Systems & Workflow Educator For Creatives – Dolly DeLong is the Host of The Systems & Workflow Magic Podcast where she teaches business owners about the power of systems, workflows, and SOPs to strategically use them to impact the backend of their businesses so that they feel like a streamlined wizard even if they are mere Muggles!

She believes that ANYONE can take baby steps in implementing systems, launches, SOPs, and workflows to impact the backend of their business (with or WITHOUT a giant team). Stop overcomplicating systems, workflows, launches, and SOPs, and just take the first dang step of stepping into a more intentional (and streamlined) version of your business self!

In this episode of the Homemakers in Business Podcast, host Stephanie Duke and guest, Dolly DeLong break down the practicalities of launching a business rebrand. From pre-launch strategies to post-launch momentum, they provide actionable insights on engaging your audience, driving traffic to your website, and utilizing collaborations and incentives effectively. Skip the fluff and dive into the essentials of a successful rebrand, learning strategies that work in the real world of business.

Stephanie

Dolly, would you like to tell us who you are, what you do, and who you help?

Dolly

Thanks so much for having me. I’m so excited, Stephanie, to be on your podcast. By the way, congratulations on your podcast. I’m a podcast listener of yours, and I’m just really excited to be here. So thank you. 

I am a Nashville-based family photographer and, I am also a service provider for other small business owners who want to learn more about systems and workflows. I’m a systems and workflow educator. And I love doing that because I love teaching other small business owners like us, like solo business owners, how to use and utilize systems and workflows to operate the back end of their business so that things run smoother and we have more time back and we have more clarity of how to run our business.

Let’s be honest, I know you feel this way, I certainly feel this way – as a small business owner, I wear 25,000 hats. I am my marketing team. I am my PR team. I am all the hats. And so I want business owners to see how they can incorporate systems and workflows to make it work for them on a smaller scale.

I’m also married to my husband, Ty, and I am a boy mom. And so it’s a wild ride here in Nashville, but it’s so much fun.

Stephanie

Absolutely, and you are so good at what you do too. Your podcast is so full of great tips and you give so much away for free that is so helpful.

From higher-education employee to full-time self-employed photographer and systems educator

Stephanie

What led you to pursue a home-based business? What did you do before?

Dolly

Yeah. Before in my past life, I had my master’s in professional counseling, and I worked in higher education for about 8 years. I did not want to leave my job not because I loved it so much, but because it was comfortable.

I had the nine-to-five, I had the benefits, I had insurance, I had a lot of great benefits going for me. But I was also doing my photography business on the side that I started in 2007 as a hobby. We all start our businesses as a hobby. And that hobby grew to surpass my salary.

It took 10 years. It wasn’t overnight. It was very slow. It was a slow trickle, but it started matching my nine-to-five. And then in 2018, I got pregnant with my first, Blaise. That is when I was kind of forced into deciding between do I stay at work full-time or stay at home with Blaise. 

I had told my boss at the time at the university, hey, I’m pregnant, is there any way for me to go part-time? And he said, yeah, like we can work something out for you to be part-time. I wanted the safety of my job, I wanted that paycheck. And…within an hour or two, he had sent out a department-wide email and said, “Dolly is leaving us in the fall and she’s not coming back.” 

It was shocking and was kind of the forcing catalyst that helped me start my business full-time. So I grew two babies in 2018. I grew my business full-time, and then I birthed my baby.

That is the story of why I am a home-based business now.

Stephanie

I didn’t know that you worked in higher education. That’s so cool. That makes sense of why you’re so into education and stuff now, like why you’re so good at what you do on the systems and workflow side of things.

Dolly

Thank you so much. Yeah, it was fun. I just really enjoyed it. Like I said, I was very comfortable. I love structure. I love just knowing that there is a consistent paycheck. I was terrified of going into my business full-time.

Stephanie

So after you went full-time into your photography business, how long was it before you started doing the education side of things? What led to that?

Dolly

What led to that was another really sad thing in this world called 2020. I had no intention of pivoting into education. I just wanted to be a photographer forever and ever and ever. But in 2020, like where I live, Nashville, a lot of places were closed. There was a rule that if you were found photographing sessions, you would be fine. 

