6 financial steps to a filthy rich business
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Girl, your website is GLAM.
And the clients are rolling in. Your social media campaigns are well-oiled machines, your services & products are really connecting with your followers, and you feel like you’ve finally got something here.
But you haven’t moved the needle on your money situation.
Your savings account has barely grown (if at all), you’re paying yourself less than what you did at your full-time job, and you’re working a schedule that may support a wardrobe of leggings & top knots but also is causing those bags under your eyes.
And dear lord, woman, you’re stinking up your house. Take a shower.
It’s the life of a semi-struggling entrepreneur, and while it’s a rewarding one, it’s also highly frustrating. Why?
The hamster wheel is no place from which to run your business.
The core of what you already do – your values, model, and offerings – can make you extremely wealthy without burning your candle from both ends. You are already providing a great service or product that people value. Your client base reflects that.
You just need to know the right pieces of the puzzle to implement in your business to get to the point of major profitability without continuous late nights and early, coffee-fueled mornings spent in front of your computer.
And these are those steps.
They are in no particular order, so no need to follow step by step. Pick which one really pulls at your entrepreneurial heartstrings and run with it.
GET YOUR SYSTEM IN PLACE
Whoa, whoa, whoa.
The first thing on this list doesn’t have anything to do with money?
No, it doesn’t. But yet…
It does.
For one, implementing easy-to-follow systems in your business means that you are more efficient. And with more efficiency comes more time for you to spend doing those things that will move your business forward instead of drowning in all that back-office work of invoicing, responding to emails, and planning social media posts.
Secondly, developing systems allows you to grow your team because what you’re doing is easily teachable to someone else.
Even if you’re a one-woman show right now, getting these in place and, for those key processes in your biz, written down, will allow you to multiply your efforts AND your revenue.
I used to work for a company with little-to-no written processes, and let me tell you, it turned into a cluster because no one was on the same page when trying to get something done. It made things inefficient, it caused the company drop the ball, and it wasted a lot of time.
So identify the key time-wasters and critical processes in your business, define processes for handling them, and write down those that would need to be passed along to someone else in your absence (in case, you know, you decide to head out of town for a 3-week backpacking trip across South America).
PREPARE A PROFIT PLAN
If I asked you how much you want to make this year, how would you answer?
If it’s sounds eerily like, “Oh, something around XXX,” then we need to slow our roll and reconvene.
Like any other goal, you need to be specific in what you what; without that, you ain’t gonna get it, sister.
Each year or quarter, you need to set a defined profit goal, and then work backwards as to how you can earn it.
Note: I didn’t say income goal. I said profit. And I meant it. A high income means nothing if you have high expenses, but a high profit means you are rolling in the $$$.
Once you’ve got that figure, start calculating all of your overhead (i.e. office rent, monthly software costs, VA pay, etc.) and the time it takes to fulfill each of your products/services.
From there, determine what combination of offerings you need to sell to where your income minus those overhead (& any variable) expenses will equal your profit goal AND not cause you to work 24/7/365.
It may be 15 courses which take 1 hour of your time combined with 8 monthly clients that take 10 or vice versa.
Either way, find that golden combination that will make you rich without having to burn the candle at both ends. Once it’s in place, you’ll have a plan to track against in your business.
(P.S. I know this sounds a little complicated, but it is something I go through with my clients; thus, if you need some help figuring this out for yourself, you know where to find me!)
LEVERAGE
How many times have you pushed a fabulous idea to the backburner for a later day because you just didn’t have the time or money to invest in it quite yet?
Yeah, me, too.
However, to really scale & grow your business, you have to utilize a team. It may not be employees working directly under you, but it definitely will at least be those people who will take off the non-essential components of your business so that you can gain those hours back and focus on what actually brings in the money.
Humor me on this:
Track your time for the week and see where you’re spending a lot of hours on those tasks that aren’t truly moving you forward. What can you outsource? What can you move off your plate? What do you dread doing and would happily pay someone else to do so that you can free up time & bring in more clients?
Now, while most entrepreneurs would claim they lack time above all else, there are also points in your biz where money will be a limiting factor.
At this point, this is where you want to leverage someone else’s money to make more for yourself.
I wouldn’t take this lightly: borrowing money for your idea is a risk for the banks, and you need to prove to them and yourself that it makes financial sense.
But if you can do this, using their money to further your business can be a great step.
