Back in the day, we recorded an entire series on starting your business and one of the first subjects we talked about was adopting a profit-first mentality. Here’s the thing, we re-looked at that episode and have so many more things to say! The way we run our business has dramatically shifted in the last 12 months and because of that, we have so many things to say to people who are just getting started. Even if you have an established business, we have some thoughts about what you should be doing differently when it comes to your dollar bills.

We recorded that first episode about adopting a profit-first mentality in February of 2018 but we honestly didn’t really put our ideas into practice until 2020! It took two years for us to learn how to do that, so we are going to save you that time today. We are not saying that our first episode has no value, but now that we have actually been through the trenches, this is the episode you want!

Today on the podcast we have Melissa Fryer. She is a creative artist, who has been in the professional baking industry for sixteen years and she noticed that people needed to find out more information about building their own baking business. But this was not until after she moved to the middle of the desert, had to leave another business behind, and start all over again with the help of Strategy Academy. Melissa is one of our rockstar, OG Strategy Academy students who has truly taken the program to a T of how it was designed. We brought her on to not only get a peek behind the curtain of her business but to follow along with her thought processes and different strategies that she implemented in her business with how she was learning and what she was learning from the program.

You’ll get a good glimpse today behind Melissa’s business that has succeeded and continues to thrive. She has taken pivots and made different decisions and tweaks based on not only what she is learning from our program but by knowing her audience and herself as her life has changed. This is exactly what we designed the program for – your life and not the other way round. So we are going to talk about the Strategy Academy a lot today but you are also going to get so many good tips about memberships, monetizing a Facebook group, how to grow an email list, and how to identify your offer depending on your lifestyle. Learn more about Strategy Academy here.

Are you ready to plan the year ahead? It might be easier to do when you’ve had a great 2020 but, even then, you can plan to stick to the plan! We know we just want more of what we had but we are also keen to try new things too. In 2020, we found the sweet spot of being consistent and boring and realized that they are our middle names. We embrace them, we love them, and this is where we flourish and feel comfortable. While it’s not flashy or sexy and it doesn’t do dances on TikTok, we are 100% okay with that!

Not all of us dream of making seven figures. For some of us, our businesses are perfect the way they are when they work for us instead of us working for them. In other words, while you might not roll in the dough, if you are satisfied with what your business brings in and it supports you to the extent that it suits your lifestyle, who cares about the rest? It is worth remembering that you risk much more when you try to grow and scale your business aggressively, and many have closed their doors after pursuing exponential growth instead of keeping to the stable and consistent things. We would like to be around, no matter what happens in the world, and we believe that we can do that by doing more of the same-old same-old. This strategy will not get us on Oprah’s couch or anything spectacular like that, and we don’t have $10 million growth plans, but tune in to hear how we are planning to bring boring, stable, and consistent back!

Today on the show we have Liz Rishel from Within the Grove. For the last five years, Liz has grown her blog and Instagram to become an influencer to watch! We have loved observing her journey since she was a Strategy Academy student who accomplished amazing things and, in this episode, we pick her brain about what she has done to get such phenomenal results.

We’ve often talked about blogging and making money from working with brands and have given our listeners some insights into how this all works, and Liz is here to give us her perspective on the whole thing. She gives us a peek behind the curtain of her growth over the past five years, getting into when it became a full-time job, how many hours she had to put in before it became a viable financial option for her and her family, how she collaborates with brands, her engagement with followers, and creating amazing products in her own home. Be sure to tune in for an episode that might just inspire you to start your next DIY project or finally get that online business of yours off the ground!

Emylee is back from a much-needed break, but now she feels like she has forgotten how to do her job! Getting back into business mode with Boss Project is also different from returning to her side hustle, since the more creative tasks use another side of the brain. It got her thinking about overwhelm and taking breaks and thought it’s high time they did an episode on honoring your creative process. Abagail, on the other hand, is in the middle of a big house move and, as they both want to take a break over December, they find themselves in an interesting place. Abagail finds that, after a busy day, it is more relaxing and energizing to do something creative rather than vegging out on the couch. Once Emylee got back into her clay-making studio, she also had an idea for a pair of earrings she wanted to get out, surprising herself with creativity she didn’t even think she had at that point.

