Just as your taste in clothes matures, so will you and your bellydance business over time. Evolution and change is necessary to stay on top with trends, personal growth, to break through hurdles and of course, to keep things interesting.
One myth I hear all to often is that if you are to make a successful business as a belly dancer you are either a) a teacher at a studio/owner of a studio or b) restaurant dancer or c) an event producer and I simply have to disagree.
Everything from publishing a magazine, being an author, designing clothing/costuming, creating an online studio, coaching bellydancers in business or in a skill there is demand for are examples of ways to diversify your business.
Once thing that came up often during coaching sessions from my clients was that they felt they hit a ceiling in their business and were not sure how to get back the motivation and take their bellydance business to the next level. They knew in their hearts that a-c was not their cup of tea, and felt stuck having to do one or the other to pay the bills.
Ever felt this way? To this I say…EVOLVE! Look at Madonna, she is a chameleon! Every few years she re-invents herself, her image, her message, her musical style and it reflects where she is at that time on her personal journey. When you find you feel stuck, stop mudding around and simply do the thing you feel you are ready to do in your heart and do not apologize.
Bored?
Bored of your dancing? Take on a totally different genre for a year and see what happens. For example, if you are oriental train in American tribal, or why not devote a year to a specific folkloric dance, or how about a year to a new regional style like Debkeh, or Turkish oriental, or khaleegi, and etc…
You will be amazed what it will do for your dance, and your mental health. You may even find that this new style or genre you grow to love even more than what you were doing before.
Feel your website and marketing materials just do not represent who you are anymore in your business? Great, so change it. You do not need a fortune or a website development degree to update your website with fresh pictures, content, and do a few simple color changes with basic coding you copy/paste from Google. Do not let fear of these technical aspects hold you back from doing a week revamping project that will make you so much happier.
Tired of teaching? Then do not teach. Tired of dancing at restaurants? Then find something else instead and get creative. You are your own boss, you decide what you want the next year to look like, so why wait? Show how you have evolved in your bellydance business.
In the past year I have really had to fine-tune what I want my business to accomplish, and where I want to go. Remembering my main goal, this led to some hard but necessary decisions, and now I have reduced certain aspects to make time for other ventures, and have a strong focus on my one main goal and put 90% of my time and energy on that.
When I started 8 years ago it was all about restaurants 5 days a week. Eight years later, all I focus on are private parties as that is what I found to be very, very good at. Everything from classes, to costume design has been reduced as I have evolved and have chosen other paths to put my time into.
So tell me, what do you want to accomplish in your business, and how can you project that into your business? What changes would you make? What needs to be added or subtracted?
Hope this blog help to get you to think about these things and motivates you to look at your branding and bellydance business activities and see if they reflect you and your goals today and not the you from 5 years ago.
For more information about me, my coaching experience, and so on and so forth, visit my contact page.