Building my Brand, a Year of Risks, Rewards & Realizations 🍾
“We tend to overestimate what we can do in a day and underestimate what we can do in a year” - Bill Gates
In this blog post I’m sharing where I was a year ago and where I am today. I hope that after reading this post you will make some time to reflect as well. It doesn’t have to be a year, you could review the last three months or any period that is meaningful to you.
A year in review
Today is a special day because it marks the day that I started building my own business again- exactly a year ago. Before that I divided my time working for two of my favorite brands TRX fitness and a superfood pancake company. It was great to be able to support and help grow their businesses but I also realized it wasn't smart to divide all my time between two brands and help grow their businesses instead of growing my own. I needed to free up time and gave notice to the superfood pancake company - but two weeks later TRX announced budget cuts, my position was absorbed by a different department and I got laid off. I went from working full time and making good money to being an entrepreneur without an income. A little scary yes, but I had savings and I was ready to step into the unknown, to focus on building my own brand. The big goal I had in mind is to create a passive income stream selling E-courses for content creators.
A lot has happened in the past 12 months; and I’m proud to say that I build this website, I started a podcast and yes I did create and launch my digital course twice this year. It’s called the On-Camera Confidence course, in which I teach how to write a script, how to shoot and edit speaking reels and how to build a community. And you probably wonder if I achieved my goal for this course to be a passive income stream?
The passive income stream
Not yet. I have invested a lot of time and energy to get up and running and it’s been great to see the transformations and receive feedback from the women that signed up. I know I have created something valuable and ideally every launch is outperforming the previous one. But it’s not that easy. At this time I’m not making enough money with my course to cover my bills yet and although it’s a bit disappointing and at times the voice of fear creeps in “ can I really pull this off?” I know that I have to give myself some grace; I have worked so hard to get here and it’s going to take some more time.I will have to learn some new marketing strategies, including selling to cold audiences; meaning that I’m marketing the course to people who have had no prior interaction with my IG page and brand. It typically requires more effort and that means most likely investing in IG ads. There is definitely a lot more to learn and to experiment with. I’ll keep you posted!
The next steps
In the meantime I do need to make more money of course. Throughout this year, I have been earning my income by collaborating with fitness and health, and wellness brands. I manage influencer campaigns, create content and Instagram strategies, and enhance brand visibility at events. I enjoy doing all that; I’m constantly learning and I keep getting better.
And the next step for me is to start my own influencer agency. I have built a great network over the years, I have lead many influencer campaigns and I noticed that the quality of work that I deliver is greater than many large influencer platforms that aggregate a ton of content creators they take on pretty much anyone but they don’t do a good job onboarding them which means that many deliver poor quality content and brands waste their money.
This summer I’m going to actively reach out to brands that I already love, use and recommend to others and think about a name for my agency. This feels very exciting, it energizes me and I am ready for this next step. There are a lot of unknows and there is a lot of competition but isn’t it always like that?
Summer goals
As an overachiever there is always more to do and it’s so easy to get caught up in work and constantly be busy. I feel like I have been busy since age 17, when I started working full time. And now I’m in early forties I am more aware that life has an expiration date and a strong desire to have more fun and move a little slower. I have decided that this summer I’m not going to work super long days, I want to make sure I get to fully enjoy where I live; beautiful Maui HI and get to spend quality time with my sweet husband Eric Buddy our cute little puppy, my wonderful friends here and the magical ocean.
I am setting new goals for the next three months and I’m going to focus on the things that move the needle most. That way I don’t keep myself too busy with the small stuff, and I will be productive while working less.
How about you? How are you going to spend your summer? How are you going to run your business and how are you going to make time for you, your loved ones and everything that fills your cup ? Tag me in post that you’d like me to see and reach out on DM anytime @ _ ModelsDoEat . I love hearing from you.
