546: Making Time
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How do you make time for yourself while running a busy business? In this episode, we explore the importance of structuring your business to protect your time and mental health. A strong pricing strategy helps you work smarter, not harder, while setting clear booking boundaries brings predictability to your schedule. By fostering respectful client relationships, you can build a loyal base of cheerleaders who genuinely want the best for you. Additionally, learning to say no to certain clients benefits your business far beyond financial gain. Protecting your time isn’t selfish—it’s the foundation of a sustainable and thriving business.
Main topics:
Pricing for Time and Balance
Setting Clear Booking Boundaries
Fostering Respectful Client Relationships
Structuring for Daily Efficiency
Confidence in Business Decisions
Main takeaway: Protecting your time is not selfish. It's necessary for your mental health and the longevity of your business.
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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SPEAKERS
Collin, Meghan
Meghan 00:01
Hi, I'm Meghan, I'm Collin, and we are the host of pet sitter confessional, an open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter. We are in the thick of the holidays in the United States, so we thank you for joining us today. We also want to thank our Patreon, people like Leslie Eli and Amber for supporting the show with a few dollars of their hard earned dog walking and pet sitting money every month. Thank you so much. If you enjoy listening to the podcast as well and have learned something from it, you can go to pet sitter confessional.com/support, to see all of the ways that you can help us. We also want to thank pet sitters associates for sponsoring today's episode. Here in the United States, it is Thanksgiving week, so it's crazy schedules all around we hope each day over the next few weeks, you can take a little bit of time for yourself. Even just five minutes a day makes a difference
Collin 00:44
well. And you say that phrase right there, takes some time, right making time is really difficult, especially during the busy periods. And it even links back to our previous discussion on episode 544 where we took an opportunity, we seized an opportunity because we had a little bit of time in our schedule, but in order to have that time, we have to make it and so that's what we want to talk about today, is as a busy business owner, especially as a solopreneur, even if you have a team with you, what are ways that we can go about utilizing and making time in our schedule? The phrase making
Meghan 01:18
time is a little bit of a misnomer, because obviously nobody can make 25 hours in a day. Five
Collin 01:22
hours in a day. But what we can do is have structural things that we set up in order to take the time that we need to actually create that separation between our business and our personal life, that without these it's really difficult in order to do that. That's true.
Meghan 01:38
We can't just wake up one day and hope that we have time. It doesn't work that way. Time doesn't magically appear. You do need a structure around it to be efficient as possible. In order to make that time when you do things more efficiently, you are able to then essentially create more time on the back end because you've done them faster. The first structure that you need in your business in order to make time for yourself is to price accordingly. This actually came from a listener, Rochelle Steele, and it was a great point, because under charging keeps you doing visits even when you don't want to. When you aren't charging enough to pay your bills, you have to keep adding more visits to your plate, and then with inflation, things keep going up, so you have to do more visits
Collin 02:18
even whenever you're tired, you're exhausted, you're burned out, you're frustrated or angry, or you have other things that you'd rather be spending your time doing. So think about this right now, if you raised your prices by just a single dollar per service, how many fewer visits would you have to do over the next month? What that dollar has now done, it has bought back that much more time for you. You have been able to carve out of your schedule that much more time because you raised something by $1 then what's important? Part of this is, and I know this is where I struggle a lot, is instead of filling that time that we've just created with more visits, we need to fill it with things for ourselves so that we have the availability to take advantage of opportunities as they come across our plate.
