Butt Naked Business

When I first launched my course last fall, I ran on pure adrenaline.

I wondered aloud in my Insta stories why people complained about launches because I had a ton of fun webinaring and Facebook live-ing and spreading the word about something I was so proud of.

By the time I finished my latest launch last week, the adrenaline had worn off.

I felt the pain.

(I’ve been watching a lot of “I Shouldn’t Be Alive” docu-TV on Amazon Prime about people falling off cliffs or getting stranded in the ocean for 72 days and living to tell the tale – so this idea of “the adrenaline masked the pain” is pretty fresh in my mind.)

But I’m not the type o’ gal to let the ocean sweep me up and throw me around willy nilly. I want to UNDERSTAND the ocean and how it works.

So I drilled into exactly why my second launch felt different from my first. And why OTHER entrepreneurs also feel this way about launches.

I boiled it down to this:

Launching kinda feels like that recurring nightmare I have of going back in time and walking into high school butt naked.

(Anyone else have those?)

But it’s not just LAUNCHING – I realize I feel that way in small doses anytime I’m doing a push in visibility.

It can be something as simple as publishing this blog right now.

Or posting a pic on Insta.

Or reaching my hand out to shake yours at a networking event.

WHOOOOOO DOGGIE! Like in the nightmare, I have the urge to run and hide behind a locker until the gym teacher finds me and saves my naked butt with an extra P.E. uniform.

Why am I telling you this?

Because when I share this with friends or work colleagues, they are often simultaneously SHOCKED and RELIEVED to hear that someone like me — someone who has noooo problem running around her backyard in a dinosaur suit or donning 30+ wigs in ridiculous green screen sketches — would feel nervous, insecure, and yes, BUTT NAKED being visible in her business.

I’m an extroverted theater kid who used to entertain kids on the playground with parodies of Full House and MacGyver and I STILL FEEL THIS WAY.

Marketing experts like me push visibility all day, every day without recognizing the EMOTIONAL COST of putting yourself out there.

There’s more to overhead than what you pay for office space and subcontractors.

This is the EMOTIONAL overhead of doing business. And you gotta take it into consideration when you’re calculating your costs, scheduling your time, and planning your marketing strategy.

You don’t have to be an introvert to NEED time and space to re-fuel after being visible and highly interactive, whether it’s just your day-to-day Instagramming or during a launch.

Running around butt naked is expensive.

Are you factoring that into how you price your services and divvy up your time?

I don’t think launches would hurt as much if we accounted for the “butt naked tax.”

Next launch, I’m going to carve out plenty of time for baby cuddles. Amazon Prime docu-TV, and chilling in my backyard hammock. Because THAT, as well as the money stuff, is the true cost of doing business.

Rachael Kay Albers

Rachael Kay Albers is a creative director, business comedian, and brand strategist gone wild. She writes and performs about branding, pop culture, tech, and identity. When she’s not muckraking about marketing, Rachael runs RKA ink, a reinvention studio and branding agency for businesses that burn the rulebook. She's also on Instagram a lot.