363 - Stevie Dee Photography Interview Unf*ck Your Biz With Braden podcast

28:11

On today's episode of the podcast, we're talking about big business changes that are coming based on what has and has not worked for us this year. One question I ask myself and continue to ask yourself is, "What can I do less of next year in order to spend more of time on what's working best? What's making the most impact and how can we do more of that?" Between multiple memberships, courses, social media channels, blog posts, podcasts, guest speaking, summits, bundles, stage speaking, I've been pulled in a lot of directions, especially as our business keeps growing which is fantastic, but comes with push pull. When you say yes to one thing, you say no to something else. I've seen areas of growth, I've seen areas of decline, and I'm sharing today how that's impacting what we're doing in 2025. What's working for us: 1. The Contract Club 2. Speaking 3. Affiliates What's Kind of Working 1. Threads (Great for business connections, not as much for sales) 2. Our quiz funnel (People are going through it, need to look more into conversion data) 3. Our blogs (They're a resource, the SEO could be better, I'm not putting more resources into this) What's not working 1. Instagram, especially stories 2. Facebook group, engagement is down 3.Too many offers, too much we're trying to do What I'm not sure about 1. This podcast Our 2025 Core Offer Suite 1. Contract Club 2. Compliance Club 3. Unf*ck Your Biz 4.Alumni offers for Unf*ck Your Biz students What we're doubling down on in 2025 1. Affiliates (if you aren't already an affiliate, you can become one at notavglaw.com/affiliate ) 2. Strategic partnerships/guest speaking in programs 3.Core offer suite 4 Stage speaking/podcast guesting 5. Threads and Instagram 6. Quiz funnel What's getting the cut 1. New offers, instead focusing on different launch strategies 2. Growing my business TikTok audience 3. Reddit 4. Our Facebook group - I started this in 2018/2019. I started it as a list builder and as a way to cross promote my offers in the group. The group is now mainly people who are/have been students or bought a program and has mainly turned to a place where they are getting support for the programs they've purchased. Providing this community can be done within our offers in Kajabi. And most of the questions I get on Facebook already are not community-answer questions, they're questions for me and my team. 5. This podcast - I feel uncomfortable talking about this because I really don't know if it's doing much for us from a business perspective in relation to the effort and with the time saved not planning and recording podcasts, I can nurture other areas of our business, like our offers, so that people naturally want to share them and affiliate market. I've found that the podcast is very cyclical, people come for what they need to get answers for where they are in business. Do I talk about the same topics year after year so do I re-record that same episode about LLCs or direct you to a pre-recorded one? I'm not ready to make a decision on the podcast right now and have decided the best thing to do is to take a 3-ish week hiatus to spend time with family for the holidays and think about the future of the podcast. I'll be back in January with an announcement of what will be coming next. Thank you so much for tuning in! I appreciate you all more than you know. I'd love to hear your thoughts, send me a DM on Instagram @notavglaw…

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367 - November Profit Report 40:12

