Is this what you really want to spend your time on?
👉 another smart question from my wife
Today’s message is a bit tangential to writing emails and newsletters. But it’s something that’s on my mind right now and something I hope you find useful.
And in a way, it does relate to emails too - I’ll explain at the end.
Kathy and I spent some time yesterday making plans for the next phase of her business.
One of the options that came up was a project that would have made us decent money, but would have been a bit of a grind. Nothing new or exciting. Just going through the motions really.
I ummmd and ahhhd about it. Tried to weigh up the pros and cons and just couldn’t make up my mind.
Then - as she often does - Kathy said something that cut through all the confusion and complexity.
“Is this what we really want to spend our time doing?”
The answer was a clear no.
And honestly, it was such a relief to say no to it. Like a weight being lifted.
We’ll be a bit financially worse off as a result of the decision. But emotionally way better off.
And maybe with the time freed up we’ll find something even more lucrative that we do want to spend our time doing.
Reflecting later I realised what a great question this is. Deceptively simple. But powerful.
Earlier this year I stopped using social media for business because, frankly, I just wasn’t enjoying it.
I love writing these emails because they’re honest. They’re me talking to you and telling you things I’ve found helpful that I hope you’ll find helpful too.
Sure, I put work into structuring them to get more people to read them. I have calls to action I hope will lead to people buying from me.
But they’re me writing to you.
They make me feel good.
And they feel a lot more honest than “strategies” like commenting on 10 Linkedin posts a day so that when I do my posts more people will see them. Or being deliberately controversial on Twitter to provoke more engagement.
Yuck.
These emails are what I really want to spend my time doing. If I’d asked myself Kathy’s question earlier I would have realised that and saved myself months of torment trying to do things I wasn’t enjoying.
And I do get that I’m in a privileged position.
Sometimes in your business and life you have to knuckle down and do things you don’t enjoy so much because it’s needed.
I’ve done plenty of that myself in the past: from accepting less-than-ideal client work to networking I didn’t enjoy to doing technical stuff I’d have outsourced if I could have afforded it.
But it seems to me that an awful lot of people are doing things they don’t enjoy when they don’t really have to.
Chasing after more money than they actually need. Or just doing stuff because it’s something they’ve always done or some so-called expert says it’s how things have to be done.
And I’ve found that when you stop doing things you don’t enjoy it frees up time and mental space and suddenly you start seeing more opportunities to do things that are even more lucrative and that you will enjoy.
How does all of that relate to writing emails?
Well, maybe it doesn’t. But I hope you’ll find it useful anyway.
And maybe it does.
When I talk to a lot of people about writing emails - and when I read a lot of expert opinion - it’s all about “what works best”.
What’s the right frequency for sending emails? Should I include images? Should I write stories or make them factual? Long or short?
But really, for most of us, the most important question is “is this what I really want to spend my time doing?”
I like writing emails with little stories and anecdotes. Others like in-depth fully referenced articles. Others like to do roundups of hot topics and news.
If you do what you like you’ll do it consistently and you’ll do it well. And unless you like doing something really weird, you’ll find a decent audience of people who appreciate that style.
Just as importantly, by not doing things you don’t like - including writing emails a certain way because you’ve been told it’s the best way - you’ll free up the time and mental space to allow opportunities in.
And you’ll be happier. Don’t overlook that.
- Ian
I applaud this point of view and try to live by it as well. I’ve just been revamping some business planning midway through because I caught myself creating an offering that didn’t align with how I want my life and work to fit together. It’s so easy to get caught up in trying to be everyone’s cup of tea, when we need to be our own too. I always enjoy your emails. Thank you for sharing.
I enjoyed reading this Ian - a very perceptive and pertinent newsletter.
Like you I find the striving for social media impact somewhat disconcerting: it feels as though you're in a race of thousands trying to compete for 'likes' and 'followers'. I'm sure that building a profile and a following do help provide an audience to whom you can promote your events, services etc, but so many posts lack depth, and the race seems relentless (Professor Joe O'Mahoney described it as "shouting at passing traffic").
What I'd really like to spend my time doing is having meaningful conversations - listening and trying to understand others' situations in depth (an organisation's current strategy challenges in my case, but the point is general). Counting 'likes' and writing 'follower grab' posts feels a long way from this.