And I, of course, the avid rule follower I am, I was like, I don’t want to break any rules. I don’t want people to be mad at me. And so I asked myself what can I start doing that would earn income, make a different stream of income in my business? What am I really good at? 

And I knew, one of my strengths is being organized on the back end of my business. I had always been organized. I’d always leaned into like some sort of, I didn’t know it was called system at the time, but I had leaned into that for around 10 years while I was building up my photography business while working a nine-to-five. 

I was able to balance everything out well. So I decided to lean into that education. Again, I didn’t know what to call it. I just knew that I wanted to teach others about it. And I wanted to see if I could develop a stream of income from that. And so in 2020, that’s where the systems and workflow magic side of my business came into bloom.

Stephanie

How has that affected your photography business now that things are more open?

Dolly

I think what impacted me was that I wasn’t a fast, overnight success. Like I feel like everybody’s like, oh, in two months, my business grew to like a million dollars. Well, that’s definitely not the case for me. I would say it took me a solid two years to slowly take steps and just throw spaghetti at the wall and see what was working for me. 

In the meantime, things were opening up again. I was doing photography, but at that time, keep in mind, I also had Blaise and I was learning how to balance motherhood and being a wife and also owning a business. Blaise was at home with me full-time because a lot of places were still closed. 

The waitlist for a lot of daycares and childcare places in Nashville is sometimes over a year or two. We just made the decision I’m going to stay at home and take care of Blaise. Childcare is like $3,000 a month here. It’s crazy. So we are saving money by keeping them at home before kindergarten.

I was balancing all of that and I realized, I was wasting, it’s not wasting, but I’m spending so much physical time out doing photo sessions for just an hour. An hour session would take like three or four hours because of driving, because of editing, and everything, versus the income I was making from educating. 

I created digital products. I had different layers of VIP Days. That was just more efficient. I was asking myself where do I want my time to go? I still wanna invest a lot of time in my new family and my son. And I still wanna balance my business. I didn’t wanna give it up, but I didn’t want to be wasteful of my time either.

That’s when I decided I really wanted to lean more into systems and workflow education. I still want to do photography, but I want to be picky about what I do. That has helped me decide I’m only available to work on certain days of the week physically, like to go out and shoot. Then I have set aside a certain amount of time every week for the education side of my job. 

So far, it’s been a good balance. And I have two kids now and it’s still a good balance. And I mean I love working. I know you love working and I wish there were more time in the day, but I feel like I’ve kind of hit my stride. I’ve found some balance, but you know life.

This week, the wrench was thrown in my plans. Blaise is at home all week because school was canceled due to snow days. You have to be flexible. Still, I’m just so grateful. I get to work from home and figure out how to run a business and be a mom.

Stephanie

Oh yeah, it’s so great because, like you said about the school being out because of snow and stuff, you get to change your schedule. It may not be the ideal week for you as far as work goes, but you still get to work and take care of your family and you don’t have to ask a boss to be off and it’s just so nice.

Dolly

Yeah, it’s very nice. I always think now that I’ve been in full-time business since 2018, I never want to work for somebody else ever again. I mean I love owning my own business. Yes, it’s a roller coaster, but I love it.

Stephanie

That’s one of those things where you have to choose your hard, right? Working with someone else is hard, and owning a business is hard, but they’re two very different types of hard.

Dolly

Exactly, exactly. So it’s been a great, it’s been a great learning experience for me.

Grow your email list with bundles

Stephanie

Speaking of learning, how did you get into bundles? That has been a big part of your business for the last what, two or three years now?

Dolly

Yeah, three years, which is crazy. 

A bundle is a way to collaborate with other business owners who are very similar to your business, and who serve a very similar audience. 

You can either create free resources, like a free bundle to boost your email list, or you can have paid resources for a one-time cost to get access to so many different paid products for a short amount of time. And it’s still a great email list growth option strategy. 

I realized I had learned about this from somebody named Kate Doster, who I learned a lot about email marketing and list growth strategies from. She had created this strategy called Collaboration Cash-In. I was really curious about it. This was in 2019. 

I learned about it from her and I just liked the way she educated. I also liked how she broke down how you can network and collaborate with other business owners because owning an online business is lonely.

You don’t work a traditional nine-to-five with other people. You’re working from home alone and can get really lonely. I missed the social aspect of working with other people. So I decided I’m going to give it a try. 

