10 Tips to Transition Your Business

Written by Tammy S. Durden

A couple of years ago I made a huge transition in my business. In fact, I exited one of my brands to be able to transition fully into another one full-time (this had been a side gig for a few years). I was excited about the transition but it was a lot of work. This is why I wanted to share these 10 tips to transition your business.

Change can be a bit frightening at times. Especially when you step out into a brand new area or newly learned skill. I have been through many changes and transitions over the years.

Before I give you my tips for transitioning, first, let’s discuss some reasons why you might want to transition your business.

Reasons you may want or need to transition your business:

No matter the reason for transitioning your online business there are ways you can prepare and minimize negative effects on your business and your clients.

I like to remind my clients that…

For most of us, our business will not be an overnight success. Creating, growing, and scaling a business is a journey. It takes time to build let alone have growth and be able to scale it.

The next change was to my company name. I wanted to help empower other disabled professionals to work from home as I knew how difficult it is for a disabled person to find work. In order to do this with my team, however, we needed to drop the lead generation as it was not a good fit and offer VA (virtual assistant services) + Social Media services for our clients.

Shortly after transitioning to a new brand/name I also added Bookkeeping Services (this was my corporate background) and kept social media with some VA work. I wanted our company to be the all-in-one place where your backend office needs were met.

I soon began taking more training and certification courses as well. This enabled me to transition our small team into a boutique digital marketing agency. We Offered digital marketing services for our clients including email marketing, SEO Blogging, social media management, and Facebook ads. Later, we added a virtual ‘in-house’ graphic designer because so many of our clients had never truly branded their company or wanted re-brand.

In the meantime, I also added coaching services due to a demand for them. I had mentored for many years (right after my first year of VA services) and I have been a Pastor’s Wife who counseled teens, women, couples, and families and did pre-marital counsel for over 25+ years. Therefore, in 2017 I created a coaching company. I did business coaching in addition to digital marketing with my team.

Finally, at the end of 2020, after 12 years in this industry, I decided to exit. I wanted to leave the agency so I could focus more on coaching along with teaching and speaking. My health was one of the main reasons I decided to make this change. The digital marketing agency had grown and I was managing a team. This meant I was spending many hours working (sometimes 12–18 hours). My business coach helped me discern that it was time to put my health before my business!

Why transition again? I transitioned again due to my health and because I knew business coaching, speaking, & online instruction were what I was meant to do! This is what I was meant to do!!!

So Fearless Business Boss and Fearless Gal Boss (under the Fearless Business Boss brand) were born. I have to tell you that absolutely love coaching and helping others move their business forward. And I know this is what I’ve been meant to do!

You come to times in your life and business when you KNOW it is time for something to change. You must evaluate and weigh options and make a decision or choice. For me, this was one of the hardest, yet smartest decisions I’ve ever made.

I believe we often start out in business geared toward one general area overall or possibly even a niche. And as we start our business we do not think about the possible transitions it will likely take in the coming years.

Often times client demands start to cause you to turn in the pathway. Other times it may be that you now have a family and want more time with them or your health may need more of your attention. Or perhaps your interests change. There can be a number of reasons to transition your online business but make sure you are ready and have steps in place to make it easier for you and your clients.

Looking back on your journey do you see how you arrived here?

Do you see any similarities between my journey with yours?

Believe it or not, I’m going through another transition in my business life. Once again, I’ve come to a crossroads. Where I must make a decision in the direction I am headed.

My current choices involve (1) I can keep going as I am or (2) I can try to reach out to a niche part of my audience to help them by doing group coaching. By adding this group coaching opportunity I think I will be able to help more people and in the process, I will even help myself.

This is not something I ever considered in the past. When I began this new business group coaching was not even in my thought process. I honestly thought I would always do 1 on 1 coaching, speaking, (some) writing, and online teaching.

I found that at the end of my 1-on-1 coaching programs the clients wanted to continue to receive help but often continuing an ongoing 1-on-1 business or marketing coaching program was cost-prohibitive. I also wanted to stay connected and help them continue to move forward in their businesses at a reasonable cost without giving hours and hours away. The group business coaching is a win-win for us both.

I have now invited some clients to join the group I developed. I chose to make it an “invitation only” group for those I believe will continue to put the work into it as well as be a good fit for those already in the group. It is a way for clients to have access to me and coaching at a reasonable price point. It has worked very well for those who chose to accept the invitation. And I really enjoyed it. Most love group coaching for accountability.

After having success and really loving the first group I have decided to offer a very niche group that will be for Christian Service-Based Business Owners. I’m excited to get this one started soon. In this group, you do not have to have gone through one of my programs. You can simply join the group coaching program.

A note about transferring your business…

When you are transitioning your business the most important thing is to take the time to do the steps to prepare for it.

There are a number of ways you can prepare yourself and your business.

Hartford even recommends having your business appraised before a transition.

Whether you transition, change your focus, or exit, these steps should help you through it. As promised, these tips to transition your online business should help you.

Determining what will happen to clients can be extremely stressful for you and your clients. When I knew I was going to exit my agency the first thing I did was find a great provider who could take on all of my current clients. Fortunately having some influence in this industry by this time, I was able to secure another wonderful provider (whom I had worked with previously) for my clients. She also agreed to keep them at the same rate for the next several months.

She and I worked together to give clients the best possible outcome. I believe we had a rate of at least 90%+ client retention and about 95%+ were very pleased with how the transition was managed.

One day you will find yourself thinking about the future and what it may look like for you. I can tell you, in my case, that I did not expect the changes that happened in my business. For me, most of the transitions were natural and flowed with the course of the business and client needs.

The transition at the end of 2020, however, was a significant change, that for the most part went very smoothly. There will always be a few bumps and hangups but overall it was executed well. I know this last transition went smoothly for two reasons.

I hope you have already developed some of these steps and tips for your business. If not, please take the first step today! I cannot stress how important processes & systems are for your business.

Tammy Durden is a business & marketing coach specializing in helping online service providers start, grow, and scale their businesses. If you need help with your business please email info@fearlessbusinessboss.com

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