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11 | Website Perfectionism
Are you guilty of website perfectionism?
I am.
If I had my way, I could easily spend 10 or 20 hours a week tweaking things on my website.
But I'm not really helping anyone when I spend that kind of time working on aesthetics.
Here's the problem: focusing all of your attention on your website prevents you from doing the harder work of finding clients.
Too often website perfectionism gets in the way of actually starting your practice.
Do any of these sound familiar?
"I can't really promote myself until my website is done."
"I'll wait to *really* start once I like how my website looks."
"I couldn't possibly [give a talk/write an article/ask for referrals] until my website is more professional."
These are all forms of procrastination.
Don't get stuck!
Is it important to have a website? Sure. (Although I do know several practitioners who only work via word of mouth/email and it works for them!)
Do you want it to look professional? Of course.
But it's not the end of the world if it's not perfect.
In fact, I can almost guarantee that it will never be perfect. I've had a website for close to 20 years, and it is never EVER done.
In this In the Clinic episode, I share why I recommend limiting the amount of work you're doing on your website every week (hint: aim for good enough rather than perfection).
I'll tell you what I think is the bare minimum, and how to give yourself parameters so that you're not using your website to avoid other types of marketing and promotion.
Let me know what you think & if you have any tricks that you use to avoid this.
Feeling stuck? Need extra eyes on your website?Join us in Monday Mentoring or sign up for Voxer Coaching
--- Send in a voice message: https://www.intheclinic.com
Thanks for listening.
I'd love to hear from you. Leave me a voicemail with feedback or submit a question (click the pink "Send Camille a Message" button on the side of the page) 💚
Camille's Helpful Links for Practitioners
Transcript
Camille (00:03)
Hi, everybody, welcome to In the Clinic with Camille. My name is Camille Freeman. I am a registered herbalist and licensed nutritionist.
(00:10)
And today I want to talk to you about whether you're working on your website too much. Sohere's the deal. A lot of people, especially when they're starting out.
(00:20)
Feel like the very first thing that you should be doing is getting yourself a logo and business cards and a website, and it's all very fun and exciting and it's very easy for people to kind of go down the rabbit hole of picking out fonts and colours and images and getting the website looking professional and perfect.
(00:44)
And I get this, you want your website to be a reflection of who you are and how you practice, you want it to be professional, you want people to look at it and think that you know what you're doing and they'd like to work with you and so forth.
(00:57)
And it could be really easy to spend lots of time and or lots of money getting your website exactly how you want it, and that is fine.
(01:07)
However, I'm going to argue here that a lot of people are working on their Website instead of doing the harder work of being more visible in other ways.
(01:19)
Because here's the deal. People are, generally speaking, not going to just Google you, happen to come across your website and sign up for an appointment right then, especially when you're a new practitioner. The main way that people are going to find your Web site is because they have come across you or your work in some other way, such as you're on social media. They've seen you posting there and there's a link in your bio or you've gone on someone else's podcast or you've done a talk or presentation and you've encouraged people to come here and sign up for it.
(01:52)
You've done guest posting, etc. You've gone out there and you've emailed clients, you've emailed your friends and family and said, hey, I'm taking clients. Could you refer people? Here's my website. That's the way that people come to your website. And that's hard and it's uncomfortable and you don't like doing it.
(02:11)
And it's more fun for a lot of us to just fiddle around with a new font or to see if we want, like light pink or dusty pink, whatever, try to get the box to go away or get it to come back, all those different things.
(02:26)
Yeah, OK, so we have to find a balance between having a website that looks good and professional and spending so much time on it at the expense of doing the other harder work of promoting and marketing her practices.
(02:42)
Here's what you actually need on your website: you need your name, a description of what you do and who you help, you need a way to get in touch with you if somebody has questions and/or a way to schedule an appointment directly and you need a way to connect with people. Maybe it's your email list sign up or social media or both. Ideally, those are the bare minimum. That's a very bare minimum of what you need on your Web site.
(03:10)
If you want to get fancy, you can have a blog, you can put a podcast up there. You can have lots of different pages and resources and so forth. But mostly what you need is just the basic description of where you are and what you do and how to sign up. And if you have those things on it, it's going to work. I know a number of practitioners who have websites that are, quite frankly, pretty crappy and they've got booming practices, some of these folks are so busy they just don't have time to fiddle with their website.