I knew from day one that email list growth is important because I don’t want to depend on social media. I also knew that I wanted to take strides in growing more of my brand awareness of systems and workflow education. 

After learning from Kate, I decided to put together my first bundle and it was all centered around the theme of systems and workflows of how to operate the back end of your business. It was because people don’t really know they need systems and workflows.

As small business owners, we tend to overcomplicate things. We think we need to become AI robots. You need a PhD and I don’t know, like computer science to understand. But it’s really very simple. It’s just different puzzle pieces of what would help your business.

For my first bundle, I cold-pitched to so many people and people said yes. I was terrified that people were going to say no to me because nobody knew who I was. I was so small in the internet pond. I’m like a very small fish, but I did it. 

Sometimes you just have to go for it as a small business owner. You just have to pitch yourself. You have to get outside of your comfort zone. And yes, there were nos, but there are also a lot of yeses.

And that was my first bundle. It was a free bundle.  I dipped my toe in the water and I saw that this is good. Let’s just say that in one week, it grew my email list by 4,000 subscribers, from that strategy alone. I was like, wow, this is amazing!

Dolly

I think it was just like the people who were involved and the theme. People need systems and workflows. The theme was good. That started my email list growing journey that started my journey in wanting to refine how to lead bundles, how to create bundles that people want to consume, and how to collaborate with other business owners. I really like that.

I love getting to know other business owners. I learned it from Kate Doster and I have just been doing systems and workflow-related bundles ever since 2021.

Stephanie

Amazing. Tell us about your upcoming bundle because this one that I’m very excited about. I bought your bundle last year, what was the theme of that one?

Dolly

The theme was the systems and workflows of funnels. So digital funnels.

Stephanie

Funnels, yeah. That one was really helpful in actually launching my podcast, which is ironic because your theme for this year is launching.

Dolly

Yeah, this year’s theme is all about the systems and workflows of launching. It’s called the Systems and Workflow Magic Bundle: The Launch Edition. I know I’m not too original in my naming, but I just like calling it edition.

Stephanie

We like simplicity!

Dolly

Yeah, it’s very straightforward, but I want to showcase to businesses, especially small business owners who don’t have teams who are running the show on their own, the power of having a well-planned and mapped-out launch. 

If you think about it, launching is just promotional marketing for your business. You need to promote your business year-round very strategically. We don’t have marketing teams to help us out with that. We don’t have a huge team to help us out with that. So I wanted to bring together contributors who have resources that are centered around launching and act as different puzzle pieces for buyers to see, okay, I can use this to help me out with my business in launching XYZ this year.

Tips for launching a business rebrand

Stephanie

No, that’s so great though, because I think a lot of business owners when they think of launching, they think of only launching a new product or a new service. 

They’re not thinking about it in a continual way of launching existing products or services or in the case of what we’re going to be talking about, a rebrand, because that’s something that I find my clients as a brand and website designer get tripped up. 

They get their new brand identity. They’ve got new logos, colors, fonts, all this good stuff, and a new website, and then they’re like, now what? How do I tell my audience about this? Do I tell my audience about this, or do I just start posting and ignore the whole thing? 

What would your suggestions be for launching a rebrand? What kind of tips do you have around that?

Dolly

Yeah, I have a lot to say about this. First of all just because you, if you have a new brand, which is amazing, and it’s like, it’s a new elevated form of your business, it’s like a new era, let’s call it a new era, because I’m about to make a Taylor Swift reference, like you are not Taylor Swift, you are not Beyonce, so they can like literally tomorrow release something new and people will go nuts and insane and crazy because that’s like, that’s just who they are. 

That’s just the level they are. But unfortunately, we as small business owners, we’re not at that level. It is not because we’re not awesome and great. It’s because like, you can’t just expect to post once and then people to like recognize your new brand. You need to be intentional about the lead-up to the announcement.

And even during the announcement phase, you need to be intentional. And I was at a conference this past week called the Creative Educator Conference. And it was amazing. I loved being in that room full of really smart, intelligent business owners. And one of the speakers, Ashlyn Carter, she is a copywriter for creatives. She was talking about this very topic of launching. And she told us, like she’s launched so many times it’s like a, it’s, it is a mental game. It is an emotional game. 

