to do it myself. So I had started looking at what sort of business I might start. And I didn't know this was the business to begin with. I looked at opening a Pilates studio, actually, one point and I'm not a Pilates teacher. As you know, the things happen to come across once you're looking once you're looking for the answer, you know, the answer presents itself and it presented itself. I thought I know what I love because I already mentor my team in marketing. That's what I know what I breathe, that's what I think about in the shower, even when I'm on leave. So that is what I should do because I've got so much passion for it. And I can help other business owners who don't have the experience I have that Don't you know that are finding this hard I can help them by being their coach so rather than doing it for them actually help them to understand the strategy so they then have this skill for their life as well. You know, they can learn it from me and then they have the knowledge to shape their business and, and make life easier for themselves with gaining clients. So that was I guess the backstory of how I got into this.

Christine Li  14:50  
Okay, beautiful. Now, as we both know, entrepreneurship brings its own complications and Time challenges. Also, I'm wondering, how did you incorporate desire for being streamlined and sane in your method of working with your new business? And how you teach your clients? How did you get to value? making things simple and smart in your systems? Can you describe how your thinking goes in that direction? And how you show other people how to do that? Because I'm a natural complicates of things. So I'm fascinated myself for how to do this.

Jessica Osborn  15:42  
Absolutely. Great question. And I think, at the time, it was a necessity, because I had a brand new baby at home, and I had a toddler who was in daycare, or kindy. And so I was working on my business. When I was up in the middle of the night breastfeeding, I was writing social posts and, and blogs on my phone while I was in the dark, so it was very strange existence for a few months. But it was almost, you know, for me at the time, I had to do it that way, I didn't have a choice to have that freedom that we often would have, if we didn't have the more pressing needs. So the fact that I didn't have all the time i i wanted to, meant that I had to be really strict with myself and make some tough choices. And, you know, when I looked at the business model, I thought, well, I need everything I'm doing to create leverage. So rather than creating separate services that had no connectivity between each other, and nothing that would lead people in, I designed services that had connection and flow. So I thought, if I bring people into this one, then there's an obvious next step. So I had a model in mind, right from the beginning, I didn't start with the main thing, though, because, again, this was sort of me trying to avoid procrastination. Like, I wanted to create a big online course. But with marketing strategy, it can never really be one little thing, because there's so much that goes into it. And that, for me was big enough to put the brakes on me doing that, even though I knew that was what I wanted the main part of my business to be, it was too big a bite to bite off it, you know, this was really, you know, not on a daily basis. But you know, it was a massive onion that I needed to eat, and I didn't know how to even start, I thought, I just don't know, there's too much in there. I'm going to put that aside for now. Maybe ignore it, and do what's easier and faster. So I started with a one to one service coaching, which, you know, I made seem set black, it made sense. And it did. And that helped me get some real life, you know, testing the method testing, working with people really feeling on that one to one basis, how easy people find it. So could I then put this into a program? And so I did it that way, partly because yes, it was too hard to take the step I wanted to take, and I thought it would take too long. But partly also, you know, looking back in hindsight, it was beneficial to do it that way, because it gave me the ability to create a program that was really proven, even before I launched it. Because it was based on the methodology I used with my one to one clients.

Christine Li  18:34  
Mm hmm. Okay, beautiful. So it really is, you know, even with the mind of, I need to make this time efficient. You did need to go through and find your way of how am I going to structure what I can offer that every step required? Considering consideration and experimentation and patience, it sounds like

Jessica Osborn  19:00  
yes, absolutely. And you know, a few other things come to mind when I think about deliberate ways that I created and built the business and that what I talked to my clients about is for everything I was putting in place, I thought, Is there a way that I don't need to do this manually? Is there a way that my client can self serve? Is there a way that I can reduce any time that's not spent on either serving the client and doing the work or on doing the marketing, you know, how can I systemize and automate the business and that's why I did things like I set up for upfront payments, so that I never had to create invoices, send out invoices, chase up invoices, manage invoices, I'm like, Ah, if I can not do that, you know, that would be fantastic. So I set that up right from the beginning. It was hard because at the time I'd been in a world where everything was invoiced, and it was what I knew and, you know, I thought well, people really up for this, but you don't know until you try. So that's just how I made my offers were, you know, you pay upfront or you pay in installments, but it was all automated installments. So once they sign up, then the payments are coming out, and I don't have to chase them or worry about it unless, you know, unless a card has expired, something like that, which I might then follow up. But again, you can automate that follow up with a client. With the technology we've got available. It's so clever, it can do almost anything these days. And being able to automate things like that meant I wasn't spending my time on things that I didn't need to be doing. So that was one example another one was setting up an online booking system. So they can book themselves in setting up automated emails. So when they sign up, they get an email, it's already got the information that they need to onboard. So my whole onboarding process, my onboarding process, it took a bit of time to create and set up in the first place. But once it's done, then it all happens while I'm asleep, or while I'm out with the kids or wherever. So these days, when a client signs up with me, they get everything that they need without me having to do it. So you know, I jump on a call, we have a chat if we're doing a one to one. And then I send an email afterwards, because I love to give a personal response. But once they decide, that's what I'm doing, and they go click on the link, everything is automated until we have our first call, which obviously saves a huge amount of my time. But then, you know, that's now the smaller part of my business because one to one clients. As much as I love working with them. It's very time intensive. And it also I found it very energy draining. So, you know, I started in that way, and I got to about five or six clients. And I thought I don't think I can physically manage any more than this. Because my brain is about to explode with everything I've got going on in there. You know, I'm trying to keep track of my business and their businesses. And that really was the moment that I decided I've got to now take action on building my program. So my program business jam, is an online program that has the same marketing strategic framework that I teach my one to one clients with. And now that I had it a new it, creating the course suddenly became so much easier. I had some big decisions to make around technology, which you know, that delayed me because I procrastinated on choosing the right platform. But there were a lot of things that had been holding me back that now weren't because I had an income stream coming in through my one to one. So I made the hard decision to cut down my one to one clients, while I built the program to give myself the time to do it, instead of taking over my personal time and family time.