13 weeks назад40:12

40:12

On today's episode of the podcast I'm sharing Are you ready to unf*ck your biz? The doors are now open to our signature program, Unf*ck Your Biz, where we go through our six-part framework to get your legal and tax shit legit through our video course with group coaching support through weekly calls and a group Slack channel. You get access to our bookkeeping spreadsheet, quarterly tax estimator, contractor classification guides by state, our state-by-state business blueprints and so much more. The doors close on Monday, December 16th. Learn more at unfuckyourbiz.com November was an exciting month, we experimented with new strategies to lead up to the launch so we'll dive into the report but before we do, you can grab your free copy of How to Conduct a Profit Report for Your Business at www.notavglaw.com/355 to follow along with my step-by-step process and run your own profit report. November Projections vs. Actual • Monthly Clients: $8,500 → $8,900 • UYB: $0 → $0 (Doors were not open in November) • Compliance Club: $13,000 → $21,000 • Contract Club: $7,500 → $13,850 (We did a promotion before we increased the price and it closed December 2nd and we had over $15k those last two days so more will be reflected in our December report) • Trademarks: $2,500 → $6,750 • Other: $2.500 → $1,500 Total revenue: $33,500 → $52,000 (A record revenue month for me) Profit Total revenue: $52,000 Cost of Goods: $227 (printing my books) Expenses: $22,678 Profit: $29,000 Owner's salary: $5,300 Total business profit: $23,708 Notable Expenses • Employee wages: $8,500 (Pretty high, but I had two team members with me at Wedding MBA clocking extra hours at our booth) • Contractors: $4,000 This brings my team expenses to $12,500 • Monthly tools: $1,900 (Higher than usual, but I have an annual payment of $1,500 for Kajabi) • Affiliate payments: $380 • Marketing: $800 • Hotels: $1,600 • Trademark client fees: $1,900 How am I feeling about the numbers? Prior to November I was not feeling great, we had a pretty bad spring and summer. But November slingshot us over our adjusted goal of $270,000 good goal. We got to $280,000 and with our UYB launch in December, I know we'll be able to hit my adjusted best goal of $300,000 for 2024. This was a big profit month, but we know I love transparency, so a lot of this is actually going to loan repayments. In October I took out a $15,000 Stripe loan to help get out of the hole of the summer and run payroll and make investments into our November launch. We went from our Compliance Club launch to Contract Club launch to Unf*ck Your Biz launch. We did our workshops to launch UYB as a paid workshop because there was more content in it than past years but anyone who had the Compliance Club, Contract Club or came by my booth at Wedding MBA had the opportunity to register for free so we had about 700 registrants between our two workshops. Compliance Club Debrief We offered a few price points - $10/month or $180 for lifetime membership to this monthly compliance newsletter, private podcast and additional compliance resources. I started the lifetime membership at $250 and offered it first to the 19 people on our Compliance Club waitlist but even as warm, interested leads, 8 people opted into monthly instead of the lifetime deal. I lowered the price to $180 as I found that interest in a lifetime deals is best when the price of lifetime is just under the cost of 2 years so people would price anchor that at $240 and psychologically under $200 is more attractive. Once I lowered the price, 70 of the next 92 people who joined were lifetime. I capped lifetime at 100 members and we had 101, one person snuck in as I was toggling it off. I then changed lifetime to annual and made it $90. The Compliance Club is not currently open, but you can get on the waitlist at notavglaw.com/compliance . The Compliance Club is also a temporary upsell on paid offers like the Contract Club. Total revenue: $20,800 • Lifetime: 101 sales • Annual: 22 sales • Monthly: ~80 sales Our launch goal was 50 monthly sales and 50 lifetime with a stretch goal of 100 lifetime sales. We surpassed those goals. Wedding MBA Debrief • 40 book sales • 35 Compliance Club lifetime memberships • ~40 Contract Club sales Current Project Plans • Wrap up Unf*ck Your Biz launch • Move into our Quiet Weeks • Run our clubs and programs to a higher level in 2025 • Doing less to do more in our business in 2025 (I'll dive into this on next week's episode) Key Performance Indicators • Bumps across the board on everything as a result of promotions • Instagram: +80 new followers • Facebook group: +50 new members • TikTok: -4 followers • Website: 40,000 unique visitors (about quadruple what we see in a normal month) • Quiz starts: 107 starts, 68 finishes • Email subscribers: Went up a bit despite higher unsubscribes due to promotion • Podcast downloads : down December Projections • Monthly Clients: $8,500 • Contract Club: $22,200 (we did $18k in sales at the end of our Contract Club promo that fell on December 1st and 2nd) • UYB: $35,625 (15 full pay, 25 on monthly payments) I think we'll be a bit below this goal of 40 students based on current data, but we will see) • Trademarks: $5,000 • Other: $2,000 Total: $70,875 YTD Revenue • On track to finish around $330k which would be very exciting considering, especially how the first half of the year went after my mom was put on hospice and passed away. If you're dealing with anything in your personal life that's going to make this holiday season or next year rough, remember that you can always circle back to your business goals and take a break for your mental health or to spend time with family. I've been there and many of us have all been there. Keep that in mind as you do your own goal planning and figure out how you're going to make it through. Business is a roller coaster and we can do our best to make it look like a kiddie roller coaster, but there are always hills and valleys and we are here to support your legal and tax goals. If you enjoyed today's episode, share it with your biz besties and tag us on Instagram and Threads @notAVGlaw…

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BONUS: You're Invited to an Open House + Unf*ck Your Biz is Now Open 11:23