But one of the things she pointed out was if you feel like you are screaming from the rooftops about your launch, you feel like you’ve talked about it so much. You probably are just talking in a normal voice. Like people, the algorithm has only heard you maybe like once, and like people are not.

I don’t know, people, we as humans now, because of technology, we only notice things once it’s like been put in our faces like 700 times, then we start noticing it. It’s not like, oh, like this one ad popped out to me once, and now I’m thinking about it for the rest of the day. No, like it has to come up over and over and over again.

I want to encourage even with a new brand design, I wanna encourage listeners to be intentional about how you are gonna launch it because I want people to start pairing your new brand with your business and start recognizing it. 

One way you can do that is by, when you’re in the middle of rebranding with your designer, I’m probably butchering all the terms, please forgive me, Stephanie, with your brand designer, with your graphic designer, maybe like, Jerry, think of that phase as your pre-launch phase. And so you can use that time as a, so if you know that your new brand is gonna be ready in, let’s say in two months, so you have eight weeks, and to build up anticipation, and anticipation and excitement for what’s coming in the next eight weeks. 

Now you don’t have to say the same thing over and over for eight weeks because that can be redundant and boring and people will start, people will notice that if you just say the same thing over and over. But think of this phase as kind of like a launch runway. 

You know how a plane has a runway to take off? It just doesn’t burst up in the air. When you’re on a plane, it just doesn’t go straight from zero to like, oh, you’re in the air. It takes time. It comes out of the gate, and then it finds a runway, and it goes from, starts at, what, you feel like you’re not even moving to, you are moving, you’re going at a fast momentum, and then you just take off. 

Think of that as the launch runway. There is momentum built up, there is anticipation built up, and you do that with, you can do that so many different ways. There’s not just one roadmap. There are so many ways you can do this through your social media, and build up anticipation through content marketing, blogging, and through your email marketing. 

It’s entirely up to you and your business model, but the whole point I’m trying to make is you can develop a plan of action for how you’re gonna start teasing out your new brand. And that way, when the doors open to your new brand, like think of that as like the cart open week, like, hey, I’m making a huge announcement. Here it is. 

Because if you don’t build up that anticipation, you’re gonna feel very like let down, disappointed, and wondering why aren’t others excited about this rebrand the way I am. 

It’s like you’re announcing kind of like a new baby or I don’t want to say a new baby. I don’t want to compare it to a human, but you know, it’s very exciting. And I know other people want to celebrate with you, but you have to give them a reason to celebrate. 

You have to build up that anticipation. And if eight weeks is too much, well, then give yourself a six-week launch runway to prime your audience and you can do that in very strategic ways along the way.

Stephanie

Yeah, absolutely. I agree with that. You comparing the actual branding phase to the launch runway, because that’s how I kind of think of it too. I’m always sharing, when I’m working on a brand design for a client, I’m sharing behind-the-scenes footage of it. I’m tagging them in it cause I want them to share that to their Instagram stories, take screenshots of it, and share it with their email list or whatever, because sharing that behind-the-scenes look does help build that anticipation and it gets people prepared for what’s coming so they’re not shocked when they see that first post that’s like, oh, this is new. Is this the same person?

Dolly

Exactly, exactly. And I’m so glad you brought that up because if you just like share it overnight and then expect everybody to recognize that it’s attached to you, there will be confusion. There’s a phrase called when you confuse, you lose. 

You don’t want to confuse your followers. You don’t wanna confuse your email list cause they might be like, wait does she not do this anymore? Does she do something else? You may do the same thing and you might’ve rebranded into a different era. Like you might’ve elevated it.

So you need to give your, hopefully, your email list base, your audience base, plenty of time to get used to it slowly before you, I don’t know why this term, before you release the hounds, I don’t know why released the hounds came out.

I’m imagining opening a door and all these dogs running out. That’s a horrible analogy!

Stephanie

No, I love it! It’s a great visual.

Dolly

I feel like you understand. Yeah, exactly.

Stephanie

Love it. So what we’re talking about, you know, launching a big rebrand can generate a lot of excitement, not only for your audience, if you do it in the right way, but for yourself too. But I also know it’s easy to lose that momentum once the newness has worn off, you’ve launched it, you’re like, yay, we’ve gotten to this big moment and we’ve released all the new fonts and graphics and logos, and all this good stuff. Now what? 

