Hey Friend!

Today we are going to talk money! I’m going to lift the curtain on how I created a half-a-million-dollar company by getting into the numbers. I’m giving you all my tips on how to make sales, handle your expenses, when and how to take a salary, and some bonus tips to get you started!  I’ll show you what it took to build to this level so you can see how possible it is for you!

* This post contains affiliate links. This means that I get a percentage of sales at no additional cost to you.

Let’s Talk Money – How to Make Sales for a Half-Million-Dollar Company

You first need sales to make money! When making sales capitalize on your organic market first. This means starting with selling from your podcast and then moving on to selling through emails and your Facebook groups. 

I pitch right from the podcast. Podcast pitching is something I teach inside Podcast to Profit. The other place I sell is inside my captured leads which are my emails and Facebook groups. When we sell to captured leads we casually mention evergreen content and do urgency offers a few times a year. Urgency offers are a reason you give your customers to buy now by giving them a coupon or a bonus.

Once you are successful in those areas you can start selling to cold traffic. Cold traffic comes from Facebook ads or Pinterest. We use evergreen webinars to sell here. I do not think this is a strategy anyone should use until their business is over that 100K-200K revenue mark. Marketing takes a team and you need enough profit to cover that expense.

Let’s talk money – expenses for a half-million-dollar company

Let’s look at business expenses. If you are starting out you want to consider where your finances are at. If you are making $1,000-$2,000 a month you might only have the overhead to cover items such as Teachable, for course creation, and a website fee. 

Here is how you can structure expenses for a half-million-dollar company:

Taxes – 35% You have to consider this because it is such a huge amount as you grow your business.

Tithe – 10% This is completely up to you and God but we tithe off our top-line revenue.

Labor – 25%

Marketing – 8%

Other – 4% Purchases such as software.

Distribution – 18%, Profit/money that is redistributed or invested back in the company.

As you grow you can add more expense line items to your budget like marketing and increase the percentage of income that goes into labor. You can even start taking a salary!

Let’s talk money – when to take a salary

To know when you can take a salary and maybe even hire an employee you need to know your numbers. To grow a half-million dollar company you have to know what that number is for you to sustain expenses, taxes, and tithe comfortably. After that, how much money is left? 

You have to ask yourself how much you want to keep in the business accounts to cover cash flow and then you can decide what you want to pay yourself. This is not an easy answer I can give you. I like to leave a nice cash flow buffer in the business if I have a bad sales month. Talk to your CPA, they are life-changing.

Bonus tips for building a half-million-dollar company

• The best thing you can do is just start!
• When you launch a course and it fails, feel the sting but then put the emotions away and look at the data to revamp and try again. Don’t give up.
• Don’t try to make money from affiliates or sponsors. Use your podcast for marketing your own products. (My affiliate income is 1%)
• Don’t leave your job until you have been profitable for three months or more in your online business. Start by going part-time and scale down.
• Start with contractors before you bring on any employees. 
• My biggest regret in building my half-million dollar company is not sitting in the stillness long enough to get God’s divine direction to do it right the first time

Growing my half-million-dollar company took a lot of work but I did it in four years through podcasting and online courses. The best thing you can do is start! If you feel completely lost watch my Clarify Your Calling workshop to uncover your God-given calling. If you have already started and want to monetize your podcast come check out Podcast for Profit.  Remember, God can do whatever God wants to do with whatever your situation is.

I pray this blesses you!

Xo,

Stef

P.S. Also, listen to podcast episode 534 for the full training on Behind The Business – MONEY & PROFIT – How We’ve Grown Into a Half a Million Dollar Company. Let’s Talk Money!

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