The Dip

In every business I've ever owned, I've encountered "The Dip". Seth Godin talks about this in his short book, The Dip.

It's the point after things are going well, and then things, sometimes for a moment and sometimes for much longer, stop working the same way that they were.

I experienced 50% revenue growth month over month from October to January, which felt amazing.

Then, in February, it nearly dropped in half.

In the past, I would have been discouraged, frustrated, stressed, and even a little ashamed that I let it happen.

This time, however, was different.

I saw the dip coming, and I mentally and emotionally prepared for it.

In order for any business to have revenue (and profit, for that matter), it has to have sales.

Because of my schedule in February, I knew I was going to be filming a lot (5 courses, to be exact) but not releasing any new courses on CraftsmanCreative.co

No new launches means that we wouldn't have any weeks with big sales numbers.

I tried getting one course to do a presale launch, but that didn't end up happening, and it would have been too early for her audience anyway.

Another course has taken MUCH longer to edit than expected. (6 weeks vs the normal 2-3 weeks).

All of those things compounded and I ended February with just $3,000 in sales, mostly from past courses, and a few from two new Google Ads campaigns that I set up to start testing that part of the business.

Now, again, I could be discouraged, but I now have better insight on how to stagger the releases of courses, the filming of courses, and to better manage my time in post production so that we can get to launching one course a week on the site.

Plus, I have a huge 1-2 months ahead where these 5 courses will be released, so having one course a week launch on the site is going to lead to some of the best months ever on the site.

Rather than being depressed, stressed, or ashamed, I've learned new lessons, made changes to how the business runs, and am excited for what's ahead.

I guess you could say I made it through the dip and am now back on track to scaling this mountain I'm on.