Introverts need more time to recharge. That’s just a fact.
We can try to be someone else.
We can try to convince ourselves that we’re ambiverts.
We can try to work up the energy with Tony Robbins state change methods.
But at the end of the day, none of that is sustainable.
Introverts need alone time to recharge, so it’s even more critical that introverted coaches and consultants learn to manage our energy.
So what happens when introverts try to run our business like an extrovert?
Here are 5 signs along with an action you can take right now to break the cycle and build a coaching or consulting business that fits your personality.
Let’s jump in!
Sign #1: You’re spending large chunks of time on social media hoping to get clients
This is the easiest pitfall because this approach is rammed down our throats all the time. And social media companies are happy to promote anyone who pushes this approach.
Extroverts enjoy being social, it gives them energy, that’s what makes them an extrovert. So should it come as a surprise that being social online is easier and more sustainable for them? Of course not.
The problem is that being social online works for them, so we assume it must be the right way. Maybe even the only way to get clients.
So introverts try to follow and reproduce the results that extroverts get, and we often crash and burn. We simply can’t shout loud enough or often enough to get attention and get clients on social media.
But we see it working for Gary Vee, so the problem must be US. We must be the ones who need to change.
I don’t agree.
Introverts don’t need to change. We just need a different approach to marketing.
Action Step: Track how much time you spend on social media creating content, posting, engaging, responding to comments, etc all in efforts to get clients. Have those efforts actually produced clients in the last 12 months?
Sign #2: You’re exhausted from trying to juggle marketing, sales, client service and all the other aspects of your business, most of which require human interaction
In my old agency, our very extroverted Sales VP could do 60-minute sales calls, back to back, all day. It got old after a while, but did it for months while the company was in a growth phase.
I don’t know if I could do back-to-back sales calls for a week before wanting to jump off the nearest bridge.
As introverts, we need to acknowledge that we have a limited amount of human interaction we can handle every day, let’s call it “social time.” And that “social time” has to cover all those functions in our business.
If we burn through all our social time in our marketing, we have nothing left for client service and we end up delivering crappy service to our clients.
If we burn through all of our social time in coaching or consulting, we’ll deliver great service and great results, but have no energy left to market or sell.
Action Step: Set a daily limit of “social time” that you are comfortable with, and see if you can fit all your appointments, marketing and sales time within that limit. If not, what changes can you make right now to automate, eliminate or delegate some of your tasks?
Sign #3: You don’t have enough time left to build systems, so every part of your business depends on you pushing every day
Extroverts can cover up for this lack of systems for a long time – sometimes decades – because they feed off energy from social interaction.
As long as they’re running from meeting to meeting, they can convince themselves everything in the business is fine.
But as an introvert, social interaction drains your energy. You can’t run off that fuel for very long.
That’s where systems come in.
Systems in your business can make up for that energy limitation.
Marketing systems can bring in prospects with less social interaction.
Sales systems can help turn prospects into clients with less follow up.
Operations systems can limit service problems, mistakes and other energy-drains.
But if you spend all your time running from meeting to meeting like an extrovert, you’ll never have the time to build the very systems that can set you free from all that.
Action Step: Look at your schedule for the next week and ask yourself, Could I free up 1 hour a day to work on systems in my business? If not, what’s the worst thing that could happen if I took off that hour each day?
Sign #4: You feel the pressure to meet challenges with “More” – more offers, more options, more activity
I love Grant Cardone’s book 10X, because it’s a way of doing everything you can to guarantee you get the result you want.
But when we apply the 10X mentality to other areas like marketing, we end up with some unpleasant side effects.
We end up with 3 brands, 7 coaching programs, 5 books, 6 lead magnets and 4 webinars.
That’s an extroverts’ approach to marketing. The more options, the more offers, the more activity, the better.
But more isn’t always better. Especially for introverts.
With our limited social energy, it’s best to put everything we have into one brand, one group of people we serve, one great offer created specifically for them.
Keep it simple, and put all of our energy into that one thing.
I used to be in 4 different ventures in the coaching, consulting and B2B education space.
I got out of all of them and focused on the podcast production agency. That was where I could make the most impact.
My schedule went from chaotic and stressful to working mornings and having a ton of white space on my calendar.
By focusing on one brand, one offer to one group of people, I had the time to build the systems that set me free from most of the daily work.
In fact, it’s the reason I have the time to write this from a coffee shop at 4pm on a Tuesday.
Because I’m not running from meeting to meeting, call to call, or putting out fires in the business.
Action Step: Write down how many offers people can buy from you. Programs, services, packages, books, etc. How many actually generate a profit, and what would happen if you cut out everything but the most profitable one?
Sign #5: You have limited time to onboard and train, so hiring is all about finding people who can “hit the ground running”
“It’s not my responsibility to hold their hand. We need a rockstar who can hit the ground running with little supervision, we’re going to let them sink or swim.”
I used to hear this all the time in the real estate space, mostly from extroverts who were busy running from meeting to meeting and didn’t want to slow down.
The reality is that there are a few people out there who can hit the ground running. They are the A players.
And they’re incredibly rare and valuable.
I don’t want my business to be based on having rare and valuable people in every position just to run smoothly.
So my focus is on building rockstar systems, and then plugging in smart, capable people into those systems.
I make sure we have great onboarding and training systems in place, too.
That makes it easier to attract and retain good people.
When I get an A player, a rockstar, I focus on getting them to improve our systems.
So even when they leave, my business is better off.
Action Step: Make a list of all the tasks you do in the business that are heavy on social interaction. Which of those tasks could someone else take on… if they were properly trained and empowered? Set the goal to start creating systems for those tasks so you can hire someone to replace you.
There is a lot of pressure to run your business like an extrovert on an IV-drip of Red Bull.
But you don’t have to give into that pressure.
With the right systems around you, from marketing to sales to operations, you can create a business around your personality.
So if you take anything away from this article, it’s to go your own way.
Build your business around who you really are, not who the business world pressures you to be.