January Updates: New Year New Pivot 🌠
Setting a new direction for Joyfully and Small Business Chronicles
Welcome! Small Business Chronicles is a blog where I candidly share my journey to build a creative small business while managing a full-time job as a product manager. If you’re a Medium member, you can also receive these post updates directly on Medium instead.
I’m building Joyfully Books — a place to find the most personalisable storybooks to give as a joyful gift to a special child in your life.
Recap
In my last update, I:
Paused my Tik Tok content channels
Started experimenting with different types of products
Took a break
So, what did I get up to since?
Setting 2025 up for success
Happy New Year! 🎆
I’m not much for New Year’s Resolutions — I can never predict which goals will remain meaningful all year long. But I do like to set ‘themes’ to reinforce the mindset I aim to approach the year with.
With that said, my 2025 themes for my side business-building journey are:
#1: A business is something I get to build.
I used to stress about making money quickly so that I could replace my full-time income and have a crutch to lean on. Turns out I just wasn’t feeling very happy in my job.
Now that I’ve started a new job that I like, I realise that if I’m not enjoying the journey of building a business on the side, then what’s the point?
Building a business on the side is something I choose to do because it’s fulfilling in its own right — I will no longer think of it as my second job or as a get-out-of-jail free card to escape from a job that I don’t like.
#2: Systems over goals.
I’m done with goals in 2025.
Instead, I’m focusing on finding a system that works for me. This includes finding an optimal routine that balances time for everything important to me (including plenty of rest and friend and family time). I’ll physically block these into my calendar — if I can’t even theoretically fit everything into my calendar, then I know I’m not being realistic with what’s on my plate.
#3: Don't be afraid to take shortcuts.
In a previous startup life, I was horrible at outsourcing. The tinkerer in me wanted to do everything myself. I subconsciously believed I should receive brownie points for even being able to do those things, rather than having to spend precious cash on hiring someone else to do them.
I eventually realised that I’m not owed success just because I choose to suffer more and do things the hard way. This year I’ll outsource more, and get comfortable with reinvesting every dollar I make from my side hustles.
A new direction for Small Business Chronicles
I have a recurring catch-up with my old co-founder, Matt. Every month, we catch-up to discuss progress on our ventures and share learnings.
I frequently lament that I’m struggling to do ‘too many’ things — writing on Medium, writing on Substack, creating on Tik Tok, and then building the actual ‘Joyfully’ business.
His response surprised me— ‘I see all those things as just the same project’.
Matt is in a similar boat — he works full-time and on the side: writes, creates video for YouTube, manages Headbot.ai, all on top of building his latest new project.
With that, I’ve decided to stop thinking of every new project as ‘straying’ from my core of building Joyfully. Instead, I plan to make Small Business Chronicles a place to share the variety of projects I’m building outside my full-time job. I also plan to be more open about what’s working, what’s not, and what results I’m seeing.
So let’s take a look at what happened this month.
Joyfully “Books”
I’ve been procrastinating from illustrating more pages for my first personalisable storybook, ‘Timmy Eats’, for months. I blamed it on spending too much time on content.
Whether that’s true or not, I’ve officially come to terms with the notion that pursuing this book as the debut product of Joyfully was the wrong approach.
I am not yet confident enough in my art skills, or in the engagement in ‘Timmy Eats’ on my content channels, to continue investing painstaking hours into a fully illustrating a storybook that people may not want.
So what now?
Instead of pigeonholing myself into starting with a storybook (which is something artists typically tackle much later in their career), I’ve committed to starting with a smaller product. The main value prop for Joyfully however, will be a focus on ‘hyper-personalisation’ and curated bespoke gifts.
With that, I’ve redesigned the Joyfully website — showcasing a few upcoming product ideas I have. These are all based on art gifts that I’ve made my nephew in the past.
Next, I’ll be experimenting with different channels to drive traffic to the website (and sharing the results here!). This will help me gauge which products most resonate with my audience.
Custom Storybook Commission 🎁
While I couldn’t commit to illustrating Timmy Eats, I did agree to illustrate another storybook.
This one is a commission for a short storybook as an anniversary gift for a customer and his partner.
It’s not a significant sum, but it’s my first-ever commission storybook and I see it as a way to get paid while building my skills.
I don’t have much to update yet, but it’ll be an eight or so week long project. More to come!
📺 An Update on My Content Channels
Tik Tok 🪦
My Tik Tok is still on-hold. However, I was pleasantly surprised to see a video from over 6 months ago go viral-ish (from ~400 views to ~16,000 views) seemingly overnight.
Though I haven’t posted any videos since November, I still gained over 100 followers during this time. Not bad!
Instagram
While I paused Tik Tok, this month I decided to start my Instagram (@joyfully.au).
For those unaware, Tik Tok does not allow you to add a link to your profile until you reach a certain number of followers. This restriction doesn’t apply to Instagram, which made me keen to start it up given I’m now interested in driving traffic to Joyfully as a priority.
For now, I don’t plan on investing much time into it other than reposting my short-form videos from Tik Tok.
Medium
This month was one of my lowest earning months by a long haul.
To be fair, I didn’t publish at all this month. And the last article I posted, ‘I made 4-figures from one article — here’s how I did it’ was ironically my lowest earning article of all-time, earning only pennies.
Writing on Medium is something I enjoy in its own right. The traffic it drives to my Substack and website is fairly trivial. For now, I think that if I’m earning enough from Medium to pay my subscription, then that’s a win.
Medium is currently my main source of funds that I use to directly pay for SaaS subscriptions and equipment for building Joyfully.
Substack
I was ready to quit Substack multiple times last year.
The traction I’ve had here has been minimal compared to Medium. I wasn’t quite sure what I was getting out of publishing on Substack, and how it was helping Joyfully.
But I found myself finding the itch to post here anyway — for no reason other than enjoying reflecting on the journey and hoping a few people here and there finding it useful also.
I still have no answers to my overall goals with Substack. Which is convenient, given my mantra of systems over goals this year. So, I guess I’ll just keep writing.
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Thanks for reading! 🫡
Until next time,
Joy