Graham Allcott 0:04
Hello and welcome to another episode of Beyond Busy. This is the show where we talk productivity, work-life balance, how people define happiness and success. All the big questions for work and life. My name is Graham Allcott. I'm your host for the show. And on this episode, I am talking to Eman Ismail. She is the founder of InkHouse. She's a young working mom, she's an entrepreneur. We talked about her journey, starting her business from scratch, and of course, why writing matters. Why is writing an important skill for business, how to get better at it, and really the benefits of thinking in a copywriting kind of way. So loads in this one, I think you're gonna really enjoy it. She's great company, great to talk to and you're gonna really enjoy the episode. At the end of this episode I will give you more details about my new programme Six Weeks to Ninja And lots of other stuff so stick around after the conversation. But let's jump straight in. Here's my conversation with Eman Ismail.
We are rolling on a very wet Thursday morning here in Brighton and I'm with Eman Ismail. Am I saying that right? Eman Ismail
Eman Ismail 1:21
You are. well, Eman Ismail.
Graham Allcott 1:23
Ismail that is also you do email so the fact that your surname Ismail.
Eman Ismail 1:28
You know, I only realised that. Literally, about two weeks ago, I'm thinking that must be very confusing for people it's taken me this long to realise it but I'm glad you like it because I thought it might just confuse people
Graham Allcott 1:39
I mean that could be your brand name right, Eman Is Mail
Eman Ismail 1:43
Right I should probably just rebrand now
Graham Allcott 1:47
and that you are the founder of InkHouse, which we'll talk about in a minute. And but yeah, let's just start with where where are you in the world right now? What is your world look like? What can you see from where you're talking to me?
Eman Ismail 2:00
Okay, so I am in northern England, I'm in Manchester. I'm sat in my co working space, which is the most stunning space I've ever had to the kind of blessing to work in. It's very green and it was actually created and designed by a photographer. So he's a creative himself. So everything in here is just designed to inspire other creatives. It's absolutely stunning. So there are loads of plants, and it's very green. I'm actually sat in the greenhouse, there's a greenhouse in the building. And it's a really great place to be when you're on phone calls and recording podcasts because the acoustics are fantastic. And I actually have a little a little is an orange tree. Next to me, it's tiny, it's growing. And but I think someone's put it on the table so that it takes up, you know, room and nobody else comes and sits next to me because of you know, COVID it's actually on the table next to me, but I saw smelling oranges as well, which is quite nice.
Graham Allcott 3:02
So you know orange trees and surrounded by greenery not generally what you think of when you think of Manchester a No, not at
Eman Ismail 3:09
all. Not at all, which I think is what made me fall in love with this place was I was working in a co working space before I came here. But it was it was really inexpensive, which is fantastic because I've just started my business. And but it was, I mean, you get what you pay for. Right? So it was really grey and bland and it was actually in the city centre as well. So I was paying so much in parking fees. And then it just got to a point where I actually calculated how much I was spending on parking each month and thought I might as well just pay for an icicle working space that has free parking and managed to find one.
Graham Allcott 3:41
It's so funny, isn't it like with money where there's there's certain costs that you think about and then there's certain costs that are almost just hidden? Yes. You know, like commuting people get a pay rise but the job involves a longer commute and then they never think about how half of their pay rise is just taken up in the train season ticket.
Eman Ismail 4:00
Oh my gosh, I used to before starting InkHouse. I used to work in Bradford. So I used to commute to Bradford four days a week, and the amount of money I spent on petrol because I had to drive because the trains didn't get me back in time to pick up my son. And it was just insane. And I realised once I left that job, how much I was spending on petrol. And now I fill up my tank once, once every two and a half weeks, probably three weeks. So it's a big change. Yeah, it's those little, those little things that you spend money on that you don't even realise that really counts
Graham Allcott 4:35
money and rationality and logic that I'm in sort of increasingly thinking just do not go hand in hand. I think there's definitely a lot to explore around people's relationship with money, for sure. Let's talk about in house. So do you want to tell do the little spiel at the beginning about what InkHouse does and then we'll talk about how you started it as well.
Eman Ismail 4:59
Definitely. Okay. So I am an email conversion strategist and copywriter. I write revenue boosting, relationship building emails for business owners and ecommerce brands. So basically, I'm the person that business owners come to when they want to make money through their emails, when they know the value of email when they know that email works, and they believe in email, but they just don't know how to start selling through emails. Well, they might actually already be selling, but they know that they're not selling enough and they could be doing better. So I go in there and look for ways to boost that conversions and create money making a relationship building sequences for them.
Graham Allcott 5:35
Do you think people are returning to email as a marketing tool? Do you think it's almost having a bit of a comeback?
