Work Less, Earn More

If you want to start your own business, the very first, most important part of the process is just deciding what business you want to start.

You can’t move forward, and you can’t begin to grow your business at all until you make that crucial decision.

So in today’s episode, I’m going to share with you exactly how you can make that decision, whether you’re stuck because you have too many ideas and you just can’t choose, or if you’re stuck because you don’t have enough ideas.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• The three different kinds of businesses you could start
• Three lists to brainstorm business ideas
• Three ways to score your ideas and narrow down your list
• Why you need to have an idea of what a day in the life of your business would be like

Learn more about Gillian:

• Small Business 101
• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

Resources:

• 100 Digital Product Ideas – Free Download
• 50 Service Business Ideas – Free Download

Last month, I was teaching a class about how to start a business. And even though most of the participants hadn’t yet started their businesses, all of them had worked on the branding for their business.

So even though they hadn’t done almost any of the other steps of setting up their business to make it legal or to start making money, they’d designed their branding.

Of course we get really excited by new ideas and want to start doing things that feel satisfying and that we can see right away.

But when you’re starting a business, the things you can see aren’t necessarily the most important. And there are a lot of things behind the scenes that we have to do before we can actually start a business.

Today, I’m covering six practical things you have to do before you can start your business.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• Two places you need to register your business
• How to start handling your business finances
• Why you should create a separate email account just for your business
• Why you have to validate your business idea before you invest time, energy, and money
• The simple marketing plan you need to start generating leads

Learn more about Gillian:

• Small Business 101
• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

To make money with your business, you need to make sales. To make sales, you need leads. But where do you get those leads?

One of the most popular places on the planet to get leads is through traffic from Google. 

That traffic is usually directed to content on your site, which makes Google SEO one of the most common aspects of a content marketing strategy.

But Google SEO can be complicated and you might have questions about what it is, how it works, and how to get your content to rank, especially if you’re just getting started.

Today I’m talking to Brandon Gaille about how to get started with Google SEO, what your first steps should be, and how to build a system for getting your content to rank on Google, so you can tap into that source of leads.

Brandon Gaille is an SEO expert who has been studying Google SEO for well over 10 years. He’s also the founder of Rank IQ, one of the top SEO tools on the market. He hosts the popular podcast, The Blogging Millionaire, where he teaches SEO strategies to over 20,000 bloggers.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• Why keyword research is the foundation of your content strategy
• How to use AI tools to generate post topics
• Tips for optimizing your content
• How to get backlinks to your site
• How often you should be posting

Learn more about Brandon Gaille:

• Rank IQ
• The Blogging Millionaire

Learn more about Gillian:

• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

Resources:

• Ahrefs
• Semrush
• Frase
• Google Search Console
• HARO
• Apple Podcasts
• Chartable
• GoDaddy Auctions

When I was first trying to get my business started, I spent a lot of time watching YouTube videos about how to start an online business and about business strategies.

I also listened to podcasts, read blog posts, and subscribed to dozens of newsletters.

I was hungry for advice about how to get my business started and making money.

I got a ton of advice from mentors from afar during that phase, and I appreciate what I was able to learn.

But the problem with taking in all of that information and advice is that you get so many different ideas about what you could be working on or what you should be working on, it can make it really difficult to know what you should really be focusing on when you’re first starting out.

Today, I’m giving my best advice for what made a difference, what was a distraction, and what you really need to focus on when you’re getting your online business going.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• Why you need to make decisions and stick to them
• How to streamline your branding so it doesn’t eat up your time
• Why quality content is more important than being everywhere at once
• Why making your first sales has to be your primary focus

Learn more about Gillian:

• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

The other day, I was talking to my sister-in-law, who wants to start a business as a wedding planner.

She already has a lot of experience doing it for free, but the prospect of making it official and legal so she can get paying clients is overwhelming her, so she hasn’t taken those steps yet.

And I know she’s not alone.

A lot of people who want to start a business feel the same way. They’re overwhelmed by the things they need to do, or they feel like they don’t even know what they’re supposed to do, so they feel overwhelmed by the unknown.

If that’s you, keep listening. Because today, I’m going to break down seven basic, but necessary, steps to make your business official.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• Why you don’t need an official business plan to get the process started
• The first step to making your business legally official
• What you need for taxes and finances
• Why branding your business matters

Learn more about Gillian:

• Funnel Masterclass
• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

Resources:

• How to Start Your Own Business (and make it LEGAL)
• Register your business, Small Business Administration Guide
• Wave Accounting
• QuickBooks
• Xero
• WordPress.org
• Squarespace

The initial appeal of passive income is to make money without any effort.

