Adjusting to life during lockdown

I’ve never been a 9-5 kind of person, getting home for the One Show, then sitting in front of the TV until bedtime. No, that’s not for me!

Probably given the nature of my job, I’m in meetings most of the day, then helping to keep an eye on social media accounts of our clients until late at night, so a daily routine doesn’t really exist for me. Along with this, I have a great love of working in coffee bars!

Something about the atmosphere, the real mix of people and why they are there, always seems to inspire me to do some of my best work. With the 24 hour culture that has crept into mainstream UK lifestyles this century, this means that many evenings when many are watching their favourite soaps, you’ll find me tapping away on my laptop in some random Costa or Starbucks somewhere!

So lockdown to me, was more about the lack of lattes than missing out on pub life.

On the day before we were all told to stay at home, I decided to treat myself to a coffee machine! I have wanted one for years but always thought I’d leave the joy of creating the perfect frothy coffee to the experts at the establishments mentioned above. So here I was, with a delightful addition to my kitchen, two weeks’ worth of pods and uncertainty as to when I was going to be able to get back to my fave hangouts.

I am now on week 4 and wow!! I can hardly believe that I’m actually able to virtually reproduce a cup of my delightful favourite drink, from the comfort of my own home! It takes me a matter of minutes to perform the entire process and there’s something really magical at feeling like I’m an actual barista whilst still wearing my PJ’s!

So that’s the first life changer.

Business-wise, given that many of our clients are from within the hospitality sector, things have gone rather quiet. Whilst we are confident that things will return to normal soon, keeping myself active on a daily basis from home felt like it was going to be a struggle. I’m not one of those guys who will spend hours doing DIY or gardening, I’m just used to working away on my laptop.

Within two days of lockdown, I was getting requests from clients and social media followers to help them with their own online businesses. Whilst some (understandably) have struggled to see a way out of it all, some showed an instant entrepreneurial instinct, wanting to innovate their business to accommodate the lockdown. They saw it as a way of actually making the most of the situation, whilst keeping their businesses alive.

I appreciate that certain businesses are unable to do this, but the people who were knocking on my virtual door were seizing the opportunity.

Whilst I have a decent knowledge of virtual software, having only used it a few times to chat to clients abroad, to believe that I was an expert and able to help set other people up is a different matter! But hey, I had time on my hands, so off I went (to my office downstairs!) and spent hours upon hours watching videos, reading articles, free trialling software after software, to enable me to find the ideal solution for these people.

The buzz I felt, was unlike anything I’ve felt in business for a long time. The challenge was immense, but to have to push myself, to use my brain in ways I haven’t done for a long time has been so amazing and I’ve had to work till the early hours most nights. Thank god for my amazing coffee machine, which has helped to keep me awake so well!

So now I’m happy to think of myself as able to develop and train people on how to use tools like webinars, video meetings, click funnels, training portals, membership software, automated email campaigns and lots more in between. The journey will continue for the foreseeable future and whilst social media and website design is the main part of our business, being able to add more services to our offering can only help to make the business stronger in the future.

Within one month, I’ve learned all the above skills and I can also pledge to be able to make a coffee that will compete against anything available on the High Street! Once we are out of this, I may even make you one to show off my skills!

Stay safe people.