Eman Ismail 5:43
I think so. I think there was a period in time which people spoke about email being dead, which was not the case back then. Anyway, I think that came with the advent of social media. I can understand why people were having that conversation, but I don't think social media took away from email at all. I think emails remain Kind of consistently part of people's lives. And if anything, as technology advance, our relationship with email got closer. So we all Now have you know, emails, most of us have our emails on our phone. Most of all, most of us have our emails pinging through to our phones all day and all night actually, unless you have, you know, a bit of restraint. But yeah, I absolutely have seen more people returning to email now because of COVID. And people having to move their businesses online, people are really starting to appreciate the value of email. And I was reading an article yesterday, I can't remember the exact stats but there's been a huge boom in the number of e commerce businesses that have emerged in this period over the last few months. And I just got me really excited because that means there's so many more ecommerce brands to get in touch with and to to work with
Graham Allcott 6:48
and more people to give you money and grow your business. Absolutely. I have for those of you listening are not part So I've just recently started my own email mailing list. So Think Productive, my company's had a, an email list for, you know, for pretty much its entire history for the last sort of 10-11-12 years. But me personally, I've never had one before. And I just started it 678 weeks ago, something like that. And it's been a really, it's been a really interesting journey, actually. But I think one of the things that it's really starting to teach me is just how intimate your communication via email can be. So my thing is called Rev up for the week and it goes out on a Sunday. And like you say, I think a lot of people are picking up those messages, you know, in their kitchen on a Sunday evening or, you know, sort of Lastly, on a Sunday night, they're pretty reading it all up early on a Monday morning, and that was the idea for me is like put something in people's inboxes for the sort of start point of the week. And that's like their sort of theme for the week ahead or just something to think about for the week ahead. But it seems to me like if you can get that, right it's, it's a it's a very genuine connection. I've kind of started following a few people's email lists myself as well, which I hadn't really been doing much before. But do you find that you can get almost like a more sort of deeper connection with people via email than you can on social media? Because it's like you're in, like your world and their world rather than interest as well, or Instagrams world or something like that. Like it just kind of feels different to me.
Eman Ismail 8:28
Absolutely. I mean, practically anyway, we have no control over who sees our social media posts, right. So the algorithm controls that which means the majority of people aren't even seeing your post. So email is you know, the best way to ensure deliverability it has the kind of the highest deliverability rates you can guarantee and you pretty much guaranteed that when you know when you send an email most people are going to get it unless obviously some emails bounced and that kind of thing. And then the other thing with that is that you know, people mistake email for being a Once in many markets into when it's actually a one to one marketing tool, it's a very, like you said, intimate way to communicate with people. Because for every person that's getting that email, they are opening it as an individual and reading it as an individual. So it's almost like a private personal letter that you're writing to one person. So that's one of the biggest email tips I always give is, don't write your emails as if you're right into hundreds or thousands of people, right as if you are into one person because that's exactly what you're doing. And it is and that's how you build the connection and you build the trust and that's how you I guess, nurture people from being subscribers and its customers.
Graham Allcott 9:40
And the other thing is a lot of people reply right so then it does become a very intimate one to one experience because people are sending you back direct questions and you know, you're having that kind of one to one dialogue with people
Eman Ismail 9:52
exactly. And that's when you know emails are really good. Another workout when people hit reply for you to have you know, and encourage someone to As they go out of their way, hit reply and reply back to you and talk to you. It's a huge accomplishment. So yeah, that means your emails are doing brilliantly. Thanks,
Graham Allcott 10:08
Musketeer. I yeah, I'm gonna keep up my policy of replying individually to all of them. And then yeah, we'll we'll see how that goes. If I scale it in the way that I want to scale it. I'm already slightly worried that I'm going to spend the whole of Monday just replying to people's emails, but actually, like, it's a really enjoyable part of my week at the moment is getting those messages from people and replying so I'll keep doing that. So let's talk about how you got started then. So how long is IncHouse been going festival
Eman Ismail 10:43
in Carlos has been going almost two years. So in September at 2020 and a few months, um, it'll be two. So still very young.
Graham Allcott 10:52
And you you had a sort of lightbulb bulb moment a bit before that way you decided that you were a writer as well. So How did that how did it all get started for you?
Eman Ismail 11:03
Yeah. So I mean, I'd always wanted to be a writer, I just didn't know that I could actually get paid to be a writer. I didn't know that that was a thing. I was kind of taught in school that you're either rather JK Rowling or you're, you know, you're poor as a writer, you can't make from writing. So that was the kind of message that I'd always grown up with. But it was something that I really loved to do and is what made me happy. And I was actually teaching in Milan in Italy for for a summer. And I got the chance to write for a publication. And they paid me at the end, they paid me for my article. And I remember sitting on this, Melanie's veranda with the host families, stalk the host somebody that I was staying with, and they were so lovely. But they had a dog I was terrified of dogs, by the way, but this dog came was lovely. She was a golden retriever and so she was the only dog that I've got that I'm not scared of or that haven't been afraid of. So she was sitting next to me and I remember writing the article and just thinking, well, wow, I can be a writer. If, if I want to be artha. Some people will pay me for this. I just need to find a way to make this and to make this work. So, I mean, years later, I tried a few different things. I went in and out of freelancing, I couldn't find a way to make it work. I couldn't find a way to get out of being paid really terrible rates. And eventually, I decided to go and work for a charity. So I was running that communications department, and my job involved doing a whole lot of copywriting. I was managing their social media, I was producing that video content, I was responsible for helping to come up with the campaigns and you know, managing all the copywriting for the campaigns. And the thing I enjoyed most about that job was the copywriting and I thought I'd actually stay in that job for a few years. I saw myself there for the long term. But it had me commuting as I mentioned a bit earlier on. So I was, I was on the motorway for nearly three hours every day. And I'd get home to my son who would be fast asleep. He was a very strong willed child, even at the time, and he'd refused to go to bed unless he'd seen me. So he'd sit up on the sofa and wait and try and stay awake and he couldn't. So every night he'd fall asleep and I'd walk in and he'd be asleep on the couch. And it was just more and more difficult to deal with every time. Every time that happened. And I was just starting to feel really exhausted. I was really unhappy. And I