dog walking

A Stranger Helped Me Complete This Blog Post. If You Want to Be Productive with Anything, Try This

Dog Training, Dog Walking, Pet Business, Pet Business Owner, Pet Care, Pet Grooming, Pet Sitting, Productivity Hacks / /

Today I had on my to do list to write a blog post. 

BUT… I also needed to do a bunch of other things today like:

  • Write my morning pages 
  • Gather a lot of important data about my pet business books to a possible book foreign rights publisher (Woot, we’ll see! It was very tedious work, but I got all the data to him. Whew.)
  • Make a healthy breakfast and lunch 
  • Talk on the phone with a friend who is really struggling with some health issues
  • Show up on time and prepared for my business mastermind 
  • Respond to a lot of emails and phone calls 
  • Spend some time looking at pictures and a long article my husband sent me about treehouses (because we may want to build one this year so we’re doing research now). 
  • Take a sauna at the Air BnB I’m at because if I don’t get in the sauna before I leave my stay here, I’m going to really regret it! (The sauna was a big reason why I booked this spot.) 
  • Plus, a lot of other things.

You’re a business owner. You know the drill. 

Anyway, I really wanted to write this blog post before the day’s end. (Here I am writing the blog post, but I’m also writing about what’s helping me write it. It’s very meta, isn’t it?) 

Long story short: I didn’t want to write this blog post. I wanted to dive into that sauna (the sauna that is currently heating up and that will be my reward for writing this). But a sauna at the end of my blog post writing wasn’t enough to get me to actually write a blog post. 

<Brief pause in my writing right now to check to make sure the sauna is actually heating up. It is. Good. I’m back now.>

So, in comes one of my most powerful secret weapons for productivity. It’s my productivity sauce, people. 

You may have heard me mention what I’m about to share here in one my webinars or in a coaching session you’ve done with me. 

Or maybe you read about my productivity hack in my Facebook group for pet business owners, or in my Prosperous Pet Business podcast.

It’s one thing to read about it or hear about it. It’s another thing to actually do it. And today I did it. 

So what is this “it” I’m referring to? 

Focusmate.

It’s virtual co-working. For 25 or 50-minutes you meet with a stranger by video at a time you both signed up for. They tell you what they are going to work on. You tell them what you are going to work on. And then you do it. At the end you check in and share briefly what you did. 

Having that accountability: check in/take action/check out is POWERFUL. 

I created a Focusmate matching system for pet business owners – your own group for pet business owners. It doesn’t mean you’ll always get matched with a pet business owner but if a pet biz owner books a session time at the same time you do, if you’re part of the group, you’ll get matched!

So I recommend you stop reading about it and join it now. It’s free for up to 3 sessions a week. Unlimited is just a few dollars a month. You’ve got nothing to lose, except some things on your to do list. 

Find out more about Focusmate for Pet Business Owners.

A Stranger Helped Me Complete This Blog Post. If You Want to Be Productive with Anything, Try This Read More »

How I Worked Less and Made More Money in My Pet Sitting and Dog Walking Business

Pet Sitting Business / /

I recently wrote an article for Thrive Global (Arianna Huffington’s online magazine) and wanted to share it with you pet sitters and dog walkers. I’ve had a lot of you ask me how I went from working 7 days a week to working 3 days a week in my pet sitting and dog walking business.

Here’s the article that addresses that topic. (Click on the link below to read the rest of the article.)

In 1995, I started the business of my dreams with lots of passion but no business experience of any kind. That first year I had lots of time but almost no money. A few years in, I had plenty of clients but hardly any time. Friends and family often complimented me on my business success, but I didn’t feel successful. To me, success was having both time and money. I was working 12-14 hour days seven days a week and still not making much compared to when I worked full-time as an employee.  

I was exhausted, frustrated and ready to call it quits, but instead I committed to one more year and to making fundamental changes in how I ran the business. If I didn’t have both time and money by the end of that year, I decided I would just walk away. Having nothing to lose freed me to try both traditional and nontraditional approaches to create more time and more money. CLICK TO READ THE ARTICLE..

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Blogging and my Book

Blogging, Dog Sitting Business, dog walking business, Pet Business, Pet Sitting Business / /

KristinOliveback

I’m noticing that I’m excited about this new blog and being able to communicate with all of you pet sitters on a regular basis and yet I’m also really excited and lit up about the book that I’ve been writing for pet sitters.

So…though the thought of  blogging every day sounds so fun and is tugging at me a bit, I’m finding that I really want and need to use my extra time to work on (and finish) my book.

Writing this book really has been a labor of love. I started it a few months ago when I hurt my back and was bedridden for a couple of days. One day I found myself writing for 10 hours straight! Now I usually write for 1-2 hours every couple of days and will stop when I find my attention wandering or I realize that I don’t want to be writing anymore.

I’m trying to really honor my natural rhythm of writing and not force myself to keep writing if I don’t want to.

I’m keeping the title hush-hush for now but in a few weeks I’ll be announcing it and telling you more about it. Stay tuned.

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Hello Pet Sitters and Dog Walkers

Blogging, Search Engine Optimization (SE0) / /

Horray! My blog is finally up and I’m so excited to have the opportunity to post every few days as my way to communicate with you in between our coaching sessions, teleclasses and my newsletter. I’m still trying to figure out how to put pictures up but other than that blogging is easy. You should try it.

If you’ve been thinking about getting a blog I really recommend it for these reasons:

1) You’ll get higher on the search engines like Google, MSN, Yahoo and the new Bing if you have a blog.

2) It’s so much fun. Try it. You’ll like it.

PS-I finally figured out how to put pictures in. 🙂

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