Leverage is a beautiful thing if you do it right.
For instance, if you follow me on Instagram, you’re probably well aware that I’ve been investing in real estate, which is a highly leveraged business. I use the bank’s money at a low interest rate to earn a monthly income at much higher rates. The gap between those two is where my wealth is built, and the same can be done for any business.
IMPLEMENT PROFIT FIRST
If you haven’t already read Mike Michalowicz’s book Profit First, then get off your hind end, head to Amazon, and order it now.
It’s one of those books that not only gives you that complete mindset shift around how you run the money in your business but also gives you actionable steps to MAKE MORE OF IT.
Win. Win.
Here’s the fast & dirty:
You know how personal finance gurus (myself included) always say one of the best ways to ensure you hit your savings goals is to transfer that money straight into savings the moment your paycheck is deposited?
Yeah, it’s essentially the same concept. But for your business.
Most entrepreneurs are so focused on covering expenses and investing in their business that they forget one of the main reasons they threw the deuces to the corporate world and started living in leggings was to make money.
And to make money, you have to pay yourself. First.
This concept essentially ensures the highest priority categories – like taxes, payroll, and PROFIT – are funded before you blow all your money on high-end business lunches or courses you buy but never use (*cough* Britt *cough*).
If you implement and stick with this concept, it is a serious GAME CHANGER for your business and personal wealth. So pick up the book. It’ll be a nice little nighttime read.
SURPASS YOUR CORPORATE PAYCHECK
One of the first big money milestones for your business is the moment when you start earning more than you did in your corporate job.
The bliss! The joy! The ability to finally feel like you can get Starbucks again!
Maybe you were already bankrolling this when you slipped that two week notification across your boss’s desk. Maybe you’re still working towards it.
But when you hit that sweet spot? That’s when you realize you’re providing more value to the world all on your own than you ever were at your 9-to-5. And you’ve got the dollars to prove it.
Now, surpassing your corporate paycheck isn’t just some mark on a dart board, nor is it simply a mindset win for you.
No, making more than you did in that four-walled cubicle is important for two very specific reasons:
BEING AN ENTREPRENEUR IS MORE EXPENSIVE
Get $3,000 deposited in your account every month from your previous employer back in the day? Well, you want to earn more than this as an entrepreneur because your boss isn’t covering your health insurance or supplementing your retirement savings anymore.
Which means you have to do that all on your own. To get back to where you were financially as a corporate career girl, base your monthly income goal on your pre-tax income plus any amount your employer put in for retirement AND the current costs of your health insurance.
That’s where you’ll be in equilibrium. And once you surpass that, you’ll be bringing in more money than you ever have.
YOU’VE NOW GOT MONEY TO LEVERAGE
Remember that leverage section we discussed?
When you’re bringing in more than you did in corporate, it most likely means that you have extra money in your monthly budget that isn’t needed to cover current costs in your personal life.
That’s the money you use to outsource. Or grow your team. Or invest in a course or product that will move your business forward.
The most wealth is built when you use your money to make more money. Remember that.
DEVELOP A CONTINUOUS REVENUE STREAM
As much fun as working until I die sounds, making money in my sleep sounds MUCH more exciting.
And lucrative.
No matter what type of business you own, you want to have something that is constantly working in the background for you.
Something you create once and sell twice (or you know, hundreds of times).
Something that doesn’t take up a lot of your precious daylight hours.
Something that will give you a solid income base month-in and month-out so that you aren’t earning diddly-squat if you decide to vaca for a while.
Creating this means you have passive income coming in, and if you couple that with the other work you’re doing, it could mean you could be earning TONS in a short amount of time.
To really hit the ball out of the park? Use that passive income to generate more passive income. Create an evergreen product or service that delivers a ton of value so that it’s a NO BRAINER upsell for the clients of your current products to generate even more, low-hanging fruit income.
If you want to know the key to being filthy rich, it’s that concept right there.
Now go utilize it.
Money isn’t the end all, be all to this entrepreneur game. Earning a living is definitely key, but there’s also other fantastic perks that make the journey worthwhile – like flexibility, pride in your work, and getting to wear sweatpants for 300 days out of the year – even if you don’t find Amy Porterfield or Jenna Kutcher fame.
However, you want to make the most of what you do have, so pick the one financial tip laid out in this post that speaks to you, and begin implementing it in your business TODAY.
Good luck, and if you have questions, you know where to find me!
