Consistency Is Key 🔑 Actionable Steps To Building A Consistent Routine With Simon Chan
Consistency is the key to everything. Going into the gym every day for 10 minutes is better than going to the gym every month. Posting on social media every day is better than posting every other day. You need to have a routine or a checklist in everything you do. Join your host Adrienne Hill as she sits down with Simon Chan, the founder of MLM Nation. Simon is a consistency coach who helps you create consistency in your life. Take his steps and principles so that you can build a consistent routine in everything you do.
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Consistency Is Key 🔑 Actionable Steps To Building A Consistent Routine With Simon Chan
Impactful Entrepreneur Show Guest Interview
Have you ever thought that you would get dramatically better results if you could be more consistent in your business, but you struggle with being consistent day-to-day, week-to-week, and month-to-month? You're not alone. Many people feel exactly the way you do. In this episode, we will talk about some super simple, actionable ways to become more consistent than ever in building your business even if you don't have a lot of time to spend and you've never been consistent in the past. Let's do this.
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I'm super excited because we are here with Simon Chan. He is a consistency coach and speaker who helps network marketers earn a part-time income of at least $1,000 a month by getting them to be consistent and defeat overwhelm. He's best known as the host of the MLM Nation podcast, the number one network marketing podcast that features in-depth interviews with over 500 top income earners.
He started in network marketing in 2003 and built a $1 million business with over 200,000 distributors by pioneering online duplication. He retired from building in 2013 so he could be a full-time trainer and founded MLM Nation. We are so blessed to have him here with us. It doesn't get any better than this. We are going to be digging into the topic of setting up social media routines and figuring out a smart daily method of operations so that you can be more consistent on social media. Thank you, Simon, for joining us. I'm so excited to bring your wisdom to this audience.
Thank you for having me here. It's an honor to be able to serve and share.
For anyone in the audience who has not had the pleasure of meeting you or following you on social media yet, could you tell us a little bit about your entrepreneurial journey and how you evolved to the point of starting MLM Nation and became this motivational inspiration piece to so many people?
I grew up with stereotypical Asian parents where you study and work hard in school. I was blessed to be born in an upper-middle-class family. My dad was rags to riches. He was born in Hong Kong in the ghetto and then became a doctor. At one point, we had three Mercedes and a big mansion growing up in Brooklyn, New York. Everything is the hood, but we grew up in a nice part of Brooklyn. I never had time with my dad. I always wanted to go to Yankees and Knicks games. After a certain age, he was always busy at the hospital, the nursing home, and the clinic.
I listened to my parents. I didn't want to get in trouble. I want to get my allowance to study hard and work hard. I'm eventually going to take over my dad's practice. I don't want to be a doctor. I'm working a job and I love the job. I worked at the NBA, the National Basketball Association. Here's the cool thing. Since it's such a cool job, you can get any sports fan off the street and work for them. The salary is not that good. It's like supply and demand. The demand is huge, so you don't need to pay much. I was like, “This is awesome.”
I always saw myself as, “I'm going to work there for 30 to 40 years and climb the corporate ladder.” I'm so grateful for my bosses., everyone there who taught me so much, and our first mentor at the NBA, who taught me how to be a professional. It was, “Work 30 to 40 years, get a corner office, be the head of NBA China or something.” I read a book that changed my life. I used to wake up at 5:30, go for my 30-minute run, and then get on the freeway by 6:15 to beat traffic and get to work.
If you left to work earlier, it would take two hours to get there. If I leave at 6:15, I'll get to work at 7:00 AM. I'll eat breakfast there and stay there until 7:00 PM. I loved my job. I was like, “That's life. I'm going to do this for 30 to 40 years.” I read Rich Dad Poor Dad. I was like, “There's a thing called passive income. There's a thing that you don't need to work like that.” I liked my job but getting up at 5:30 AM is not fun. I can do that. That changed my world. From there, I looked at different opportunities and franchises.
I didn't have the money to start a franchise or any skills. I found network marketing. At first, I was skeptical. At that time in 2003, I read The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren. God is a big part of me. I felt that God wanted me to do network marketing. Even though I was a shy and quiet Asian kid from Brooklyn, New York, I always enjoyed coaching and helping. Even at my church, I was leading a youth fellowship. I used to coach at the YMCA in Chinatown and New York basketball clinics to help kids off the street. I have always enjoyed coaching and mentoring.
Consistency can't be a weakness since everyone is consistent in some parts of their life.
