On this edition of the The Strategy Hour we have a very special guest, Christine McAlister, founder of Life With Passion and author of the new book The Income Replacement Formula. Christine’s business is dedicated to helping hopeful entrepreneurs transition from their day jobs to owning the business of their dreams, and boy, do we love her for it! It is a challenge that almost all business owners have to face and doing it correctly can be so tricky. That’s why Christine’s service is so important!

During the episode we go over the steps that Christine lays out in her book and she details each step with great information to get you started and excited about this shift. We talk mindset, marketing, visibility and much more that you are not going to want to miss! Our guest has one of the longest and most diverse lists of achievements we have ever seen: Olympic broadcaster, horse mother, raising service dogs...amongst other things! So do we even need to say how excited we are to have her here? The point of this episode is to start you on the path where you can quit the slog and start working on your passion full time. Let’s jump right in and get started!

Welcome back to the podcast all you beautiful business unicorns! Today we are doing the monthly round-up and recap of July and we’ll be looking forward to August, so jump on board with us as we take this fun ride. We will mostly be talking about the funnels we have implemented and these helpful changes that we made to our website that have continued to improve our engagement and sales. We will carry on implementing more funnels as time goes on but mapping these ones out and seeing the positive results has been so exciting that we could not resist sharing these successes with y’all!

As our business has grown it has become more and more complex to understand and map the journey our customers and new visitors make within it. It is, as always, vitally important to have a handle on these dynamics and it is always exciting to understand what efforts yield results and where you may be able to improve. It’s so invigorating to see how these funnels impact our programs and we can’t wait to see the growth in sales continue into the future! At times reflecting like this can be be tricky or difficult and we may not alway give ourselves a fair review, but please remember how important it is! When we see the numbers across the last few months, it makes it all worth it!

On today’s episode of The Strategy Hour we are tackling a very important subject and a problem that is very close to home for most business owners, including ourselves here at TCC. We are going to be looking at the two schools of thought that might be holding up your business’ progress. With the rise in entrepreneurship and self-made business owners there has been a natural growth in literature and thought on the subject. So much of this has been helpful and inspiring in many different ways but there are also ways in which it can be stunting you and your work.

The first popular school of thought we look at is the “hustle ‘till you die” attitude, which has been popularized by many successful entrepreneurs and has so much influence over the way go-getters portray themselves at events and online. We at Think Creative Collective know the value of hard work and persistence but attaching someone else’s or a collectively held image of blood sweat and tears to your own life can have devastating effects on your health, family life and of course your work. The second thing we look at is the idea that hiring and outsourcing is the direct line to success and credibility. After unpacking just how damaging these two ideas can be to you and those around you we look at ways in which you can avoid these problems, taking only the necessary pearls of wisdom from the philosophies and finding your own, healthy pathway to success!

Today on the podcast we welcome Katie Hunt of Tradeshow Bootcamp. Katie is a third-time guest on the show, where she was on previously to talk about wholesale and tradeshows. Katie is a business strategist, a mentor to creative entrepreneurs and has been super helpful for us in the realm of retail and all things product based. Today, Katie brings a new conversation to the table to help all you service-based babes who are wanting to dip your toes into physical products but just don’t know where to start. She is going to talk to us about how service-based businesses, and any business really, can start having a product shop without housing an inventory.

We are going to be breaking down drop shipping, print on demand and the different software and systems that you can set up to get you going as hassle free as possible. Katie will also be giving you a bunch of vital questions that you need to be asking yourself in order to help get yourself ready for your product journey and ensure that you are setting expectations from the get-go. This conversation definitely set fire to our own booties and inspired us to get our own products listed. If introducing products is an idea you’ve been toying with for a while but just don’t know where to start, Katie is here to help us hit the ground running.

