[00:00:10.250] - Gordon
Hello.
[00:00:10.730] - Taylor
Hello.
[00:00:11.210] - Gordon
My name's Gordon from Drayson Design.
[00:00:13.070] - Taylor
And I'm Taylor from The Creative Tinker.
[00:00:15.410] - Gordon
And welcome to "This Week With Taylor and Gordon," a weekly podcast and vidcast where we talk about things that have affected us, as self-employed business owners, over the last seven days. Welcome back. We had a week off last week because Taylor, you were out of town.
[00:00:32.750] - Taylor
I was indeed.
[00:00:33.590] - Gordon
And we weren't able to bring an episode to you, so we do hope you didn't miss us too much. So we're back this week, though, and lots of things have happened. Clocks went back last week, so it's very very dark now. I'm looking out the window and it's starting to get dark already. Because of the change in the weather, I've managed to get a bit of a cold. You can probably hear.
[00:01:02.630] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:01:02.630] - Gordon
Those of you who are here for the first time. This is not how my voice normally sounds. It's not quite as deep as this. You've been not feeling your best either, have you?
[00:01:15.050] - Taylor
No, I wasn't too well earlier in the week.
[00:01:17.570] - Gordon
Yeah. So everyone, I think, that I know is coming down with something at the moment. Anyway, let's get on with what we're here for. We have two topics this week, one from Taylor, one from me. Is there any news before we go ahead?
[00:01:34.250] - Taylor
Nothing from me.
[00:01:35.210] - Gordon
You've updated your computer to the latest version of the OS, haven't you?
[00:01:40.010] - Taylor
Yes.
[00:01:41.330] - Gordon
Any experiences you want to pass on to people?
[00:01:45.170] - Taylor
On the most part, it's quite similar to the previous versions. There's some new stuff with FaceTime and stuff like that. Nothing too major, really.
[00:01:54.650] - Gordon
It's normally about big stability changes, isn't it? And making sure that everything's stable. If you are going to upgrade and there are certain applications that you rely on, whatever operating system it is, whether it's Windows, Linux, Mac OS, whatever it is, if you have specific applications you use, find out if they're compatible with the next version of the OS before you update. That's a really good tip. I've been there and done it wrong. Where I've updated because I've always wanted the most newest and shiniest, and it's broken compatibility with an application that I used every single day. So I had to then just sort of either not use that app or take everything back to the previous OS again, which is a ton of time to do that.
[00:02:46.190] - Taylor
It is.
[00:02:46.190] - Gordon
It takes a long time to do. So there you go. Just make sure they're compatible. Right, do you want to start this week?
[00:02:53.270] - Taylor
Yes. So this week I have been moving over all of my subscriptions or all my renewals over to "Zoho Subscriptions." This is basically just to make sure, because I had lots of my renewals in different places, and I just hadn't kept on top of it really. I was just going through making sure I noted down all my renewals, made sure I didn't miss any that I got caught up in, and just making sure that everything transferred and moved over to the new system really well, really.
[00:03:30.350] - Gordon
So, you had a manual system previously.
[00:03:39.630] - Taylor
So I created my own system that we've spoken about before, using "Airtable," and I was using that for a long time. But with the new system I've got with Zoho, I don't need it. However, I was kind of half migrated where some of them were moved over, kind of like my monthly subscriptions, they were set up in the new Zoho Subscriptions, but all my annual renewals were still in the old one. I kind of had things kind of in two places, so I kind of needed to find the time to basically say, "okay, I'm going to sort this out" and then kind of move away from it. Nothing wrong with the system I had before. It's just easier and kind of set up for me for the future.
[00:04:24.030] - Gordon
Okay. And Zoho Subscriptions is part of your package that you have.
[00:04:29.850] - Taylor
Yeah. Exactly.
[00:04:30.510] - Gordon
So it makes sense to use it, if you're paying for that package and it's going to do what you want, then why not use it? I'm still using the Air Table system, which is a manual system. It emails people and lets them know a renewal is due. They then have to reply and say, "yes I want to go ahead."
[00:04:51.150] - Taylor
Semi-manual.
[00:04:52.470] - Gordon
Well, it is... Yeah, it is up until the point when they reply.
[00:04:56.370] - Taylor
Yes.
[00:04:56.910] - Gordon
And then it's... It's automated, sorry, up to the point that they reply, and then it's a manual process.