People tend to lose that excitement and momentum. So how can business owners combat that loss of motivation post-launch and keep their engagement up?

Dolly

I like to look at launching, it doesn’t matter like what you’re launching, like a digital product, a service, a membership, or maybe a rebrand. So with launching, there’s that pre-launch phase. Like this is like when you are dreaming, you’re scheming, you’re kind of planning out, like this is what I want to do in like six months. 

Then the pre-launch phase is, okay, you are building up to like, you’re priming your audience. You’re the airplane, you are slowly getting out of the gate. You are building up momentum. It’ll take like six or eight weeks to get to that momentum. 

Then the third phase is the actual launch. So the cart is open, and you are showcasing your new brand. 

And then the fourth phase is what people, a lot of business owners, and I’m guilty of this because like you wanna move on to the next thing. This is the post-launch phase. How do you continue that momentum? 

Now you don’t have to show up every day the way you were doing. So during the cart open phase or the pre-launch phase, but hopefully you are building, you’re taking that momentum and you’re putting it into some sort of workflow for yourself, so okay, you have a cadence, let’s say, or you’re building up those muscles. 

You can’t, this is another phrase I love, but I’ve loved hearing from the conference, that you can’t outsource your reps like you can’t outsource building your muscles. Like if you want to build muscles, if you want to become stronger, you can’t outsource that. You have to do the work. And so even like after, let’s use a running analogy. You train for a marathon and you’re planning on it. So that’s the pre-pre marathon, pre-pre launch phase. 

During the pre-launch phase, you’re training for the marathon you’re eating well, you’re sleeping well, you’re doing all the things that would help you out for the actual marathon. The launch phase is like that card open week, the marathon, the day of the marathon, the half marathon, or the 5K. For those of us who are like, I hate running long distances, let’s say 5K, you run that 5K, but after that, hopefully, you don’t go back to that lifestyle of eating unwell not exercising, not sleeping well. 

Hopefully, you will continue that momentum. I’m not saying you’re gonna become a marathoner for life. I’m just saying you will, I’m hoping this analogy is making sense to listeners. After your big day, now you have that momentum of keeping up the workflow of posting, let’s say every Tuesday, you post something new about your brand or you post something that will continue to help people ingrain in their minds. 

Like this is Steph, I’m gonna use your name. This is Stephanie’s new brand design concept. And you’re reminding them of your services. You’re reminding them what you do. You’re reminding them how you’re serving them, how you can help them. Because you’ve built up all that momentum. You had that cadence, you had that workflow set up for yourself. 

Why not make it simple for yourself on the backend? And keep up that cadence. And you can do that with workflows, you can automate things, you can batch things out, you can make it easy for yourself.

Stephanie

Oh yeah. Yeah. Getting into a flow with creating content and doing these, not necessarily launch phases, but like going through periods of rest in your content where you’re still posting and you’re still in this, in this production phase, for lack of a better term, but then you’re not going as hard at it as you are during an actual launch period, because launch periods are exhausting.

Dolly

Exactly. They are very exhausting. So I’m so glad you read that because I don’t want a listener to be like, so you are saying to me, Dolly, that I have to be on 24 seven all the time and all the phases. No, I’m not saying that. 

I’m just saying, that I really want to encourage the listeners and I’m even telling this myself to find some sort of cadence, like a slower cadence when you’re not in the promotional phases of your business that still works for you because you still have to market your business. You still have to remind people every week what you do, who you serve, how you can help people, just like more about you. 

You still need to show up in your business. And you still, and also if you’re a service-based business center, you need to think about how is your marketing going to get those clients who are gonna book with you mostly like three or four or five months down the line? 

You can’t just be focused on booking out this month, you need to also be forward thinking and how can your marketing impact the future too.

Stephanie

Yep. And that’s why you’ve got to be consistent because you don’t want to be having to worry about the current month. You want to be worrying about, you know, next quarter already while you’re working through getting your client work or selling your products or whatever during this quarter. So I love that.

