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For the next three weeks, we will be doing a series on simple ways to double your income. Here are the weeks and what we will be discussing:
- Week 1 – Tracking Stats & Collaborating
- Week 2 – Raising Your Rates & Focusing on Growth
- Week 3 – Embracing Paid Ads & Creating Products
Let’s get started!
Welcome to Week 1!
What’s are we going over today?
- First: simple steps you can take to learn how to track what strategies are actually working.
- Second: how collaborations can benefit all involved and tips on getting those dream collabs.
What's Actually Working For You In Your Biz?
The Preliminary Choice
Figure out what’s working and do more of that.
Simple, right?
HA!
How do you even KNOW what’s working and what’s not?
You track everything.
*Katt Williams voice* Everything? Everything!
Once you start tracking your analytics, you’ll have a clear picture of what your focus should be moving forward.
Step 1 - Make The Choice
What do you want to accomplish in your business?
I’m guessing that objective will change on a monthly, weekly or even daily basis.
A good place to start: income and expenses.
Look at things like:
- Your Products
- Your Programs
- Affiliate Products You Promote
- Any Source of Income
- The Cost of Hosting Your Products
- What You Spend the Most Time On
Let’s start with income tracking.
Did it come from..
- Course/Product Revenue?
- Affiliate Payments?
- Advertising Space on Your Site?
If possible, look back on the last 6-12 months of your financial data. The more data you have, the better.
Step 2 - Income & Expenses
Next up: expenses.
Where is your money going?
I’m sure you will have hosting expenses. You’ll need to park your products and programs somewhere, right? For now, we’re going to put those aside.
Take a look at each item you wrote on your income list. Now, think of any expenses for each source.
Examples:
- Graphic Designer
- VA (Virtual Assistant)
- Software Fees (shopping cart)
- Payouts to Your Own Affiliates
Some income will have little to no expenses. The only thing you’re giving them is time and a spot on your social media profile or your website.
Once you’ve subtracted those costs from the income figures you have from earlier, you’ll have a pretty good idea of what your profits look like.
Now let’s move on to time.
Step 3 - Time Tracks
How much time are you spending to generate your income?
Think about the amount of time you spent creating your products.
A course might take a full month of 10-12 hour days, while you could probably knock out an eBook in a day or two.
Are you leveraging content you’ve already published?
Are you using PLR (private label rights) products to streamline the process?
Take the amount of money you have made from each product and divide it by the number of hours you worked on it. Once you have your final figures, it might surprise you, but you’ll have a clear picture on your most bankable venture.
That is what you might want to concentrate on moving forward.
The Final Choice
Now that you’ve seen all of your stats, what next?
You have three choices:
- Do more of that
- Do less of that
- Stop doing that
Time to focus.
Start pouring your time and energy to what’s serving you.
Give it a good six months, then go back and recalculate.
Have your profits gone up?
If so, you now have a solid strategy moving forward that might just double your income!
How Will Collaborations help Your Biz Grow?
Just Get Traffic... Right?
Here’s a possible way to double your income: get your brand in front of twice the amount of people in your current audience.
Simple, right?
Haha.. I know I know.
Getting traffic is easier said than done. As demand expands and more people start putting out the same types of content, competition increases. Yes, you could throw money towards some well-placed ads, but what if you’re just starting out and your budget is pretty much “as close to $0 as possible”?
Adspend just wouldn’t be a viable option.
Alright STOP, Collaborate and..
LISTEN! Hahaha
What’s a super simple way to get your brand in front of a new audience? Collaborate with someone who has a similar or complementary business and jack theirs!
Search for hashtags on social media or just do a search on a search engine or Pinterest.
Example: let’s say your business revolves around growing tomatoes. You find someone who is in the gardening niche. Maybe they sell garden kits or blog about organic gardening or even have written a book about backyard gardening.
The goal is to find someone who isn’t a direct competitor, but a collaborator who has products your audience might be interested in or benefit from.
Your audience might want a kit to grow the tomatoes that you recommend.
Do you see how this could work?
Make Them An Offer..
They can’t refuse.
Start by sharing their content with your audience (sign up for their affiliate program if they have one).
Ask for:
- an interview to discuss their products
- a special offer you can share with your community
Provide value for them before asking for anything. You want them to see the collaboration as beneficial for both of you.
I've found my endgame..
LOVE that song “Endgame” by Petula Clark!
Your endgame is ultimately asking if they can share your content with their audience.
As I stated, your collab partner has to see that this partnership is worth the time and effort.
Here are some tips:
- Create unique content for their audience
- Offer an exclusive discount on your signature products
- Ask for a simple mention on their social media profiles or email newsletter
- Make sure your client journey is already set up
- Check all of your links – dead links lead to nowhere
- Make sure your lead magnet is in place
Once you have handed over your content, it’s up to you to make sure all of your funnels and pages are in place so you can turn your new potentials into paying customers.
Stock Photos:
resources
Income & Expense Tracker
This is a personal finance planner, but can be easily used for business purposes.
There is an income and expense tracker inside, as well as:
- vision boards
- calendar pages
- specific savings charts
- debt tracker
Time Tracking & Goal Planning
My FAVORITE PLANNER OF ALL TIME to set goals and keep track of your time.
There’s so much space in this planner for setting goals and schedule your time.
You can find it HERE.
Collaborating
Mimosas & Motherhood has a FANTASTIC Ebook about Partnerships! It includes tips on pitching to brands/people you want to work with. It’s a must-have if you want to get started collaborating with other businesses. You can find that HERE.
My FREE ebook “Welcome to Collaboration Station”, which includes practical tips to:
- make collabs beneficial for everyone
- make them start off on the right foot and run smoothly
- delegate tasks
- manage conflicts
Subscribe to our email list to get your copy:
Figuring out What's Working
How do you know what’s working and what can be improved upon in your biz? You do a quarterly review!
Included: 20 Pages of Journal Prompts to take stock in what has happened and how you can use that knowledge to move forward.