Christine Li  22:52  
And how have you found having a rich personal life works with your business? I guess what do you see your clients being able to do once they figure out how to systematize and really sharpen their business? How does it affect their family lives? What are the lessons on the personal side that you've been able to get from doing the business the way you felt you needed to do it?

Jessica Osborn  23:24  
Such a great question. Thank you. Because I think sometimes the stories, you know, I love telling other people's stories and what they've been able to achieve. And they do really help to show what is possible. So one of my clients who did business jam with me last year, she has only what he gives herself only 10 hours a week for her business, because she's got two young daughters at home. And that's all she wants to spend on the business because, you know, she's decided how she wants to live her life. Right now at this time of her life with with the kids being young. That's a big challenge. You think, Well, 10 hours a week, what can you really do in 10 hours a week, but if that's the life design that she wants to create, and that's always where I start with with the business plan. So when she came to me, you know, to her business wasn't new. She had been running her business for about 10 years. But she'd been charging by the minute for her service, which is in the voice industry. So they tend to everybody does it the same way. There's a big catalog of voice artists, they charge by the minute you choose which one you pay them by the minute. She was just doing what everybody else did. But she had visions and goals and wanted to grow her business. She also wanted to become a coach and coach, other voice artists, you know, and I said to her look, you've got 10 hours a week. So first of all, we got to make a decision on what is your priority? What part of the business do you want to build? Because you can either build the part of you doing the service or you can build a coaching arm. You can have both but you can't work on both at the same time, especially if you only want 10 hours a week. So she made that decision to start with the service offering. And this is where it gets really interesting because going through my process, which was very hard for her, because as an artist that's in a catalog, they're literally like anyone who wants to hire me can hire me, and I'll voice whatever they want. So it was very much led by the client. And I challenged her to decide on what it was that she loves doing the best. What was her ideal project and type of project and also the type of client that she wanted to work with? Because, you know, I was like, Well, surely you don't love doing everything or love talking about everybody's type of business. So what is it that you want to spend your 10 hours a week actually doing? Who do you want to work with. And in doing that, we discovered that her sweet spot and the thing that made her different, was actually that she could help a brand have a strategic voice. So instead of being just a, you know, commodity, we actually could then suddenly see how she could offer a strategic service and work with a client over a long period of time, which is exactly would work for her. So instead of having a job for a few minutes here and there, she could work with someone for six months, and work with them consistently each week to voice their content, but also to help them with what their brand voice strategy was how it sounded. So that was massive for her and scary because no one was doing it yet. So I love telling her story, because she's pioneered something different. And everybody laughed at her. They said, You can't do that. No one's doing it. And but the thing was that it made so much sense. And she did it. So this is what happened. Still working the 10 hours a week, she managed to implement that she grew her revenue and profit by over 300% In just three months. And she's now gone on in just under a year to have made half her house deposit for her dream home with her husband, that was a savings goal that she had for, you know, thinking it would take at least five years to get there. And the fact that she's been able to do that, with her business and 10 hours a week in a year just shows you the power of that the power of the process. And yes, getting a bit uncomfortable to get there was so so worth it for him.

Christine Li  27:25  
That is a great story. Feel like that is a really happy, powerful story. And I have been interviewing a lot of guests recently. And I think the theme really is how much further you can go, and how much better the journey is, when things are structured in a way that is in alignment with what you really want for yourself. And I love that that is your business strategy that you use it for yourself that you knew intuitively to go for that despite the fact that it was a difficult decision. It was a big leap that you had to take to bring yourself into alignment. But then you unlock this opportunity to show how many other people how to do the same thing for their business to grow both the business and their life at the same time.