13 weeks назад11:23

11:23

On this bonus episode of the podcast, I'm inviting you to my open house on December 12th and sharing all the details about how to join Unf*ck Your Biz before the doors close. If you've been wanting to get your legal and tax shit legit to start 2025 off feeling secure in your business protection, now's the time to join! The doors are now open for our signature program, Unf*ck Your Biz. Learn more at notavglaw.com/uyb Doors close on Monday, December 16th. Have legal and tax questions? Considering joining Unf*ck Your Biz but aren't sure if it's a good fit? Stop by our open house on Thursday, December 12th at 10:00am PST/1:00pm EST and we can chat, get your questions answered, and go through a run-through of the program. Sign up at notavglaw.com/openhouse To learn more about the Unf*ck Your Biz program, check out today's episode or visit the website where we cover what's included and the framework of our 10-week, high-touch group program. Get all the details at notavglaw.com/uyb The Unf*ck Your Biz Framework 1. Account - Update your books, learn how to create and analyze a profit and loss statement. 2. Tax -Learn how taxes work, what you need to pay, how to calculate your quarterly tax percentage and how to save. 3. Unf*ck - Complete any back tax strategy, fix any business entity errors, and determine worker classifications. 4. Layer - Update contracts and business insurance and obtain trademark searches. 5. Form - Learn how business entities work and form or update your LLC, S Corp or Corp. 6. Flow - Learn how to pay yourself and complete your cash flow policy. We'll go through the framework, with implementation weeks built in so you can get the unf*ckening done with the help of the course, weekly group coaching calls and a group Slack channel.…

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366 - Why You Need to Own the Role of CEO of Your Business 15:02

14 weeks назад15:02

15:02

On today's episode of the podcast we're talking about the importance of leaning into the CEO role of your business. The doors are officially open to Unf*ck Your Biz : Your step-by-step framework to get your legal and tax shit legit. The program will help you get your 2024 taxes and bookkeeping wrapped up, make sure your business entity is properly formed going into 2025, getting your legal protections in order including contracts and trademarks and more. It's our signature program that's only available a few times a year and you can join now until December 16th at notavglaw.com/uyb . To announce the launch of Unf*ck Your Biz, I hosted two workshops today to help you at your stage of business. If you missed our workshops, check them out at notavglaw.com/masterclass Legally Launched: The Absolute Legal and Tax Essentials for New Business Owners The 6 Figure Tax Blueprint: The Roadmap to Money in Your Pocket At and Beyond Six Figures When you run a business, it's important to have an understanding of everything that goes on in your business. CEO may stand for Chief Executive Officer, but I often say it also stands for Chief Everything Officer, which is very accurate as a small business owner, especially before we hire anyone. As CEO, we need to know all the core aspects of business. Would a CEO ever get handed a P&L statement from the accounting team and not know how to read it? They have to have basic knowledge because they can't make business decisions if they don't know the numbers. As CEO, it's important to consider that you're building a business as an asset that's ideally going to provide you, family members, team members, etc. a livable income. You may also decide you want to sell your business one day, even if that doesn't seem possible or of interest right now. What legal structures do you need in order for this to happen? You need layers of legal protection to protect your business. These are the foundations we grow our business on. Even if you hire other professionals to manage things bookkeeping or tax strategy, you need to know enough to have savvy conversations with them. When do you go to your lawyer and ask for a new trademark? When do you need to tell your accountant about changes to your business or your personal life that may impact your taxes? No one is keeping track of your business 24/7, you need to proactively be talking to your professionals in order for them to be able to help you. If you want to put on your CEO hat, check out Unf*ck Your Biz at notavglaw.com/uyb…

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365 - Debunking the Legal and Tax Advice You See on Social Media 33:22

