Stress relief ideas for Stress Awareness Month 2023

A little pressure to get things completed on time or to a good standard can help to drive us forward and be successful in life. If we never worried about showing up on time or finishing things when we said we would, I think most of us would spend a heck of a lot more time lazing about in our PJs, don’t you?!

When this spills over into full-on stress though, it can be a slippery slope to burnout if left unchecked and untreated.

April was Stress Awareness Month (and I certainly was aware of stress!), so I thought it would be helpful to look at what stress looks and feels like and discuss a few ways to help you reduce your stress levels as a solo business owner.

Are you getting overwhelmed with everything you need to do in your business?

What does stress feel like?

Stress can show up in so many different ways. You know some of those niggles you’ve just come to accept as part of grown-up life? Yep, probably stress-related! And Stress Awareness Month is a good time to remind us to reduce these high levels of stress we're trying to function on.

Let’s take a quick look at some of the signs of stress then we'll look at stress relief ideas later. It's actually astonished how much stress can affect our bodies in different ways:

• Irritability

• Anxiety

• A racing mind/being unable to ‘switch off’

• Low mood and depression

• Chest pain or difficulty breathing

• Panic attacks

• Sleep issues

• Sore muscles and headaches

• Fatigue

You can’t pour from an empty cup

When faced with a stressful situation, the hormones we produce can have long-term effects on our bodies. In addition, the way we respond to stress can also affect our emotional well-being and those around us.

As a business owner, you’re responsible for revenue generation for you and your family. If you’re failing to recognise your body’s signs of stress, you’re setting yourself up for potential problems down the line.

If you become ill from stress, who’s going to keep things ticking over and what effect might this have on your business going forward? Make sure you look into insurance that covers you with illness if you have to be off work for a certain amount of time. I know Simply Business offers this in some insurance policies for small business owners.

Remember, you can’t pour from an empty cup. So, if you’re swerving too close to exhaustion and burnout, it’s time to look at ways to reduce stress levels for your sake… and those who rely on you.

Five stress relief ideas to decrease your stress levels

1. Know your stress drivers!

Do you want everything to be perfect? Do you feel like you must always remain strong? Are you always in a hurry? Do you want to try your hardest in everything you do? Are you a people pleaser?

There are usually external drivers affecting how we perceive and react to situations, and it’s these drivers that help keep us in a stress loop!

Why not take a few minutes to think about your stress drivers? Identifying why you put additional pressure on yourself can really help you to see the bigger picture and actually see stress in a completely different light.

I think we all know a perfectionist, don’t we?! That person who likes everything to be just so. Perfectionists are hard-working and produce high-quality work. BUT they can be easily prone to stress as they expect a lot of others and are sometimes prone to procrastinating and overthinking!

If you’re the kind of person to wants to be strong all the time and finds it hard for people to see your vulnerabilities, you may find yourself withdrawing under stress and holding all your emotions in.

“I’ve got so much to do and so little time to do it!” Does this sound familiar? People who are always in a hurry tend to focus on delivering work quickly, but they often take too much on and find it difficult to say no! (This one’s definitely me!)

The ‘try-hards’ are like a dog with a bone. They just won’t give up! They’re super hard-working and show perseverance in everything they do, but the effort of trying can easily lead to stress and burnout.

And lastly, there are the people-pleasers! Well-liked, good company and friendship. BUT they tend to worry too much about what others think and fail to neglect their own needs.

I wonder which camp (or camps) you fall into? We often have two or three main stress drivers affecting how we approach life.

If you’d like to delve into this in more detail, there is a great questionnaire you can complete. You can find it here.

2. Outsource and delegate

Now you understand a little bit more about yourself and your approach to your daily tasks; perhaps it’s time to draw upon some of the talented people out there who are just waiting to support you and your business.

It may be co-workers who are looking for new challenges or responsibilities, or it may be subcontracting some of those tasks that you know you don’t really need to be doing but you’re unsure or scared of outsourcing.

It’s time to bite the bullet and see some stresses float away before your very eyes! Reach out to friends or contacts in our Gossip Gals network to get recommendations for outsourcing or get tips on the dos and don’ts of delegating within your existing team.

3. Take breaks

Listen to your body! When you start to feel overwhelmed and stressed, a break is well overdue. You might think downtime is a waste of time and will get in the way of what you’re trying to achieve, but it’s the complete opposite.

Taking regular breaks can help in so many ways. For example, going to make a cuppa gets you standing up and stretching those muscles a little, and 5 or 10 minutes away from your desk gives your eyes a well-deserved break.

A little fresh air can give us a whole new perspective on life. Have you ever noticed how much better you feel after a quick stroll around the block? Suddenly that email that was really stressing you out seems like a minor task you’re ready to tackle.

4. Curb some of the ideas

All business owners have done this… we want to do everything, and we want it done yesterday! Having lots of ideas and a clear vision of where you want to head is awesome, but finding that you can’t implement things quickly enough or feel like there is so much to do is stressful.

Sit down with a pad and paper, jot down all your ideas, then look at which ones are realistic or the top priority, and create a plan to focus on JUST those ones.

