If you've been noticing that too many questions, decisions, and next steps still come back to you, I created something to help you start changing that. Make Your Business Need Less of You in 5 Days is a free email experience where you'll make one small change each day so you can start reducing how much your business depends on you. You'll find the link in the show notes.

Now, today we're talking about one of the places that dependency can be easy to miss. It's your client communication. Sometimes the reason your clients keep asking questions isn't because you haven't communicated enough. It's because the communication you've already sent isn't doing enough without you.

And if your solution has been to send another email, add another reminder, or personally step in, we need to look at what that's actually creating in your business. Because more communication doesn't always create more clarity.

[Prerecorded Podcast Intro]

Welcome to Online Business Tips, Mind Your Time. I'm Shannon Baker, your coffee-loving host and Capacity Systems Strategist. If you're an online business owner and too many questions, decisions, and next steps still come back to you, you're in the right place.

On this podcast, we talk about what's happening behind the scenes of your business and the practical changes you can make so it doesn't depend on you for everything. So grab your cup of coffee or your favorite beverage, and let's get into today's conversation.

When a client seems confused about something, is your first instinct to communicate more? Well, don't feel bad if your answer is yes. This is a mistake I've even made myself.

I've had moments where I say to myself, "I know I sent that." So I'd answer the question again, send another reminder, and keep it moving. It took me a while to realize that if I have to keep clarifying the same thing, the fact that technically I had communicated it wasn't really the point.

Because we want to make sure the client has what they need, we send another email, we add another reminder, we schedule another check-in, or we explain something again. And in theory, that does make sense. But sometimes your clients don't need more communication. Sometimes the problem is the communication that you're already sending to them just isn't clear enough for them to take the action that you want.

Now, in Coffee Chat Take number 14, I asked you to think about what your clients have learned to expect from you because you keep doing it. If you haven't tuned in yet, I highly recommend you go back and do so later.

But I want you to keep this in mind. Communication is one of the places where this can happen without us realizing it. A client isn't sure what to do, so we step in, we answer the question, we send the reminder, or we personally make sure the next step happens. So we're hand-holding.

But when you do that often enough, what started out as you being helpful can become part of how the client experience works and not necessarily the experience that you had envisioned.

See, your clients, they're not walking into an actual office where someone can point them in the right direction. So instead, because it's an online business, they're getting emails, they're completing forms, they're clicking scheduling links, they're logging into client portals, and they're using whatever other tools are part of your process and your system.

So when something isn't clear, it's easy for us as the online business owner to assume the answer is just send another email, just give them another nudge or another reminder, or we need to schedule another check-in call.

So before you add something else to your plate, I want you to answer one question. Is the communication you're already sending doing its job? Is it doing enough?

And when I say doing enough, I'm not talking about how much information you've included in the email. You can give the client everything they need in one email, but giving it to them all at once is actually making it harder for them to recognize what they need to do right now.

So, yeah, kudos if you send a very detailed welcome email that answers every question that your client could possibly ever have because someone else asked it of you before. But if they receive it right after they sign their contract and make their payment, they're excited. They're trying to take in a lot of information, but you're probably giving them some details that they don't need yet.

So if your email includes that link for them to schedule their kickoff call, which I hope it does, instructions for them to complete an intake form if they haven't done that already, and then you give them information about where communication is going to happen, everything they need to send you before you get on that kickoff call, technically, you have communicated everything that they need to know.

But this is what usually happens. They email you and ask when or how they can schedule the call with you. Then a few days later, they ask if there was something that they were supposed to do before the call. Then the day before the call, you check everything and you realize they never completed the intake form. So you send them a reminder.

And this is where it's really easy to decide that you need to communicate more. So you may decide that you want to add another reminder email after the welcome email that has even more information in it. Or you may decide to personally check in with them to make sure that everything is completed and see if they have any questions.

So now you're communicating more. But does this approach actually solve the problem? No, it doesn't. Because maybe the problem isn't that the client needed more information, it's that your welcome email is trying to get them to do too much at once.

And the most important action is buried underneath information they don't need yet. And you're probably giving them more information that they don't need at all.

Now, none of those problems are automatically solved by adding more emails. Adding one extra email may not seem like a big deal, but neither does answering a quick question. But those minutes can add up.