15 weeks назад33:22

33:22

On today's episode of the podcast I'm talking about terrible advice I see on the internet and how to avoid it. Next Thursday, December 5th, I'm hosting two workshops - "Legally Launched" and "6-Figure Tax Blueprint," tailored to your needs as a business owner. You'll leave with the core takeaways you need to take action after the workshop. Learn more about which one is right for you and register for the workshop(s) at notavglaw.com/masterclass I'm only sharing 10 of the terrible pieces of advice I often see on the Internet, but I could have made this a multi-part episode. 1. Don't form an LLC until you hit $30,000 in revenue. - I hear lots of mythical revenue markers but there's no magic number because LLCs provide liability protection at any revenue. The more money you make, the more liability you're likely open to because you're more working with more clients which can lead to more problems. The longer you wait the more hassle it is to form an LLC. 2. Form an S Corp right away. - When you form an S Corp you are legally required to put yourself on payroll, pay yourself a reasonable recurring salary, and have profit leftover in your business which you can't do if you aren't making money when you start right away. We'll dive into this deeper on the 6-Figure Tax Blueprint workshop . 3. Just use LegalZoom. - I'm not a huge fan for many reasons including lack of added benefits. They ask you questions to fill out a form you can fill out for free yourself online. They charge you to get an EIN when you get your EIN for free on the IRS website. 4. Just do it yourself. - If you scroll through social media I frequently see people say "use LegalZoom" or "do it yourself" or "go work with a lawyer." I suggest somewhere in-between. The problem with doing it yourself is we've seen clients who did it incorrectly. Once you file, you need to maintain your LLC compliance requirements including back franchise taxes. I believe in a well-rounded approach of doing it yourself, with guidance which is why I started creating courses. 5. You don't need trademarks. - This is kind of like telling someone you don't need health insurance. You hope you'll never need to enforce it, but if you need to use it and don't have it, it's a problem. 6. Trademark everything. - It depends on who you are as a business owner and what you're launching. 7. Don't trust templates. - The person who writes the contract template understands your industry, your business, and these templates are typically based on contracts they've custom written for clients. 8. You don't need to do that. - This can refer to a lot of things, but I see it often with things like BOI (Beneficial Information Ownership reports), testimonial requirements, website compliance, etc. Too often people think these laws are for big corporations like Amazon or Target and not small businesses like us, but we see it happen to small businesses all the time. 9. Just write it off. - Not everything is a tax deduction! You need to be using it for business. And writing it off doesn't make it free. Focus on buying things that have a high ROI. 10. You can pay $0 in taxes. - Not every strategy is helpful, even if it's not fraudulent. You may end up owing more in the long run and all tips don't apply to all businesses. Register for our December 5th workshop(s) at notavglaw.com/masterclass…

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BONUS - Why the Contract Club Price is Going Up 21:46

15 weeks назад21:46

21:46

On today's bonus episode I'm sharing the why behind our decision to raise the price of the Contract Club, how you can get it before the price goes up, and, of course, I tell you all the revenue and profit numbers that went into this decision. Join the Club: www.notavglaw.com/club (Price goes up Tuesday, December 3rd) History of the Club - Launched January 2022, originally called the Contract Vault. Prior to this I had a Contract Template Shop that wasn't very profitable and frankly, a pain in the ass. - Did almost 1,000 sales in the first year - 2023: Started our affiliate program - 2023: Sold more passively and did about half as many sales as we did in 2022. $17,280 in revenue, averaging 48 sales/month (Compared to 80/month average for 2022) - End of 2023: Released our Contract Bot, a $70 upsell to the Contract Club that generates your contract for you from our templates - May 2024: Offered 100% affiliate commissions on Contract Club sales (meant we were losing money on processing fees). We had 248 sales and 30 Contract Bot sales. - June: Contract Club price went up to $50, Contract Bot price went down to $50. - June - early November 2024: Contract Club brought in $10,300, averaging 37 sales/month. Bot conversions went up from 10% to nearly 30% Our 2024 projected Contract Club revenue (assuming we have ~200 Contract Club sales this month as part of our pre-price increase promotion plus 60 bot sales): $41,520 Year-to-Year Sales Breakdown: 2022: 964 sales, $28,940 revenue 2023: 576 sales, $17,280 2024: 741 sales, $41,520 Why Increase the Price? I'm frequently asked why the price is so low (a flat $50 for all the contract templates you need) and the answer is because up until now we've been treating the Contract Club primarily as a lead generator. It brings us in the majority of our leads who bring us in additional revenue from higher ticket offers. I didn't get a lot of drop-off from the $30 to $50 so I figured we could up it some more since sometimes people tell us they didn't buy it because it was so low and it seemed too good to be true. I got this idea from the Kajabi conference this year and the message hit me at the right time. The message I took away this year was "make the main thing the main thing and do less in business." It really resonated and to me, "less" means just really focusing on the things that are already working. The price is going to become $200. I can justify a higher level of service to the Contract Club members, running more ads, divide our attention across less projects, and elsewhere, many people sell one singular contract template for $200 or more and you can get all your templates from us for $200 ($50 through December 3rd). Love the Contract Club? Become an affiliate and get paid to refer the club at www.notavglaw.com/affiliate…

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364 - The Finance Formula You Need 29:34