Dolly

Exactly, and that’s where that cadence comes in. And there will, like we were sharing, during your promotional periods, that cadence will be a little bit more aggressive and more reps, but then during your slower periods if you’re not really promoting anything, you’re just staying consistent with client work, you still need to have some sort of slower cadence to still promote yourself so that other people can book you for the future.

Strategies for increasing engagement on social media during a rebrand launch

Stephanie

Yep, absolutely. So going back a little bit to the actual launch phase, do you have any strategies for increasing engagement on social media or getting people to sign up for your email list during that, either the pre-launch phase or the actual launch phase? 

Do you recommend people do giveaways or some kind of collaboration specifically talking of launching a rebrand? Like what are some specific tactics someone could implement?

Dolly

Yeah, my favorite thing to remind everyone is, especially if you’re rebranding, you’re hopefully attaching that to your website, which is a thing you own, because you don’t own social media, you don’t own all these other platforms. You want people to drive traffic to your business, because to your online business, to your website, your home base, because that boosts.

SEO, search engine optimization that boosts, like that shows Google, like, hey, like, I’m gonna use your name as an example. Hey, a lot of people are going to Stephanie’s website. This is really good. The Google gods love that. 

I would say, this is just off the top of my head. Like I would say if this was specifically like a brand rebrand, I just said brand rebrand, a rebrand of you and you want to have more eyes. It’s not necessarily a product launch or a service launch or it’s just like something new about your business. I would say I would lean into the power of my network, my fellow business owners who serve very similar audiences to me, but like more, it’s not the same, but like we serve similar people, there’s overlap.

And I would reach out to them weeks before and I would ask like, hey, I am going through a rebrand currently and I would love to get more eyes to my website. Can we do like, can we do like either an email list swap to get people to drive traffic to my website during launch week or can we go live on Instagram? And like we talk about…the new brand, like how can it serve me? How can it serve you? 

Make sure you’re also serving your fellow business owners really well, and make sure there’s a benefit for them. So I would lean into the power of collaborations leading up and see how their audience can look at my new brand. Cause that again drives traffic to my website and I would also have incentives to like, I would probably also lean into incentives as well. 

Like what, I would probably do a giveaway. Like, just like, since it’s like a fun new era I’m stepping into, like maybe I could do a giveaway of, do like a little treasure hunt on my new website. Like I’ve hidden these like gems all over. If you find all of these, like, it’s like a, like, DM me and let me know how many of, I don’t know, like little Easter eggs you find that are in alignment with your brand so that they are like slowly associating.

I love Harry Potter. This is true. I love Harry Potter so much. So I put a lot of Harry Potter references all over my website and they’re like little hidden Easter eggs. And so now people associate me with Harry Potter. And so whenever I get people to like, they fill out my contact form and they’re like, I love Harry Potter too. And then like, that’s that connection. 

So you want to see if you can have like little connection points like kid and Easter eggs and because you’re driving traffic to your website and then maybe have a giveaway that is in alignment with how it could serve your audience well that they would get excited about signing up for that would drive more traffic to your website. Because again, you wanna boost up your SEO, you wanna get people, you wanna get Google to notice like people are going to your website. It’s all about driving people to your website in this period.

Stephanie

Yeah, I agree. And then from your website, you hopefully have something on there that leads them to your email list. That way you retain them and you don’t lose those visitors. Yeah.

Dolly

Exactly, exactly. And I am a strong, you know this, I’m like a strong believer in always growing out your email list from day one. It doesn’t matter if it’s just your grandma and your husband on your email list. Start repping those muscles because again, you can’t outsource your muscles, you can’t outsource your health. 

You need to take the time and baby steps to build out that email list. And it’s gonna be as honestly, it’s gonna be a small trickle for the longest. It’s gonna feel like you’re not making any momentum, but the fact is if you’re adding a new subscriber every day or every other day or once a week that’s huge. Like they’re choosing to be on your email list. 

Don’t compare yourself it’s unfair to be like, well, I have to be Jenna Kutcher or I have to be Amy Porterfield. Like you can’t do that to yourself. That’s unfair to you.

And they, they are at a whole different level and like they have a huge team working for them. They started at ground zero years ago and right now you’re starting maybe at ground zero or maybe in year one or two of your business. So don’t, don’t compare yourself to them. 