remember complaining about something at work one day and my colleague, he was a friend, and she said something to me about me always complaining. And I just thought, wow, when did I become that person who was always complaining because she was absolutely right. And I just had to have a moment of reflection where I thought, this isn't who I am. I'm known for being happy and bubbly. But my work situation just made me so unhappy. I was also doing a lot of overtime, which honestly, I wasn't paid for. So I was working a lot of evenings and weekends, and it just wasn't working out. So I did try to have a conversation with my manager, and I let him know that, you know, this isn't something I can keep doing and I need something to change. And can we talk about flexible working hours, can I work from home more, because it was a job I could absolutely do from home. I was already doing it from home once, one one day every week and an axe so could have done it full time from home. And but that's not what he wanted. I also asked for a pay raise. And he agreed to give me a pay raise but it wasn't as high as I wanted it to be. And it wasn't, you know, particularly high but what I was asking for And yeah, it just didn't work out. So I decided to resign. And I was terrified because I had no savings. I had no backup plan. I just knew that I really wanted to set up my own business. I wanted to focus on copywriting. I felt like something really good could come out of me just focus in on copywriting. And that actually having worked in this,
this organisation for a year that actually picks up some really great skills, I picked up a great ad created a great network for myself, that maybe I could do this. I also started listening to a podcast called Hot Copy Podcast and every day on my commute, and it's a podcast by two ladies called Belinda Weaver and Kate tune their copywriters and they basically run through how to be a better copywriter houses, copywriting, business, all the things that you need, that kind of thing and by the time I finish Binging all those episodes, I thought, I think I can do this. So I left that job being terrified. But actually an hour after I left that job the, the CEO sent me a message asking me to ask him if he could hire me as a freelancer. So that was he was my first client. And by Monday I had at left on the Friday, so by Monday, I had another client and then by the end of that week, had a look another couple of inquiries. And so
Graham Allcott 16:31
These people that you knew,
Eman Ismail 16:32
yeah, this was this was the network that created it just fantastic. Because I, I had, I'd obviously been working with a lot of people in the charity sector, and I haven't particularly seen myself as as working, you know, with charities, and honestly, only because, I mean, I loved working with charities, but with charities is usually the conversation of budget a lot does you know, we don't have the budget for this. We don't have the budget for that, and I don't really exhausted by it just wanted to work with, with businesses that you know, didn't, weren't so I guess, constrained by by the budget. And then the other thing was actually found it really, I guess emotionally and psychologically draining working with charities, it had a huge, I guess, psychological effect on me. Because every day we were just talking. And I was writing about and remember I was I was reading and writing up a case studies for the people that we supported, who were living in the most horrendous conditions. So every day was just me write and read and hearing about war and death and pain and suffering and poverty. And it was so much and I actually wrote a blog post Not long after about the need for charity professionals to have psychological support and therapy as part of the, I guess, the package of working in the charity sector
Graham Allcott 17:58
because there's that the other side to that as well. Isn't there which is that you? If you work in a charity, you're often surrounded by stories of kindness and human ingenuity and resilience, and there's this sort of inspiring part of it. But then, yeah, if you're working in, you know, a charity that's about, like, say, conflict or cancer or whatever, then, you know, it just it does become the fact that you're just surrounded by such negative stuff, like, all the time, you know, I remember, I used to do some work with one of the cancer charities. And in in the culture of that organisation, there was a very dark sense of humour. Because I think that's the only way that you can deal with the fact that, you know, you have cancer in your email signature, and like, you know, you're using that word all the time and, and sort of talking about all those, you know, the really bad stories the whole time. So, you know, they're kind of created this whole safety blanket around themselves, which was to use this dark humour as the as the sort of kitchen If you like,
Eman Ismail 19:00
yeah, it's the coping mechanism. And I think now that you've said that, I think the issue was, it was an international food charity. So obviously, I was dealing with a lot of poverty and hunger, which was just horrific. And then the other thing is, you know, because it was an international charity, we never got to meet the people that we supported and help. So they were really not many cases or instances where we heard about, you know, a family coming out of poverty and, you know, happy things. So that was really difficult to deal with. So I never intentionally kind of, I never saw myself working with charities long term, but because that was my network, and those were the people that I'd met and I just come out of the charity sector. A lot of the people that wanted to work with me are from the charity sector, which was great again, I love I love working with charities, but I just noticed that I had to really be careful around it. So all those first few clients were charities and for the first probably eight or nine months, all my clients Which charities until I started to an intentionally decided to move away from working so much with charities and start focusing on working with that with businesses too.
Graham Allcott 20:12
Nice. It's good to have the range, I think as well. Yes. And you started the business. So when you started the business a, you were quite young and B, you had a toddler. So just wondering, in terms of a stage in life to start a business. Do you think that was a good thing to start young? Or would it sounded like it was, you were terrified when you left the job was it was it quite a daunting prospect?
Eman Ismail 20:37
It was extremely daunting, but it was also really exciting and exhilarating and liberating. And no one's ever asked me that question before. It's such a good question. I must have been 26 when I set up InkHouse, and I remember feeling like life is only going to get harder. I'm only I'm only gonna get I'm only gonna have more responsibilities, I'm only going to have more bills to pay. And so if I want to start a business, now is the time, this is gonna be the best time for me to do that. I remember really clearly feeling like that I'm thinking that and then just going for it. And I've never really stopped to think about my age. The only time that I have if I'm completely honest is when? right at the beginning, I'd have conversations with people and I guess, again, two years ago, I wasn't really, I wasn't as established as I am now. Not that you know, I'm not Marie Forleo or anything, but I wasn't as established and trusted as I am now. And I used to have a lot of silly conversations with people and I used to think this person is just taking the Mick out of me because they can see that I'm young, and I'm a woman. And you know, I'm visibly Muslim as well. I am from the BAME community as well on top of that, and they probably think I'm a younger than I am because I don't say this in a good way. I still want to look my age. But you know, people meet me and I'm 28 now, but people meet me and think I'm like, 19-20 is highly frustrating. So I often used to think people are just don't take me seriously. And but actually, once they started working with me, they took me very serious.
