ASK ME ANYTHING: We're Talking About Balancing the Elements of a Henna Session - Henna Client Interaction and Henna Application and the New Hennapreneur Program for Henna Artists!
Ask Me Anything!
You’ve got questions, I’ve got answers!
In today’s Ask Me Anything!, we’re tackling the following questions submitted from hennapreneurs like you:
[02:07] My practice is paying off but I’m still slower than I’d like to be. Do you have tips for getting quicker and still providing a great, personable experience for my clients?
[15:00] I don’t have the motivation to practice doing henna after a long day. How can I make myself practice?
[11:07] Is the Behind the Scenes Hennapreneur program for me? Could you share more about it?
[17:40] I’m happy with my henna design skills but I need to get faster. When I chat with clients while doing their henna, I slow down. It feels awkward to only chat with my clients before and after I do their henna design. Do you have any suggestions, drills, or tips?
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By the way, you’re totally invited to join me and other high-aspiring henna artists inside of the private Hennapreneur Community on Facebook! There we connect about henna, about business, and about all things related to crushing it as a henna professional.
+ Read the transcript here
Chelsea: Hey, hennapreneurs! Alright, give me just one second. I'm gonna get this feed shared over. Make sure everything's good. Get it shared over to the Hennapreneur Community. Hey, listen... Here we go. If we can't get this. Here we go. This is old. Y'all this is old. I don't know if we have any Wheezy fans over here. Alright, let's see. Let me get this shared over to the Hennapreneur Community and we will start with our Ask Me Anything. I'm hyped! Let's see. Here we go. Alright, so I see the feed is up and we've got this shared over to the Hennapreneur Community. So we are ready to go. I'm pretty excited. Um, let me... Oh, let me... Let me turn Wayne down. Okay. So, we are here today for our first Ask Me Anything session for the month of October 2020! And if it's your first time joining me - Hey! Hello!
How are you? My name's Chelsea Stevenson and I'm the founder of Hennapreneur. I am a professional henna artist and business strategist based here in Baltimore, Maryland, and twice every month I come live here on Facebook to answer all your questions about henna, about business, about branding, and about how you can do the thing as a hennapreneur. So today I've got, um, I think two or three questions that came in that we'll tackle. And if you guys have any questions while we're here live, you can drop them here into the comments and I will check them out for you and we'll answer them because I think we should have time. So, first things first, uh, we had a question... Actually, if you guys noticed, we had to reschedule from last week. Um, so I had a question from last week that I want to be sure to address first, okay?
This hennapreneur says, "Hey, Chelsea, I'm happy to say that my practice is paying off. My lines and henna designs are looking great, but I'm still slower than I'd like to be. Do you have any tips or suggestions for getting quicker? I can't seem to get a client in and out in under 40 minutes and still feel as if I'm not compromising the design or the experience with my clients. I'm faster if I don't talk, but then I'm not connecting with them." So, this is a really good question. And I think this is something that a lot of times, I think many hennapreneurs, right, experience this. Hey! Hey, Najlaa! Assalamu alaikum! So I feel like this is something that, um, many hennapreneurs experience and, um... So, yeah, let's tackle it! So, first things first, I have to ask... Well, one, congratulations to this hennapreneur for having put the work in and get into a place where they feel really comfortable sitting and working with clients with their actual design work, their line work, their composition. That's amazing! Right? Um, so kudos to her.
The second piece, in terms of whether I have tips or suggestions for getting quicker? Honestly, it's going to come down to creating a solid process with your client. So, um, this is the thing, right? When I am sitting- my shortest session, my shortest session is a 15-minute session, right? Inside of that 15 minute container I, um, set the expectation with my clients that they can have one full design, which would be somewhere between about two inches above the wrist and down to all fingertips, or they can choose to split that time across two different hands and we'll do two party-style strips, right? That's what a 15-minute session will offer, for me. Now, I try really hard to honor the time container that I create with my clients.
And, um, I want to encourage you to do the same thing. So if you're charging by time and not by piece, then you definitely want to make sure that you are, you know, being respectful of that boundary. With that said, I kind of want to- and this, I feel like this answer might actually be counterintuitive, um, or it may not be what you guys were expecting, but this is the thing: I don't actually want you to focus on being the fastest. I don't want you to focus on being the, like, you don't have to be the fastest henna artist on the planet. What you do have to do is, you do have to set up a solid expectation or boundary around what you are offering for a specific parameter of time, right? So if you're not doing a full hand with all the things and like, if you're not doing that within the container of the 15 minutes with your client, that's okay. Just set that expectation early.