Direct selling and network marketing is not a sales business but a coaching and mentoring business. After much thought, I got started in 2003. I would love to say I was an instant success, but I struggled for months. I lived in Los Angeles. Most of my friends were in New York. This was way before Zoom and all these webinars. I've had many friends. I wasn't consistent and struggled for months. In the end, it was all a blessing. I found a mentor that taught me how to be consistent. That was my turning point. He came there, grilled me, held me accountable, and every single day made me do what I needed to do.
From there, I started online marketing. Since I was shy, I'm not good at meeting people. I say, “I'm going to go meet some strangers.” We started doing online marketing way back using Yahoo, Overture, Google AdSense, prospecting ICQ forums, AOL Instant Messenger, MSN Messenger, and Yahoo! Messenger. That's how we used to communicate with my team. That's how I got started. I was struggling. The turning point was when someone helped me stay consistent. Once I started getting consistent, I started getting results.
That is so fascinating that The Purpose Driven Life and Rich Dad Poor Dad turned things around for you. I've also read those books. It's fascinating because whether you're talking about your spiritual side or learning about passive income, both are these topics where once you see it, you can't unsee it. Once you understand how passive income works, you don't want to go back to trading time for money. That's why everyone is here. That's why you are here.
When I read The Purpose Driven Life, I realized I did the whole 40 days and stuff. I realized God's purpose for me is to positively impact as many lives as possible. It's not about me. It's about helping others. I felt like network marketing was the vehicle for someone in my background to be able to do that. Once I did that, I became consistent and started getting results. I was a $1 million6 club member at my company. The team was huge, hitting 200,000 people. In 2013, I had a change in purpose. I felt that it was all a drop in the bucket. If I want to positively impact as many lives as possible, there are so many other people in the direct selling profession that I could impact. I became a generic coach in April of 2013.
By letting your light shine, it enables other people to be their best selves and let their light shine as well. It was the knowledge that it was your purpose paired with the consistency that you learned that got you where you are now. You're the perfect person to be talking to about consistency. It all comes full circle. I love your topic because the number one concern or struggle that I hear people talk about is being consistent. Social media is the beast that it needs more no matter how many times you feed it. What advice can you give to struggling entrepreneurs who know their number one weakness is that they're not consistent enough and are looking for some way to systematize things or come up with a regular routine?
Most people will say they struggle with consistency, but the reality is we're all consistent in some parts of our lives. I always joke with my coaching clients, “I know you're consistent.” They say, “I'm not consistent.” “I know you're consistent because I'm sure you took a bath this morning. You took a bath yesterday. You're consistent with that. You're consistent with brushing your teeth and making dinner.” We are consistent in certain parts of our lives. I'll break down seven things.
If you implement these, you will be consistent. It's like taking a shower every day, whether you're taking bath or shower. One of the things is it's a non-negotiable. It's like a checklist. If you want to be consistent, you have to have a checklist of what to do. We call it the DMO or daily method of operation for network marketers. This is something that people who are new entrepreneurs struggle with. I struggled. When I got started in digital marketing, that was my first step in being an entrepreneur.
I struggled for months because I was born and raised over a school and job mentality and employee mindset. If my teacher told me to do it, I'd do everything. If the teacher gave me extra credit, I'd do that too. I never took the extra step to, “I'm going to do this.” If my boss told me to do something at my job, I'd do an awesome job, but I will never go above and beyond, think outside the box, or do something. When you get started being an entrepreneur, you often realize you don't have a boss. No one is going to fire you. I need a structure and routine.
That's why having the checklist guides you on what you need to do. Whether you're in affiliate marketing, a coach, or in network marketing, we love to be our own boss. That's why we chose this career or profession. We also have to be our own employees. Often, a boss will fire an employee. I wanted to be my own boss, but I wasn't doing it. There are certain types of things you have to do in every business. That's the checklist. Social media is on the checklist. It's not something like, “When I have time, I'll do it.” It's something you must do. All the other speakers have talked about that.
The first thing is a checklist of what you have to do. That's the first component. If you want to take a shower, there's a checklist. If you're making coffee every morning, there's a checklist. If you're brushing your teeth, there's a checklist to that too. The checklist could be, “Turn on the water. Wet my toothbrush. Put the toothpaste on.” There's a checklist. You got to have a checklist of what you need to do whether you're posting or doing a Story, Reel, TikTok or live video.