Graham Allcott 22:19
You even got on your website, some of you said something like, I am older than I look. Don't worry. Yes.
Eman Ismail 22:24
Yeah, exactly, exactly. And it's, and to be honest, it's taken me some time to kind of get over that. But I feel like now that I've been doing this for a couple of years, and now that this might sound might sound a bit, I don't know, bragging I hope it doesn't. But now that kind of my reputation kind of precedes me, like people generally come to me and have heard about me from someone else, or I've been referred to them from someone else. So we don't even have, you know, weird conversations anymore. And I feel much more kind of in control of this situation and like I am respected. So that was the only I think struggle For me in terms of in terms of my age,
Graham Allcott 23:02
when it comes to copywriting itself, do you have a secret source or a particular formula that you follow? Or like, is there is there a thing that you think that you do really well, in the way that you use words that makes your work stand out?
Eman Ismail 23:18
Well, the first thing I would say is that people usually think that copywriting is an art and it's a creative form. And I guess in some ways, it is but really, copywriting is a science so it is full of formulas and systems and processes and ways to do things. So yes, I definitely follow all of those that helped to make my copywriting successful and effective. But I think the main thing is that I'm not afraid to be myself. I'm not afraid to inject my own voice into my copy. And like if you join my newsletter, you will either love it or hate it because it is just It's just me and I, you, you will gauge very quickly whether you want to work with me and whether you know we'll gel. And so I think that's, that's what I do well,
Graham Allcott 24:11
and where where do you find all those formulas from and the kind of scientific side of it because I'm really curious about that because I'm probably I don't know, even though I write business books, I think of it as a creative thing and I think of it as being more artistic than scientific, which is probably completely wrong of me by the sounds of it. But, you know, where do you find those those formulas from in terms of email newsletters and, and copywriting kind of science,
Eman Ismail 24:41
books, books and courses, and I've done so many. And you know, there are some people who are so against people and taking courses and who think that courses are, you know, just scams and whatever else. But honestly, there are things that you need to learn about copy Writing in order to do it well, and the reason I say it's a science is because this isn't like a get creative writing where you are really kind of expressing yourself. Copywriting is about the art of persuasion. And it's about persuading someone to do what you want them to do. And that involves, you know, sales, marketing, psychology, all sorts of things. And so there are best practices. And I think you can definitely stray from those best practices, but you need to know what the rules are, in order to break them. And yeah, I actually have my own online copywriting course for business owners, and I created that because I had a lot of business owners who would come to me and they were right at the beginning of the business journey, and they didn't have the budget really to hire not just the copywriter hire anyone really. So I felt I found that I was turning a lot of people away. We didn't feel great. And so I decided to to Face to face workshops that I've been doing into into an online course. So yes I believe in online courses I have taken so many I am in I mean I'm always learning even now I'm signed up so couple of courses that I actually implement and go through and you know, and create time on my schedule and my calendar weekly to progress through these courses. And I'm also in in a couple of membership communities with an a mastermind as well, with copywriters that are just so much more successful than me and who are so much smarter than me. Because I, I just my philosophy in life is to never ever be the smartest person in the room. I always want to be around people. I want to be around people that made me feel really dumb, because I just want to learn from them. I want to learn everything that they know. And I'm so lucky to be in a number of communities have eyes, but that is the case. There are people who are where I want to be in five years. And, you know, they share their strategies, they share their mistakes and lessons learned. And again, they even just sharing their copy, like when they put up their copy to be reviewed by our coaches. First thing I do is check it out and I'm reading through it and I am I'm going through and I'm seeing what's what's good and what's working and what's not. And like you said earlier on about signing up to other people's email address, email newsletters, I have an entire inbox dedicated to signing up for the people's newsletters. So just seeing what other people are doing with that email and analyse analysing math and being really intentional about analysing that as well and seeing what's we know which emails made me want to open them which subject lines maybe want to actually open the email and why and what worked what worked what didn't work and you know what a people's newsletters doing, what are they talking about? All that good stuff. So yeah, I get a lot of inspiration from from other copywriters too.
Graham Allcott 27:59
Nice, we'll put a link to your course. in the show notes, that'll be a copy on busy.com if people want to check it out, are there other courses or books that you'd recommend as well like things that influenced you? early on?
Eman Ismail 28:12
Yes. And so Joanna Wiebe at copy hackers, and is just amazing. And it's, it's really strange actually because she has always been someone that I've learned from and then just last week, she hired me to do some work for her which was amazing. And but she does have got she gives away so much free content. So you don't even have to be a copywriter to benefit from it. You can be a business owner and benefit from it immensely. So if people check out Tuesday tutorials by copy hackers, those are 20 minute really fast lessons that go through a whole range of stuff and just really improve your copywriting skills and to essentially boost conversions and through your copy. So that's one and Tom Albrighton has written a book as well. Ah, what is the name of that book? And it's completely gone. But check out sometime I reckon
Graham Allcott 29:08
we can put it in the show notes as well. We'll we'll find it afterwards and put it in the show notes. Thank you. And
Eman Ismail 29:13
I think
hardcopy podcast is a great one. And a lot of copywriters listen to it, but it's also really beneficial for and business owners who just want to improve their copywriting skills.
Graham Allcott 29:23
And I think it's one of those things. I mean, you mentioned business owners there and obviously, if your job is in comms or in copywriting, then it's, it's, you know, 100% specific, but actually, everybody is trying to persuade people in their emails and, you know, even verbal communication. Like it comes from the way you think about written communication to write so kind of feels like one of those skills that perhaps a lot of people, they practice every day, but they never really learn or develop the skill consciously.