If you feel like you lack creativity, feel overwhelmed, and get stuck comparing yourself with everybody else, this episode will help you navigate these ‘meh’ situations and get your creative fire going again! At the very least, you will walk away encouraged by the knowledge that others also go through dry spells. Tune in!

Joining us on the show today is returning guest Ward Sandler, the co-founder and CEO of MemberSpace. Ward runs a SaaS company that enables entrepreneurs and organizations to turn any part of their website into members only with just a few clicks. But we are not talking only about MemberSpace in this conversation but a new way to integrate an amazing community to your membership or products using a tool called Circle. While Circle isn’t affiliated with MemberSpace, they work together perfectly — which we love! Ward breaks down the features of Circle and how you can add-on a community to make a great experience for your members and customers.

We did an episode on Patreon and Mighty Networks a while ago (Episode 468), and this is yet another option for those who want to move their community away from social media platforms such as Facebook groups. Ward gives his take on Patreon and Mighty Networks, explaining how the pricing and features differ from MemberSpace and Circle and why he is a huge fan of picking the best tools for every need and then making them fit together seamlessly. Listeners will also get plenty of advice for setting up MemberSpace and Circle and learn how it can transform their membership engagement. Be sure to try it and check it out at bossproject.com/memberspace!

In today’s episode, we are going to bring back an oldie but a goodie — We are going to do a Boss Talk episode, where we just ask a question, riff on it, and see where it leads us. That's totally our style anyway; we love to riff on things. No one is surprised that we go on tangents and talk about whatever we want, whenever we want. The question for today is, how do you cope with stress and still remain productive when you have got all this stuff going on? We both run two businesses, so there is a lot on our plates! Also, we are in the middle of a pandemic, heading into a new season, Emylee has a kid who is bouncing off the walls, and Abagail just bought a house that needs renovations!

So, as you can hear, there is hardly anything going on at all (sarcasm much?). The question around productivity is one we hear super often, and Emylee finds she always gets it in her DMs when she has shared an especially productive day. People want to know how she manages to sleep, much less do it all. So, just to clear the air, she wants to let everyone know that she is not a workaholic, and it’s actually something she actively puts effort into not being. It's so easy in today’s world to just work all the time, especially for her personality type. So, she wants to share some of the expectations she has for herself, and how she and Abagail have stayed productive in the midst of it all.

We know our listeners are super smart, and there are tons of cool things you do every day, so maybe the best thing you can do today is to outline your group course! We have been in the teaching space for a while now, and Boss Project has recently celebrated its fifth anniversary. Go us! Interestingly, even though we have taught tons of people over the years, we haven’t shared that much about what we put out into the world. We teach a lot about business and marketing, but we have not really gone into course development that much. This is mostly because this is not everyone’s primary job.

We have, however, noticed an influx of coaches, and actually, the majority of the people in the Creative Template Shop are coaches. While this is surprising, it is also really incredible because people are looking for connection and transformation, and they want someone to guide them in that process. Before we get started, we want to invite you to a party. All you need to do is open the Strategy Hour Podcast up in your favorite podcast app, give us five-star reviews only, and then share these screenshots on Instagram. You can win one of two great prizes, either a free copy of Trello for Business or a whole month free of the Creative Template Shop.

Today on the podcast we are joined by our wonderful friend and all round badass, Sarah Peck. Sarah is the founder of Startup Parent, a New York City based company dedicated to documenting women’s leadership. She is a writer, yoga teacher and hosts Startup Parent’s weekly podcast too! Her goal is to amplify women’s voices and promote their business through her work and she definitely has one of our favorite brains in the game! We share a lot of her business philosophy and will be using this episode to geek out on some strategies for listening to your audience as a way to help grow your product or service.

This super under-utilized and somewhat simple strategy can help you and your biz so much! By paying closer attention to your audience, you can really improve what you offer and make the direct connection between those paying you and what you provide for them. Quite a straightforward equation, right? This is the second time Sarah is joining us on the Strategy Hour and if you haven’t heard her previous appearance, go back and check it out immediately! It’s Episode 185. Today’s episode’s topic was sparked by a conversation a few days prior where we were chatting to Sarah about business philosophies and implementation. We really believe in these ideas and they are so in line with our core values that we could not resist having her on to talk all about it! So stayed tuned to hear it all.