Consistency Is Key: If you want to be consistent, you have to have a checklist of what to do. If you want to take a shower, that's a checklist. You're making coffee every morning. That's a checklist. That's the first component.
I love this advice so much because there's a big difference between theory and reality. In theory, everyone loves the idea of working for themselves. Who doesn't want to be their own boss? In theory, that sounds amazing, but the reality is that no one will come and give you that checklist. When you're your own boss, you have to create the checklist yourself.
From attending the summit, you hear the different speakers. You have an idea of what to do. To start a great consistency, my advice is this. There are tons of great advice shared at the summit. A mistake that a lot of people do is they try to do everything. I've made that mistake. I have attended numerous online marketing conferences and pages of notes on my Evernote. You're like, “Where do you start?” You do a little bit and end up dabbling. My advice is you learn so much at the summit. Take one action step and get good at that before you do everything else.
One of the things that built our coaching business and MLM Nation was we focused on the podcast for a long time before we started doing Instagram Reels and stuff. We got good at one thing. Could I have done a lot? Here's the reality. We humans only have 24 hours a day. We have families, other obligations and errands. There's no way you can implement so many things. I'll give you an example. There's no way you're going to do Instagram or TikTok well and get a Facebook and LinkedIn all at the same time. That's not happening.
The checklist for each of them could be different, so it gets confusing, “What am I doing?” What I recommend is to take one thing. Let's say you like Instagram, “That's my personal favorite. I want to do Reels.” Get good at Reels, focus on it, do it every single day, and create a routine for that. In 3 to 6 months, you're going to get at good at and then do the next thing. You can't do it all. It's just one at a time. Let me go over a couple of things and go back to taking a shower every day. Every one of us is busy. For every new thing you take, you got to drop one thing because you only have 24 hours in a day. Normally, it's like, “I can't give something up.” Don't give up your family time.
The easiest thing to give up is to stop talking to poor prospects or poor clients that suck up a lot of your time and energy as well. Let those go and create that time. It doesn't matter. I know how busy you are. You create the time to take a shower, brush your teeth, or make that morning coffee if you're a coffee drinker. I don't drink coffee. I drink tea. I create the time every morning to make my gallons of green tea. I have a routine. You got to create the time because you're never going to have the time. It's Parkinson's law that says everything falls into a vacuum.
Aristotle talked about it. If you ever moved into a new house, everyone experienced this. You have a spare bedroom or such a great closet. Before you know it, there's this thing called entropy. That place becomes a mess or a vacuum. You say, “One day, I'm going to clean it. I'll clean it on the weekend.” That weekend never comes because all of a sudden, life happens. The next thing you know, it's Sunday night and you still haven't done any of that stuff. You have to create that time and intentionally block off that time. You don't need that much time. It could be fifteen minutes.
What I'm hearing is that for the people struggling to create that list and that time, the issue isn't time management. The issue is prioritizing. You have a habit of showering because you prioritize showering.
I have a time management course that I teach. Most people think time management is tools and stuff. It's 90% attitude. My mentor told me that. For example, if it's life and death, you can do it. My mentor said bluntly to me, “If you don't get it done, we're taking your kids away. You're not going to see them for a week. We're going to threaten to hurt them. You're going to make it happen. You drop everything and choose your priorities.” In this age, social media has got to be a priority. Here's a tip in terms of creating that time.
If you're consistent, whether you're taking a shower, brushing your teeth, or even going to exercise, I guarantee you it's around the same time every day. Some people take a shower in the morning, at night, or whatever it is. If you take it three times a day, you're taking it at a consistent time. If you're making coffee, it's at a consistent time. If you eat dinner consistently, it's at a consistent time. If you exercise consistently, I'm sure it's at a consistent time. I ask people, “What time do you exercise?” They say, “When I have time.” I immediately know that person doesn't exercise consistently.
Who has extra time lying around? Nobody does.
Sometimes it's in the morning, afternoon, or when I have the time. That person is not exercising consistently. The people who exercise consistently say, “I go first thing in the morning. I go at 9:30 after I drop off their kids. I go in the evening after dinner.” Those are the people who do it consistently. In social media, I'm sure a lot of people ask you this question. When is the best time to post because we're all busy?
Take one action step and get really good at that before you do everything else.