(03:40)
It's working. It's fine. And other people are just getting started. And they've made a conscious decision to leave their website as-is for now, and to work on it as more money comes in and more time opens up or whatever it is. So. The thing is, you don't have to have a perfect website. It is OK to have your website be a work in progress.
(04:02)
It is OK to say, you know what, I'm going for the minimum for right now and I'm going to tweak it as I go. What I don't want you to be doing is spending all of the time that you have to promote and market your practice working on your website or all of the money that you have to promote and market your website or to promote and market your practice on your website. So that's not going to serve you in the long run.
(04:27)
So here's what I recommend that you do: come up with a basic estimate for how many hours a week you have to devote to your practice overall. This includes seeing clients, dealing with money stuff, anything related to your practice. Let's say you have 20 hours that you want to be devoting to your practice in some form or another.
(04:49)
And then I want you to give yourself a limit, say, of those 20 hours, two of them or five of them are going to be devoted to administrative details, such as working on my website or coming up with a new form or talking to somebody about a logo or whatever it is, and then track your time.
(05:08)
And once those hours are done for the week, then you need to go on and do other things, promote yourself more actively or, you know, see a client do something else related to your business.
(05:22)
And then the next week you can keep twiddling with your website for another couple hours. I also encourage you, if you get stuck on your Web site, you can hire someone to help you relatively inexpensively. So you can go on Fiverr if you're just needing somebody to pick out a font and some colors. There's tons of people who would love to do that for you for a very inexpensive price. If you just need somebody to figure out how to get this button gone forever, get somebody to do that for you, you don't have to spend a ton of money.
(05:50)
My recommendation is that once you have got a practice and you've got people coming in and you're feeling like you've got a little bit of financial buffer, if you want to, then you can pay somebody to make a much nicer website, a fancier website than you can probably do yourself.
(06:07)
But when you're just beginning, it really doesn't have to be perfect. Don't let yourself hide behind the need to have a perfect website, because that's not what's going to bring clients in. You want a website that's good enough and then as you go on, it can get better and better and better.
(06:23)
When I say all this, partly I'm saying it to myself, because I am definitely a person who likes to have a very professional website. I like to I do it myself and I like to change things around. And it stresses me out when there's something that's not working or I've messed up the format or something like that happens all the time. But I give myself a limit. And if it's not perfect, then I'm like, well, I have to work on it next week.
(06:49)
It'll just have to be not perfect for a week. And it's made a noticeable difference in how many new clients I'm bringing in and how much I'm able to serve my current clients because I'm not spending all that time dealing with it. And it makes me go out there and do the things that are less comfortable to do, the more active visibility work, that is what gets clients in the door.
(07:13)
So I hope this is helpful to you. Remember to aim for good enough for now and just keep working on it over time. If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear about them. Please send me a message via my website, Camille Freeman Dotcom, and let me know what you think. All right.
(07:29)
Take care.
Hi, everybody, welcome to In the Clinic with Camille. My name is Camille Freeman. I am a registered herbalist and licensed nutritionist.
(00:10)
And today I want to talk to you about whether you're working on your website too much. Sohere's the deal. A lot of people, especially when they're starting out.
(00:20)
Feel like the very first thing that you should be doing is getting yourself a logo and business cards and a website, and it's all very fun and exciting and it's very easy for people to kind of go down the rabbit hole of picking out fonts and colours and images and getting the website looking professional and perfect.
(00:44)
And I get this, you want your website to be a reflection of who you are and how you practice, you want it to be professional, you want people to look at it and think that you know what you're doing and they'd like to work with you and so forth.
(00:57)
And it could be really easy to spend lots of time and or lots of money getting your website exactly how you want it, and that is fine.
(01:07)
However, I'm going to argue here that a lot of people are working on their Website instead of doing the harder work of being more visible in other ways.
(01:19)
Because here's the deal. People are, generally speaking, not going to just Google you, happen to come across your website and sign up for an appointment right then, especially when you're a new practitioner. The main way that people are going to find your Web site is because they have come across you or your work in some other way, such as you're on social media. They've seen you posting there and there's a link in your bio or you've gone on someone else's podcast or you've done a talk or presentation and you've encouraged people to come here and sign up for it.