Eman Ismail 29:54
Absolutely. And I think that's one of the difficult things about being a copywriter. When people come to you, who guess don't don't really value the skill of copywriting anyway in the first place. That's probably the first issue. And you often find yourself having conversations with people where they say, Okay, well, how much is this? And then you tell them and they're like, Oh, I can go and do it myself. I'll go and do it. So, because writing is a thing that everybody can physically do. It becomes a case of people feeling like, well, I don't need I don't need a copywriter. I can I can just do it. And I would say, and, of course, if you're in the early stages of a business, you you kind of have to write your own copy. So it's a very good idea to invest a little in learning how to do that properly. But when you can't hire a copywriter, I would say go for it. If I could hire a copywriter and write the budget hire a copywriter. I would absolutely would and I know that all the top copywriters in my industry and a lot of them don't write their own copy. They hire other copywriters to write the copy and that's often because First is a time thing. And so it just outsource in those things that you don't have time to do anymore. But also, it's about you being too close to your business, and needing someone else who isn't as close to step in and to tell you what is great about it and what will encourage other people to invest in you and to trust you and to like you. Because we kind of come from a place when it's our own business, we feel like we know everything there is to know and it's true. I mean, there is there is no one who will know more about your business than you. But when it comes to copywriting the kind of questions that I have to ask when I am first talking to a client is not just you know, who is the target audience? Or who is your ideal customer? I'm asking, What does your customer most want from life? What is their greatest desire? What are their greatest fears? What keeps them up at night? How do they start their day? How do they wind down at night? What is stop them from buying from you what? What does little voice in their head? Tell them when it's time to hit that Bible? And what can you do to overcome those objections, all that kind of stuff? So we go so far into that. And sometimes it's it's hard to, to be able to do that alone without someone guiding you through that process.
Graham Allcott 32:21
Yeah, I mean a bit more of an objective methodology around it. Exactly. And let's shift gears a little bit and talk about work life balance. So on your website, you are very clear that you keep good boundaries around your time and like you two met before, you want to make sure that you're there to put your son to bed and to have that family life outside of work. And then during your working hours, it's like you are just focused on getting stuff done. So it really feels like there's a focus to what you do. What's your what's your sort of general philosophy around work life balance and just drawing There's boundaries.
Eman Ismail 33:00
Well, I created this business because I wanted to build a lifestyle that worked for me and my son, because my lifestyle wasn't working for us before that. So that's one of the main things. I always tried to keep guests at the front of my mind. And it's been difficult because obviously, when you're in the early stages of business building, it really is the case of this probably this is the case for every business owner, if you allow it to the work will never stop, because there is just no end to the amount of things that you could be doing. There's always something else you could have done. So it's been really hard for me to kind of create that boundary. And there definitely been times when I haven't been able to maintain that boundary. But certain rules have always had in place of things like Firstly, clients don't have my I've never had my personal number. There was a time when I did give out a business number but I removed that actually from my website and everywhere. So now clients can only talk to me and even leads in inquiries not conveying, they have to book a call through my scheduling software calendly in order to speak to me, so that is that is very scheduled, and it it, you know, nicely slots into my working hours, instead of me kind of being called the old days, and sometimes, you know, and at all hours of the day and night. So, that was, that was a lesson that I kind of had to learn. But one of the other things is I don't do, I don't contact clients in the evenings or weekends. So if I get an email from a client in the evening, I might even you know, I might actually reply, but I'll schedule it for the for the next day for the next morning during working hours, so that they only get it when I'm working because one of the best things that one of my mentors told me when I first started out was that you have to train your clients and you have to really educate them in how you do business. So if I don't want my clients to contact Me, you know, in the evenings and on weekends, then I should not reply to them. When they do contact me. I also make it really clear. I have eight my opening hours in my email signature. So people know that I'm not available on evenings and weekends. I, I explained that to clients when in my onboarding process, I'm not available in evenings and weekends, and that these are my working hours. I I would say that, you know, I do work on weekends, but I try not to make it client work because it always kind of kind of feels like clients have hijacked my weekend if I end up doing client work on the weekend. So I generally have a rule where if I'm going to do work, I'm going to be really intentional about it. So I'm going to enjoy the day with my son and have and spend some time with him. And then usually when he goes to sleep, I will get my laptop out and I will do work and I used to feel really guilty about that because I used to think that I was running my business the wrong way. And it, it was, it wasn't until I joined my mastermind. And my coach kind of walked us through this idea that it's completely fine to work weekends, if that's what you want to do. Just be intentional about it that changed everything for me. So I probably schedule about three hours of work on a Saturday and a few on a Sunday as well. And it doesn't feel like my entire weekend is me doing work, because it's just really intentional. And I've laid out those hours beforehand. And I know when I'm going to do work,
Graham Allcott 36:36
I guess if it's the work that you have planned for you and not client work, then if you get to the weekend and you're really tired or something, then you can just change that and just come back to that on Monday. Right? Exactly.
Eman Ismail 36:48
And business building work is my favourite type of work so it doesn't feel like work. It feels really fun. And I feel like I'm excited to have some time. to just spend on, you know, better in my business
Graham Allcott 37:04
nice. Tell me about productivity, what are the things that particularly fuel you in your work and help keep you on track and keep you focused?