People say it's in the morning because everyone is checking their phones while sitting in the toilet or in the afternoon when people check their phones. That is somewhat true. This age is global. You have global clients anywhere. It's irrelevant. If you post at 8:00 or 9:00 PM Eastern, it's a great time, but it's a terrible time in California and the Middle East. It all varies. The best time to post is at a consistent time that you can do it every day. I'll give an example. For me, I have a routine. I've been doing a motivational pep talk on my Instagram and Facebook for years.
It's always at 5:25 AM in California because I live in Los Angeles. That's not the best time for me, but it works great for the East Coast. At 8:25, people can catch me while they're driving. It works well maybe if you're in Central, but it doesn't work well in the Mountains. It works well if you're in Asia, but it doesn't work well if you're in the UK. It's not a good time because I wake up at 4:45. It's not good for me, but I do that because it was the only time I could go live consistently, six days a week.
You have obligations at other points in the day that are such a high priority. You don't want to disturb them, so you've chosen a time slot that doesn't disturb any other time slot and you're protecting it.
Also, the creative energy is there. I get the energy. It's not just time and energy management. I've tried it in the afternoon. I have to do it before the kids wake up. I have two kids. Once the kids wake up, you don't have time freedom. You never have time freedom if you have kids. You do get time flexibility, but there's no such thing as time freedom. Once they're up, I'm distracted and I can't speak when I can do it every day. Before the kids get home, I could do it in the afternoon, but my energy is low and I'm not there. Choose the time and block it off as non-negotiable Monday through Saturday.
I was at a party late at night. I still got up on Saturday morning because I know it's easy to skip once if I don't do it. Don't skip once and make an exception because the exception becomes the rule. If you skip once, it's so easy to skip again. If you're getting started, do one thing. You see all these great speakers here. They're doing so much stuff. Do one thing but do it every single day. I go live seven days a week. On Sunday, I do a spiritual talk. That's how it keeps my game sharp on sharp and gets the habit and routine. When you're doing something like that, it increases your self-esteem and confidence.
Things always happen twice. First in the mind and then in reality. How you see yourself is important. Adrienne, you see yourself as consistent and a go-getter. There are many days where you don't feel like doing it, but you did it anyway because you see yourself as that person. You don't need to do much, but you need to do something. I always share this example. Someone wants to get healthier and be more fit. They go to the gym for 20, 30, 40 or 45 minutes to 1 hour. This person only goes to the gym for five minutes. It takes them ten minutes to drive there and goes there for five minutes.
This person has ever exercised before. They go there for five minutes, have the wimpiest workout, and then go back home. I ask people, “Does that help?” Some people are like, “That's a waste of time.” It helps because that person starts seeing themselves as healthier and more fit people. Eventually, that 5 minutes is going to go to 6, 10, and 15 minutes. You don't need to do a lot, but you do need to get started. I always share this rule of one. I got this from my mentor, James Clear, who wrote Atomic Habits. He said, “One is better than none.” The second rule is, “Afterward, you add one more.”
Let's say you never exercise and you couldn't do one push-up. Do one push-up. Maybe you have to do it on your knees. The next day, you do 2 and then 3. The third rule is that you split it into two times once you get to a point where you can't do it that much. Social media could be like, “I'm wasting so much time on social media.” Get five minutes and engage with your audience. It's five minutes at 6:00 or 7:00. You say, “Simon, I'm spending fifteen minutes in the morning. I can't do it anymore.” You split it into two. It's 5 minutes in the evening. That's how you're going to create that routine. Before you know it, it becomes a habit after 1 or 2 months.
I love this advice and it's so encouraging. For those of you reading, I hope you're noticing a trend. Everything that Simon is sharing with us, whether it's writing your list, protecting times on your calendar, or creating a routine, he's stepping into his personal leadership. He's learning to lead himself and not make excuses. He's stepping into it, claiming it, owning it, holding it and not letting it slip through his fingers for any number of a hundred reasons. He has little kids like a lot of us. Instead of using that as a reason to not be on social media, he gets up at 5:00 in the morning to do it. That's personal leadership. That's amazing and inspiring.
Consistency Is Key: Everyone is busy. So for every new thing you take on, you need to drop one thing. So you have to create the time to do it because you're never going to have the time.
Thank you. We're all leaders. It doesn't matter if you have a team of 5 or 10 people or how many followers. We are all leaders. Don't ever accept someone's lies that you are not a leader. It doesn't matter. You have to give up the past. Yesterday is history, today is a mystery, and tomorrow is your legacy. You are a leader and the first person you've got to lead is yourself. You inspire that, “I'm going to lead myself.” In every one of us, we have the angel and the devil. The angel is like, “You can do it. You're awesome and great.”