Keep hold of your master ideas list and then when you have conquered your priority ones, you can revisit it and create a new plan for the next ideas. A lot of ladies in our business women network relate to this one of the stress relief ideas. So many ideas, so little time! Just curb them, hopefully, you're in business for years to come, and you will get to them all.

5. Look after yourself!

And the last of our stress relief ideas on this is a reminder of something we should always be doing. Not just in Stress Awareness Month.

Rather than waiting for the signs of stress to come knocking, build some preventative measures into your routine. When it comes to self-care, the three main areas to focus on are:

• Rest – are you getting enough good quality sleep? Remember to build enough downtime into your daily routine, especially just before bed. And remember to put down those laptops and phones to avoid too much blue light before you get some shut-eye.
  

• Exercise – rather than waking up and hitting the emails straight away, could you start your day with a short walk or some light yoga? It’s a great way to set the tone for the day and ensure you’re getting some exercise under your belt early on.
  

• Diet – we’re all guilty of consuming too much caffeine and sugar. And feeling stressed only seems to increase these cravings! A few small changes to our diet can make a big difference in how we feel. So have a think… are you drinking enough water? Are you having regular, nutritious meals? Where can you add more fruit and vegetables to your meals? I cut down to decaf tea 10 years ago now, and it helps keep my anxiety levels down.

I really hope you’ve found these stress relief ideas helpful.

If you’re interested in connecting with a brilliant business women network who can empathise with these feelings, come and join our Gossip Gals Facebook group or join us at one of our friendly networking meetings!

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We’d love to welcome you!

Emma x

What's the best graphic design for social media success?

Have you noticed how our attention spans seem to be getting shorter and shorter, especially when it comes to social media?! If something doesn’t excite, interest, or shock us within a few seconds, we’re already scrolling toward the next thing.

That’s why it’s SO important for our graphic design for social media to be on point to hook prospective clients quickly and easily.

In this blog, I’m going to explain five ways you can take your graphic design for social media to the next level! I hope you find these top tips helpful.

1. Get good at Canva!

Canva is a graphic design platform that can be used to create graphic design for social media, as well as presentations, posters and bags of other visual content. It’s very intuitive software that can be used to tweak curated templates or to create your own from scratch.

There’s a free subscription, or if you’d prefer to pay a small fee of £10.99 a month, you can upgrade to the Pro option. Canva Pro gives you access to more stock images and plenty more awesome features, such as resizing, a background remover, a social media scheduler and a whole host of awesome elements which are brilliant in graphic design for social media.

As with any software, it can seem a little daunting to use at first, believe me, I know this feeling! But I can assure you once you’ve played about and created some graphic design for social media, you’ll soon get the hang of this must-have platform.

Would you like to learn more? I’ve put together a fantastic, short tutorial on Canva. You can view that here:

2. Choose your brand colours

Colours are a simple and powerful way to convey mood and define emotional states. If you take a few minutes, I’m sure you can picture many famous brands, their recognisable colours and the feelings they evoke in you. Many large brands are even identifiable by their logo or colour alone. Just think about Apple, McDonald’s and Coca-Cola!

Choosing the right colour for you and your business can be a quick and easy way to reel prospective clients in and create a lasting first impression on them.

Bearing this in mind, I thought it would be worthwhile to look at the kinds of emotions different colours bring to mind and examples of brands that have opted for each one:

• Red – evocative of passion, energy, and excitement… Tesla, Netflix, Disney.
  

• Purple – a sophisticated yet mysterious colour. It’s often used for high-end products due to its associations with royalty and religion… Cadbury, Hallmark, Zoopla.
  

• Blue – one of the most popular colours, with around 1/3 of the top brands choosing it. It can elicit a couple of responses; one is calm and serenity as in the sky and sea, and the other is trust, security and confidence… Facebook, Ford, PayPal, Oral B.
  

• Green – tends to be associated with nature, health, and freshness… Land Rover, John Deere, Tropicana.
  

• Yellow – popular for injecting positivity and vibrancy into a brand... McDonald’s, Lipton, Post-It.
  

• Orange – combining the passion and energy of red with the optimism and brightness of yellow, orange is a friendly and adventurous colour… Nickelodeon, EasyJet, Fanta.
  

• Black – another popular colour, especially with luxury brands. It stands out and provides a classic and sophisticated look… Chanel, Gucci, Sony.

Once you’ve selected your brand colours that compliment your business's goals and aspirations, be sure to use your colours across your social media platforms. This could be in your templates, fonts, logo and complimentary stock images.

3. Choose two to three fonts to use

Just as colours evoke an emotional response, so do fonts. They can be easily overlooked though, with many people concentrating on their business name, logo and colours!

Your choice of typography on your graphic design for social media can say a lot about you and your brand and can influence how people interpret what you’re trying to convey to them. The correct fonts can certainly help to deliver your message and portray your intentions. On the other hand, the wrong fonts can be distracting and cause people to make incorrect assumptions about you and your business.

As with colour, select two to three fonts (maximum) that match the values and feel of your brand, and stick to them to achieve consistency and familiarity.