Today on the podcast we have our work husband, Parker Stevenson. Parker is our bookkeeper, our CFO, business adviser, our friend, our frienemy and everything in between. You have probably heard us mention Parker throughout this podcast series. He is like the Where’s Waldo of TCC and an absolute hoot. Today, we are revealing the mystery of Parker Stevenson and are going to be talking all about scaling a service-based business. Instead of teaching you sexy bookkeeping things, Parker is actually going to talk about his own business and give you a peek into some of his own business strategies.

Parker went down the same rabbit hole that many entrepreneurs do, where he thought creating a passive online course program was going to be the solution for his business growth and scalability. But in this episode, you’ll learn how they decided it wasn’t going to work for them and why they decided to scale the service side of their business instead. Parker has a wealth of experience and is here to share with you why service-based businesses are severely underrated. If you are a new business owner or in the process of re-thinking your current online business model – this is definitely an episode you won’t want to miss!

On today’s show we’re doing things a little differently and taking you through a process that we believe can make a world of difference in your life! This episode will be all about inventing a new possibility in your life, and you’ll see just what a shift this can make. Abagail tried out this exercise recently and found it super helpful and enlightening, so we could not resist sharing it with our listeners. Full disclaimer though, it might be a bit of bumpy ride because let’s face it, most things that help you grow are not pain free. But we promise you’ll thank us in the end!

Emylee will be going through the guided exercise for the first time during the episode and you can join in with he. We can all get down to the nitty gritty together! A lot of the time we deal with the positive and negative aspects of our lives in repeated patterns of behavior that do not allow for very much progress. The process we will be detailing is simple and straightforward, yet it provides a lot of insight and hope into how small adjustments can change our lives in big ways. So if you’re game, grab your favorite notepad and buckle in, we’re going deep!

So, we have a crazy idea! We’re excited and nervous about it and can’t wait to share with you. We have big dreams this year and yep, you guessed it. We want to take you on our journey to $100k per month. We recently came to the conclusion that making this amount of money every month is realistically quite doable for us at this point. We have formulated some new strategies, broken down more of our goals and in the next few weeks, we’re going to be pushing to make our $100k month a reality.

In this episode, we will be sharing with you how this dream came about and delving into the shifts of our money mindset, our questions and fears and why money is amoral and much like a brick. We want to open up the conversation about money with you and encourage you to examine your own money mindset. So, by the end of this episode, you should feel more comfortable talking about money, dreaming big and feeling less guilty about wanting more money – if that is what you truly want.

We are super excited to welcome our guest on today’s show and know you will love this episode! We talk to Lisa Robbin Young of Ark Entertainment Media about the idea of a six-figure business, something all entrepreneurs have thought about at least once. For many of us, Lisa included, six figures is a bottom line a business needs to reach in order to feel successful. Lisa also talks about how this does not have to be the case. There are in fact some instances where these standards do not apply, but realizing when is the key.

Lisa has a wealth of experience and expertise we cannot wait to share with you as we discuss different types of entrepreneurial styles and personalities and how they influence the way a business is run. We break down how to start translating those strengths into money and success as well as tactics such as freebies and promotions. We sure are grateful for Lisa’s know-how and know you will be too after this great episode. Get ready and let’s get into it!

Hey ya’ll! Today we wanted to take you back to our most popular episode ever, and it happens to be one from the very beginning where Abbie shares her story and tells you all about her journey before Think Creative Collective was born. Abagail graduated from Kansas State University with a degree in Fine Art in Graphic Design and a minor in Business Administration. Before the launch of TCC, Abbie had an incredible five plus years of business and design experience accelerating companies of all shapes and sizes. Inside this episode she also shares about her time running her free lance design business.

One of the most amazing stories is how, within 30 days of getting the pink slip, she was able to completely replace her corporate income. Wow! Before the inevitable moment came along, Abbie created a website and started blogging five days a week. Eventually she grew her own business and worked day and night to find success. So if you are just starting out in the business world and you haven’t heard her Abbie’s story of how she went from getting laid off in the corporate world to replacing her cushy corporate income within just 30 days, you are in for a treat! So put on those slippers, bust out the coffee and enjoy this throwback episode.