(01:52)
You've done guest posting, etc. You've gone out there and you've emailed clients, you've emailed your friends and family and said, hey, I'm taking clients. Could you refer people? Here's my website. That's the way that people come to your website. And that's hard and it's uncomfortable and you don't like doing it.
(02:11)
And it's more fun for a lot of us to just fiddle around with a new font or to see if we want, like light pink or dusty pink, whatever, try to get the box to go away or get it to come back, all those different things.
(02:26)
Yeah, OK, so we have to find a balance between having a website that looks good and professional and spending so much time on it at the expense of doing the other harder work of promoting and marketing her practices.
(02:42)
Here's what you actually need on your website: you need your name, a description of what you do and who you help, you need a way to get in touch with you if somebody has questions and/or a way to schedule an appointment directly and you need a way to connect with people. Maybe it's your email list sign up or social media or both. Ideally, those are the bare minimum. That's a very bare minimum of what you need on your Web site.
(03:10)
If you want to get fancy, you can have a blog, you can put a podcast up there. You can have lots of different pages and resources and so forth. But mostly what you need is just the basic description of where you are and what you do and how to sign up. And if you have those things on it, it's going to work. I know a number of practitioners who have websites that are, quite frankly, pretty crappy and they've got booming practices, some of these folks are so busy they just don't have time to fiddle with their website.
(03:40)
It's working. It's fine. And other people are just getting started. And they've made a conscious decision to leave their website as-is for now, and to work on it as more money comes in and more time opens up or whatever it is. So. The thing is, you don't have to have a perfect website. It is OK to have your website be a work in progress.
(04:02)
It is OK to say, you know what, I'm going for the minimum for right now and I'm going to tweak it as I go. What I don't want you to be doing is spending all of the time that you have to promote and market your practice working on your website or all of the money that you have to promote and market your website or to promote and market your practice on your website. So that's not going to serve you in the long run.
(04:27)
So here's what I recommend that you do: come up with a basic estimate for how many hours a week you have to devote to your practice overall. This includes seeing clients, dealing with money stuff, anything related to your practice. Let's say you have 20 hours that you want to be devoting to your practice in some form or another.
(04:49)
And then I want you to give yourself a limit, say, of those 20 hours, two of them or five of them are going to be devoted to administrative details, such as working on my website or coming up with a new form or talking to somebody about a logo or whatever it is, and then track your time.
(05:08)
And once those hours are done for the week, then you need to go on and do other things, promote yourself more actively or, you know, see a client do something else related to your business.
(05:22)
And then the next week you can keep twiddling with your website for another couple hours. I also encourage you, if you get stuck on your Web site, you can hire someone to help you relatively inexpensively. So you can go on Fiverr if you're just needing somebody to pick out a font and some colors. There's tons of people who would love to do that for you for a very inexpensive price. If you just need somebody to figure out how to get this button gone forever, get somebody to do that for you, you don't have to spend a ton of money.
(05:50)
My recommendation is that once you have got a practice and you've got people coming in and you're feeling like you've got a little bit of financial buffer, if you want to, then you can pay somebody to make a much nicer website, a fancier website than you can probably do yourself.
(06:07)
But when you're just beginning, it really doesn't have to be perfect. Don't let yourself hide behind the need to have a perfect website, because that's not what's going to bring clients in. You want a website that's good enough and then as you go on, it can get better and better and better.
(06:23)
When I say all this, partly I'm saying it to myself, because I am definitely a person who likes to have a very professional website. I like to I do it myself and I like to change things around. And it stresses me out when there's something that's not working or I've messed up the format or something like that happens all the time. But I give myself a limit. And if it's not perfect, then I'm like, well, I have to work on it next week.
(06:49)
It'll just have to be not perfect for a week. And it's made a noticeable difference in how many new clients I'm bringing in and how much I'm able to serve my current clients because I'm not spending all that time dealing with it. And it makes me go out there and do the things that are less comfortable to do, the more active visibility work, that is what gets clients in the door.
(07:13)
So I hope this is helpful to you. Remember to aim for good enough for now and just keep working on it over time. If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear about them. Please send me a message via my website, Camille Freeman Dotcom, and let me know what you think. All right.
(07:29)
Take care.
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