But with a greater understanding of what passive income is and how it really works, you can get a more realistic idea of the power and potential of this alternative way of earning a living.

It’s not necessarily an easy way to get rich, but instead a strategic way to diversify your income and create greater financial freedom.

But creating streams of passive income does take effort. Quite a lot, in fact. But the long term gains will make that effort worth it.

What’s the best way to earn passive income?

Should you sell courses, publish a book, set up a drop shipping website, start a membership program? Or even build a business and sell it? Or simply invest your savings into an existing business or dividend-earning stocks?

Today, we’re looking at seven of the best passive income options. These are all strategies that are easy to get started and proven to be able to earn at least $200 every day.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• Three key elements to a successful membership site
• How you can earn money from a YouTube channel
• How to earn money from your blog or podcast
• Two ways to stand out and make money in the creator economy
• Why layering your strategies leads to the best results

Learn more about Gillian:

• Funnel Masterclass
• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

These days, there are so many ways to monetize your knowledge.

You could write a book or an ebook. You could create a course that people can go through at their own pace. Or you could run a live program where you guide people through the material and help them apply it. You could provide coaching or consulting or even a service where you use your knowledge to help others.

Over the last five years or so, I've monetized my knowledge in almost all of these different ways. And some of them took a lot of effort and time and didn't pay very well. And then others have been extremely profitable.

So today I wanted to share with you what has worked best for me and has allowed me to build the multi six figure information business that I run today, and also what I would recommend someone do if they’re interested in getting started in the information industry.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• The first two steps to turning your knowledge into a business
• The research questions you need to ask when you’re developing your idea
• Why you need to sell your product before you create it
• How to go small to make sales
• The two sides of automating your business 

Learn more about Gillian:

• Funnel Masterclass
• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

Resources:

• 100 Digital Product Ideas

Ever since people started lending other people money thousands of years ago, it's been possible to earn passive income.

But things have changed a lot over the centuries and they’re changing all the time now as technology advances.

That means there are so many different ways you can earn passive income beyond the old fashioned way of collecting interest on a loan.

So how does passive income work nowadays?

It can sound too good to be true. It sounds like making something out of nothing. And a quick google will pull up hundreds of stories of people who say they’ve been wildly successful at it.

So how do you know what’s real?

Here’s the reality. We’re not creating something out of nothing. We are investing time or money into creating this stream of passive income for the future.

Let’s dig into what that really means.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• What passive income means at its most basic in the real world
• Why passive income is never passive to start out with
• How to weigh effort versus return and risk versus reward when investing time and money
• Five steps to starting a passive income stream

Learn more about Gillian:

• Funnel Masterclass
• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

If you are thinking about creating your first course, this is the episode for you.

From generating leads with no audience or a small audience to launch strategies to pricing to turning your leads into paying, satisfied customers, I’m going to cover it all with Jess Catorc from Teachable.

Teachable is a course hosting platform that has been around for nearly a decade and has worked with thousands upon thousands of course creators. They’ve got the data, the tools, and the expertise to help make your course a success, and Jess is a major part of that.

Jess is an award-winning brand strategist and leads Launch Creator Initiatives at Teachable. She’s been featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur, ABC television network, and has spent the last 8+ years working with creators and startups to expand their reach and revenue online in the Creator Economy. 

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• How to collaborate to grow your audience
• Why using lead magnets and microproducts helps you validate your course idea
• Why your first launch is about collecting data on what works
• How to build a simple sales funnel
• What you need to consider when you’re pricing your course

Learn more about Jess Catorc:

• Teachable
• Instagram: @jesscatorc @teachable
• Keep the Receipt podcast

Learn more about Gillian:

• Funnel Masterclass
• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins

If you’ve heard people talking about repurposing content, you’re probably heard something like this:

Plan and film one video, then edit it and turn it into 8, 9, 10 pieces of content! One video turns into a YouTube video, a podcast, a blog post, social media posts, a newsletter, and more! 

The gurus will tell you this is a smart, time-saving way to multiply your efforts so you can show up everywhere online.

Sounds great, right?

The only problem is, it doesn’t work.

Which is why today I’m sharing my content repurposing strategy that makes effective use of my content and my time.

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• Why posts from standard repurposing advice fall flat
• How I create content that works for multiple platforms based on my YouTube videos
• Why promoting your content isn’t the same as repurposing it

Learn more about Gillian:

• Small Business 101
• Startup Society
• Get on the waitlist for VALIDATE
• Profit Planning Challenge
• Get in touch!
• Instagram: @GillianZPerkins