[00:05:02.550] - Taylor
Yes. Which is what I didn't like. I didn't like the fact that the invoice was the manual part.
[00:05:09.030] - Gordon
Yeah. I mean, this is because of legacy software that I've been using forever. And if I was to move over to something like Zoho, I mean, you're looking at probably a month or so of work just to move everything over. And you have to sort of weigh up the pros and cons. Is it worth your time moving everything over versus what you have at the moment? And for me currently, it's not.
[00:05:38.610] - Taylor
That's fair enough.
[00:05:39.750] - Gordon
But seeing as you have the system, and you're still quite a new company, it's nice to get everybody into the same system at this point, so that moving forward all your new customers can go into this system.
[00:05:54.330] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:05:54.330] - Gordon
And you haven't got to get to the point where I have where you've got thousands of invoices in the past that you need to try and move across, which would just be a really difficult process to do. Anything else you want to say on that?
[00:06:09.390] - Taylor
I think that's everything. But yeah, just kind of back to the automation thing is, to see if you can find stuff that's manual, or if some of it's automated and some of it's manual, see if there is ways to automate it. Because it can be really useful and free up your time to either spend more time with your family or whatever you enjoy doing, or spend more time working and being able to either be out there on the road if you're a tradesman, for example, or doing more of your actual work rather than admin, really.
[00:06:43.170] - Gordon
Yeah. So you're going to spend more time with your family now, are you?
[00:06:46.230] - Taylor
No, that was just for other people.
[00:06:50.310] - Gordon
Yeah. Okay. So if you are interested in Zoho, we'll put a link in the show notes for you, so you can go and check it out. I should say at this point, we're not sponsored by anyone. All of these recommendations that we give are from our own experience and from our own testing. We're not supported by anybody at all. So if we tell you we like something, it's because we like it not because we're being paid to tell you that.
[00:07:20.970] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:07:20.970] - Gordon
We may have affiliate links every now and then, but that is only because we like the system and we want to promote it. And if they're offering an affiliate system and we have this way of bringing people to them, we might as well use it. But that's the only way we would get something from it. So my topic this week is about letting it go, just like in "Frozen."
[00:07:47.730] - Taylor
Yep.
[00:07:47.730] - Gordon
So letting it go is basically getting to a point in a project or a personal project normally, or a job that you are in the middle of doing, and you get to a point when you suddenly think, "do you know what? I'm not sure I should finish this." Because either it's not going the way you want it to go, and maybe that's because you haven't got the time to put into it, or the technology isn't quite there yet, or it's a major pain to actually be able to do what you want to do, you know, let it go. Just come back to it in the future, when technology has moved on, when things like this are going to be possible, and have another go at it when there's a better chance that it might work. Just recently, I've had two websites that I created. One is about learning marketing, and one is about selling magic, both in courses and as an Amazon affiliate. And neither of these sites have actually done anything for me. They've taken a ton of time to set up, a ton of time to create and find the content to put onto the sites, and there's just no return. And I could spend another two years, because that's how long my domain names last for, and I could continue trying to make them work, or add more content, or hope that at some point people are going to find the site and really like it and start using it. But, it hasn't happened yet. And so I have a choice to make. I either stop doing it, or I repurpose that content, which is another really good way of salvaging something from a project that maybe hasn't gone the way you wanted it to go. You can take the assets if you like and move them somewhere else and reuse them, repurpose them; as long as your licence allows for that, if you have a licence for the content. So you could either do that, or you can just say, "look, I gave it a try, I gave it a shot. It's not working. I'm just going to stop and move on to other things." It will free up your time for things that will bring in more of a return, and that return might be monetary. It might be something you're doing because you have a passion for it, and so it's a passion project. It might be a personal project, something you're doing because you want to do it. Something you're doing because it gives you pleasure, or it...
[00:10:54.630] - Taylor
Skills.
[00:10:54.630] - Gordon
It helps develop your skills, yeah. But it's really difficult.
[00:11:01.170] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:11:01.170] - Gordon
Because once you've put a set amount of time into something, it becomes your baby. It becomes your little project. And to be able to say, "yeah, that's not working" and just sort of delete everything, is really, really difficult. And I've got this decision to make with these two sites. I think I've already made a decision with the magic one.
[00:11:27.990] - Taylor
Okay.
[00:11:28.770] - Gordon
So there's a couple of courses on there that I, video courses, that I'm going to repurpose.