I would argue that more important than how much henna is being given, is actually the experience that your client is having that they're taking home with them, right? And of course, that's not to say like, oh, they come in for 15 minutes and then you're giving them, like, this tiny little thing and sending them on their way. Now, let me pause, because I said that and as soon as it crossed my lips, I'm like, wait a minute, that's going to open up the floor for misunderstanding. If you're in a place where 15 minutes is what it takes for you to do that size piece, that's okay. And that really is my point. It is okay for you to do what you can do within the specific parameters of what you're booking, what you're offering, right?
But you just want to be sure that that's communicated properly. So I don't actually think that it's necessary for us to be like, "Oh, well, I can only see a client in 40 minutes or less," um, or excuse me, "40 minutes or more and feel good about it." Well, if that's the case, then why rush? Like, this is your business. So who's to say, who's requiring you, who's requiring you to book a shorter session. If it takes you 40 minutes to do a really good job and for your client to have a good experience, then make your minimum session a 40-minute session. That's fine. Like, this is your business and you get to do what you want. And ultimately you want to have an experience with your client where you feel really good about the service that you rendered and they feel really good about the service that they've received. Not just the henna that they received, but the ambiance while they were there, the energy that they picked up off of you.
You mentioned, you know, that you like to talk with them and connect with them there. They're also there for that experience. They're there to connect. They're there to sit in that energy with you, right? And so I don't think that it's necessary for us to put this pressure on ourselves to be super quick and to give the most henna for the least amount of time, necessarily. No, that's not a requirement. Build your business around what feels good to you. And so, I actually, I almost want to like, shift this question, right? Let me shift this question. Instead of asking, um, "Do-" you know, "What can I do to get faster? What can I do to be faster?" Which the answer to that really is simple. You're going to have to practice more.
You're going to have to, like, that's what it comes down to. You're going to have to practice more. You're going to be doing all the drills. You're going to be building the muscle memory. And like, that's what it is. But the fact of the matter is, you could be super fast, but who cares if you're super fast and you brought that client in for 10 minutes and then that client left feeling like they never got the connection that they came for, right? Or you bring that client in and you do the henna for them in the 10 minutes and then after they leave, you just feel like, drained and kind of gross about the experience because you also weren't able to give them what you hoped for them to experience with your business and with your brand. So, um, I would actually say, in this case, let's shift this, right?
Instead of asking "Why-", "What can I do to get me faster?", "What can I do to be able to move more quickly through my clients and through my bookings?" What if instead you were to ask, "Hey, it takes me 40 minutes and to feel really good about what I'm offering and for them to feel really good. What else could I do within that 40 minutes to elevate the experience a little bit more? What else could I do within that 40 minutes to make it feel really good?" Like, give yourself permission to, I think, interrogate that instead and take off the pressure of having to be the fastest artist in the room. It's not necessary. It's not, like, it's not a thing. Now, guys, I say this knowing who this hennapreneur is and knowing like, some of the things about her business as well.
So if you're listening to this and you're like, "Okay, I- you know, Chelsea, this wasn't my question, but it kind of applies to me. What about me?" Listen, a more generic piece of advice that I would say, is that you have to understand that you are - when you're engaging with your clients - you are exchanging your service, right? Your service for a particular dollar amount. Now what that dollar amount is, or is not, is up to you, right? But that exchange is an energetic exchange.
And so what I'm encouraging this hennapreneur and what I would encourage each and every one of you, is to what that energetic exchange should be like, should feel like from both parties perspectives - from your client's perspective and from your own, right, as the business owner and as the artist who's creating that work. And I want you to ask yourself: What makes me feel really good about delivering this service? What makes my clients feel really good when I'm delivering this service? And how can I create a balance in which, an environment in which both of us feel really fulfilled? And who cares about the timeframe as long as it's well-communicated and expectations are set, you're golden. You're golden. Now, of course, and we can talk about profitability, right? So there's always, of course, there's the piece of, well, if I'm spending so much time with X client, if I'm spending 40 minutes with a client, then maybe I'm not going to make enough money because I can only see so many clients if I'm working at that pace. I hear you. I hear you. But what if I were to say, okay, let's take, again, this is where I say, consider what additional value you can add. How can you make that 40-minute session appropriate?
How can you- What can you do to add in enough value, um, enough of a quality experience? And this doesn't necessarily mean that you're giving anything extra. It may have just to do with those little details as you're working with your client, right? But what can you do to take that 40 minutes and be able to still place a price tag on that that's going to provide you with a sustainable model, right? So, um, I want to kind of like, again, just kind of change our perspective and change our perception around how we are booking the things and the way that we see ourselves as artists as well. Take the pressure off. You don't have to be the fastest. What you do have to do is serve your clients. Go above and beyond their expectations. Exceed their expectations whenever possible.