16 weeks назад29:34

29:34

On today's episode of the podcast I'm sharing my finance formula and how to make it work for your personal financial plans. The Finance Formula is a bonus resource included in our Unf*ck Your Biz alumni membership. I am a very big advocate of people fixing their business before they dive too deep into personal finances so even if you're not a Finance Formula member, you can still learn a lot from this episode on how to implement this to improve your personal finances. It's hard to strategize how much money to put away for emergency savings or retirement if you don't know how much you're actually making. We need to know our income, revenue, business expenses, profit, tax rate and how much we should be putting away to pay the IRS quarterly. If your business is not really fucked up and you don't think you need this, I would challenge you on that because there probably are some things we need to fix. To get the most out of the Finance Formula, we need to start with our money mindset - Ask yourself questions like "What are some of your beliefs about money?" - Read a money mindset book or two (I recommend Denise Duffield Thomas) - Get as little or as much woo-woo as you want with it Learn the bare bones basics about retirement and get up-to-date on retirement plans. 1. Take advantage of 401k match if it is available to you or your spouse through an employment role 2. Max out a Roth IRA 3. Max out 401k if you have one 4. Look into self-employed retirement options Tackle debt - I have a lot of feelings on Dave Ramsey, but his most popular teaching is his debt snowball method to help you pay off your debts from smallest to largest by making minimum payments on all your accounts. - What Dave Ramsey is missing is nuance, customization to our own individual needs, and that's where the Finance Formula comes in. The best way to look at this is with a hypothetical. Let's say you have four goals: - Build an emergency fund of $3,000 - Pay your quarterly business taxes - Start a retirement account - Pay down, let's say, $3,000 in consumer debt What order do you prioritize them? How would this change if your consumer debt was a lot higher, like $50,000? There's not really a right and a wrong answer, it's personal for everyone based on so many factors like how old you are, how long you have until you want to retire, what your income looks like, etc. It's important to get the wheels turning so we can focus on our own individual goals. For more personalized examples of what your Finance Formula might look like, check out today's episode.…

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363 - Stevie Dee Photography Interview 41:25

17 weeks назад41:25

41:25

On today's episode of the podcast I talk with Stevie Dee about the AB5 law, its impact on her business, and how it effects all of us. Get in Touch with Our Guest Stevie Dee Photography Check out their website www.steviedeephotography.com

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362 - October Profit Report 27:29

18 weeks назад27:29

27:29

On today's episode of the podcast I'm taking you through my October revenue, expenses, profit and goals. I'm using my downloadable guide, How To Conduct a Profit Report for Your Business, to record this episode. Get your free copy of How to Conduct a Profit Report for Your Business at www.notavglaw.com/355 and listen to episode 355 to hear me break down step-by-step how I structure my own profit reports. October Projections vs. Actual • Monthly Clients: $9,250 → $10,220 • UYB: $750 → $1,625 • Contract Club: $1,200 → $3,300 • 1:1 Services: $2,500 → $5,050 • Other: $4,000 → $2,100 Total revenue: $17,500 → $23,735 Profit Total revenue: $23,735 Cost of Goods: $65 (printing my books) Expenses: $25,245 Profit: - $1,500 Owner's salary: $5,300 Total profit: -$6,800 While this is not great, I was prepared for the expenses to be high. I went to the Kajabi conference in Los Angeles and the hotel alone was $1,600. I booked hotel rooms for Wedding MBA and I had a team member forget to clock out so I paid them double as much (not a big deal, that will get remedied next pay period). Notable Expenses • Employee wages: ~$9,000 • Contractors: $4,500 This brings my team expenses to $13,000 • Affiliate payments: $4,000 (This was high because w e paid out some lagging affiliate payments) • Marketing: Higher than average due to conference planning Annual Goal Review • Annual revenue: $300k. We're roughly on target but need to have a pretty big November and December • Profit: 20% margins. I used to have a goal of 50% but I'm spending a lot more now on team expenses. Current Project Plans • Alumni membership launch for Unf*ck Your Biz students • Wedding MBA • Contract Club price increase promotion • Contract Club affiliate promotion - Become an affiliate at notavglaw.com/affiliate • Big December Unf*ck Your Biz launch • Launch the Compliance Club (aka the Not AVG Newsletter) - Learn more at notavglaw.com/compliance Key Performance Indicators • On our social platforms we had about double the amount of followers we normally get due to meeting people at events. • Higher completion conversion of our quiz November Projections • Monthly Clients: $8,500 • Compliance Club: $13,000 (100 members between monthly and life time) • UYB: $0 (payment plans will be wrapped up) • Contract Club: $7,500 (150 joining before the price increase) - This should shift to December because if Black Friday is the 29th, this won't hit our bank account until December. • 1:1 Services: $2,500 • Other: $2,500 Total revenue: $33,500 YTD Revenue • Exceeded October revenue goal by almost $7,000 • Exceeded October 2023 revenue by almost $4,000 • Annual goal of $300k revenue looks possible if we have a strong promo for the Compliance Club, but that we could at least pass last year's revenue of $270k Get your free copy of How to Conduct a Profit Report for Your Business at www.notavglaw.com/355 and listen to episode 355 to hear me break down step-by-step how I structure my own profit reports. If you If you enjoyed today's episode, share it with your biz besties and tag us on Instagram and Threads @notAVGlaw…

