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Writer's pictureHannah Isted

How to experiment in your business

Trying something new in your business can be exciting.


But it can also be daunting, scary and we put it off until everyone forgets we ever mentioned it in the first place.

Unless we want to do exactly the same thing forever, we are going to have to experiment at some stage of our business.


It makes me think of that classic quote by Henry Ford.

‘If you always do what you’ve always done you’ll always get what you always got’

But Henry, when you’re already battling with a long to do list and the thought of adding something new makes you want to shut the laptop and get back into bed, what are you meant to do?


Wouldn't it be cool if?

A few years ago I read something by Marie Forleo that said instead of trying to figure out everything that you want, just ask yourself ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if?’

It takes the pressure off setting big serious goals and lets your mind go to different places until you think - ‘actually yeah that would be pretty cool’.

I did this task with Tom a few years ago and on the list were things like…

  • Wouldn’t it be cool if we had a networking group in Barry

  • Would it be cool if Barry Magazine had thousands of readers

  • Would it be cool if we had more than one dog 👀 (okay this one was mine)


Just by brainstorming cool things, we thought about lots of ways we could experiment which didn’t necessarily mean setting huge goals.

There was no pressure to achieve them.

It would just be cool if some of these things happened.

And they did!

We started a networking group, Barry Business Club. We had thousands of people read Barry Magazine. We starting ticking off some of the cool things we hoped would happen.


(Don't worry, we did get the second dog in the end)


Take the pressure off

If you want to mix things up in your business, I’ve found the best way to experiment is to take the pressure off and just have fun.


When I tried reels for the first time I didn’t expect them to change my Instagram forever.


When I started Pinterest I didn’t expect it to bring thousands of people to my website (although it did, which is why we love Pinterest!)


Every time I tried something new I learnt more about that platform and about how I like to promote my business.

I did this just by setting aside a little bit of time to try, test and see what the results were.

Because nothing was relying on it going well and I had no expectations, it didn’t matter what the outcome was.


If you watch other businesses trying new things and you think ‘I wish I could do that’ just have a go. What is the worst that can happen?

If you spend 10 minutes on it and decide it’s not for you, you’ve only lost 10 minutes and moved something into the ‘it’s not for me’ box.


The Best 90 Days Ever

In the best 90 days ever we try a new marketing theme every week.


Some of them you will have done before, like social media and writing content, but some will be new like Pinterest or email marketing. You'll have my support every single day to try something new without with the worry of it going wrong.


There’s a task for you no matter what stage your business is at and you’ll get one small thing to try each day.


You might find there are weeks where you experiment with something you’ve never thought of or tried.

The worst thing that will happen is that you spend 10 minutes on something that isn’t for you, and the best thing that will happen is that you realise you love it, or it sparks an idea for something completely new to try.


Experimenting can lead to some amazing things for your business and that sounds pretty cool to me!

If you’d like to join us for the next round of The Best 90 Days Ever, we start on 1st April. Sign up to find out more here!




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