Why successful entrepreneur ditched multi-tasking

Jessica Williamson juggles three businesses and says the trick to making it work is not using this popular technique.

Jessica Williamson. Picture: Julie Casali

Jessica Williamson was just 22 years-old when started her own online swimwear label.

The Perth-based entrepreneur leveraged her job in digital marketing and a fascination with Instagram to successfully launch Ete Swimwear in 2016.

“I was working in digital marketing and I had always wanted to have my own business,” she says. “I ended up choosing swimwear because I love the beach and the travel and the lifestyle.

“Also, I couldn’t find any swimwear that was my style. I wanted to create something feminine for girls like me.”

From the idea to launch, everything happened quickly for Ms Williamson.

“I started looking into it and then within seven months I had a business and it was launched online,” she told news.com.au.

“It happened pretty quickly and I didn’t really stop to think or question what I was doing, it just felt right.

“Before I knew it, I was going full steam ahead and making sales from day one.”

Ms Williamson, 26, said her digital marketing experience coupled with her fascination with Instagram were the keys to early success.

“I built up a social media following before I launched,” she said. “So because of that we had sales right away — and internationally — so that was awesome.”

Ms Williamson said she taught herself the secrets of Instagram through trial and error.

“I used to create accounts on Instagram just for fun,” she says. “I grew accounts and figured out what time to post, how to post, and what kind of content worked. I played around with accounts because that was where my passion lay.”

That passion for Instagram and online influencing led Ms Williamson to branch out beyond swimwear and into creating her second business — a side hustle that has quickly become big business.

NEW DIRECTION

Somewhere Elsewhere, which Ms Williamson started in January 2018, is an agency that organises trips where brands can align with high-profile influencers in an attractive location and hires photographers to create content for brands of all levels.

Jessica Williamson was just 22-years-old when she launched Ete Swimwear, but her love of new challenges has seen her embark on two new ventures. Picture: Julie Casali

She said the idea came from her passion for photo shoots and Instagram.

“I also ended up working with over 300 influencers through Ete Swimwear — some good, some not so good — and I learned a lot along the way. A lot of small businesses are wary to work with influencers, and there is a right and wrong way to do things,” Ms Williamson said.

“What I wanted to do was help other brands of all different sizes navigate the influencer world, but also by doing it on trips it creates more hype and the fact is I’m not just an influencer agency where we send stuff out and hope for the best — I’m right there too. We bring our own photographer and we shoot to the brief of the brands.

“I noticed a lot of big brands doing their own trips with influencers, but they have to cover costs and pay the influencers. It’s an expensive business, and there’s no way small brands can afford that.

“The concept was that we would sell packages so different brands with different levels of budget could still be part of the trip and they get different levels of numbers of images, numbers of posts included. So there’s something for all sizes of brands.”

Somewhere Elsewhere has been running for only a year but already the growth has been exciting, says Ms Williamson.

“Our first trip, we went to Bali,” she says. “We had a few smaller Aussie brands on that trip, and we went for three days.

“Our most recent trip, which we’ve just arrived back from, we went to Fiji for a week. We partnered with the Marriott group there so we spent seven days across three resorts. And we worked with some major brands like Samsonite and Fiji Water.”

The biggest challenge so far was communicating the business idea to influencers and brands.

“Whenever we do our trips I’m overwhelmed by the amount of inquiries from influencers and brands who have understood the concepts by seeing past trips and how excited they are to be part of it,” Ms Williamson said.

“It’s quite overwhelming now the amount of influencers who want to come on our trips, and they have a really fun time and get to hang out with awesome other influencers from around the world which isn’t common.”

Starting a business and creating a unique niche would be enough to be proud of for most, but Ms Williamson also offers business mentoring — teaching other small businesses how to grow their online brands.

SIMPLE WAY TO WORK SMARTER

Time management can be a “little bit up and down”, admits Ms Williamson, who said the secret to managing three businesses on her own lies in abandoning the idea of multi-tasking.

“I’ve had to start segmenting my time,” she said. “Changing from left to right brain and admin and accounting to swimwear is quite difficult so I’ve had to stop multi-tasking as much and start segmenting my time into blocks.”

She’s also had to carve out time to relax — most likely in the morning before she has been pulled in several directions.

“I have a bit of time to myself because it’s very tempting to just pick up the phone because while I’ve been asleep a million emails and messages have come in from all over the world,” she said.

“But just trying to give myself that time in the morning sets me up to be in a good frame of mind because it can be quite stressful, and once you get stressed then everything seems to fall apart.”

Not hitting the emails first thing has given her much needed downtime in the mornings.

For those wanting to start their own business, Ms Williamson said her advice was simple:

“Just start”.

“People want the secret answer but if you have goals and you have ideas and you really want to chase them then start today,” she said.

“All I did was look into how to manufacture swimwear and then seven months later I had a whole business. So I think once you take the first step you can’t really stop.”