Today on The Strategy Hour we’re diving deeper into what exactly we mean when we say that it should be easy and fun to make $100k from your service based business, within a year. There’s a misconception that money cannot be earned without really hard work, and to an extent this is true, especially for certain types of businesses. But you also have to be smart about it! Just to reiterate, when we say it’s easy to make six figures, we are talking about offering services like copywriting, designing and photography. And this is by doing the basic work only, aside from all the other side offerings like podcasts and training courses.

In fact, you should keep it as simple as possible, focusing on doing one thing really well instead of doing a bunch of different things. These other ideas are not bad, but until you’ve done the one thing properly, you won’t enjoy its full benefits. We’re also guilty of this and we’ve seen many of our mentees battling with the same thing. Today we’re breaking this down in a way we hope will help you not to fall into the trap of believing that diversifying will necessarily expand your business and make you more money. Today we’re busting the myth that the single solid service you’re offering will not get you to your financial goals, and we’re going to show you it is totally possible to achieve your goals by sticking to the basics.

Are you unsure of what you are doing or where you are going? We know the feeling! Here at Boss Project we want to talk about these things with you! On this episode of the The Strategy Hour we are talking about the crippling effects of fear and anxiety. We are here to tell you that everyone feels these things at different times and you need to be kind to yourself when these scary feelings come around! It is the unknowingness and feeling unsure that make it so unbearable most of the time. But if we can talk about and acknowledge what is going on maybe we can make some progress and take a little more control of our lives. Come on sister, we know you got this!

Emylee feels that she has an unhealthy fixation on the amount of time she has left before she dies, something that can become overwhelming and paralyzing. This can stop her from achieving the exact goal that these fears arise out of, wanting to be impactful and do great things. She feels like she is not sure what to do next and how to go about getting over these hurdles. Abagail on the other hand finds she is stuck more in the present than in the future. She ends up settling for the dissatisfaction and inaction of not having any more to give and just wants to put her feet up and do nothing. We are sure all our listeners have all their own worries and concerns that affect them in different ways and we really feel for all of you and hope that this episode can be the beginning of some important conversations towards better managing these issues.

Today's episode is all about the required step you need to take in order to successfully sell what you do. That's right we are giving you the tools to really beat your imposter syndrome and beat it well! We have shared in the past a lot about where your clients are and how to find them, this is a big internal piece and it means getting over a big hairy monster! We also suffer and have suffered from this issue, so do not fear, this is the way to crack the code and move forward. We know you are doing this so no need to hide in the reeds! We see you convincing yourself that if your work gets better you will get more clients and that the reason you are not currently getting more clients is because of the quality of your work. It is easy to start thinking you should work for free or very cheaply and get into the churn of lowering your value, so that one day the glory gates will miraculously open and you will have arrived.

You know this is not the world we live in! It is not like your portfolio does not have any say in your client base but so many potential clients out there are less concerned with your portfolio than you. Customers are not in your field and do not have as discerning an eye as you do, they are more interested in the experience you are selling. So we are here to tell you to stop selling yourself purely on what you have already done and how good you think you are, not everyone knows good from bad as well as you do!

Today on the podcast we have Lindsay Hotmire. She loves to work with female creatives, entrepreneurs, and CEOs to help them discover a non-formulaic version of authenticity. She’s helped over 200 clients and counting ditch the one-size-fits-all formulas and frameworks and helps them genuinely align with their message. In this episode with Lindsay, we break down what being authentic actually means and how to be authentic in a way that feels good for you and with your audience.

We talk a lot about business values, your core values as a person, and how to not only identify them but then use the results in marketing, branding, messaging, and in your overall strategy to grow your business and sell your product, offer, or service. There are so many examples we talk about today, everything from messaging and Instagram presence to how you build community; so many different ideas! It’s a really good one and we hope you love it!

Today, we have Amanda Boleyn back on the show! She is the founder of She Did It Her Way, where she coaches women how to quit their jobs, replace their income, and build an online business they love. In this episode, we are talking about the four steps she has developed that you can implement right now to start landing clients and offering your services!

We know that considering current circumstances these steps might need to be expedited a little bit and they could feel a little hurried and rushed, but the point is they work so implementing them effectively could be just what you need. So, today we are giving you a lot of ideas on who you can be reaching out to, how you can figure out what to offer, and how to actually market and get your product or service sold!