They’re awesome, but you don’t have to do that to yourself. Instead, just like put your head down, stay in your lane, and have a plan of action for how you’re going to get new the new people who are coming to your to what you own the land you own your website have a plan of action for how you’re going to incorporate email list growth once they’re there.

The Systems & Workflow Magic Bundle: The Launch Edition

Stephanie

That is so good. So are there any products in your current bundle that would be helpful to a business that’s planning for a rebrand launch at some point in this year or the next coming year? Something that they can start planning for?

Dolly

Yeah, definitely. So I will say that there are 32 different resources in this bundle. Again, different puzzle pieces of how to plan out the different phases of the launch. And it’s worth it, I added it up, and I’m gonna look at it right now, cause I wanna be very exact. It’s over $3,700 plus of everything. 

And off the top of my head, especially for like, if you’re launching a rebrand, the first one that pops to mind is the ultimate launch bundle because it has a marketing launch planner in it. So if you are wondering, oh my goodness, I need to actually like know like how to plan out six weeks ahead of time, like how do I do that?

There’s a marketing tool calendar. It lets you know what type of content to write. It lets you know when to send out emails. It gives you templates and graphics to use. So if you feel stuck with like the copy, if you feel stuck with the, like what to write an email, if you feel stuck with, well, I don’t know how to like map out six weeks of content. It’s all in that one resource. 

And that one resource alone is $297. And then, if you need help with content marketing, there is a resource called a Year in Preview where somebody sits down with you and like on an online masterclass and it’s Amanda Warfield and she sits down and she maps out like how to plan your content very strategically by the quarter and how it impacts the full year. And so if like content marketing is a stopping point for you that’s a great resource as well. 

So pretty much all of them are great, but as far as planning out and mapping out your new rebrand strategy, those are the two things that come to mind.

Stephanie

Those are so good. I do think that just about anything in that bundle because I’ve taken a peek through it. But I think anything in there, you could apply it to any type of launch that you’re doing, whether it’s a rebrand or you’re launching a new business to nobody. 

Like you have no followers or anything. You have no business. This will help launch a business. But it could also be helpful in just re-promoting your products throughout the year. Like if you are in a funk with one of your offers, then this would be a great boost for driving engagement towards that offer and getting people to buy it.

Dolly

That’s right. That’s right. And I love that you said that because like we as business centers feel like, Oh, I need to have something new to promote like no, you can see what is working for you. 

See what services are money drivers and you can think you can find new ways to market it and like get people amped up to either sell out a program, buy your digital course, or buy a service from you. You can promote yourself in new ways this year. And like just rethink, reframe your brain, and think of it as launching.

Get to know Dolly more

Stephanie

Well, Dolly, let’s start getting into these rapid-fire questions just to get to know you a little bit more. And then we can talk a little bit more about where to find the bundle when it’s going to be live when it closes and all that good stuff. But the first question I want to ask is what is the best automation that you’ve implemented in your business?

Dolly

Oh man, oh. Okay, this is hands down my favorite because I think, this is so sad. I’m like, I think about this a lot. I’m like, I love this automation. It’s through Dubsado. Dubsado is my client relationship management tool of choice. 

And I love that Dubsado, whenever you hit a submit form from them, they allow you to have like lead people back to a confirmation page. So I love that, I love the strategy of instead of a person filling out a form and they hit submit and then you see that blank screen that says thank you. And then that’s it. I love the strategy of a URL redirect page because once a person hits submit.

And then they’re redirected, hey, guess what, to your website because you’ve built out a thank you page on your website. And so it’s pushing them back to your website and it’s letting them, it’s confirming, hey, they’re in the right place. 

You can also insert a lead magnet. So like, hey, like while you’re here, while you’re waiting to hear back from me, here are some of my favorite free resources so you can build out your email list. And then on that thank you page you can also embed a video of yourself, and do a general thank you. So the person sees your face and it’s building that trust. 

And yes, that’s a lot of work on the front end because you have to build out the thank you page. You have to create the video. You might have to do, for me, for example, I would have to do my hair and makeup. I usually don’t do that. But it takes that intentionality of the different puzzle pieces. But that automation alone has helped me out in so many different ways. And I love it, I love it.

Stephanie

I love that too. As a website designer, I want everyone to be sending all of their people back to their websites because that’s going to improve your SEO.

