December 3, 2017 marked my 1 year podcast anniversary.  

I've learned so much about myself, my profession, online marketing, and entrepreneurship, etc., the list goes on.  

In this episode, I narrow it down to the five (5) most important things I've learned.  Here's my list:

• You have something to say and people want to listen. 
  • someone is waiting for YOUR story to get started

• Just start!
  • Done is better than perfect

• You cannot do it alone.
  • building a community of other solopreneurs has been the highlight of my year.

•  Create systems that support your goals and collect data.
  • data tells you who your audience is and what they want.

• Know your true competition. 
  • everyone who does what you do is not your competition.  Knowing your true competition will take your business to the next level.

 Two things I've learned about myself:

• I'm a risk taker and I like it #goodtrouble
• I'm afraid I'm not disciplined enough to be an entrepreneur :-/  

Listen for more details.  To get more information about this episode, check out www.artsteele.co/ep37-podcastanniversary.   

Is your content irresistible?

Content creation is a major component of building an online business;   it's what helps to get your name out there - as an expert, it's what helps you build your list and it's what makes you those sales.  But monetization is not always easy.  

Today's guest, Danielle Leslie is the founder of Courses From Scratch and is a course selling bad ass.  She's has developed a few techniques and strategies that help content creator monetize their content.  

Danielle's career has taken a few twists and turns.  She's worked for a couple of start-ups and Udemy, where she honed her course creating and course launching skills.  

When she started her consulting business 2 years ago, she made 10K in consulting revenue within 30 days and booked over $35,000 in consulting contracts.  Danielle now teaches other business owners how to monetize their content.  

In this episode, we discuss:

• How she went from 0 to 1530 email subscribers and made $20k from my online course (when she had no following, no blog, & no course content; 
• How she grew her Instagram to 18,000 followers in 1 year and earned $25k in 4 weeks from my Instagram followers alone;
• How to create an irresistible offer that involves using T.A.S.T.Y. Content to attract their MVPs (Most Valuable PAYERS); and
• How to avoid the customer thirst trap.

You can find out more information about Danielle and this episode at artsteele.co/ep36-danielleleslie

Enjoy!

 

     

LinkedIn is one of the most underutilized social media platforms and today's guest Becky Mollenkamp discusses how creative solopreneurs can use LinkedIn to attract steady paying corporate clients.

Becky is a business mentor for creative entrepreneurs and started her career working for one of the largest publishing companies.  At one point she left and started her own freelancing business and uses linked in to attract corporate clients. 

There's a lot of talk about who your ideal client is but unfortunately, that doesn't usually include corporate clients.  Corporate clients are great because they are usually working with a sizeable budget, pay on time, and give you more leeway in creating work.  

In today's episode Becky details the process of getting in the eyeballs or the inboxes of corporate businesses and landing those corporate clients;  How to use linked in to up your connections and your chances and how to create content and post content on Linkedin that will attract those corporate execs.

To get more information about Becky or this episode, go to artsteele.co/ep35-beckymollenkemp

Enjoy!

 

Multiple revenue streams are a key component to building a sustainable business.  And one way to create an additional stream of income is through affiliate sales.  

Addi Ganley started her online journey in 2011 on a whim because she wanted an outlet to share how her family was saving money. What began as a hobby quickly turned into a business and now 6 years later it generates a six-figure income.

Addi realized that as her blog was becoming a daily resource for her readers, they began asking her for tools (read - links) to help them.  Addi then created a system to monetize the traffic she was getting from various outlets to her affiliate links.  

I've applied some of her methods and teachings to my business, and it has helped me generate affiliate income – so it does work.  

In this episode, Addi and I talk about how she stumbled into affiliate marketing, how she connected the dots between what her audience was asking for and affiliate links and how she created a system that drove traffic to those links, and how teaches others to do the same. 

If you want to learn how to monetize your blog without having a product, you want to tune in.

Enjoy!

You can find out more about this episode and Addi Ganley at artsteele.co/ep34-addiganley.

 

If you want to learn how to build a successful business, Courtney Sanders is the person to talk to.  Not only has she built her own side hustle to multiple 6-figures in about 2 years, she's helped thousands of other women do the same.

I chose Courtney to open up this series because building profitable business starts with self-discipline and focus.  Courtney specializes in just that.  Courtney is an authority on women's empowerment, she offers training and personal development online & in-person education. 

In this episode, Courtney details her progression as the Think and Grow Chick from having her first event where she lost $300, to self-publishing her first book, to developing a sales funnel and a mastermind that has earned her multiple six figures in her business.  And she breaks down exactly how she did it!  Courtney explains why when she was steadily grossing almost 6K per month, she waited almost a year before quitting her job.  

Since launching Think and Grow Chick, Courtney has had the opportunity to speak to and develop training programs for a number of organizations, including The White House My Brother's Keeper and was recently featured in Forbes Magazine!

Finally, Courtney leaves you with three tips to help you start of 2018 on the right foot.

You can find out more about Courtney and this episode at www.artsteele.co/ep33-courtneysanders

Enjoy!

 If you haven't heard about Arsha Jones then you're missing out on an amazing resource and a source of inspiration.

She is one of the smartest online business and e-commerce entrepreneurs I've come across.  She has a keen sense for marketing, sales, technology, social media and pop culture.

She has built multiple e-commerce businesses, including Capital City and Tees in the Trap, with revenues approaching nearly half a million dollars in less than two years.

Arsha's brands have been featured on media outlets such as Buzzfeed, The Washington Post, Black Enterprise, Fox CBS, and TV One.  Arsha also runs a wildly popular Facebook group called Build, Brand and Launch where she teaches others how to turn their passions into profit with physical products and how to optimize their e-commerce business.