4. Be consistent to get known and stand out

One of my biggest tips for getting the most out of graphic design for social media is showing up regularly! There’s no point throwing the odd post out there and hoping it will attract hundreds of new followers. It can be a slow burn, especially when you’re first starting out, so the key is putting meaningful content up frequently.

This can seem really daunting but there are so many different pieces of content you can share. For example, blog content, videos, Lives, infographics, case studies, testimonials, how-to guides, polls, and to keep things light… fun memes!

To help achieve all this, I highly recommend planning ahead using a content calendar, researching awareness days to supplement your content strategy, and remembering to organise offers, new lead magnets, events and training sessions to promote your brand. We have a monthly Social Media Planning Session you are welcome to join us in. We combine planning, creating and scheduling during the session as well as advice on graphic design on social media.

Templates are a great way to quickly and easily batch-create graphic design for social media so you don’t have to spend loads of time on your content creation… which leads us nicely to my final tip!

5. Save time and buy some templates

If you feel like you don’t have the time or the confidence to create your own templates, don’t fret! There are plenty of creative people out there who can support you with this.

Buying templates can be a cost-effective way to source high-quality, eye-catching content blueprints that you can tweak as and when you need to.

If you’re ready to stand out on social media, check out The Social Signature Bundle!

315 fully editable Canva template specifically tailored for businesses that want to uplevel their social media presence!

Women in Business Networking – 3 top tips to get you started in International Networking Week!

Did you know we’ve just come to the end of International Networking Week? For women in business networking is a great way to bring in warm leads to your business.

Running for fifteen years now, International Networking Week is an opportunity to highlight the power of networking and to discuss the benefits of being part of a business community, like Gossip Gals.

As you can imagine, this is right up my street! I love any opportunity to talk about my passion for bringing like-minded women together to teach each other, find solutions for their frustrations, grow their client base, support each other, and meet new allies. I have made so many good friends through my years of networking! Plus the amount of help and expertise I've been about to access through women in business networking events has absolutely boosted my business.

I know that the term ‘business networking’ can bring many people out in a cold sweat though! They picture walking into a business networking event and having to make small talk with a bunch of strangers, or they picture standing up and having to ‘sell’ themselves or their business. Eeeekkk! I have to say, I've been to some meetings like this and I had terribly sweaty palms and stomach knots doing it!

But that’s not what all women in business networking meetings are like!

That’s why I thought it would be useful to go back to basics and share my top three tips for getting you started with confidence at your business networking events. Hope you find them helpful!

1. Understand what networking is about!

Networking (noun): the action or process of interacting with others to exchange information and develop professional or social contacts.

Sounds pretty serious, huh?! When you think about it though, we’re all CONSTANTLY networking.

Dropping the kids off at school and chatting to the other mums and dads about homework, school events, or arranging playdates… networking. Speaking to suppliers to sort out supply chain delays… networking.

We’re social beings by nature and networking is at the heart of our daily lives. But when we give it this grand label, it can start to feel a bit daunting. Don’t you think?

A common mistake people can make is thinking that networking = selling. Wrong! People can smell this a mile off and it can really turn people off interacting with you and building meaningful connections.

If you are worried about going to a women in business networking meeting and you're just starting out, you're more than welcome to book a 15-minute chat with me and pick my brains about the best networking approach you could take. I will give you some tips on different meetings you could attend and how to asses which is right for you and your business.

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Another mistake is when people are only in contact when they want or need something. Instead, think of networking as an opportunity to solve problems. It could be problems you have, for example, you’d like to attract more clients, or it could be someone with an issue that your service or products can fix! A surefire way to get yourself noticed is to help someone out with a problem they have… it can be the start of a long and beautiful working relationship! It certainly makes you more memorable in the right way when you help others than being remembered as the person that talked too long about themselves and everything was about getting them a sale.

2. Start with who you know

You don’t have to meet a bunch of strangers to start networking effectively.

Chances are, you probably already know lots of people who you can start networking with… friends, family, or old colleagues.

Even if they’re not the right people to help you out with a particular problem, or they don’t work in your particular niche, they might have friends or other contacts who are! Having someone who can introduce you or just having someone in common can be a fantastic icebreaker and take some of the pressure off.

Before long, you’ll be feeling much more confident to reach out to complete strangers, like making connections via LinkedIn, at trade shows or at in-person or online networking events like Gossip Gals Networking.

3. Keep in touch

Don’t forget to check in with your women in business networking connections from time to time! The last thing you want to do is to put all this work into building relationships and then let them gather dust on the shelf.

If you connect with someone at a networking event, and it seems like you can help each other out, call or email them afterwards saying how nice it was to meet them. You could also list a few ways you think you may be able to collaborate in the future.

If you think you have a solution to someone’s problems, drop them a line detailing ways you could support them.

When someone reaches out to you, thank them for their time and assistance and tell them that you’re looking forward to working with them in the future.

Would you love to join a supportive and friendly women in business network?

If you’re ready to try networking the Gossip Gals way, then come and join us at one of our upcoming meetings. We’re known for our relaxed and friendly approach to women in business networking!

Emma x