When you're excited that you're about to do that social media post, “You're an imposter. You haven't achieved anything yet. You're no good. Why would people listen to you?” The devil talks you out of it. One of the ways is to recognize that. It's awesome that you're watching the summit. You surround yourself with positivity. The second you think about something, take action on it quickly. If you don't take action on it quickly, the devil in you will say, “You're not good and pretty enough. Why are you taping yourself? People are going to laugh at you. You're bad. You haven't done anything.”
That's so easy to fall into. I love that you're stepping in your personal leadership and claiming it. When that voice pops up, you can say, “I'm the type of person who does it no matter what that little voice says.”
That's why the person has gone to the gym for five minutes. It helps because he's saying to himself, “I'm the person that shows up every day, even if it's only five minutes.” That person who's showing up every day for five minutes is better than the person who's going to the gym once a month for two hours.
For those of you reading, take that phrase, “I'm the person who blank.” Fill it in with something positive, encouraging and amazing. Every time you're trying to implement what Simon is teaching, you're going to repeat that phrase to yourself, “I'm the person who implements, believes in myself, or steps into personal leadership.”
The thing that's important is when you start, don't do too much. You don't need to go all out. People say, “I'm going to go all out and do this.” You have the person who never goes to the gym. I always use the gym a lot because it's talked about a lot in the media and I work out and exercise every day for seven days a week. At first, it's like, “I won't get in shape.” The person who has never gone into the gym goes there and gets a trainer. They go all out for 1 hour and 30 minutes and then can't move their arms and legs for a week. It's a terrible experience. They quit. It's the same thing with social media. I'm encouraging you. If you're new, start with five minutes a day or something easy like doing one push-up.
Everyone can do that. It's five minutes. Slowly expand to that. If you want to do social media recruiting and social media sales, you may not be able to spend 1 or 2 hours. It may be miserable for you to do that or scary. Do five minutes and build up that courage. That's a big mistake. People want to go all out. You can't go from zero to hero. You got to take time to do that. I didn't go from being able to do live videos seven days a week. I've done over 10,000 presentations and training over the course of many years. I got to that point. I remember my first presentation was awful. Do it every single day for a little bit. Start with five minutes, slowly build that up, and you will get there.
You were taking us through seven principles.
We talked about the checklist. That's number one. There's creating the time. The third thing is the strategy. How do you plan to do that or this? Let's say you are a coach. A strategy could be, “How do I get people to believe in me?” At the next event that you do, go and take a lot of videos of you speaking on stage, speaking to people, and interacting with your clients. You take that up and chop it into reels. That's a strategy, “What type of content can I give?” What are you sharing with your coaching clients? Take those coaching calls and get them transcribed. If you do a 30-minute coaching call, there are at least 15 to 20 topics that you can make into a good quote for social media. That's a strategy.
I have a certain strategy that I do in terms of my pep talks. I'll share that with you. I knew you were going to ask me about this. There's a free book that people can get and download. If there's a motivational quote, I read that quote and that quote becomes the topic for my pep talk. You don't even need to do that for my book. It could be for anything. It could be taking the notes from what you're learning from the summit and taking that. You got to have a strategy on what to do. For things, the environment is important.
I'm sure you experienced it where you're sitting at your desk, you have brain fog, and you can't think of anything. Get out of that environment. I prepare all of my training when I'm in the backyard. When I'm walking my dog, I recap my day. I'm thinking of ideas. My best idea is after I ride my bike, I exercise. It must be the endorphins. I get a lot of ideas. I immediately write them down. Change it and rhyme it. I couldn't even do anymore in my apartment when I was grinding and doing tons of sales. I was brain-dead. I'll go and walk in the streets and make phone calls. Walking, standing up, and getting fresh air fired me up.
Time management is 90% attitude.
The tiniest change in the environment can make a huge difference. Why do you think so many people joke that they get their best ideas in the shower?
I still do. Over the years, one of the best business advice I ever got was to never make a big decision until you take a shower.
Instead of never until you sleep on it, it's never until you're in the shower.
When I'm sitting here, even though it's a great office, I'm seeing the same thing. Once in the shower, you're out. It's the shower in nature. I go to my backyard. I've got a beautiful view there. All of a sudden, the ideas pop up. I meditate as well. After my meditation, all the ideas come. Change your environment.