Eman Ismail 37:14
Well, one of the things is the daily deadline that I have, which is apt for that 30. I have to get up and go and pick my son up from nursery. So that's a really good thing that keeps me on track. It helps me stay focused, because I know I've only got a you know, a limited amount of time to get stuff done. I also use theme days that was again taught to me by joanna Wiebe from copy hackers. She teaches you to use theme days and to really, to basically only do one type of thing a day. So Mondays, for example, are learning Mondays for me so I focus on getting up to date and getting up to speed with all my courses and membership, community resources and that kind of thing. And that's been amazing because it meant that I actually implement what I'm learning and I have time to implement what I'm learning. And Tuesdays and Wednesdays are client days. So I know Tuesdays Wednesdays, I'm focused on doing that. Thursdays are my marketing and business development days, which is why we're recording this podcast. My Thursday, I pick the Thursday to stay aligned with my theme days. Friday is my content day content Friday. So I focus on creating my own content for my own business. And I've recently started doing email tear downs of big brands. So that's been really fun. And I do I do those on a Friday.
Graham Allcott 38:39
What's it What's it email tear down? Oh,
Eman Ismail 38:42
an email tear down is a review basically like an audit of someone's entire email funnel. So the last one I did was Kylie Jenner's company and Kylie Cosmetics. So I went through her. I went through the customer experience, from her website to emails. I I did a whole entire audit of her emails. And what I found was not great, by the way. So if you want to check that out, you want to check that out, go check it out on my website, but it was really fun and oh my gosh, people loved it. I think small business owners just loved seeing and hearing that even the biggest businesses get it wrong sometimes. And I'm about to release another one actually, where I tear down Vance's email funnels. So that was, that was really cool as well. So I spent my Fridays doing that. And just, oh, I also write my email content on a Friday as well. So I like to botch. I write all my email newsletters for the month in one day, and scheduling them schedule them all as well. So then I don't have to worry about it again until my next dedicated content Friday for newsletters comes around. That's a really great way to keep productive and to stay on top of sending my emails out regularly and consistently because it can get hard for me otherwise. I also know, by the way, other copywriters that do that differently and someone that I know and love she schedules a she writes her emails literally half an hour before she sends them out. Yeah. So they're really different, obviously ways to do that, but that's just how I stay productive.
Graham Allcott 40:18
Yeah, my approach with my weekly email at the moment is I, I tend to start thinking about it on the Monday and I'll try and write it kind of Tuesday Wednesday. But you know, I'm talking to you on a Thursday, and I haven't written anything yet for this Sunday's one, right. So I it only once did it actually get to me writing it on Friday night and Saturday morning. And that was I did quite a long and quite detailed thing around Black Lives Matter and I really wanted to work hard on it and make it good. Yeah. So I ended up putting quite a lot more time into that than I do on the the more regular Weekly ones. But yeah, I don't have like a fixed thing for it. But I suppose that the other question about the theme days, because it sounds like a really great setup and a really nice rhythm. I love the fact that your Mondays are dedicated to learning and it's like, you know, you start the week with that sense of possibility. I think that's really cool. But then what happens if Monday morning 9:15am or something, you get an email from a really valued regular client and they're saying, Hey, we want to, we want to engage you for four days and our deadline is this Friday, like, do you have weeks where it all just goes completely out the window? And do you have ways of trying to protect that that rhythm because it sounds like a good rhythm?
Eman Ismail 41:43
They such a good question. And the answer to that is that I have I decided a long time ago not to take on urgent work. Okay. Yeah, at the beginning of when I first set up in college, what I did was charged an extra kind of 25% for crazy deadlines, especially those that have be working evenings and weekends. And then actually, I just kind of got to the point where I thought, I, I really don't like this, like, it makes me dislike my job because the stress and the anxiety that comes with having to work on a really tight deadline that I didn't see come in when everything else is quite meticulously laid out in my week. And is it's not fun. And I'm also really aware that when I feel like that, I bring it home with me. So if I'm anxious and stressed about work, not bring it home, and, you know, my son gets the brunt of that. And that's not what I want. So I stopped taking on urgent work about a year ago, and I've told all my clients, I don't do urgent work, and even when I'm on calls with people who are just you leads and we just have any no office conversations. I tell them I'm not the type of copywriter that you want to hire, when you need work doing tomorrow or the end of this week. Yeah. My waiting list is anything between three to six weeks long so people who got on the phone to me know that I mean you Start the project for another month. And I'm just really upfront about that. And if it doesn't work for some people, which it doesn't, that's completely fine. It just means that you know, we can't work together, but most people are fine with it.
Graham Allcott 43:09
Hmm. And that's a really sounds like you're in a really strong position in terms of having that pipeline to be able to then turn down those things you know, if you're desperate to keep every single client or desperate for the next one, so slightly different.
Eman Ismail 43:24
Absolutely. I do have to say that it did take me a long time to get to that point. But there have been times when I've not been in the greatest position and I have still said no to kind of work that didn't work that didn't work for me or work that wasn't paying well. And there was one January where I had zero inquiries and adjust remote sorry, zero good inquiries. I had a couple of people call me about some about working the wanting to pay me peanuts, and I remember thinking I still think With telling me to say yes to this, because I really have no work. But I think I've made those difficult decisions as well, in those times when I really did need the work to also say no and also trust in my, the work that I have been doing because I market myself like crazy. I really work hard on that. And so I kind of have to trust that it will come back to me, and that, you know, I will continue to get inquiries, even if I do have dry spells sometimes. But you're right, it's now at the point where I feel quite confident in the kind of stream of inquiries that come through.
Graham Allcott 44:37
I read reminds me of the early days of think productive, we had basically no work coming in. It was very, very early stages. And we had an inquiry from a big tobacco company, and they wanted to do they wanted to do less work with us. And obviously the dilemma then is do I want to spend my time making tobacco companies more productive And it was this real moral dilemma to because it was also involved, the first person that we brought on to be a freelance trainer. And so he had no work. And me saying no to this inquiry also meant I was saying no to him getting paid, as well as my own my own moral decision on saying no to it. And it felt it felt like one of the hardest decisions because, you know, your real loyalty is to is to try and build your business. But I still, I look back on it now. And I'm still pretty convinced I made the right call.
