My launch failed. And that’s a good thing.

For those reading later, at the time of writing, it’s January, 2024. I'm in the middle of "launching" the 4th cohort of Thriving Visibility (my visibility boosting, confidence cultivating, speaking ... uh.... spectacular? program for small business owners), and Phase 1 of the launch bombed.

Hard.

Like, crickets.

But I actually feel great. (Really.)

First of all, almost no business folks tell you when their launches fail.

They just stop talking about it and pretend it never existed. (Been there, done that. You?)

And do you know why?

Shame.

They feel like if they tried something in their business and it didn't work, it makes them bad at business.

<cue angry buzzer noise> ENHHHHHH! Nope! Wrong!

In fact, when something "fails" it's a great opportunity.

"Oh fuck off, Megan" I can you saying. And I honestly would've said the same thing a couple of years ago.

There is no such thing as a fail

"OH FUCK OFF AGAIN MEGAN", perhaps you might be screaming in your head.

Here is the truth: "failure" is information. That's it.

Last year when I launched Cohort 2 of Thriving Visibility in the early part of the year, the same thing happened. Nobody was signing up.

And yet the year before, I'd had 6 people already signed up before January 1.

So I was freaking. Because I'd built the first half of my year on this program. And it wasn't working like I'd planned.

So what did I do? 

Well, honestly, first I had a little panic and probably Voxered my business co-conspirators a lot to talk it out.

But in the end, I got curious. And that's when my entire business changed.

(For real.)

I got curious.

So I did a poll trying to figure out why people weren't joining. Was it money? Was it that people didn't want the program? What was it?

Then I reached out to folks who had expressed interest, or who had applied for the program, but who weren't making that final commitment.

I also reached out on DM, and here's what the majority said: the timing was wrong. If this was happening in a couple more months, it'd be doable.

It was not the price. It was not me. It was not that the program wasn't something people wanted anymore.

So I switched gears. I simply changed the start date. (If you've been around here a while you might remember that.)

And what happened? 3 people signed up immediately.

BAM. Instead of panicking and retreating and feeling like I suck and that my business is dead and I've used up every last client who would ever want to work with me, I did not take it as a moral failure. I did not allow the shame to seep in.

I simply got curious, asked questions, got the information I actually needed, and did a restructure.

That also meant recalibrating my year based on this new information. 

And that flexibility is one of the key pieces that make your business visibility grow instead of get stuck.

So what's wrong this time?

Here I was offering a bonus that people actually wanted. That several people wrote to tell me what a great bonus it was! (It's the Tarot for Business Clarity reading - I don't expect you to remember, haha.)

But the deadline to sign up for the program and get the bonus? Was last Friday.

The end of everyone's first full week back to work and school after the holiday.

When I crashed on the couch after doing tarot readings at the Evergreen Health Collective for their belated holiday party (so much fun), and woke up realizing how absolutely exhausted I was, it was like a "ding!"

Even I myself was incapable of formulating full sentences by 5pm, so how was I expecting folks to make a major financial decision when trying to remember how to make a school lunch and what time you have to leave the house was likely the main priority of the week.

So instead of panicking that nobody is going to join, I just realized I had to make a tweak and extend the bonus period. 

That is simply it.

And I feel great about it?

And I’m realizing… I’m proud of that. I worked hard to feel ok with this. Yay me!

I'm not worried about this program. I'm not worried about money. (I also have a few other revenue streams, especially with my 1:1 clients and my corporate training, so my whole year isn't riding on this, either.)

I also have the benefit of several years of being in business, and the proof is in the pudding: I continually get new clients because I put in the marketing work, and I put in the personal work.

Why is this a visibility issue?

<In my best Elyse Meyers voice> Great question, I'm so glad you asked.

If I had not done a lot of shadow work, if I had not discovered how powerful curiosity is over retreat, if I had not worked on my own visibility ladder and kept pushing past my lines of comfort, I would probably have tried to design a whole new program last year, lost several months of revenue, and questioned whether or not I should be a business owner anymore.

Instead I had a 62% increase in revenue over 2022. (I just did that math right this minute and HOLY SHIT.)

Because I would've just faded into the background hoping nobody would remember that I'd tried to launch something (which, by the way, they won't. Nobody remembers anything anymore.)

I would have lost momentum. I would have lost confidence.

I would have lost the opportunity to connect with people and figure out what they actually needed, and kept flinging spaghetti at the wall to see if something might stick.

And I would have done all of that because of shame and the feeling of being a failure.

Instead of switching gears and getting curious.

So, this is important, that switch is not easy. There is some dedicated inner work (shadow work) that you have to do in order to not care what people might think.

And guess what? We do that kind of work in Thriving Visibility. ;)

So if you're thinking about joining, but aren't ready to commit, I don't blame you.

But what you could do is get your application in (there's no obligation to join - honest) to get a sense of what the program might be able to do for you and your business.

And then take some time to sit with it and let yourself decide at a pace that feels good and not panicky over some deadline.

And in the meantime, join Instagram Bloom if you haven't yet - it's 2 weeks of Instagram prompts to help you get excited about social media again! 

Full transparency, IG Bloom is there to help me get folks interested in working with me, and it's a good runway toward Thriving Visibility, so I'll be closing it soon (probably this week before I go on holiday to a warm place.)

And if you haven't yet, here's the Thriving Visibility information page.

I really hope you found this transparency helpful. I know that I needed this kind of honesty in order for me to make the choices that I have.

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OK truth time - have you ever had a failed launch? What did you do? How did it make you feel? Are you still struggling with it? Let me know in the comments (there’s power in the truth!) or send me an email.

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