Meghan 03:06
Now, if you are saving for something big or really just want to take on more visits and more clients, then of course, you can say yes. But for the majority of us, I feel like we reach a point where we get burned out, or we've been in this game for too long, and we go, Ah, I need more time for myself. I want to go do the hobbies and the activities that I want to
Collin 03:24
and when we have the pricing structure, when we know how much a service costs us, whether we have a team or whether it's just ourself, when we know that, that actually gives us confidence in order to raise that dollar, because we know with this extra dollar, I'm getting back so many more opportunities that maybe I would have said no to otherwise. I'm getting back a weekend. I'm getting back extra time in the evenings, because as you go through the month, as you go through the week, you're not going, Oh, I gotta get that extra one. I gotta get that next one. I gotta get that extra one, you know. Okay, I have my bookings all out here. I have enough, right? And that is such a wonderful place to be when we know what enough is for us. Instead of chasing that mindset of, I need another thing. I've got to do this thing again. Like, like Meghan said, unless you're trying to pay down debt really fast, you're trying to save for this thing, you know you've got big expenses coming up, then you do need to grind a little bit to push through that. But when you know what enough is, the next dollar on top of that doesn't mean anything to you, because you have what you need. You know exactly what that is allowing you to say no to things. It
Meghan 04:28
is important to do that budget, just like we do it for personal we need to do it for business too. This is how much my services are. This is how many I need in order to make my personal budget and my savings and my operating expenses and take out taxes and everything else on top of that is just gravy.
Collin 04:42
Yeah, when we do those monthly projections, it gives you a lot of security and surety whenever you do hit that enough amount, whatever that is for you, because then you go, Well, if I don't get a single other booking for the rest of the month, that's fantastic. Or maybe I get that booking that I really don't want to take because I already took off the weekend, or it's my birthday, or. Whatever, whatever you know you can tell them no, and you're not worried about the money at that point, as you grow, as you get these things. And one of the one of the best things that you can do is try and calculate what your daily average number of visits is for an entire year. This is so powerful, because what this gives you is, this gives you an average number of visits that you do over the course of 365, days. And this, this blows through the slow months, the really busy months, and just averages all out to one number. And then you can start calculating your income based off of that one number over the course of an entire year, and really see how your business is doing. And it helps you not stress out so much, yeah,
Meghan 05:39
because during the slow times we panic. We go, Oh my gosh, I need to get more clients. I need to get my name out there, more we we panic that not enough people know about us. And during the busy times, we almost want to close the book saying, Ah, no, too much. Back up, go away. Which leads right into the second part of structuring your business. Well, in order to make time, which is setting and booking boundaries. So for example, you can't book my company if you need me within X number of days. This allows you to know ahead of time how much you're taking on on a given day well
Collin 06:11
and just plan your life. How many times has somebody asked you to do something two weeks from now? And you just kind of shrug your shoulders and go, Well, I can until I can't Meg and I we've lived that so often going well, I don't know what we're going to do in a couple weeks from now, or we'll just have to wait and see when you set a boundary like this in your life, in your business, you're going I have to know 10 days before you need me minimum if you want me to take you on for both new and existing clients alike. And what this gives you, this gives you the power of predictability. This gives you the ability to plan ahead and not constantly wake up in the mornings and go, Well, I don't know what's going to happen today. Obviously, we know that clients are going to have emergencies, and we accommodate them as best we can. We know things are going to happen, and we want to be there for people that we are caring for and their pets, and they know and trust us that if they need to leave suddenly for whatever reason, they can look to us to take that on. But we are saying as a rule as a whole, we don't want the last minute Louis just ruling our lives. We want a little bit more predictability so that we can do things. I can say, oh, I need to get my oil changed in a week, and it's going to be on a Tuesday at 9am I can be pretty sure that I'm going to be able to hit that. This gives you the ability to make that time, because you are purposefully going if it's not on my books X number of days before the hand, it's not going to get on my books at all.