[00:11:35.070] - Taylor
Okay.
[00:11:35.490] - Gordon
And I'm going to move them to another system, and they are going to be linked more closely with my children's entertainment, and my Gordon's Magic, and my balloon twisting site, because they all have overlap. And so this site I can grab the important content from and reuse it. But the actual site itself, I think I've decided I'm going to close down because it's just... It doesn't cost a lot to run it. The hosting is being paid for by myself anyway, and the domain name is another of the big costs. Maintenance is not such a big cost because the site's already been built and it works and it's fine. Every now and then I might need to go in and check it's still working, which you should do on every website you have. Just check it every month or so and just make sure it's doing what you expect it to be doing. Especially if it's an e-commerce site. Make sure that orders are actually going through. Give yourself a low cost product that's hidden and only you know about it that you can then activate, do a checkout, go through the whole process, make the payment, and then just make sure that everything is working and you're getting the orders and the payment goes through. Because the worst thing that can happen with an e-commerce site is that your payments structure stops working, for whatever reason, and you don't know about it. How would you know you're not getting the orders come in? Is that just because it's slow or people not just making orders? Or are they going to make orders and they're not able to because the processing is not working properly?
[00:13:22.890] - Taylor
Yeah, definitely.
[00:13:23.910] - Gordon
So if you have an e-commerce site, do this at least once a month, do it even more regularly. If you find that there's a period of time when you haven't had any orders and you would have expected to have had some, go test the site, make sure it's working as it should. Sometimes plug-ins, get updated and they break something, and that stops things from working. So it's really important to get on top of that quickly. Anyway, back to where I was. I think I've decided that the magic site is going to stop. Amazon affiliates is not what it used to be, and I don't think I earned anything to write home about through it. So I'm going to just knock that on the head completely. It's not really of interest to the people who come to this site. They obviously don't want to purchase it when they can go to Amazon themselves anyway, so why come through a third party? I think that's what I've decided. The marketing site is a little bit more difficult, because the domain name for that has just auto-renewed.
[00:14:33.330] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:14:34.410] - Gordon
And so for me to be able to stop it, I'm going to lose sort of two years worth of domain name with it anyway. So maybe what I should do is I should say this is going to be the time in the next year, I'll work on it on and off, and I'm going to move it to a new system, one that I've already sort of earmarked and decided I'd like to use, and we're going to see if anything comes of it and if it doesn't come, if nothing comes to it by the time we come to the next renewal, then I'll just stop and probably repurpose the content somewhere else. But this is it. It's the make or break time for this site.
[00:15:18.630] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:15:18.630] - Gordon
Once I have something to tell you about, I'll let you know and then you can go and have a look yourself. Because I think the actual content is really useful for people. It's just not being found. And you have to put time and effort into the marketing of a website. You can't just put it on the internet and just hope people will come to it. You've got to actually put a bit of time and effort into getting people to it; bringing the traffic to it; building some sort of fan base or customer base. And only then will you know if the site is going to be successful or not. And this site currently isn't. So watch this space. I'll let you know how it goes. So...
[00:16:01.650] - Taylor
It's really interesting.
[00:16:04.410] - Gordon
As a, putting it as sort of a summary. Don't feel bad about letting something go, even if it's a project that you've put a ton of time into, it's better to use that time on other, more worthwhile projects than it is to keep putting it into the same one that's just not working. That's it.
[00:16:26.550] - Taylor
Thank you. We'll catch up with you in a couple of months time, see how you're getting on with it.
[00:16:31.530] - Gordon
See how we do, yeah. So that's everything from me.
[00:16:35.610] - Taylor
And everything from me as well.
[00:16:37.170] - Gordon
Thank you very much for joining us this week. If you've enjoyed what we've been talking about or you think other people might enjoy it, please like, share and subscribe; we can be found on YouTube and on Facebook.
[00:16:51.330] - Taylor
You can also go to our website: this weekwith.co.uk to find all of our past episodes and search for any topics that we've spoken about or mentioned.
[00:17:01.110] - Gordon
We'll see you next week at 1pm on Friday, live on Facebook and YouTube. Until then, my name's Gordon I'm from Drayson Design.
[00:17:10.650] - Taylor
And I'm Taylor from The Creative Tinker.
[00:17:13.350] - Gordon
Goodbye.
[00:17:13.950] - Taylor
Bye.