Eman Ismail 45:34
It's a hard one isn't that it's really tough.
Graham Allcott 45:37
Yeah. And I think it's also it's a It feels like a very different and it feels like a different moral dilemma when it's your business versus if you're working in a company and you want to take on a new client, right? So yes, you have the sort of the kudos aspect of, you know, if that client thing if you're within a business, maybe you have some kind of target to hit around sales and stuff, but when it's your own bread and butter, and it's your identity is so wrapped up in that business succeeding, that it feels like you want to just do everything that you possibly can to to be loyal to your business and make it work but there are there are certain lines for me that I don't want to cross for sure, agreed. And tell me about the the future as you see it because it feels like you. Like you've made very clear very boundaried decisions around setting up your work, you'll your work around your life rather than the other way around and creating the right kind of lifestyle for you. And it sounds like at different points you've had the ability to to look at things like taking on urgent work as being things even I'm not doing that right now. I'm going to set that up as my next boundary or the next thing that I'm going to change or the next part of the setup. So I'm just wondering Do you have like a long term vision for how you want the business to look? And how do you think about how you define success and happiness in your work?
Eman Ismail 47:09
Right now I'm focused on re actually throwing my current website in the bin and starting again, and doing a whole rebrand. Oh, wow. Yeah. The reason for that is because I firstly my copywriting skills have improved immensely from when I first wrote that website two years ago. So I want it to better reflect to me and who I am today. But also because I want to set up my website as almost like an employee. So I want it to do the work for me, I want it to do the persuading. For me, I want to get clients solely off my website and clients who've never spoken to me before, but who go on my website and are convinced by my copy of my website that they want to hire me and I know that's entirely possible, because firstly, I know the power of great copy, but also because I see it work for the people. So that is my next plan. And I say that because that feeds into how my life will or how I imagine my life will then look, because one of the biggest things I really want to do that has been kind of a gasp and it's been on my mind for a little bit, I didn't even know I wanted this until I heard another copywriter called Helen Dibble, talk about the fact that she does it. I want to afford a four day week, I only want to work Monday to Thursday, and I want to give myself Friday's off now at the minute, that is not going to happen. Not gonna happen right now. But I love the fact that I'm thinking about it and that it's there. And I can kind of, I know that's what I want now so I can start working towards it. And I think my website is a big part of that. As for happiness and success. I would love to say that I you know, money doesn't mean anything to me, but it does. I have financial goals that I want to hit. They're gonna hit consistently. I will be happy when my business is making a certain amount. As Sorry, I will see that as that is my kind of one of my definitions of success is hitting my financial goals for my business. I'll be really happy about that.
Graham Allcott 49:13
And it's not a success for you or success for the business, do you not I mean, because I think sometimes, like, there's there's an amount of money that we all need to live. But there's also an amount of money that we think reflects our sort of worth in terms of our work and the business. And sometimes there's a slightly different things.
Eman Ismail 49:31
You're so right. And I think it is a really slippery slope. But for me, it's not about business, because I've never, I've never just made money just for the sake of making money. I make money and once I make money for the things that it gives me in my life for the safety and security that it gives me and my son for the thing that allows me to do from travelling to I guess even what we were talking about before where you know, we have those sense of values and morals. I feel like that is that's a luxury Like some people don't have the luxury to be able to stand by their values and stand by their morals. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, and, and all that stuff. So I, I see, you know, financial successes as a business thing. But primarily for me, it's a very personal thing that is connected to my life, and what I can build for my self, my son, because I've been in a place where I didn't have very much money, and I don't ever want to go back there again. So I had to add a spin. It's been a process, but I've really had to work through this idea of, it's okay to like money. It's okay. But most importantly, I want my business to give me you know what I set out for it to do so if it is taking up all my time, if it has me working evenings and weekends, if it's the only thing I can think about, which honestly, sometimes it does, and sometimes it is, I'm not quite there yet. But I mean, it's not serving its best. If I want to build a business where I can go away and you know, it can survive without me Firstly, and I don't have to worry about crumbling because I'm not there 24 seven, and also a business that allows me to live the life that I want to live and and 100% be the mum that I want it to be.
Graham Allcott 51:19
That's a good answer. One question I forgot to ask you earlier, which maybe we'll just use this as the the finishing up question. I'm thinking a lot at the moment about how I think through COVID. A lot of people obviously sort of questioning whether what they're doing for work is the right thing or they're having to pivot or they're having to redesign things. I'm just wondering if now that you've gone through this transition from being an employee to being a business owner. Is there anything that you look back on and you think, ah, I missed that from my days of being an employee, like, Is there a part of being a business owner that you didn't expect or You know, perhaps I didn't realise that you'd have to take on or anything like that.
Eman Ismail 52:04
I think the biggest thing for me and just the type of personality that I have is, I've always been a kind of Teacher's pet. So I like being a teacher's favourite. I like being the managers favourite and you know, getting praise and being told I'm doing a good job. And suddenly, when you're, when you're self employed, there's no one to tell you that you're doing a good job or that you're doing it right. There's you just you just alone. You're alone, for as long as you allow yourself to be because once you kind of hit that point where you think, Oh, I'm really isolated. I am making all these decisions by myself. I could really do with advice or someone to just bounce ideas off. And then you start searching for communities and Easter's start searching for people who are in a similar role to you or just other other freelancers or the business owners who understand what it's like to be a business owner. So that's one of the things I never saw come in. I didn't realise how much I wanted to be told that I was doing a good job until I didn't have it anymore.