So, how can you take that 40 minutes that you're going to feel really good about because you did a great job and make it also an experience for them where they're really, really loving it, and raving about it, and can't wait to come back and do it again. Okay. So, uh, let's see. I had... Okay, I had an email that came in, um, and it was about the behind the scenes membership. Basically, they saw the email and wanted to know- "I was wondering if it was for me. Could you share more about this program, please?" Yes. So if you guys have not, if you're not on the mailing list, you did not hear about this. Um, it was only offered to the mailing list. Inside of Hennapreneur -you guys know - typically, if you're wanting to work with me, you work with me in this capacity where it's public and free inside of the Facebook group, or here on the public page, listening to the podcast, things like this. Or you can work with me inside one of my signature programs or in consulting one-on-one consulting. All of those things have pretty significant investments.
There's pretty significant investments and that's fine. They offer a lot of transformation. They're worth every penny, if not more. However, I opened up about a week and a half ago, a membership which allows you access to the behind the scenes of my business. And so when this person says, you know, I'm wondering if it's for me. Well, it depends on what you're looking for. If you're looking for a space where you can see the nitty gritty of what it is to run a henna business, this membership is for you. If you are feeling kind of like, lonely, not feeling like you have a place where you can ask questions and be vulnerable, like ask legitimate, like numbers, dollars, and cents, those sorts of questions - this is probably a good space for you because here that's what we're talking about. Um, just this week in our, um, in my weekly update I gave the details of exactly how much money I made this week, this past week that passed how I made it.
Some things that happened inside of my business, what money I spent to make it, etc. Like, if you're wanting to know those sorts of things, this is the membership for you. If you are looking like, I think thatwant to be a henna artist, but I'm not sure what that even looks like - this is the membership for you. The great thing is, with the... With the - excuse me, I'm trying to put this up here out my way - with this membership, um, when you come in, you have access to- There's a monthly design class workshop. We have not done that yet for October because the membership just opened. So if you come in, you'll be getting access to that for this month, too. Um, so it's a monthly design workshop. Every week there's live business recaps with me where I go in and I tell you all of the nitty gritty of how I'm running the business that I am. There are, um, there's also the expert trainings. So once a month there is like, a business training inside of the group, either with me or with a guest expert who I invite and, mmm, twice a month, I'm also giving you guys access to behind the scenes of actually watching me work with my clients. So like fly on the wall, hearing the conversations, seeing what I do and how I do it and how I respond in X-situation and all of that.
So if this is something that interests you, right now, and for the first hundred people to join only, you can access the membership for 29 bucks. After that ends, like, after those seats are filled, then those seats are filled. Um, and so if you want more info on that, like, I'll put the- there's not even like a big sales page or whatever for this, like, literally it was a, "Here, this is what it is. If you want it, it's for you." Um, and later on, I'll be launching it much more big. I'll be doing a more serious thing. Um, and at that point it's not going to be $29 a month.
So if it interests you, definitely check it out. I'll put a link in the comments after we're done here. Um, but thank you for asking. Another question we have, this hennapreneur says, "How do you make yourself practice? I just get so tired after work and the kids. And it's just frustrating me so much. Babe! You're not gonna like this answer.
We make time for what's important for us. Whatever is important to us, that's what we're going to spend our time on. And so if practicing is important to you, you're going to make the time for it. I know that that sounds really judgy. And I guess in a way it kind of is. You have to be in alignment with what you're saying is important to you. You're saying, "It's frustrating to me that I don't have time to practice. How do you make time to do it?" Well, I do it because it's important to me. I want to make sure that my skills are sharp. I want to make sure that I can serve my clients in the best way. I want to disconnect from the busyness of what's going on in the world around me and I want to be able to connect with my art, right? I want those things, and I value those things, and they're important to me, so the actions that I'm going to take will be in alignment with that.
If I said to you, "Okay, guys, I really," I don't know, "I want to have better sleep. I want to have better sleep. I'm really frustrated because I'm not getting enough sleep at night." And then I told you, "Well, but also like, I refuse to go to bed on time. And like, I'm definitely, I'm definitely staying up anyway." Like, my actions are not in alignment with what I'm saying is important to me and of course I'm not going to get the results that I'm wanting, right? So the same applies here. Just like life in any other capacity, if you want to make time, if you want- if you truly want to practice, if you truly want to make time to practice, you'll make time to practice.
I have suggested, um, building this into your schedule in other ways. You can build it in like, you know, maybe that's five minutes while the water is boiling while you're getting ready to cook dinner. Or maybe that's 10 minutes in the morning, you have, you know, you pull out a henna cone and put it in the fridge. And in the morning when you get up, that's one of the first things that you do is, you know, finish that henna cone and that's that. Perhaps this is like putting it around nap time. I know you said you've got the kids at home and I get it. Like, the kids being home all of the time now, especially with lockdowns, like it's a lot. I know. I know. I've got three! I know. But, you have to find time to do the thing that feels worth it to you, right?
