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Welcome to the Joy Joya podcast where jewelry is joy and everyone is encouraged to add more polish and sparkle to the world with topics ranging from marketing tips to business development, best practices and beyond. This is the go to podcast for ambitious jewelry industry dreamers like you. Hi, I'm your host Larissa Worsiek.

Through this podcast, I aim to empower and inspire jewelry entrepreneurs and professionals so they can thrive while adding more beauty to the world. I'm passionate about digital marketing for jewelry brands and I'm excited to share my passion with you. As we all know, jewelry is joy, so I'll gladly seize any opportunity to talk about it.

This is episode 222. You're checking out a weekly segment of this podcast called the called the gold mine, which is a more intimate personal and brief take from me about a topic of my choosing, but typically in the categories of entrepreneurship growth mindset, as well as my own personal observations about the industry. If you're new to this podcast, welcome, you can get interviews and business development and marketing tips on Sundays and the gold mine with me on Wednesdays.

If you're a return listener or viewer, thanks for following along. In this week's episode, I'll be reminding you to take some time before the end of the year to get in touch with your why for your jewelry business, as well as with all the marketing activities that you do for it. This will be the last episode of 2022.

So I wanted to leave you with something you can take through the end of this year and into 2023. I'll be discussing why it's so important to have a why as a business owner or jewelry professional, how you can explore your why, if you're not sure about it, or if it's changed recently and how to check in with your why throughout the year. So first let's talk about why is it so important to have a why as a business owner or jewelry professional.

So especially if you've been in business for a while or you've been doing your job for a while, it can be so easy to get into autopilot mode and lose track of your why. What is your purpose? What drives you beyond making money? Or besides the fact that this is just what you've always done or you've always done it this way? The end of the year is an excellent time to assess this question and to make some adjustments if they end up being appropriate. Having a why is obviously an important component of your brand's storytelling, but it should also make sense internally to you to keep you on track with creating and working from the most authentic place possible.

When you have a clear why and you stay focused on it, you'll feel more excited about your business when things get tough. You'll be a better leader and a more effective decision maker and competitively it makes sense because you'll likely stand out from your competition in a way that doesn't have to do with your products or with your pretty website or your social media feed or whatever. It will also help you more clearly set goals and be able to take the steps to follow through on them and it keeps you passionate and hungry about your goals.

Having a why is also super important when it comes to each one of the marketing activities that you do, especially social media marketing, which as we know can feel like an endless grind at times. So are the marketing tactics that you used last year or earlier this year still serving you? Why are you sending email campaigns? Why do you post on Instagram? Do you have a compelling reason for doing these things? What are you hoping to achieve? If you can't think of a why in answer to these questions beyond just someone told me to do it or Larissa told me to do it on the Joy Joy podcast or I thought that's what we were supposed to be doing, then it's time to step back and ask yourself some really crucial questions. So let's say it's time for you to ask yourself these questions or even to just check in at the end of this year, see where you're at.

How can you explore your why if you're not sure about it or it seems to be changing where it has changed recently? First, I definitely recommend the book Start With Why by Simon Sinek. I'll put the link to that in the show notes. I think that's an excellent read.

He approaches it more from like the brand storytelling perspective and the motivating your team perspective, but he has so many great questions in there that can help you start on this journey of figuring out your why. But I'll list some questions right now. So is this really what I want? How am I defining success? Do I still feel passionate about this? Where do I want my business to be in five years, in 10 years? Am I on the right track for that? Why do I wake up every day to do what I'm doing? Why do I value this thing that I'm doing more than any other thing that I'm doing? Once you've explored these questions for yourself and you kind of have some idea of the answers, you'll want to get out of your head a little bit and actually take action.

So if you've had thoughts or ideas that have been simmering in the back of your head that are maybe related to you getting closer to a place of a why that really feels authentic to you, you want to not just have them as abstract goals and put a plan in place to take action toward those things, since they can influence your why and help you maybe discover new things about your business, help you get closer to your purpose. And definitely I think especially moving into the new year, though it's not exclusive to like a new year's resolution or anything like that, you want to write a statement that will define your why for you so that you have it documented for yourself. And again, it's not just this abstract thing.

So I'm going to share my why statement for the new year, just so you have an example. So to be the most authentic and unapologetic version of me, that I can be in my business and my brand and to inspire others to do the same. So they can also bring something new and extraordinary to the world of jewelry.

So that's my why statement, something that I revisit often to kind of keep me on track, make sure that everything I do, whether it's in my podcast, whether it's talking to a client, whether it's sending an email campaign, everything I do should be aligned with that why statement. And then just because you make a why statement doesn't mean it can't change throughout the year. I'm sure that I will adjust that why statement to my for myself, whether I add to it, adjust the language.

So it's important to check in regularly. So how can you do that? You could try adopting a regular journaling or self reflection habit, whether that's every day, once a week, once a month, once a quarter. If you don't like journaling or writing, or you feel kind of silly about that, you can like send text messages to yourself or emails to yourself.

Sometimes even love using like the voice notes app on my phone and like leaving voice notes just to get something out. And even to hear it back so that I can connect with what I'm thinking and feeling. I think with I think with our busy lives, it can be really hard to be introspective or reflective.

If you don't carve out the time to do it, it's better to check in with your why and your purpose and how you feel throughout the year than just waiting till the end of the year or the new year to blow everything up. Of course, I'm encouraging you to do this now because I think it's a good time for self reflection, but you shouldn't necessarily just wait for that like new year to like start over or like change everything. This should be a regular practice.

And know again that your why can change and don't feel bad about that happening. If it does, it's a natural part of the process. It means you're growing and changing and discovering new things about your business.

And that's super exciting. And also know that your external circumstances may change as well. New platforms, new marketing tools, the economy, customer expectations, etc.

So there's always a lot of change and you need to try to be flexible to just roll with that. What did you think? I'd love to know, have you explored this before? Are you really confident about your why and your purpose in your business and marketing? Or is it something that you've been trying to figure out? Please let me know in a YouTube comment or in a podcast review. You can also always email me lorisa.

That's L A R Y S S A at joyjoya.com. And thanks for listening or watching.