Graham Allcott 53:05
It sounds like you've done a really good job in terms of connecting with the right community. So as well,
Eman Ismail 53:11
I have and that's one of the one of the first things I did actually, I set up my business in September, and by November, I knew that this business would not survive if I carried on the way I was, I think I was charging 10 pounds an hour. And I just thought this is I can't live on this. How does anyone do this? There must be something that I don't know. So I went out and searched for a community and someone to help me and a mentor. And by November I had that mentor, and within I mean, I actually got a call with her got an a half hour call with her. And I remember my family member being shocked at how much I paid for that half hour coaching call with her. But me knowing even that and when I didn't have very much money at all to spend on this coaching call. I understood that that was an investment and I was right because within two weeks I had made that investment buck 10 times is over. And within within four months, I'd quadrupled my rates with, you know, being in this community and with this coach. And then a month later, I had the best what was back then the best financial month of my life, simply because I had found help. And I found support, and I found a community. So that's one of the biggest things that I advocate. And I am not shy to invest in courses and communities, because I've seen that the return on investment is, is phenomenal.
Graham Allcott 54:30
That's really inspiring. And also just a really practical thing that that, you know, most of us can do in whatever industry we're in is going to find those mentors and find those people to help with the things that we're stuck on. And we're about time so it'd be really good to push people in your direction if they're interested in copywriting. And also just tell us about the course that people can find as well. So just yeah, how do people find you?
Eman Ismail 54:56
Thank you. So my website is in house.org.uk And you can find me across social media at in house writing. And if you go on my website, you'll find the links to my newsletter as well. That's where most people like to hear from me. And so my course is going to be available from I think, the third of August. So I'm not sure when this is going out. But if people follow me on social media, or sign up to my newsletter, they'll get updates when it's open.
Graham Allcott 55:21
Cool, this will be going out around that time as well. So you hear this? Yeah, you should be able to get that. And by the way, I think your current site's really good.
Eman Ismail 55:29
Thank you. Thank you so much.
Graham Allcott 55:31
Maybe there isn't such a big job as you think. Maybe
Eman Ismail 55:34
I will. I'm a perfectionist, so I have that issue anyway. But um, yeah, hopefully you like the next one better.
Graham Allcott 55:40
Nice. Well, it's been lovely having you on beyond busy and enjoy the rest of your day in rainy Manchester and I'm signing off from rainy Brighton.
Eman Ismail 55:51
Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Graham Allcott 55:59
So thanks again to Eman for being on the show. Thanks also to my producer, Mark Stedman. And for Emilie's help with putting all of this together. So I'm going to just talk to you about my new products, which I'd love you to be invested in, thinking about , giving some thought to. So we're launching a new online live programme, it's called Six Weeks to Ninja. It's gonna have very limited places. And we're only going to be about 30 places on this, and partly because it's the first one I've done. And partly because I like to keep it small. I like to make sure that there's enough time to really kind of get around everybody and, you know, really get to know what your hang ups are around productivity and how I can make that better, basically, so it's deliberately small. The idea is over six weeks on a Thursday evening, we are going to be taking you through all of the main chapters of my book, How to be a Productivity Ninja, and, more importantly, giving you homework, giving you some cajoling and coaching and really helping you to implement all the stuff that's in my book that will ultimately lead to really great productivity habits. And I'm not exaggerating when I say this, stress free working. So if that sounds good, then go to GrahamAllcott.com, you'll see a link on the homepage there to Six Weeks to Ninja. And it's basically first come first serve, we're going to we're going to put this first of all on my mailing list. And if you're not sign up to my mailing list, please do there's a link on my homepage there at GrahamAllcott.com and yeah, then when they're gone, they're gone. But there's going to be 30 places or so. And I'd love you to get involved with Six Weeks to Ninja as we launch this into the autumn. So really excited to share that with you really excited to have a whole bunch of you as part of that. And looking forward to It's the first time I've done this online. So I've been doing some one day Masterclasses over the last couple of years and again I try and keep the the sort of audience numbers pretty limited for that too, for the same kind of reason. But it's the first time that I personally have moved to doing sort of more complete online programmes. So it's, it's a big step, I'm excited about it. And really my interest in doing this because obviously Think Productive, my business, is working with companies all over the world. And it doesn't tend to be me doing those workshops, I have a whole team of really brilliant Ninjas who do that all the time. And for me, it's a really nice way to just kind of keep my toe in with what is happening in productivity and how people think about stuff and just for me to sort of help get my head into the psychology of the people that we work with in our audience. So that's kind of my interest with them doing the the live master classes in London. And I thought whilst that's not really an option, I'm as well investigate doing something a bit more. You know, regular online. So here we are, we're going to do it by zoom, it's going to be a six week programme. There'll be a whatsapp group to support people through that time as well. And yeah, just really looking forward to it. So go to GrahamAllcott.com, and you'll find out more. And our sponsors for the show, Think Productive. So if you're in a company and you want to bring us in to do workshops for your team, then we just have a whole army of productivity ninjas around the world. So thinkproductive.com, you'll find out more details about that. Find out where your nearest offices are nearest ninjas are, and all that good stuff. So thinkproductive.com for that, and the only other website I just wanted to mention is our show notes, and episode catalogue website, which has getbeyondbusy.com. So show notes for this episode will be there. All the links the previous episodes, and we have just gotten weekly. This is actually our first weekly podcast if you like because we have one last week with Stef and then this one. So we're now officially a weekly podcast. So that means if you're not subscribed, I'd love you to just hit your subscribe button on whatever your podcast app is. And please review and like and all that stuff. It really helps us. And we just have some really great, great, great, great guests coming up in the next few weeks. So looking forward to sharing those with you until next week.
That's it for me. Take care. Bye for now.
Links