Jessica Osborn  28:32  
Yeah. And you know, I won't lie, because it's not always easy. Even though you might have that idea inside. It's scary sometimes to step out of what you used to step out of that groove that you've been in and actually go well this is the groove I want to be in and I'm going to go for it. You know, it sounds easy. We can say it like that in a few words. And oh, how amazing and how inspiring and motivating but the truth is that there's many layers and many barriers in our brain that we need to go through to confidently step in there. And even still, she wasn't confident taking those first steps. I remember we went through many sessions in our group for business jam, there's some group coaching sessions that we have so we'd be there in the group and you know, there's tears there's all sorts of things now we really get into it because it's not easy, but when you know it inside I always say to somebody you know when you found what it is that you meant to do you know it you get the tingling feeling in your cheeks, you get the rush in inside the butterflies, it feels right and you know it is what then stops you from taking the action is that it feels really hard and complicated to take that action and are usually a bit of a risk, you know, fear of what might happen. What if it doesn't work well What if I just feel like this right now? And it's not really the thing? Well, you know, we all have those fears, but there's only one way to find out. And so kind of the sooner we can take that step and do it, the sooner we can see what happens. And the result, you know, and everybody is going to have those moments of something happening, that's great. And then going through another time where they're feeling a little bit slow or stuck. And you know, this same woman that I just talked to you about, you know, she, she got that side of your business going really well. And then she's like, right now I want to do my group program. And you know, she's started to overthink it and feeling like, oh, this is really hard. What do I do? So yes, there's going to be the highs and lows. But if we do expect that they're going to happen, then we can not let them derail us, then we can think, okay, that just means I'm ready for the next level, like I've now mastered this level I've got here and now, the next step is actually going to require something new of me something else different. And so we're going to step again, and maybe change that groove a little bit. And every time we do that, it does get a bit uncomfortable. But we have to get there to get to that next place where we're meant to go.

Christine Li  31:11  
Thank you for keeping it real, because I do love the inspirational wins, and the aha moments and all of those. But I do appreciate the fact that you keep it real, that this isn't a fairy tale. This is hard work. This is hard decision making. This is patience. This is making risky decisions, sometimes right taking the leaps. And I love that you're the guide for these women who are bravely trying to step into a new place for themselves. And I think you're fantastic. Thank you for sharing a bit of your fantastic minutes. With us today on the show. Can you please let us know how people who might want to work with you continue to learn with you to stay connected with you? How can they do that?

Jessica Osborn  32:09  
Yeah, absolutely. So I tend to be on Instagram, mostly these days, but I am on all the platforms, I'm on Facebook and LinkedIn. If you go to Instagram, you'll find me at Jessica dot, Osborne OSVR or in and from there, you can find my Facebook page and find me on LinkedIn as well. And my website, head over to Jessica osbourne.com. That's where you can learn all about me, you can find out a bit more about business jam, if you think that that might be something that you want to do if you're starting a business journey. And you know, you want to fast track that trial and error of finding your groove, then it's the program that will help you. But like I said, it's not just if you're starting, you know, this is something I revisit myself multiple times at least once a year, probably a couple of times a year, whenever I'm feeling a bit like you know, I'm not being so clear in my what I'm putting out or who I'm talking to, I come back and do my own strategy again and again and get more and more specific, more focused and get more clarity because the clarity is what helps you move forward. When you don't have the clarity. That's often what's leading us to stay in this place of confusion and stuck and feeling like it's hard. So, you know, I think that when you have that clarity, then the steps are clear. And you know what it is that you're going to do. And you know what you want to say, you know who you're saying it to. So it's such a game changer, I think to get that clarity, and then you can do it at any point.

Christine Li  33:44  
I love it. I love it great website that Jessica has great content. And she's a great model for how to do business and life in a way that makes sense. So thank you, Jessica, again for being on the show.

Jessica Osborn  33:58  
Thank you so much, Christine. I really enjoyed being here with you today. So thank you for giving me the time to share a bit with your audience.

Christine Li  34:06  
You're very welcome. And thank you listener for spending the time with me and Jessica. I will see you next week when I drop another episode of the Make Time for Success podcast. See you soon. 

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Make Time for Success podcast. If you enjoyed what you've heard, you can subscribe to make sure you get notified of upcoming episodes. You can also visit our website maketimeforsuccesspodcast.com for past episodes, show notes and all the resources we mentioned on the show. Feel free to connect with me over on Instagram too. You can find me there under the name procrastination coach. Send me a DM and let me know what your thoughts are about the episodes you've been listening to. And let me know any topics that you might like me to talk about on the show. I'd love to hear all about how you're making time for success. Talk See you soon

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