So when you multiply that across several clients and through your entire client experience, you're spending too much time providing clarity that your communication was supposed to handle in the first place. You're also keeping yourself involved in parts of the client experience that you don't actually need to be involved in.

And client communication, that is just one place that this can happen. That's one of the reasons I created my free five-day email experience, Make Your Online Business Need Less of You in 5 Days.

Because there are a lot of small places in an online business where we become part of the process without realizing how much it depends on us until we start looking for it. But over those five days, I'll help you look at one area at a time and make one small practical change so your business can start needing less of you. I'll tell you how to join me for that before we wrap up today's conversation.

But for now, I want to stay focused on client communication because there's another piece of this that we tend to overlook. That's timing.

Sometimes we give clients everything at the beginning because we want to look like we're organized. So we fire hose them with a bunch of information. Here's your welcome email. Here's the access to the portal, here's everything you need to know about working with me for the next three months. And then we're done. Like we've checked all the boxes, right?

The problem with that is your client probably isn't thinking about what they'll need four weeks from now when they're in like day one or week one of working with you. So think about how you consume information when you're busy. You pay attention to what you need to do right now. Well, guess what? Your clients, they do the same thing.

So giving someone all of the information up front is not going to automatically create clarity for them. They need to be able to recognize what matters right now, what they need to do next, and what can wait until later. So that may mean better communication actually involves communicating less at one time. Less is definitely more.

Now, that may mean you need to simplify your process and make one next step easier to see instead of adding three more paragraphs explaining what they need to do. Now, when you do this, you're not just deciding what to communicate. You're deciding what the client needs at each point in the experience so that they can recognize what happens next without you having to step in to tell them.

So the ultimate goal isn't to create some complicated communication system. It's to make the communication you already have work harder so you don't have to.

When something isn't working the way we expect it, it's easier to step in and try to compensate for it ourselves. That's when we tend to send another email or add another meeting. We create another step. And then before long, we've become the thing that's making the process work. That's not how this is supposed to go.

So adding more isn't always the answer. Sometimes it's best to just look at what's already there, ask whether or not it's actually doing what we created it to do. And if it isn't, then we just need to tweak it.

So I want you to think about the communication that your clients receive from the moment they first contact you. I want you to take a moment and notice where you may be overcompensating for communication that's not creating enough clarity.

So think about these questions. Where are you sending extra reminders because clients are regularly missing something? Where are you explaining information repeatedly that you know you've already sent? And where have you added another check-in call because clients weren't sure what was happening?

Also, where are you personally stepping in because it feels easier than figuring out why your communication hasn't done its job?

Now, again, none of these things feel like a huge problem when they're isolated. It's just a quick reply here, a reminder there, five minutes checking whether or not someone completed a form. But those little interruptions start filling the space between the work you actually plan to do.

And that's how client communication can quickly lead to a capacity problem. And that's why it can feel like you're constantly being pulled back into things you thought you had already handled.

Those are the places I want you to pay attention to. And then ask yourself: am I communicating because my clients need more information or because the information I'm giving them isn't doing enough? Those are two different problems.

Being responsive can hide how much your communication process depends on you. And this can be hard to notice when you're good at taking care of your clients because every time something isn't clear, you just fix it.

So the client gets what they need. So from their perspective, everything worked. But behind the scenes, it only worked because you did it.

So if your clients truly need more information, then give them what they need. But if you keep adding more communication into the process because what you sent isn't getting the clarity or communicating clearly to your client, then sending more information may not be the answer.

Now, if today's conversation has you wondering where else you've become the thing that's making the process work, join me for Make Your Online Business Need Less of You in 5 Days. It's a free five-day email experience where each day I'm going to help you look at one area of your business and you're going to be able to make one small practical change.

I did it this way because you don't need to stop everything and do a complete overhaul of your business. You just need to start noticing the places where you're stepping in to keep something working and then look at what could change so you don't have to keep doing that.

You can look for the link in the show notes so that you can join me. Because better client communication doesn't mean your clients never need you. It means the communication in your business is doing its job so you can spend more time doing the work that actually needs you.

Thanks for spending part of your day with me. If something in today's conversation made you think differently about how your business is operating, don't stop there. Decide what needs your immediate attention and take one small step to change it today.

You'll find resources in the show notes to help you keep going, and when you're ready for more support, we can work together. And remember, your time is accessible, but it doesn't have to be open access. Until next time, keep calm and streamline.