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361 - 2024 Compliance Update 15:56

19 weeks назад15:56

15:56

On today's episode of the podcast we're giving you an update on what compliance tasks are new in 2024 that you are required to complete as a business owner. Get your website compliance resources when you join the Compliance Club at notavglaw.com/compliance As a small business owner, we have lots and lots of obligations that we have to meet in order to stay compliant in our business. We call this our foundational layer of protection to keep our businesses legally legit and out of trouble. It's the most important thing and compliance basically just means complying with laws and obligations that we have. Keeping up with everything can seem like an impossible tasks as a small business owner, especially if you're a solopreneur. That's really why we're rolling out the newsletter so that we can set up alerts on all of the legal platforms that we're involved with. In this episode, we're going to do a little bit of a recap on some of the things that have updated this year and some of the things that you could expect that we would talk about in the newsletter once you become a member. 2024 compliance examples that we break down on today's podcast episode include: 1. Beneficial Ownership Information Report, or BOI 2. Unrealistic promises about AI powered services 3. Fake and unrealistic testimonials 4. Digital accessibility Check out today's episode and stay up-to-date on your legal compliance tasks by joining the Compliance Club at notavglaw.com/compliance…

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360 - What You Need to Know When Hiring Contractors 30:41

20 weeks назад30:41

30:41

On today's episode of the podcast I'm sharing what you need to know when it comes to hiring contractors. Get on the waitlist for our newsletter and contractor compliance resources at notavglaw.com/newsletter 1. Contractor vs. Employee You've heard me talk about legal layers of protection, and the base level is compliance aka not breaking the law like paying your taxes and not misclassifying your workers. The state cares about worker classification because they get payroll taxes. The state is also responsible for enforcing minimum wage requirements, worker's compensation, overtime, etc. The state is invested in protecting the people that work in the state. The IRS cares because you should be paying payroll taxes for employees. If you're misclassifying, they aren't getting their taxes and it's easier for them to get taxes from employees than tracking down contractors. The worker cares because if you're a contractor, your place of work and time/ hours of work can't be dictated if it's not within reason. This is also a problem when workers who don't have businesses and don't want to have businesses don't know about quarterly tax withholding and get stuck with tax penalties at the end of the year. 2. Determining employee vs. contractor All states use different tests, but generally the tests fall into one of two categories: the totality of the circumstances test and the ABC test. With the totality test the burden of proof is usually on the worker, and with the ABC test it's on the business to prove the worker could have been a contractor. If you feel like you are in a more relaxed state when it comes to this, know that there are also federal laws around employees vs. contractors to look into. Inside the newsletter you'll find our Contractor On-boarding Toolkit that includes our State-by-State Classification Guide and our California Contractor Compliance Framework Guide. Sign up for the newsletter at notavglaw.com/newsletter 3. What type of contractor are they? If they can be a contractor, before we onboard we need to know what kind of contractor they can be. Generally speaking, we can divide contractors into two main buckets: people who are working in our business (this is not typically common as they would often be employees but there are state-by-state exceptions) and people who are project-based contractors. It can come down to who is leading the conversation. For example, if I'm onboarding a contractor and they don't have a business or a contract, I'm sending the contract and leading the conversation. If they have a business, for example a brand photographer, they have their own contract and invoice process. If you're onboarding, you'll need a process (again, be very careful about those classification tests and how control and direction plays a part in that). You should always have a contract (we've got them in the Contract Club notavglaw.com/club ) and there should be a contract per worker per event/project. For example, if they're a second shooter you'd need a contract per event with them. You'll also want a copy of their business license because some states have business to business carve outs and this will help prove if they're a business. We also recommend getting a W-9 before you ever pay them. 4. What goes into the contract? There are some basics, like a work made for hire agreement which ensures that you get copyright ownership for your business. There's also a provision that the worker understands they're not an employee, though this doesn't absolve you from any audit liability. Outline payment terms. 5. Training This is difficult to talk about in regards to contractors because one of the factors is we are not training people or dictating what they do because they should be equipped with the skills to do what you're hiring them to do, otherwise they should be an employee. I would consider this more of an orientation to a training so you're orienting them to your business and language. You're not training them how to do their job.…

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359 - Why You Need to Get Off the Carousel of Chaos 21:49