Meghan 07:44
Now we do have to counterbalance this with businesses that are on demand. Obviously, that's antithetical to what you just said. So if that is your business, it may be a little bit harder to step away for last minute personal reasons. Though, if it's an emergency, your clients are just going to have to understand and make sure to have backups, so that you have people to refer to looking ahead to 2025 Clear your schedule now, set those days aside and tell your clients about it, so they know what to expect, and you can have peace of mind. Something that doesn't give you more time, but gives you more peace of mind is pet sitters associates, as pet care professionals, your clients trust you to care for their furry family members, and that's why pet sitters Associates is here to help. For over 20 years, they've provided 1000s of members with quality pet care insurance. Because you work in the pet care industry, you can take your career to the next level with flexible coverage options, client connections and complete freedom in running your business. Learn why pet sitters Associates is the perfect fit for you, and get a free quote when you go to pet sit llc.com you can get a discount when you join by clicking membership Pet Sitter confessional, and use the discount code confessional when you go to checkout, check out the benefits, membership and insurance once again at pets llc.com the third structure that you need around your business to make more time is to build a client list that respects you. This is sometimes the hardest one, especially if you are solo, because your clients love you. They don't want anybody else. They want you, even if you have a team, they may your clients may have some preferences of which sitter they prefer over another, the clients that respect you and your business, your boundaries, the policies that you have, you need to foster these clients and your relationship with them. Obviously, this is a business transaction on both ends, and sometimes clients don't care about us, but when they treat you well, honor that I just mentioned that the clients who understand your emergencies are really the ones that you want to keep around you. Also want to be very protective of yourself and turn clients away when they don't respect you, this business will chew you up and spit you out. You have to take care of yourself. Clients either are going to understand that, or they're not. And if they don't, you don't need to entertain them any longer. What we
Collin 09:45
often think about turning away clients because their pet is bad, their dog is too pulling, or the cat is too reactive towards us, and we can't give them medications. You can turn away a client if they don't respect you, if they don't care about your boundaries, you don't need. That person in your life. So yes, if you have clients, and you can think of them right now as you're going through your client list of if I called this person and said, I have a flat tire and I'm not able to make the visit, you know the clients who would just ask, okay, well, what time are you going to be there? Versus the ones that are going to say, Do you need help? Can I send you a tow truck? Don't worry about it. Fluffy is going to be perfectly fine. I hope you take care of yourself and that you're okay. We want more of those clients, because when we have more of those clients, when we set time aside for ourselves, or when we tell them, No, they're actually going to turn into your cheerleaders, they're going to be the ones that are going to go, yep, you need that vacation. You are so amazing, and fluffy is going to be ready for you when you get back. Thank you so much for all that you do. We need more of that in our lives, and unfortunately, when we start saying yes to everybody, when we become too accommodating, we actually find ourselves with a roster full of clients, a client list full of people who treat us like we are just an on call servant, like we are just there to serve them and all of their needs, instead of a person and a professional who is helping them and coming alongside them, I was still Scott black said it best when he says, I am here to help, but I am not the hired help. That phrase has really stuck with me ever since I had that conversation with them, because it put into context exactly the line that we are trying to draw and the trying to walk as a business owner and working with people's pets and working in their lives well.
Meghan 11:33
And a lot of times, pet sitters and dog walkers will get frustrated because they don't feel like they're being heard or they're being respected. And a lot of this actually comes back to price. When we aren't charging enough, when we're just trying to get visits because we're not we need to pay our bills. We then say yes to everyone and clients that don't respect us. So it is kind of this hamster wheel of we have to balance these things, we have to charge. You know, we always talk about charging your worth, but like, how? What does that mean? That means actually doing a budget. Look at how many visits you have, how many visits you need, and how many visits you want in order to get the life that you desire.
Collin 12:07
Yeah, so that you can be selective with every single person that you take on. It's not just about that they live in a good location, or that, oh, this is a really wealthy client, so they'll be able to pay my bills. No, that's not what we're after here. We want people who understand what we do, who respect us and who want the best for us. That's really what it boils down to. And we can look at we can wake up one day and look at the people who were serving and go, none of these people are that. So we have to be ruthless with who we take on and when we talk about protecting ourselves. That's what this is. We are the gatekeepers to the people who have contact to us, and if we say yes to too many people who take advantage of that, we have ourselves to blame. And so we can't just be willy nilly with this, right? We'll have a client list of people who just want you to do their bidding instead of who trust us and want the best for
Meghan 12:58
us. But it can be hard when you're in a growth phase, or you're just starting out your business and you're going and you're going, Okay, well, Jack and Jill and Diane, I need them all. But really, it is okay to take time to grow. You don't want to grow too fast, because there's that saying move fast and break stuff, and you don't want to do that. So it is okay to go slow, even if that means building your client base while also having a part time job that is perfectly okay, because if it means you're getting clients that actually respect you and enjoy your work, you're going to enjoy this work even more.