Number five is tracking. Tracking your performance is important. If you're not tracking, it's not encouraging. It's anything you want to be successful with. There's exercise and dieting. If you want to be a good baseball player or network marketer, you need to track your numbers. How would you know how well you're doing? Look at the reach, insights, and social media to know how many people you are reaching.
Number six is using tools like a calendar. Go to your calendar. That is my favorite tool. Block it off. It's non-negotiable. At 5:25 AM in the mornings, when I go live, I want to go live for five minutes. It's non-negotiable. Right afterward, I post on a couple of my platforms. Block it off. It doesn't matter what happens, what phone call, or who's texting. I get up. I don't check any text messages or emails until I get that done. During the pep talk, I do a 30-minute posting and then a 15-minute work session with my coaching clients or my group of purpose-driven networkers. I don't get into emails until 1 hour and 30 minutes after I wake up.
You prioritize your activities, protect the time, and put it on your calendar. I have a saying, “If it's not in your calendar, it doesn't exist.”
You can also tell how successful a person is by looking at their calendar, “How much sales do you have? Let me see your calendar.” A calendar is a tool. A timer is a tool. Those are easy timers. Why the timer? It's because you can easily waste too much time while you share priorities. My social media has got to be done in this amount of time. If it's over, it doesn't matter. I got to do it. I have to post it because that prevents overthinking.
One of the things I've adopted over the years is when I check emails, at most, it's ten minutes at a time. That creates urgency. It means if I don't finish it by ten minutes, that thing will not be replied back. I'm rushing and you get a lot more done that way. You can use your phone timer. I always have a nice Apple Watch. I only use it for two things, to exercise and the timer.
Consistency Is Key: Be the person that shows up every day, even if it's only for 5 minutes. The person who shows up in the gym 5 minutes every day is better than a person who goes to the gym once a month for 2 hours.
I do the same thing, whether it's Siri or Alexa. If I know I'm sitting down and I'm going to allow myself some time to enjoy social media and scroll on it, I'll say, “Siri, in ten minutes, tell me to stop screwing around and get back to work.” She will pop up and tell me that. I start laughing. I'm like, “It's time to go back to work.”
We tend to overthink. You're an entrepreneur. We have the perfectionist inside. We want to do the best. Even preparing for this training, I set the timer because I know if I don't set the timer, I can over-prepare and spend hours, days, and weeks for this. I set the timer. Let me get it done. The last tool is important. It's accountability. We're human. We all fall off. I fall off. There are different types of accountability. You can have a coach or a peer to be accountable.
You can also have your group if you have followers, clients, coaching members. You share something with them. For me to do the pep talk, my followers watch that and hold me accountable too. They're inspecting Simon to show up six days a week on that pep talk. I'm like, “I preach consistency. I better show up.” There have been many days when I didn't get enough sleep and was tired from the kids, but I still showed up because I felt the group accountability was also powerful.
Someone is counting on you there. They're expecting that they're going to hear from you and see you. You have to report to someone. It makes a big difference.
One of the big parts of my success is doing a monthly call with a good friend who owns a big nutritional company. We get only one hour. I speak for 30 minutes. He speaks for 30 minutes. We're going to ask each other questions. We can vent our frustrations. We have never missed in years. Every month when it comes up, I'm like, “I'm so busy. I don't want to talk today.” After we talked, that was the best call ever because it holds us accountable.
You both prioritize it, protect it, and shelter it. If anything tries to threaten that time, I would imagine that you're both going, “This is non-negotiable.”
It's because it's on the calendar. The calendar is the boss. Let your calendar be your boss. You may feel like that's so boring and there's no freedom, but your calendar will create freedom for you.
The great thing about that is so many people don't want to do it. They cringe when they hear you use a calendar. You can block off family time on your calendar and vacation time. It doesn't all have to be work stuff.
Block everything off. If you look at my calendar, from 5:00 AM to 4:45 and all the way to midnight, it's all blocked off with family stuff. It's bookended. You have to bookend the days because sometimes you're thinking, “Should I be spending time with my kids?” or whatever you're thinking about. That's decision fatigue.
I learned it from people like Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg. They wear the same clothes. I wear the same shirt, clothes, and outfit all the time. It's your calendar. You don't need to think about, “It's blocked off. This is time for the kids.” That's it. There's no cost. It doesn't matter what happens. Do you know what it gives me? 8:00 in the morning to 9:00 AM is family time.
