laneimageconsulting
Now that I had more time on my hands, I wanted to get back out there and give my image business another go. We had settled in France, after 18 years in Singapore and the boys were getting bigger. I love everything colour and style and my work would allow me the flexibility to still be there when the kids get home from school.
While it sounded good in my head, it became clear fairly quickly that getting clients in a non-English speaking country was going to be a major challenge. Additionally I had no way of helping all the clients I had built up in Singapore over the years. All my hard work was lost and I had to start from scratch.
I am sitting here 30 minutes after my colour presentation was supposed to start, feeling nauseous, disappointed and fed up. Not one person has turned up despite several confirmations. One by one they had all cancelled over the last 24 hours. I was left with two people who were definitely going to make it.
No show. Not one single participant! I feel fed up, sick, angry and want to cry but I have to put on a bright face as the event host is looking on anxiously. She is coming over now, reassuring me that everything will be okay and I smile and nod and agree its not the end of the world. It feels a bit like it though! How excruciatingly embarrassing?
So how did this happen? I’m not a rookie. I had been in the image business almost 10 years before I took a break and restarted in France.
After several frustrating and self-esteem killing events, I decided I had to go back to the drawing board and really think about what would work in this new country. I knew 100% that I wanted to work in colour analysis so that was at least clear. I also realised that I had been teaching in one way or another almost my whole career and I loved that too.
The big epiphany came when I realised that I had all the skills I needed right there in front of me (Don’t we always!) – Online Colour Analysis was the new opportunity for me. It made so much sense. All of a sudden my client base became the world, rather than the English speaking community in a small village in the South of France. I could also get back in touch with all my Singapore connections and let them know that I was available for business. I was so excited and my adrenaline was through the roof. I could ‘do colours’ every day to my hearts content from anywhere in the world with all the flexibility I wanted. It was the ‘a-ha’ moment Oprah talks about🤗
However once I calmed down, the doubts started to creep in. Does online colour analysis really work? Would I excommunicate myself from the image consulting community as online colour analysis is a new frontier and there is a lot of negativity and naysayers around the topic.
After lots of research and establishing an online process to conduct online colour analysis, I set about putting a plan together to get my first clients. I quickly realised that working from pictures was just not enough. It was missing the human connection and communication. The client missed the experience of talking about their colours and to be honest, I was bored to death looking at pictures and not connecting with people.
At that point I decided to introduce a one hour online consult with the client and there was an immediate turn around. I loved it and more importantly the client loved it. The testimonials started to roll in and I knew I was on to an absolute winner. It felt so good to finally be doing what I loved every day and also to finally have a steady flow of clients!
More than that I also realised that I could help other image consultants avoid all the pitfalls I encountered by showing them how to take their colour business online and shortcut their journey to success!!
This gets me excited every day and this has now become my mission. I am helping fellow image consultants have a profitable and sustainable business doing what they love.
How did you arrive at where you are today? Did you also have a similar epiphany somewhere along the way?