21 weeks назад21:49

21:49

On today's episode of the podcast I'm explaining the Chaos Carousel, why you don't want to ride it, and how you can get yourself off of it. It's no secret I love branding and cute names. You're all my business besties, my team is Team Besties, I teach about the "WTF happened to my money hamster wheel?" and identifying where our money is going when we make more revenue, the "oh shit cycle" of back taxes which is what happens when we don't keep up with our quarterly taxes and now we are introducing what I call the "chaos carousel of contradictory advice." The Chaos Carousel happens in all avenues to all of us. Stage 1: Not knowing what we don't know. Stage 2: Knowing what we don't know. Stage 3: Basic understanding. Stage 4: You're fully competent and can do it An example of this is BOI reports (check out episode 337 for all the details). This year, business owners when from not knowing what it is to knowing it exists and not quite understanding it to then getting a basic understanding. Getting to Step 3 can be a mixed bag because it starts with Googling and Googling has all kinds of results and how do you know who to trust? So then you think you might hire someone to help and people give you different answers and you're spinning round and around trying to find a clear answer. Getting contradictory advice from professionals happens for two main reasons: 1. They only see one side of your business 2. They only know what their main niche expertise is. They aren't viewing it from all angles. Sometimes, for example, what's good from a legal perspective isn't good from a tax perspective. Contradictory advice doesn't always mean one person is wrong. It's up to you to reconcile this and determine what is most correct for you. And what is most correct for you now may not be most correct for you later. A big example is forming an LLC. Even lawyers will vary on the answer. Some will tell you don't start a business until you form an LLC because it's your biggest barrier of protection. Some tax pros will tell you not to form an LLC until you make $30,000 or another arbitrary amount. They say this because LLCs don't have tax benefits so you might as well wait until you can become an S Corp, which makes sense from a tax perspective, but not a legal perspective because your business isn't protected. Same with bookkeeping and the conversation around QuickBooks or spreadsheet trackers and when it's the right time to move to a software. Same with contract templates. The reality of those is that ant lawyer you hire that's been in business for awhile is going to have all their client contract templates. They may not sell templates, but if you hire them to write a contract for you, the first thing they're going to do is duplicate and edit a contract from a similar contract scenario. And then some lawyers will take these and templatize them. Templates can also be extremely helpful to new businesses. For example, if you're a new wedding venue and you hire someone to draft you a custom contract but they haven't worked with a wedding venue before, you'll both be trying to predict potential issues that might happen to cover in the contract meanwhile a template has already addressed all the concerns from multiple wedding venues and worked with that lawyer. (You can get all our contract templates in the Contract Club for just $50 at notavglaw.com/club ) I also see contradictory information about trademarks which drives me bananas. Why are business coaches giving trademark advice? That's something you want from a lawyer. The key takeaway is you want to know the legal and tax basics. My goal is for everyone to get to Step 3 so they have an understanding and know, when you go to hire someone you have the power of knowing if they're the right person to hire who understand what you're looking for. The chaos carousel is something that is going to exist in all aspects of life, but we, within our control, can hop off of it and stop the spinning by taking the time to educate ourselves and having the knowledge we need to have. If you want to get a baseline of knowledge, check out our book at unfuckyourbizbook.com and if you missed last week's episode, we offered a free chapter of the book which you can grab at notavglaw.com/358…

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358 - Being in business requires you to be in the business of being a grown-up 17:00