Before I learned to master my calendar, I felt guilty about not being with my kids when I was working and about working when I was with my kids because I was never sure when either one was going to happen. There was this tension. You're right. The minute you start using a calendar and protect family time, you know exactly when it's going to happen. You protect work time. The guilt goes away.
It's hard to be consistent with so many things. Find an area you like and just keep talking about it over and over again.
Be focused. When it's family time, be 100% present with them. They deserve it. When you're in your business, be focused on your business. As you said, the guilt goes away and you will be a much better parent, spouse and you can be much better in your business because you're not thinking, “This is blocked off.” It will make you more productive too because you know that, “Once the family comes up, I'm not allowed to work. I have to go do something.” It will make you have that sense of urgency.
In general, this advice and the framework of these principles can apply to business but also to your personal life. As a human, you will be a better human if you implement these seven steps. That's so helpful. If we zero in on the entrepreneurial or social media piece, if someone is saying, "I'm going to implement this, Simon. I'm going to set aside half an hour every single day, regardless of the time. It's half an hour, a full hour, or whatever that is," how do you recommend prioritizing their time within that period? Are there certain activities you found that give a better return on social media posting versus messaging versus interacting versus any specific mix you would recommend?
You have to post every day. You should post on your feed once a day and do at least 2 to 3 Stories. That's huge. That's non-negotiable. Engagement is important too. If you engage before you post, your posts will get much better engagement. After you post, hang out there for a couple of minutes, engage back, and keep engaging. That helps. If someone comments, reply to every comment. You have to reply to every single comment because people are taking the time.
Social media is not free because it's time. Time is not free. They could get money back, but they can never get time back. They're taking the time to engage and comment. You have to reply to every comment. I do that. I'll reply right away. Sometimes I reply months later, but I always reply to every comment. Engagement is important because that's what social media is. There's a lot to connect. Set a time, go out there, get engaged, and meet new contacts people. You always have to make sure you're posting every day.
You find the most value if you interact for a short period, share your content and stories, and then interact again before you end that work period.
If you have 15 minutes, 5 minutes of engagement, 5 minutes of posting, and have your posts planned in advance, that's something I recommend. It's time management. It can be a weekend. Write out your posts. When you're posting, you're not thinking because it may take you more than five minutes. Post that and afterward, hang out there and keep engaging. It could be five minutes.
It's the idea that you're pre-planning your posts and setting aside some work time every weekend, every Friday, or someday of the week where you're planning things out, so you don't have that decision fatigue. You mentioned decision fatigue. That's a real thing.
It's like batching. Batching is a concept. If you're running errands, you don't go to get milk, come back home, go back to the post office, go back home, go get your hair done, and come back home. You go out at one time and get everything done. It's like exercising. You don't go and work out for five minutes, come back, go back for five minutes, and go back. If you're playing sports, you cannot go do yoga for five minutes, go back and lift weights, run five minutes on the treadmill, and go back to yoga. You're going to pull a muscle and get hurt. It's the same thing here. If you want to be producing content, go take a weekend.
Get up a little bit early on the weekends. Weekends are great because, normally, you don't have the day-to-day stuff to do. You're in a different environment and atmosphere. You're feeling different. Often, you're more creative. Go out there and plan out your posts. Write down, “What am I posting on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday?” If you have the luxury, be more detailed. If you're not detailed, at least provide an outline. For my pep talks, I choose Saturdays and plan it out, “These are the six topics I want to talk about.” When I'm waking up at 5:25, I'm not thinking about what I'm talking about. That was done on the weekend already.
Consistency Is Key: You have to post every day, once on your feed and do at least two to three stories. That's a non-negotiable. Those posts get engagement and that's very important.
You're planning for success, protecting the time you've set aside, and making a habit out of it even if it's tiny slivers of time.
One other tip is I plan out my topic for the pep talks. When I go to bed, I always look at a topic. I strongly believe the subconscious mind works when you sleep. The topic was all planned out on the weekends. I looked at it. It takes 10 to 15 seconds, “I'm going to talk about this. I'll put it down and when I wake up, I'll brush my teeth, do my meditation, read a word and stuff, and go right into the pep talk.”
Simon alluded to this. For the audience, I thought this was such a great idea when he said this. I want to highlight it. For those of you thinking, “I can't be consistent because I don't know what to talk about,” simply being a part of this summit and learning from all these speakers, you have 1,000 things to talk about. You could talk about everything you've learned throughout the summit. You have enough content for months.