Collin 13:30
You'll be the better for it, and you'll be in it for the long haul. And all of these decisions, of being patient to find the clients who respect us, to setting those boundaries and to our pricing, all of them are actually linked back to our confidence in our pricing structure and our ability to pay the bills. When we have confidence that things are covered and everything's okay, I can really turn away that client that is just not a good fit for me personally, and I'm not going to work well with them. That's a great place to be, right? Your pricing reflects Meghan, you mentioned you. It reflects our values, which allows us to turn away clients who are not a good fit. Because what we are saying is I value myself so much that I want a well curated client list so that I can actually focus on the quality care and my personal well being that is okay to do.
Meghan 14:19
Yeah, protecting your time is not selfish. It's necessary for your mental health and the longevity of your business. If you want to be here in 30 years, you can't be running yourself ragged 300 days a year. That's not going to work. Your body is going to revolt against you and shut down at some point. So it's just like the story with the hair and the turtle sometimes slow and steady does win the race. It can be easy to feel like we're letting clients down by not being available, 24/7, or to offer every service under the sun, or to be at their beck and call to do anything they ask, but remember, you can't pour from an empty cup if you are burned out. Or every time your phone dings, you get anxiety and you get stressed out. Your business isn't likely to be. The best so that it can be the last structure that I wanted to focus on for making time in your business is to be efficient. And I know we just talked about this on episode 542 so if you haven't listened to that and you want to be more efficient, go go back to that. When you have more structures around your time and activities throughout the day, you are able to do them better and get more done so that you can fill that other time with either personal activities or more business
Collin 15:22
well, Meghan, you started at the top of the episode talking about how nobody can actually make a 25th hour in their day. We all get 24 hours. It's up to us to use them well. And so when we have good boundaries in our booking, in our personal life and our business life, when we've priced accordingly, when we have the people who love us and respect us as clients. We still need to look at the time that we have and go, I need to make the most of this. So that's really what the efficiencies are about. Is going What do I need to do? How do I need to work? Where do I need to work? How do I need to think this? Who do I need to give this work to so that this one hour can be the best hour possible for either my business or my personal life. Maybe I need to work really hard, and I need to actually structure my day so that my morning is, let's be honest, be going to be kind of full, gonna be kind of intense, but that gives me the rest of the afternoon to go enjoy a movie and time with friends, or maybe it's the evenings, or whatever that is. It's understanding that I work best in certain constraints and time periods and blocks and whatever. There's whole strategies for all around that all efficiency is is going I only have so much time to get this done. I need to make the most of it. And it's
Meghan 16:33
also understanding yourself, too. If you are not a morning person, but you have said your business starts operating at 6am with pet sitting visits, it may be time to re evaluate that
Collin 16:43
you're a morning person, whether you like it or not at that point, unless you go, you know what? I don't actually do 6am visits really well. So in order for me to do well, I just need to start at 8am and if you want me to be there at six, it's an extra charge. And guess what you've just done? You've bought back more time so that you can do that, doing something that you're pretty efficient at, hopefully, and that's getting sleep, which is getting sleep, which is really important.
Meghan 17:03
But then the caveat is always, well, clients sometimes will just go ahead and pay for that. So you may end up doing visits at 6am anyway, even with the price increase, but you never know. So we have two questions for you. The first one is, what's one thing you can stop doing this week to make more room for yourself. Mine is usually doing admin work while I watch TV, because that makes me much less efficient. Takes a lot more time.
Collin 17:29
Mine is typically getting lost on Facebook reels and just allowing it to auto scroll for me from one video to the next. Hours can go by with that, and it's very, very dangerous.
Meghan 17:38
Or maybe the question should be, is there one client or task you've been meaning to let go of that's draining your energy, whether it's stop doing a task or letting go of a client that is draining your energy? We want to encourage you to take that step this week. We hope that this has been a helpful episode to you. If you have any topic suggestions or people you would like us to interview, you can email us at Pet Sitter confessional@gmail.com, we also want to thank pet sitters, associates and our Patreon people for supporting today's show. We will talk with you next time bye. You.