Custom redirect pages like that are so good for extra engagement. As you said, getting people to sign up to your email list and that is a good one.

Dolly

I know you probably build those out for your VIP days. I’m very sure you do that.

Stephanie

Absolutely. I have done that for several clients doing custom landing pages for different parts of their workflows and stuff like that. So yeah, it’s awesome. It’s a great way to keep people on your website and it gets them to explore more pages on your website. 

For one, you can get them to sign up to your email list, but you can also get them to be like, hey, here are some affiliate links you can go check out and that can be another revenue-generating source for you. Or you can say, hey, here are some blog posts that will help with this thing that you’re waiting to hear back from, and that’ll give them more resources and it’ll keep them on your website longer, especially if it’s a blog post.

Stephanie

What is your favorite non-work-related thing to do?

Dolly

Oh, hands down, going to new and old national parks with my husband and my boys. And when I say old, I’m like, not like old, I mean, old to us, we’ve visited and then we like revisiting new parks together. So it’s always a highlight for me to just like, go on hikes and in national parks and visit and explore new places with my family.

Stephanie

So fun! What is a book or podcast or another resource that has helped you either in faith, motherhood, business, or whatever topic you wanna go with?

Dolly

Okay, so I am currently reading through the Bible with this Bible plan called the Bible Recap by Tara Lee Cobble. And I’ve read through it before, like using that plan. But what I love about it is she reads through the entire thing, as you read through the plant, she like lays it out for you, like very makes it easy for you to understand. So she explains the historical context, not just like our Western cultural context. 

She explains it from a historical context in a biblical context. And she breaks it down every single day after you read the actual Bible. Um, and then, and then there’s a corresponding app that goes with it. It’s called the Bible recap. So I, I read the Bible according to that plan, and then I’ll listen to the Bible recap and it’s been really good for me to just like get to know God more. 

His word and how like I can use his wisdom to guide my boys because I have been gifted with I’ve been interested with them so I need to take really good care of these gifts and how I do that is I um guide them with God’s love so because if it was up to me I’d be very impatient all the time.

Stephanie

I love that. That’s so good, Dolly. Last question before we let everyone know where they can find you. What does being a homemaker in business mean to you?

Dolly

Oh man, this is, whew. Well, since I just answered, like, I shared that I’m currently reading through the Bible, through the Bible recap, I have found that I want to, I wanna do all my roles well, and I wanna weave in, weave in the, I wanna weave God into everything I do. I don’t want to,

Of course, I want everything to be my way. We’re humans, we want everything to be our way. But recently I’ve been praying to God, like help me in everything I do, help me to honor you, and help me to weave your wisdom in on my podcast, in my business, with mothering, with parenting, with my spouse, like everything I do. 

And so that, like I want to weave in, I wanna be…shaped by God in how I create an environment for my family. And then also I want it to shape the way my business looks. Like I want them to be fused together to honor God.

Connect with Dolly DeLong and buy the Launch Bundle!

Stephanie

I love that. That’s beautiful. Yeah, it does. It does. Absolutely. All right. Well, Dolly, it’s been so much fun having you on today. Where can everyone find you, connect with you, find the bundle, buy the bundle? When can they do that? Just let us know all the stuff.

Dolly

Yeah, definitely. Thank you so much again for having me. You can find me on Instagram at Dolly DeLong Education, and you can also find me on my podcast, the Systems and Workflow Magic podcast. I have new episodes that come out every Monday. And I know that I’ve sent all the links out to you. So just in case you all need to go dig into Stephanie’s resources, because she has those notes there.

Then the bundle comes out officially, it launches officially on February 5th, which is Monday. It will run technically until June the 1st, but the lowest price will be February 5th through February 9th. And then after February 10th, it’ll go up, but still like there’s $3,700 of resources, so for $97. So it’s still gonna be a steal.

Dolly

So even if you find it after February 10th, you still have until June 1st to grab it. And so, because I really wanna make launching easy, attainable, and accessible for solo business owners. But Stephanie will have a link to that. If you want to go to the website, it’s systemsandworkflowmagic.com

Stephanie

Well, thank you so much again for being on the podcast, Dolly. It’s been great.

Dolly

Thank you so much, Stephanie.

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