Arsha and I talk about:

• How her SEO skills got her noticed by The Washington Post;
• Her recent recognition from Black Enterprise, winning the Best Family-Run Business award;
• How Tees In the Trap come about and why she took immediate steps to legally protect it;
• How to brand, build, and launch a product and e-commerce site; and
• some of the important lessons she's learned on her journey.

You can catch up with Arsha on Twitter (@arshajones) and Instagram (@teesinthetrap and @captialcityco) and her Facebook group, Brand, Build and Launch with Arsha Jones.   You can find out more about Arsha and this episode at www.artsteele.co/ep32-arshajones   Enjoy!    

Tiffini Gatlin was tired of spending 5-6 hours a day prepping synthetic hair for just one client, so she came up with a technique to pre-curl the hair - this idea turned into Tiffini's million-dollar hair company, Latched and Hooked.

But that's not the whole story.  Tiffini's story involves leaving her corporate job as an assistant VP and starting a few companies, including a celebrity concierge service and a digital magazine.  Eventually, she settled on braiding hair and she eventually developed a business idea that turned into her current business.  

In this episode, Tiffini and I talk about how she got started with banking, how she used those skills when she started her business, some of the legal issues she's faced while building her business and how she distinguishes herself in a competitive, saturated market.

Tiffini's big takeaways from this conversation is (1) lawyers are important - if you can't afford an attorney, then you shouldn't take your product to market (2) she doesn't balance everything, practice prioritizing your the moving parts of your life over trying to balance everything, and (3) be aware of your competition, but don't become consumed in what you're competitors are doing.  

You can catch up with Tiffini on Instagram at @latchedandhooked or on her website, www.latchedandhooked.com.  Make sure to sign up for Tiffini's Sunday newsletter; she shares tips about life, being a mom, time with her family, and running her business.  

You can find out more information about Tiffini and this episode at www.artsteele.co/ep31-tiffinigatlin.

Enjoy!

 

 

 

Janet LeBlanc, the founder Paper + Spark, offers easy online bookkeeping solutions to makers and creative entrepreneurs.  Janet, a certified public accountant, also makes jewelry and stationary products that she sells on Etsy.  Once her follow Etsy store owners found out she was an accountant, they started reaching out for bookkeeping and accounting tips.  

Seeing a void, Janet created her first iteration of the Etsy Seller Spreadsheet, 2015.  Her goal was to help creative entrepreneurs become more confident and less confused about the financial side of running a business. 

Janet's spreadsheets and bookkeeping solutions are made specifically for entrepreneurs who don't have the budget to hire a bookkeeper but still need a comprehensive accounting and bookkeeping solution.

In this episode, we talk about the four common mistakes new entrepreneurs make when it comes to the tax and accounting of their business and we walk through how Janet's spreadsheets help to fix all of those mistakes. 

Janet's spreadsheets include:

• options for Shopify, Etsy, Square or Paypal;
• pre-written formulas that capture essential numbers for monitoring your business;
• Sales tax calculation based on your state;
• a video tutorial that walks you through how to copy and paste your reports from your sales platform; and 
• a makers' inventory and pricing spreadsheet that helps you incorporate all of the expenses into making your product.

So, whether your sale's platform is Shopify, Etsy, Square or Paypal, Janet's got you covered.   So head over to Paper + Spark and get your life!  

You can find Janet on Instagram at @paperandspark.

 

 

Archel Bernard has taken her love for design and sewing African fashion to unprecedented heights.  She is the owner of The Bombchel Factory and Mango Rags boutique in Monrovia, Liberia.  When Archel moved back to Liberia after graduating college, she wanted to get into journalism and thought a great way to stand out on YouTube but blend into the community would be to wear West African fashion.

What started as a need to represent her Liberian heritage has now turned into training disadvantaged women to sew her designs and empowering the women to become self-sufficient.

Archel's mission took a significant turn amid the deadly Ebola outbreak in Liberia. She saw the devastation in a country she loved; a country still struggling to overcome civil war. Archel decided to open a factory to help the people of her ancestral homeland to rebuild.  She named it The Bombchel Factory.

We talk about selling her first pieces out of her mom's garage, her business surviving the Ebola virus, being mentioned in the New York Times, a successful Kickstarter campaign and eventually getting Kelly Rowland to wear one of her dresses to Beyonce's push party!

You can reach Archel on Instagram (@itsarchel and @shopbomchel) Bombchel Factory website:  www.bombchelfactory.com

To find out more about Archel and this episode, check out artsteele.co/ep29-archelbernard

Enjoy!

Eryn Sheilds began sewing during her pregnancy with the intention of making a few maxi dresses to get through her pregnancy.   But, she fell in love with sewing and took it up as her hobby.  

After having her baby, Eryn felt her clothing options were limited, so she kept sewing and essentially created a unique wardrobe perfect for her lifestyle and her figure.  

Eryn decided to turn her passion to profit when she stumbled across a video of a woman wearing a fabulous dress that she wanted to make.  She clicked on the link to the video only to get a better view of the dress. But, the woman turned out to be a business coach, and she opened up Eryn's eyes to the world of email marketing.  And the rest is history.

Eryn and I talk about the inspiration that led her to turn her hobby into a business, why she had to pivot from what she first started, how investing in her business through business coaches and courses has helped her make more money, and how a legal mishap set her back. 

In addition to Style Sew Me, Eryn runs her personal blog Erynshields.com where she offers one on one coaching. 

Enjoy!