22 weeks назад17:00

17:00

On today's episode of the podcast I'm talking about how running a business is a lot like putting on our grown-up pants. It's a difficult, but necessary topic to address. If we're going to reach our goals, both business and personal, that require us to do things we don't want to do. Grab the Quarterly Tax chapter for free from my book, Unf*ck Your Biz at notavglaw.com/358 Quarterly taxes are a prime example of things we need to learn and have to pay, even if we don't want to. We find in working with clients that even if you are hiring us to unf*ck your biz, there are parts of your business you still need to be doing and keeping track of, whether or not you hire someone to help. While there's no rules out there on how to be a grown up, there are rules on how to run a business. Businesses require paperwork. No matter how many people you hire, most of the mail is still going to be ending up in your inbox, meaning you need to know how to handle it - what is your responsibility and what needs to get passed on to the professionals you're hiring? If you can't afford to hire professionals yet, you need to know how to handle it. You also need to know what professionals are going to be able to handle for you and what they aren't. For example, we had a student come to us who owed four years of back franchise taxes. They had filed on LegalZoom who isn't the best about keeping people up to date on compliance requirements. Same with filing LLCs in different states if you moved. Even if you hire someone to do this for you, no one will know you've moved unless you've proactively told them. No one is going to care more about your business than you do. How can taking ownership over the thing you don't want to do positively impact your business and mindset? If you take ownership over your business from a legal perspective, it's going to help you know when to file the forms related to your LLC and avoid potential legal pitfalls. If you ever have legal issues, you or your business are going to be the ones to get sued. It sounds like a harsh statement but if you or someone who works for you makes a mistake, you'll be the one to get sued, not your lawyer or whoever you relied on to file for you. Same if you have intellectual property issues. Ignorance of someone's business name or ignorance about a law is never a defense so you need to be proactive. From a financial perspective, similar to the whole if you get sued thing, when it comes to your tax return, the ONLY person for your tax return, tax bill, penalties, fees, etc. is you. You're the only one because you signed the tax return. At a minimum, you need to know what your tax obligations are, how you owe tax, how their business income is calculated and how to read a basic tax return. You need to at least be able to skim it and know if it makes sense or not. When it comes to hiring someone, you're the person responsible for handing over all the financial documents. We have this issues over and over again. We can't do your bookkeeping if you don't give us your bank statements. We can't read your statements if they're co-mingled between personal and business expenses. We also need to put our grown-up pants on when it comes to knowing your numbers. You're the one who is making key decisions, like when to invest, when to save, when to do a new launch, when to hire, get a business loan, etc. These are all numbers-driven decisions. You should be able to look at your financial statements, know how much cash you have in the bank, how much revenue you have coming in, when your next big expenses are, etc. to decipher what you need to be doing in your business. Even if you have someone crunching the numbers for you, it's your responsibility to review those numbers. If you haven't launched your business yet, ask yourself if you want to do these things or if a hobby would be a better alternative. I know these sounds scary, but I would not trade the freedom by business provides me for not having to do these things any day. Put on your grown-up pants and download the Quarterly Tax chapter from my book, Unf*ck Your Biz at notavglaw.com/358…

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357 - September Profit Report 18:22

23 weeks назад18:22

18:22

On today's episode of the podcast I'm taking you through my September revenue, expenses, profit and goals. I'm using my downloadable guide, How To Conduct a Profit Report for Your Business, to record this episode. Get your free copy of How to Conduct a Profit Report for Your Business at www.notavglaw.com/355 and listen to episode 355 to hear me break down step-by-step how I structure my own profit reports. September Projections vs. Actual • Monthly Clients: $7,000 → $8,050 • UYB: $20,000 → $4,375 (I pivoted our post-summit launch from a signature service to group coaching based on the attendees of the summit) • Contract Club: $1,500 → $1,660 • 1:1 Services: $1,250 → $2,250 • Other: $1,250 → $4,900 Total revenue: $31,000 → $24,000 Profit Total revenue: $24,000 Expenses: $13,500 Profit: $10,200 Owner's salary: $1,000 (I only paid myself $1,000 last month, $800 of that goes to taxes but the reason for this was because we were quite in the hole from previous summer months) Total profit: $9,000 Annual Goal Review • Annual revenue: $300k. This might be a stretch, because we'd need to exceed October, November and December's projections - Profit: 20% margins. I used to have a goal of 50% but I'm spending a lot more now on team expenses. Expenses • Employee wages: $7,500 • Contractors: $4,000 This brings my team expenses to $11,500 (I expect this to be much lower in October) • Monthly tools: $335 • Marketing: $781 (I lowered my Facebook ad spend from $20/day to $5/day because they were not converting how I wanted. • Client fees: $500 (a variable expense for trademark clients. We include the filing fee in the price we charge the client) • Other: $290 Total: ~$13,000 Current Project Plans • Deliver Unf*ck Your Biz group coaching • Wedding MBA Prep • Launch of low-ticket offer • Big launch in December for Unf*ck Your Biz Key Performance Indicators Instagram: 30 new followers Facebook group: 70 new members TikTok: 9 new followers Threads 70 new followers Website traffic: 30,000 (a huge spike) October Projections • Monthly Clients: $9,000 • UYB: $750 (no new students as doors are closed, but we do have some students on payment plans) • Contract Club: $1,250 • 1:1 Services: $2,500 • Other: $4,000 Total revenue: $17,500 (need to do closer to $20,000 to match last year's October but ideally we want to do $25,000 as our best goal) If you liked today's episode, be sure to tag us on Instagram and Threads @notAVGlaw…

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356 - Where is your money going? with Keila Hill-Trawick 54:05

24 weeks назад54:05