And, um, do the thing that's important to you. And so that's, I mean, there's no way there's no way around that. Um, okay. Oh! This looks like it's, uh... This looks like... Okay, so it looks like it's a duplicate question. Ah! "I'm at the point where I'm happy with my client work, but I need to pick up speed." Yeah. "If I chat while laying henna down, I'm slower. But if I only chat before and after doing the design, then the appointment feels a little off. Any suggestions, drills, or tips?" This is actually, it's a little bit of a different angle. I'll answer this one too. Why not? So, um...
Okay.
I remember, a lot of you guys probably don't know this about me, but actually, way back when, years and years and years before I had my business, before like, all of this, I um, if you didn't know, I went to university to become an interpreter. That was my goal. Um, and so I know that you guys know that I've worked in social work. I like, segwayed into social work from a different skillset, which was interpreting. And so I went to school to become to become an interpreter. And one of the skills that they teach when you're learning to interpret, there's two different ways that you can interpret. You can inter- you can interpret simultaneously, meaning when someone is speaking, literally, you would listen to that person speak and you will speak while they're speaking. So you're listening and interpreting at the same time.
Or there is another type of interpreting where you let them pause. Like basically you listen to them complete a first sentence or a phrase or finish a thought, and then you begin interpreting. And while you- and then, you know, you finish while you're like, listening to them finish the next thought, and then you interpret again. So it's like in gaps, right? I, when I was in school, I wanted to - oh! - so badly. I wanted so badly to develop my skillset around being able to do the simultaneous interpretation. And one of the skills that, uh, or one of the ways, one of the tricks that you practice this is by like, listening to television. And so literally I would turn on the TV and I would listen to the TV and, um, I would, as it was, as the people on the TV were speaking, I would just pick whatever random channel.
And as the people on TV were speaking, I would interpret what they were saying into the target language, right? And why am I mentioning this to you? Right? So for, um, when I read this question, this is immediately what came to mind is, I would actually encourage you, if you feel like you really want to be able to work and speak, like really be able to have a, you know, an intelligible conversation with someone while you're doing the work, this might be something that you do during your practice. So while you're practicing at home, have the TV on, and maybe you're listening to a new station, or maybe you're listening to- I mean, you can listen to whatever, right? But listen and respond as if you are having a conversation with that person so that you're practicing your- and have the timer there. Have the timer
so you can see, so you can track your progress, you know, as you're developing this skill set. But see how you're able to develop the, uh, the cognitive, the motor skills and also the cognitive awareness of being within that conversation while performing the composition of your work. Um, I would suggest doing that, honestly. I feel like that's kind of like, you know, like maybe that's a little farfe- like, I don't know, I'm not going to say it's farfetched. Maybe people are gonna be like, "Chelsea, that's a really weird way to practice that," but I legitimately feel like it would work. Um, only because that, like that, you're practicing two skills at the same time. And that worked for me when I was developing that consecutive, um, excuse me, that, um, simultaneous interpretation skill. Um, so maybe give that a try. Listen to the radio, listen to the TV, and work.
And as you're doing your henna, respond. Engage. Engage. Engage. Um, and let's see if that, perhaps, gives you a little bit of help, okay? Um, yeah. Okay. So I am... I think we're done today. I saw something come up and I'm on my laptop trying to- I'm like, where did the comment go? I saw it come and then it disappeared. Um, and it's just, it is what it is. I'm not seeing it here. Well, I am going to get off of here then, because it looks like we've covered all of our questions for today's session. Um, and I want to be respectful of you guys' time also. Um, but yeah, if you guys, if you do, if you do have any questions about anything, you're welcome, you can leave them here in the comments. Um, otherwise I'll see you guys. Next week, we won't have the ask me anything. Next week is the Hennapreneur Retreat! Which I'm super excited about.
So, next week I'll be in Albuquerque with a handful of henna artists and we're doing all the freaking things. Do you guys want to see like, some behind the scenes of that? Because I feel like, I don't know, like Insta stories or Facebook stories or something. Like, I feel like you guys probably want to see, right? I know I would want to see. Um, I'll have to share. So we'll be at- I'll be at the Hennapreneur Retreat next week. And then, after that, coming back, we'll have our next Ask Me Anything session. So if you guys have questions, you're welcome to leave them, and I will answer them at that point in time. Otherwise, if you want to give a check out of, look over, whatever, to the behind the scenes membership, I'll put the link in here once we jump off and yeah, that's it.
Y'all enjoy the rest of your afternoons! And I will see you guys later, okay? Bye!