You don't need to give a course at it. If you're doing a live video, it could be 1 or 2 minutes, “I learned this great thing. It changed my mind. I'm going to take action on this. If you feel this is helpful, let me know. I want you to try this out too. Let's see what happens.” It could be a short 1 to 2-minute live video. Start there. Every master was a disaster. You don't need to be good, but you need to get started.
The tiniest inspirational piece can inspire all kinds of content. You have a little book of motivational phrases and quotes. You use that to inspire coaching topics.
Another thing to help you be consistent is if you talk about the same thing all the time, that will help. Sometimes people say, “I want to target stay-at-home moms. I want to target guys who go to the gym a lot because my product does that. I also want to target people who have three kids homeschooled.” If you're targeting too many, it's hard to come up with so many things. If you want to stay consistent, find an area you like and keep talking about the same thing over and over again. What you do is share that with different stories.
I remember when I first started, I exercised seven days a week. I used to do two-day workouts for two hours a day. I was like, “Talking about health and fitness would be perfect for me.” I did that for two weeks and I was like, “I hate talking about this stuff. That sounds weird. I'm into health and fitness. I love working out, but I don't like to talk about it.” I like to talk about motivation, positivity, and consistency.
I started talking about the same thing over and over again. When you do that, you start thinking about different stories you can share. You go deep. You never run out of ideas. One last tip is don't be afraid to repeat yourself over time because people don't remember. When you're on social media, it's like you're driving on the freeway or highway. They may have to see a billboard 30 times to remember it. If you did a post about it today, they're not going to remember it a week from now. If they do remember it, that means it was good. You should do it again.
I love that because it makes it easier for you because you're revisiting the same topics over and over. You're not having to come up with new ideas every day. It's great for the audience, too, because you become known for something. Simon, you're known for being motivational and inspirational. There are people who find Simon and they're like, “Anytime I need a little inspiration, I go search Simon, look him up, and there's always something on his page that inspires me and leaves me feeling awesome.” He has become known for this.
The question is, what do you want to become known for? What content could you share over and over and never get bored sharing it because it's who you are? It's who Simon is. It's to be this inspirational and motivational powerhouse. I love that advice. That's super helpful. You alluded to these motivational quotes, sayings and phrases that you go to for yourself but you also share with others. I understand you have a free gift that's related to some of these motivational things. Do you want to tell us a little bit about it?
When you introduced me, I'm the host of the MLM Nation podcast. We started that in 2015. I've interviewed over 600 top incomers in the direct selling profession. One of the questions I ask on the show is, “What is one of your favorite quotes that motivate you?” I collected all these quotes and put them into the book. It's a little daily guide. For example, you look it up and there's a little quote there and the link to the episode. That will help you stay motivated and consistent. It's a free book.
It gives people ideas. If they read a quote that speaks to them, they could share it on social media as well and start inspiring their audiences. It's an entire book of content ideas. You have all these amazing quotes that can inspire you and your audience and hopefully keep you motivated to use everything Simon taught you and stay consistent on social media.
This is a shift in mindset. Stop seeing yourself as a consumer. See yourself as a creator. I brought this up because if you read this book as a consumer. It's like, “That's motivational. I love it, Simon,” but you're consuming. If you have a mindset like, “I'm a creator,” you start looking at this book differently, “This is inspirational. How can I create content based on what I learned here and everything from the summit?” Don't see yourself as a student or consumer. See yourself as a creator. What are the nuggets you took from this event? How can you turn that into content? Be a creator, not a consumer.
For any one of these, you could pop on social media and say, “I was reading about Simon Chan and he said something that blew my mind. Let me tell you about it.” You immediately have something to talk about. Multiply that by all the speakers we have here and you have content for months on end, honestly. Thank you so much for sharing that gift with us. We can look at it from the view of a consumer and a creator and get a double whammy out of it.
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About Simon Chan
Simon Chan is a Consistency Coach and speaker who helps network marketers earn a part-time income of at least $1,000 a month by getting them to be consistent and defeat overwhelm.
Simon is best known as the host of MLM Nation Podcast; the #1 network marketing podcast that features in-depth interviews with over 500 top income earners.
Simon started in network marketing in 2003 and built a million-dollar business with over 200,000 distributors by pioneering Online Duplication. He retired from building in 2013 to be a full-time trainer and founded MLM Nation.